Robert Gober, Rachel Whiteread, Anthony Gormley

Robert Gober
Anthony Gormley (British)

to see more, search under their names + figure + wall

Rachel Whiteread (British)

All in connection with the work Shane showed us last night--not so much the illusionistic aspect, but the questions you can ask with figure, inversion of expectations, and displacement.

Kerry James Marshall / Maya Angelou

Kerry James Marshall

Darryl Pinkney in the NYRB, The Genius of Blackness:

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2017/01/19/kerry-james-marshall-genius-blackness/

Maya Angelou's writing ritual:

Beginning with I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Angelou used the same "writing ritual" for many years. She would wake early in the morning and check into a hotel room, where the staff was instructed to remove any pictures from the walls. She would write on legal pads while lying on the bed, with only a bottle of sherry, a deck of cards to play solitaire, Roget's Thesaurus, and the Bible, and would leave by the early afternoon. She would average 10–12 pages of written material a day, which she edited down to three or four pages in the evening. Angelou went through this process to "enchant" herself, and as she said in a 1989 interview with the British Broadcasting Corporation, "relive the agony, the anguish, the Sturm und Drang." She placed herself back in the time she wrote about, even traumatic experiences like her rape in Caged Bird, in order to "tell the human truth" about her life. Angelou stated that she played cards in order to get to that place of enchantment and in order to access her memories more effectively. She stated, "It may take an hour to get into it, but once I'm in it—ha! It's so delicious!" She did not find the process cathartic; rather, she found relief in "telling the truth".

(quoted from from wikipedia)

Holland Cotter NYTimes Reviews

“The Jerome Project (My Loss)” (2014) by Titus Kaphar in the exhibition “The Legacy of Lynching.”

Here are some of Holland Cotter's reviews from  the NYTimes. They're valuable not just as astute art writing, but because they demonstrate his range and commitment. Very interesting to follow, especially after the 2016 election. For a working critic (meaning that he writes about current shows) I'd say he's one of the very best.

The NYTimes has all of them them posted here:  Holland Cotter

Here's a selected list (to be amplified):

A West Coast Spotlight on Latino Artists Leads the Fall Art Season - The New York Times
Two Detroit Shows Focus on Art of the Civil Rights Movement - The New York Times
Glenn Ligon Rethinks the Color Line in the Show ‘Blue Black’ - The New York Times
Documenta Kassel: Using Art as Their Witness - The New York Times
Thoreau: American Resister (and Kitten Rescuer) - The New York Times
Thoreau: American Resister (and Kitten Rescuer) - The New York Times
To Be Black, Female and Fed Up With the Mainstream - The New York Times
In ‘Black Power!,’ Art’s Political Punch and Populist Reach - The New York Times
For Migrants Headed North, the Things They Carried to the End - The New York Times
William Powhida, Political and Not Amused - The New York Times
Raymond Pettibon, Wielding an Art Mightier Than the Sword - The New York Times
‘Perpetual Revolution’ Shows Artists Shaping Their Times - The New York Times
‘Paint the Revolution’ Offers Mexican Muralist Muscle and Delicate Beauty - The New York Times
Kerry James Marshall’s Paintings Show What It Means to Be Black in America - The New York 
At ‘Doomocracy,’ It’s Fright Night in Brooklyn - The New York Times Times
MoMA Looks at Migrants and Efforts to Help Them - The New York Times

and a couple that I liked in addition, on other themes:

The Joy of Reading Between Agnes Martin’s Lines - The New York Times
‘Marsden Hartley’s Maine,’ His Muse, First and Last - The New York Times
The Women Who Helped Create Abstract Expressionism - The New York Times  
 
It occurred to me that one of the best ways to follow comntemporary work that's socially and politically engaged would be to start with the best writing on the subject--especially reviews of shows that feature all kinds of artists. By reading someone like Holland Cotter, you'll get a good sense of the range of what's going on--and many references to people you'll want to check out in more depth. In  other words, you'll benefit from what he chooses to write about--and can follow on it. Critic as guide, in a sense...
 

Berkeley Stands with Groucho

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Photo from the Guardian...

