Oh man, I just listened to an episode of Decoder Ring about why making classical realist sculptures in the US is a challenge. It gives some interesting context about the rejection of realism in the post-war West:
I am starting to be under the impression that movements are steered by leaders but formed only when the underlying conditions are present. No single element can make the movement.
I am reluctant to believe stories like "The CIA created modern art", as it is just a single part, although a very influential part, of the movement.
I say this as somebody who is very cautious about believing anything and am quick to call things (probably incorrectly) propaganda or disseminated by paid actors.
Pretty embarrassing that this is the title of a post on JSTOR.
Modern art started in the late 1800s, long before the CIA or its predecessor existed. Using this term to describe contemporary art, or abstract art more generally, is an (anti?) shibboleth that indicates you don’t really know what you’re talking about. I realize the article is about mid century artists, but I’m certain it’s being upvoted here because people think the title is referring to contemporary, 21st century art.
If you meant something more specific, like abstract expressionism, then again, it’s mostly just a continuation of previous trends. Sure, the government sponsored some things, but it’s not as if postwar American artists invented the entire concept of modern art (which is what the article seems to be implying.)
And if you meant very abstract / performance contemporary art, the kind of thing uninformed people like to describe as modern art, again, most of that got started in the 60s (with antecedents in the 10s, 20s, etc.) and was mostly by people the CIA thought were subversives.
Did you actually read the article? It lays out a pretty compelling case that the CIA established funding sources and magazines to popularize American modern art and make it a worldwide phenomenon / a cultural export to have Americans be taken seriously as taste makers.
“educate, inspire, and strengthen the hearts and wills of free men.”
Funny how times have changed and more or less everyone on every side is fighting for the strength and survival of their own groupthink and little more.
Eventually, people realize they will never agree and therefore don't have to fight.
They realize the majority of their beliefs already existed before they were born and will continue on after they're dead. They have nothing to add to the conversation while they are too busy fighting. They turn their focus to developing their ideas peacefully and let their subcultures flourish once again.
This isn't the first cycle and won't be the last. The last major cycle was in the 20th century due to broadcast media. I think people sometimes forget how relatively young the internet is.
"Live and let live" is in fundamental tension with "protect the weak." ALL aggressive ideologies act as heroes protecting others from oppression. There is a barely expressible thing that allows people to live in peace with those they disagree with. It is a personality trait, an aesthetic, a mood associated with the best of the Enlightenment but never described by it. Perhaps people need relative silence, a few good books, physical labor, hand-made goods, and slow travel to attain it. I often wonder at how boldly people think they can reduce the enormous, holistic experience of being of a particular time and place and call the effect simply "reason".
I don’t know if this is a reaction to AI or something, but recently I’ve only been interested in classical/realism art. I just can’t do abstract cubes anymore. The default wallpaper of windows 11 is a perfect example - I hate it. Give me a wallpaper of some painting from the Renaissance.
Sounds like it was more about spreading American culture as part of the Cold War. This feels a lot more benign compared to Modernist architecture which seems to have fascist tendencies what with Le Corbusier and Philip Johnson being literal Nazi sympathizers.
I love art. Contemporary art is a bunch of ugly wankery by pretentious people who are bored of actual beauty and can only amuse themselves by creating ugly stuff, then claiming "you just don't get it". The world would be a significantly better place without contemporary art in it.
If there is any change I could make to the human personality at large it would be the reflexive opinion that anything you don't understand, or even dislike, is automatically morally wrong.
The leadership of nations requires you to put pressure on the thoughts and minds of your people, left to their own devices those minds will simply be shaped by someone else.
The morality in it comes from your motivation and methods. Secretly giving piles of money to the weirdos you successfully identify as being the leaders of artistic movements to amplify those movements can't be all that bad.
The question of the day is if you were the CIA trying to do the same thing today, who and what would you fund?
I wouldn’t because the CIA is explicitly barred by Congress (Title 50 U.S.C. § 3093) from conducting influence operations intended to affect American public opinion since the Intelligence Authorization Act of 1991.
