Between the 1930s and 1950s, Clement Greenberg abandoned a Marxist stance and advocated capitalism predominant in the United States. His articles Avant-Garde and Kitsch in 1939 and The Plight of Our Culture in 1953 (especially Section I, II, and III) show how Greenberg changed his attitude toward capitalism from pessimism to optimism. This transition is especially evident with regard to industrialism, class distinction, and the United States. Greenberg’s change was not accidental; it was provoked by a rapid rise of American capitalism, an oppressive Cold War atmosphere, and national projects promoting American art.
To begin with, Greenberg used to be critical to capitalistic industrialism in the 1930s. In Avant-Garde and Kitsch, he points out that kitsch, a product of the industrial revolution, was invented as a commodity to satisfy the urban masses who demanded new culture for their consumption. However, kitsch is characterized as “the debased and academicized simulacra of genuine culture” (Greenberg, 10). It is fake and mechanical art that takes advantage of mature art to pursue its commercial interests. Greenberg explains that, with its enormous profits, kitsch seduces avant-garde artists to water down their works and generates puzzling borderlines between high and low arts, which is detrimental to true culture. Therefore, noticing the negativity of kitsch, Greenberg was skeptical of capitalist industrialism.
In The Plight of Our Culture fourteen years later, however, Greenberg’s criticism of industrialism softens. Even though he acknowledges a general decline in culture, Greenberg clarifies that not “all the arts, all areas of taste, all departments of learning, or manners on all social levels” (Greenberg, 128) regress. He points out that cuisine, fashion, décor, and architecture have advanced, and most people in the industrial countries are more affluent and sophisticated than before. The “compensation” (Greenberg, 128) that industrialism offers has elevated the standard of living and taste of the majority. Furthermore, Greenberg highlights that industrialism is the most radical and comprehensible force to civilization. Therefore, even if the present culture deteriorates, he believes industrialism will make a great difference and present a future with new schemes and possibilities. Here, Greenberg’s tone regarding industrialism is opposite to the one in Avant-Garde and Kitsch. He considers industrialism not as a cultural threat but as a potential for progress.
A similar transition also can be found in Greenberg’s argument on the class distinction. In Avant-Garde and Kitsch, he claims that avant-garde and kitsch serve as two cultural termini. Their vast distance corresponds to a social interval in which the minority of the powerful leads formal culture and the mass of the poor produces folk art and kitsch. However, as the middle class explodes due to postwar capitalism, Greenberg revises his dichotomous division and turns attention to the gray area. In The Plight of Our Culture, he states that there are three levels in urban, industrial, western culture – highbrow, middlebrow, and lowbrow – and the gap between highbrow (avant-garde) and lowbrow (kitsch) is covered by infinite shadings of middlebrow. Greenberg also points out that this new cultural stratification does not coincide with a social interval. Although the upper class holds the most authority, the greatest economic power is given to the bottom and the greatest social support to the middle.
Above all, Greenberg witnesses that the middle class “armed with their new wealth, their optimism, and their political power” (Greenberg, 136) spreads its culture faster than the lower class does. Moreover, unlike the lower class, the middle class expects more than entertainment because it possesses a strong desire to ascend social and cultural hierarchies. This idea of moving up to the upper level by consuming higher culture corresponds to Thorstein Veblen’s theory of conspicuous consumption. He notes, “the norm of reputability imposed by the upper class extends its coercive influence with but slight hindrance down through the social structure to the lowest strata. The result is that the members of each stratum accept as their ideal of decency the scheme of life in vogue in the next higher stratum, and bend their energies to live up to that ideal” (Veblen, 40). Following Veblen’s argument, Greenberg believes that the middle class which gains economic power from capitalism and holds the urge to elevate its social status has the potential to reach highbrow culture. This prospect was not visible in the lower class in Avant-Garde and Kitsch.
Greenberg’s hope in the middle class strengthens as he compares totalitarian and capitalist countries. In Avant-Garde and Kitsch, Greenberg notes that totalitarian regimes cannot raise the cultural level of the majority. Therefore, they flatter the mass by bringing culture down to their standards. In this situation, kitsch serves as an efficient tool to deliver propaganda and attract people. However, in The Plight of Our Culture, Greenberg expresses that the majority in the United States, a capitalist nation, has an ability to elevate its aesthetic. He acknowledges that the middle class demands “compromise[d]” (Greenberg, 136) high culture because it lacks humility and patience to appreciate genuine art. Nevertheless, he emphasizes that not every middlebrow is prosaic. First, the middlebrow has saved “the traditional facilities of culture” (Greenberg, 137) such as prints, concerts, lectures, and museums from the depravity which movies, radios, and televisions have suffered under the lowbrow. Second, certain “enlightenment” (Greenberg, 137) starts to spread by the middlebrow which allows the public to take cultural responsibility and censor philistine impulses. Third, thanks to industrial prosperity, the middle class is able to pursue exclusive preferences of the upper minority. Unlike the mass in totalitarian regimes, the middle class in capitalist states has power to develop its taste.