Ralph Shikes: The Indignant Eye

The Indignant Eye: The Artist as Social Critic in Prints and Drawings from the Fifteenth Century to Picasso,  Ralph E. Shikes (New York: Beacon, 1969)

This is a classic sourcebook, published in 1969, so a bit dated, but still good for historiacal overview. You'll find the chapter arrangement interesting...

NAMING

Goya
Daumier
Georges Roualt
Pissarro

Jacque Callot

Charivari
Simpliccimus

Cruikshank
Hogarth   English satirists
Thomas Rowlandson

Beckmann

Ben Shahn
Käthe Kollwitz
Ernst Barlach

Frans Masereel (Belgium, 1930s)
graphic novels
white collar, north by northwest
Lynd Ward

Artists - A Start

Just started this today-5 September 2017--we will add to it as a resource...
Probably should not post until it's farther along, but let's say I'm thinking in public...



Painters:
Leon Golub  ()1922-2004)
Nancy Spero  (1951-2009)

David Hammons  (very much in his own category!)

Raymond Pettibone (drawings)

Romare Bearden
Jacob Lawrence (Migration Series)


Graphic Novels:
Art Spiegelman (Maus, 1986)
Marjane Satrapi, Persepolis (2000)


Frans Masereel (1930s)
Lynd Ward

Chicano themes:
Enrique Chagoya
Gronk Nicandro (Los Angeles)
to be developed!

Various Contemporary Artists: Time will tell on. MANY people work in a vein that could be called socially or politically engaged. Activist, in today's language. This year's Whitney Biennial had lots of examples. There was (as always) ample press coverage. For example, here's Roberta Smith in the NYTimes. Articles like this will give you names to follow up on...

A good way to research this topic is to start with a newspaper like the NYTimes (a major paper has a commitment to even-handedness--depending on the reviewer, of course.) Online sources can be good--see Hyperallergic, for example--but there are also a lot of commercially-compromised sites (The 10 Best Places to Buy Shoes in Yonkers).

An artists like Ai Weiwei, in part because of his personal history, has claimed a large following, but there are many many others--prominent and less-prominent.

LET'S MAKE A COLLECTIVE LIST!

In Addition (from Fall 2016)

In addition... Worth reading...

Here's how poet and musician friend Clara Hsu put it this week:

"I want to say something intelligent about the outcome of our election but cannot. Only that now, more than ever, we have a moral responsibility to ensure the viability of art, music and poetry. They are the true grains that make us grow as human beings. My eyes are set upon them and nothing else."
_______

Ken Knabb
OUT IN THE OPEN / Remarks on the Trump Election
http://www.bopsecrets.org/recent/trump.htm

A Cornel West piece:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/nov/17/american-neoliberalism-cornel-west-2016-election 

Richard Rorty in 1998:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/19/donald-trump-us-election-prediction-richard-rorty

Daniel Duane in NYTimes:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/20/opinion/sunday/i-wish-we-all-could-be-californian.html

José Antonio Vargas, 19 November 2016, NYTimes:
Undocumented in Trump’s America - The New York Times 

Charles Simic article from 2004 (NYRB):
One of the first pieces I recall reading about whole groups of people supporting social policies and voting against what would seem to be their own best interests:  
Down There on a Visit | by Charles Simic | The New York Review of Books

Charles Simic, NYRB 2016: 
Expendable America | by Charles Simic | NYR Daily | The New York Review of Books

Rebecca Solnit, The Guardian, 6 Dec 2016:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/dec/06/standing-rock-protest-success-demonstrations

Pankaj Mishra, The Guardian. 8 December 2016:
A bit long, but links together many important points
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/dec/08/welcome-age-anger-brexit-trump 

Richard Rodriguez, Reuters column, August 2015: 
Ladies and gentlemen, let's get ready to Trump-le! | Reuters 

Zadie Smith, "On Optimism and Despair," from the 12/22/2016 NYRB:
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2016/12/22/on-optimism-and-despair/

Timothy Snyder, the Yale historian's facebook post  on what we can learn for today from the authoritarian regimes of the 20th Century:
https://www.facebook.com/timothy.david.snyder/posts/1206636702716110 

Hector Tobar (who now teaches at UC Irvine) has written some very good columns in the NYTimes.