Betteridge’s law prevails. A fun read, but not as fun as the title suggests.
tl;dr Modern art existed before the CIA and even CIA predecessors did not originate it, but they did push it abroad to show that America is great because we put up with modern art made by socialists depite most americans disliking both the art and the artists
The interesting thing to me is, despite it being hard to imagine today, back then this was actually a strange thing, and did actually serve as a demonstration of American freedom of expression.
Hard to imagine today because this kind of weird art comes from just about everywhere with a few exceptions now.
Interesting to read about how it actually was the work of a few elite institutions that made this happen. Agreed the CIA angle is a bit weak, to me it's more a story about the Rockefellers and their compatriots who funded this stuff.
But I mean is this something that is supposed to be shocking or revelaing? All countries want to promote their culture so they win the soft war and influence. You think people just magically started liking kpop in the us? Look up what the south korean gov planned and how it worked out overall.
It is interesting they were taunting the Soviets by saying "look our artists are so free even we dont know wtf they are making but we support them!" rather than "look how amazing modern art is" lol
Exactly, it is a weird title. Modern art is as much of a "psy-op" as:
- grocery stores
- NASA
- rock music
- psychedelics and hippies
- a strong middle class
- affordable vehicles and the highway system
- Hollywood movies
- Books
and just about anything. Cultural "warfare" is a different ballgame. K-Pop and K-dramas are "cultural warfare" from Korea. J-pop and anime from Japan (here's a clickbait title: Was Studio Ghibli a Japanese Psy-Op?). So is Thai Food and avocados. Anything that makes the country look good or even become more well known outside its borders can be considered a "psy-op". But not in the sense that any reasonable person would interpret the term...
That said, the article is still interesting and I wouldn't ignore it just because the dumb title.
Incredible to believe the CIA has more sway over artistic movements than actual artists.
Wealthy patronage has always steered art, and the CIA has a lot of money.
Related. Others?
Was modern art a CIA psy-op? (2020) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36155204 - June 2023 (332 comments)
Was Modern Art Really a CIA Psy-Op? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23525366 - June 2020 (7 comments)
Also:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42987770 (Feb 2025)
Did John Steinbeck Spy for the CIA? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20587547 - Aug 2019 (33 comments)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10462602 (Oct 2015)
Literary Magazines for Socialists Funded by the CIA, Ranked - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10116113 - Aug 2015 (133 comments)
Oh man, I just listened to an episode of Decoder Ring about why making classical realist sculptures in the US is a challenge. It gives some interesting context about the rejection of realism in the post-war West:
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/we-are-monumentally-ba...
Far more things/movements are orchestrated than are organic. This is to me one of the most surprising things I have learned as I got older.
I am starting to be under the impression that movements are steered by leaders but formed only when the underlying conditions are present. No single element can make the movement.
I am reluctant to believe stories like "The CIA created modern art", as it is just a single part, although a very influential part, of the movement.
I say this as somebody who is very cautious about believing anything and am quick to call things (probably incorrectly) propaganda or disseminated by paid actors.
Pretty embarrassing that this is the title of a post on JSTOR.
Modern art started in the late 1800s, long before the CIA or its predecessor existed. Using this term to describe contemporary art, or abstract art more generally, is an (anti?) shibboleth that indicates you don’t really know what you’re talking about. I realize the article is about mid century artists, but I’m certain it’s being upvoted here because people think the title is referring to contemporary, 21st century art.
If you meant something more specific, like abstract expressionism, then again, it’s mostly just a continuation of previous trends. Sure, the government sponsored some things, but it’s not as if postwar American artists invented the entire concept of modern art (which is what the article seems to be implying.)
And if you meant very abstract / performance contemporary art, the kind of thing uninformed people like to describe as modern art, again, most of that got started in the 60s (with antecedents in the 10s, 20s, etc.) and was mostly by people the CIA thought were subversives.
