Re: [-empyre-] Abu Ghraib and the image

[G.H.Hovagimyan <ghh@thing.net>]

On Jul 21, 2006, at 7:28 AM, Susana Mendes Silva wrote:

> I find this sentence quite intriguing. Why this images are art works 
> for you? Because you find in them some aesthetical value? Because they 
> mimic the "transgressive art that is part of a fairly standard 
> Avant-garde position essentially épatez du bourgeois"? They seem to me 
> like war trophies...

gh replies:

Hi SMS,

There's a TV show and web site called, "how art made the world that 
talks about the power of the image and how it has been used throughout 
history by sovereigns to assert their power. Going back to Agamben, it 
is the sovereign that creates both the polis and through the ban or 
excommunication the bare life. Art is always wrapped up with those in 
power. It is used to represent power. The Abu Ghraib images are 
aesthetic, composed presentations of power images.  The debate in art 
is who decides what is art? The answer is that the artist defines what 
is art.  Trying to work through the 21st century media-scape and 
produce art is an interesting endeavor. Artists are slippery 
characters. They may need the support and patronage of the powerful 
elite but they are not on anybodies side but the side of art and 
creativity.
Richard Serra took the most iconic image of Abu Ghraib, the hooded man 
in chains standing on a box with his hands out stretched like a Christ 
figure and made a paint stick drawing and billboard. He immediately 
recognized the aesthetics of the situation.
The larger debate for all of us is how artists can live and expand 
creativity while critiquing the power structures that support the 
activity of art. One can be excommunicated from the art world. For 
those who present the images of power such as Damien Hirsch, the 
rewards are unlimited. They re-inforce and represent the power elite.