In short, with regard to the class distinction, Greenberg in Avant-Garde and Kitsch divides the cultural and social classes into two categories. He believes that the majority, especially the lower class, cannot elevate its aesthetic standards. However, as the golden age of capitalism arrives after the war, Greenberg in The Plight of Our Culture includes the middle class in the stratification and emphasizes its potential to uplift culture. He even hopes that someday the middlebrow would transcend itself and rise to a level of high culture. This scenario can be realized only in capitalist countries such as the United States.
Lastly, by observing the triumph of capitalism, Greenberg changes his attitude on the United States. At first, in Avant-Garde and Kitsch, he reveals the sarcastic perspective on American culture. He points out that, “in country like ours” (Greenberg, 11), traps of kitsch are laid in the preserves of genuine culture. He brings The New Yorker as an example of high-class kitsch that converts avant-garde materials for its own use. In addition, Greenberg cynically says that Repin, a Russian kitsch painter, was lucky because the audiences did not encounter the products of American capitalism, “for he would not stand a chance next to a Saturday Evening Post cover by Norman Rockwell” (Greenberg, 14). Here, Greenberg clearly exposes his sneering view of American culture.
In The Plight of Our Culture, however, Greenberg switches his position. He underscores that, “chiefly in this country” (Greenberg, 134), the middlebrow has acquired a positive identity and developed a solid force. He writes, “the new urban middle classes in America will consolidate and increase their present social and material advantages and, in the process, achieve enough cultivation to support, spontaneously, a much higher level of culture than now” (Greenberg, 140). The United States, the epitome of capitalism and industrialism that produce the cultural boom through the middle class, is no longer an object of criticism to Greenberg. He expects that America can overcome kitsch and pursue higher culture.
Ultimately, Greenberg’s pessimistic attitude toward capitalism turns into optimistic expectation. Even though passivity, commercialization, and decadence are prevalent in Western civilization, he believes industrialism, the middle class, and the United States will serve as a new force, new protagonist, and new country to lead culture. This transition can be understood as Greenberg’s reaction to political turbulence “contrary to Greenberg’s initial scenario” (Storr, 6). It is especially influenced by the unexpected thriving of the United States, ideological censorship during the Cold War, and the government’s schemes of propagating American art.
Before delving into the postwar era, it is important to look back on the 1930s. During this period, left-wing artists in New York formed collective movements against Western bourgeois traditions. Based on Marxism, they attempted to create “a radical change in artists’ self-concepts and in the work they produced” (Schapiro & Schapiro, 176). Notable examples of these movements are the John Reed Clubs, the American Artists Congress, and the Partisan Reviewwhich published Avant-Garde and Kitsch.
However, confronting the misdirection of the Popular Front and the purge of Stalin, the intellectuals lost their faith in communism. Nevertheless, they tried to reassert a theoretical purity of Marxism by identifying with Trotskyism (Orton & Pollock, 309). Greenberg also followed this flow. His argument that avant-garde with its pure quality should lead culture in the decadent society was developed from Trotsky’s philosophy. Trotsky noted, “Artistic creation has its law – even when it consciously serves a social movement… Art can become a strong ally of revolution only insofar as it remains faithful to itself” (Trotsky, 114). He considered art as a force for human advances because it contributes progressive ideas and new perspectives to the world. Therefore, Trotsky emphasized that art can fulfill its function by liberating from social constraints and pursuing its trajectory (Orton & Pollock, 312). Introducing avant-garde as a cultural momentum free from secular barriers, Greenberg inherited Trotsky’s ideology.
Nonetheless, the German-Soviet alliance and the invasion of Finland by Russia in 1939 eradicated the remaining hope of communism. Realizing the importance of distancing themselves from communism, American intelligentsia started to organize nonpolitical associations such as the Federation of American Painters and Sculptors. Meanwhile, the United States emerged as a victorious, powerful, and affluent country from the war. It discarded isolationism and adopted the internationalization of American hegemony and culture. Furthermore, the middle class arose as a new authority and secured its privileges through the economic boom. This rise of optimism eventually faded the urgency of revolution and silenced the anti-capitalist criticism (Guilbaut, 201).
In this circumstance, American left-wing artists encountered difficulties in identifying themselves. As Max Kozloff notes, “they knew what they had to reject in terms of past idioms and mentality. At the same time, they were aware that achievement depended on a new and pervasive creative principle” (Kozloff, 109). The pressure intensified as the Cold War rhetoric expanded and McCarthyism appeared. Liberal personalities were removed by the “promiscuous campaign to root out the cancer of supposed disloyalty” (Kozloff, 114). Also, in the 1950s, there was a dearth of published materials critical to abstract expressionism which represented American hegemony. As David and Cecile Schapiro point out, the 1950s was a decade of conformity. “Americans do appear to have been passive, indeed supine, during the internal battles of the cold war” (Schapiro & Schapiro, 204).
Greenberg did not anticipate these political transitions. Far from his scenario of debasement and revolution, the United States stood out as the most dominant country in the world (Storr, 6). Simultaneously, as the power struggle between the United States and the Soviet Union heightened, it became more uncomfortable to assert anti-capitalist statements in the public sphere. Therefore, it would have been challenging for Greenberg to maintain his Marxist stance.
