« Popular culture » and «high culture » : British Visual Art since 1945 L3 Civilisation britannique John Mullen

Popular culture Not organized by elite institutions -Accessible without specialist knowledge -Can be produced without long training - Is mainly enjoyed by working class people High culture -is organized by elite institutions (conservatory, Academy of Fine arts, royal college of music…) -Public expected to have specialist knowledge (eg opera) -Production requires long training -Is mainly enjoyed by elite But these characteristics are an over- simplification

Visual art: do these fit into the categories « popular culture » and « high culture »? Painting Drawing Sculpture Video installations Street art Photography Ceramics Architecture

Art Museums NameCityCountryVisitors annuallyYear reported Palace MuseumBeijing China14,000, [3] [3] LouvreParis France9,260, [1] [1] British MuseumLondon United Kingdom6,695, [1] [1] Metropolitan Museum of Art New York City United States6,226, [4] [4] National GalleryLondon United Kingdom6,031, [4] [4] Vatican Museums Vatican City Vatican City (Rome)Rome Vatican City5,978, [4] [4] Tate ModernLondon United Kingdom4,884, [4] [4] National Palace Museum Taipei Taiwan4,500, [4] [4] National Gallery of Art Washington, D.C. United States4,093, [4] [4] Musée National d'Art Moderne Paris France3,745, [4] [4] Musée d'OrsayParis France3,500, [4] [4] Victoria and Albert Museum London United Kingdom3,290, [4] [4] Reina SofíaMadrid Spain3,185, [4] [4] Museum of Modern Art New York City United States3,066, [4] [4] National Museum of Korea Seoul South Korea3,052, [4] [4] How popular is « high art »?

Monet

Picasso Les demoiselles d’Avignon 1907

Detail from Picasso’s Guernica 1937

« The scream » Edvard Munch 1893

Mondrian

Pollock

Christo and Jeanne Claude

The Tate Gallery

Tate Modern, founded in 2000

Tate Liverpool, founded in 1988

Tate St. Ives, founded in 1993

Tate online

The Fourth plinth

The empty fourth plinth

A work by Bill Woodrow « Regardless of history » 2000

Elmgreen and Dragset

Artist duo Elmgreen and Dragset have become the latest contemporary artists to unveil a public sculpture on Trafalgar Square’s Fourth Plinth. Elmgreen and Dragset, the artists famous for opening a Prada boutique in the middle of the Texan desert, unveiled their work called Powerless Structures, Fig The 4.1m high statue is a twist on a traditional equestrian portrait, the artists say, because instead of celebrating military victory and commemorating fame, it acknowledges the “heroism of growing up”.

« Nelson’s ship in a bottle » by Yinka Shonibare

Statue of Keith Park Air Chief Marshal Sir Keith Rodney Park GCB, KBE, MC & Bar, DFC (15 June 1892 – 6 February 1975) was a New Zealand soldier, First World War flying ace and Second World War Royal Air Force commander

Maybe it's unfair to interpret something so hackneyed and drab as art. At least this lamentable sculpture puts the idiocy of the know-nothing artistic conservatives into full public view. You may think much of contemporary art is shallow; you may wish for something deeper, more emotional, more imaginative. But aesthetic regression is not the answer. The simplistic call for figurative art is just lazy-minded. Modern art was called into being by modern life, and as we hurtle into the future there is no sign of its pertinence diminishing. Britain's artistic conversation remains depressingly slight, endlessly fixated on a false confrontation of ancients and moderns, "proper" and "conceptual" art. No meaningful art of our time fits easily into those polarities. Nothing is served by reaffirming them. This statue is a monument to saloon-bar fools. Jonathan Jones in The Guardian

One and other

Henry Moore

« Nuclear Energy » by Henry Moore

Barbara Hepworth

« Single form » by Barbara Hepworth

L S Lowry

Memorial statue to L S Lowry

Francis Bacon

Lucien Freud b1922

Tracy Emin b 1963

Friendship

Everyone I have ever slept with

« My bed » by Tracy Emin

2008

Damian Hirst b 1965

« For the love of God » by Damian Hirst

“The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living,” 1991

Andy Goldsworthy b 1956

Mark Wallinger

Brian Haw’s peace camp

Mark Wallinger’s reproduction

Ecce homo

Bill Woodrow

Anthony Caro (b 1924)

Anthony Gormley (b 1950)

The Angel of the North

Iron Man

Susan Philpsz, winner of the 2010 Turner Prize

2011 Turner prize winner: « Do words have voices » by Martin Boyce

Turner prize 2012 : Still from the winning video « The woolworths choir of 1979 » by Elizabeth Price

Martin Parr b 1952

From « Boring Postcards »

Gallery art vs Street Art Think about -Accessibility to the public -Identification of the public -Cost to the public -Cost to the artist -Profit for the artist -Use of pseudonyms -Use of internet -Political messages -Aesthetic standards -Subaltern messages

An older tradition of street art : the murals of Northern Ireland

Political murals in Northern Ireland Think about - Relation with the immediate community -Symbolic content -Identification of artists -Expressions of identity

1. Nationalist murals

-Reference to a famous French painting -Significant border pattern -Religious content

Jim Bryson (25) and Patrick Mulvenna (19) Jim Bryson (25) and Patrick Mulvenna (19) : IRA men shot during a gun battle with the British Army in 1973.

Cuchulainn

Eire Symbolic content

Loyalist murals

King William III of Orange 'King Billy The image of King William III of Orange (known also as 'King Billy ') can be found on many walls in Belfast. This Dutchman who was declared sovereign of England, Scotland and Ireland in February 1689, won the Protestant victory over Catholic King James II (a Scotsman) on 1 July 1690 at the Battle of Boyne.

After « the troubles », the tradition of murals continues,

Banksy b 1974

Dismaland

Other street artists in the UK

Pang, 2016, London

Dale Grimshaw 2016, London

London, 2016

Anna Laurini, London 2016

Hunto, London 2016

Unknown, London 2016

Press coverage of the « Not the Turner Prize » started in protest, by the Conservative « Daily Mail ».

Works recently shortlisted for « Not the Turner Prize »