Furthermore, regardless of his will, Greenberg’s appraisals on American art were amplified by the government projects. Based on Trotskyism, Greenberg underscored that avant-garde should protect genuine art from vulgarization and lead culture by detaching itself from common experiences. Abstract expressionism realized his ideal. Greenberg praised the vitality, virility, and brutality of abstract expressionism as direct and uncorrupted communication. Most of all, rather than compromising with political and social subject matters, abstract expressionists demonstrated their own artistic freedom and experimentation. As a result, individuality became the central element of abstract expressionism (Guilbaut, 203-207). It was the perfect contrast to the rigid, traditional, and limited culture of social realism. Moreover, the bold actions of abstract expressionists were an antithesis to the uniformity of totalitarian regimes. Therefore, by eliminating recognizable subject matter and giving their paintings an individualistic emphasis, abstract expressionists not only commenced a new art movement but also delivered powerful, innovative, and liberal images fit for American hegemony (Cockcroft, 132).
Noticing that the ideology of abstract expressionism aligned with postwar liberalism, the United States actively exploited it as a weapon in the battle of the Cold War. David and Cecile Schapiro accurately deliver the voice of the government, “We wanted our art-as-propaganda to show that we were a rich and free country that promoted pure research… We would prove by our boldness in pursuing advanced art, by our encouragement of the experimental for its sake, that we were no longer the cultural backwater that Europeans and the Russian might term us” (Schapiro & Schapiro, 206). Freedom was the symbol most passionately promoted by liberalism during the Cold War. Therefore, abstract expressionism characterized by its unconventionality, individualism, and nonpolitical manner was a perfect tool for the United States government to propagate American ideology and culture throughout the world.
This political project was conducted by the most influential figures in museum administration and foreign policy. For example, established and sponsored by the Rockefellers, the Museum of Modern Art was automatically involved in the Cold War tactics as Nelson Rockefeller participated in politics. Its international programs were organized to woo Europeans and the world by exhibiting progressive qualities of American abstract expressionism. MoMA also served its role of international representation for the United States at the Venice Biennale from 1954 to 1962. In addition, the CIA cooperated with MoMA to provide well-funded and persuasive arguments on the benefits of life and art under capitalism (Cockcroft, 126-129).
To sum up, Greenberg’s argument on the divorce between art and politics was achieved by abstract expressionism. However, its vivacity, individuality, and freedom also coincided with the liberal narratives during the Cold War. Paradoxically, abstract expressionism praised by Greenberg for its nonpolitical aspect spread into the global political sphere. Serge Guilbaut articulates, “The access to modernism that Greenberg had theoretically achieved elevated the art of the avant-garde to a position of international importance, but in so doing integrated it into the imperialist machine” (Guilbaut, 207). Whether it was intentional or not, Greenberg became entangled in the political narratives of the United States. Thus, it would have been difficult for him to continue his Marxist stance.
This analysis of Greenberg’s philosophy, transition, and political background offers a critical perspective to evaluate American paintings between the 1930s and the 1950s. For example, Man in a Whirl by Elaine de Kooning can be interpreted through the lenses of Greenberg and the Cold War. First, in contrast to the title, there is no recognizable human figure in the picture. Only a small window-like square is noticeable. Brushstrokes are bold, thick, and full of vibrant colors. The painting indeed resembles the works of her husband and the renowned artist, Willem de Kooning. The picture does not illustrate the political or social subject matter, but through nonrepresentational brushstrokes and colors, it delivers abstract sense, emotion, and idea. Man in a Whirl corresponds to Greenberg’s expectation of avant-garde.
Second, there is a slanted green square frame in the picture. Various colors are floating and colliding inside the frame. This oblique position seems as if the frame is pushed and moved by the dynamics of colors. In doing so, it highlights the liveliness and fluidity of colors. By this sense of movement, a viewer can feel the motion of a whirl even without a recognizable figure. Under the Cold War rhetoric, this composition can be interpreted as an explosion of political and economic powers of the United States; getting out from isolationism (green square frame), America full of momentum (colors) is ready to wield international authority.
However, Man in a Whirl contains questions that Greenberg cannot answer. Since Greenberg’s theory is exclusively focused on white male artists, it has a limit to explaining how femininity plays its role in the picture. This inquiry can expand to broader issues. How does femininity apply to abstract expressionism? How did female artists express their aesthetic during the Cold War? What was the women’s role in the economic boom and the power struggle between the two nations? To fully understand not only abstract expressionism but also genuine art and culture, discussions more than Greenberg’s arguments are needed.
Bibliographies
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2. Greenberg, C. (1961). Avant-Garde and Kitsch. In Art and Culture. Beacon.
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5. Kozloff, M. (1973). American Painting during the Cold War. Artforum, 11.
6. Pollock, G., & Orton, F. (1981). Avant-Gardes and Partisans Reviewed. Art History,4.
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10. Veblen, T. (1979). Conspicuous Consumption. In The Theory of the Leisure Class. Penguin Random House.