Did you actually read the article? It lays out a pretty compelling case that the CIA established funding sources and magazines to popularize American modern art and make it a worldwide phenomenon / a cultural export to have Americans be taken seriously as taste makers.
“educate, inspire, and strengthen the hearts and wills of free men.”
Funny how times have changed and more or less everyone on every side is fighting for the strength and survival of their own groupthink and little more.
Eventually, people realize they will never agree and therefore don't have to fight.
They realize the majority of their beliefs already existed before they were born and will continue on after they're dead. They have nothing to add to the conversation while they are too busy fighting. They turn their focus to developing their ideas peacefully and let their subcultures flourish once again.
This isn't the first cycle and won't be the last. The last major cycle was in the 20th century due to broadcast media. I think people sometimes forget how relatively young the internet is.
"Live and let live" is in fundamental tension with "protect the weak." ALL aggressive ideologies act as heroes protecting others from oppression. There is a barely expressible thing that allows people to live in peace with those they disagree with. It is a personality trait, an aesthetic, a mood associated with the best of the Enlightenment but never described by it. Perhaps people need relative silence, a few good books, physical labor, hand-made goods, and slow travel to attain it. I often wonder at how boldly people think they can reduce the enormous, holistic experience of being of a particular time and place and call the effect simply "reason".
I don’t know if this is a reaction to AI or something, but recently I’ve only been interested in classical/realism art. I just can’t do abstract cubes anymore. The default wallpaper of windows 11 is a perfect example - I hate it. Give me a wallpaper of some painting from the Renaissance.
I feel like a picture of rolling hills with spring wheat and a blue sky wouldn’t go amiss
They should bring it back
Kinda paradox because AI seems better at replicating complex classic paintings and realism than rather simple modern parametric imagery.
Sounds like modern art was the kpop of its era.
Oddly enough kpop is the result of American music taking over the world.
(2020)
Some previous discussion:
2023 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36155204
Sounds like it was more about spreading American culture as part of the Cold War. This feels a lot more benign compared to Modernist architecture which seems to have fascist tendencies what with Le Corbusier and Philip Johnson being literal Nazi sympathizers.
lol i think the CIA is nowhere near competent enough to even consider that idea.
https://www.amazon.com/Cultural-Cold-War-World-Letters/dp/15...
Just gonna leave this here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Endowment_for_the_Art...
Juxtaposed with: https://youtu.be/8adu_rSMdXM?si=GZSeKWodp3ivFZyo
Your tax dollars, hard at work!
And here I was thinking any psyop was necessarily bad.
Are you saying modern art is positive?
Do you not appreciate art?
I like bananas.
https://www.npr.org/2024/11/21/nx-s1-5199568/a-duct-taped-ba...
Okay, this is a bit too far xD. But I wouldn’t put this in the same bucket as Pollock. I genuinely find his work interesting.
Modern art is weird.
https://smarthistory.org/andres-serrano-piss-christ/
That's postmodern art, not modern art.
I agree. All I see here is someone following in the footsteps of pioneers such as Andy Warhol. His own pink banana was very polarizing in his time.
That's postmodern art, not modern art.
So that's a post-banana?
I love art. Contemporary art is a bunch of ugly wankery by pretentious people who are bored of actual beauty and can only amuse themselves by creating ugly stuff, then claiming "you just don't get it". The world would be a significantly better place without contemporary art in it.
This could have been written at any point after the 1850s or so.
Indeed. Once galleries became significant buyers of art, scandalous art became an attractive thing to produce: it commanded outsized attention.
The dynamics are similar in Twitter today, too.
1850? I wager we could go all the way back if we tried.
> (…) the Italian artist and writer Giorgio Vasari,who used it as early as 1530, calling Gothic art a "monstrous and barbarous" "disorder".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gothic_art
If there is any change I could make to the human personality at large it would be the reflexive opinion that anything you don't understand, or even dislike, is automatically morally wrong.
Contemporary art is the mirror of our time.
The leadership of nations requires you to put pressure on the thoughts and minds of your people, left to their own devices those minds will simply be shaped by someone else.
The morality in it comes from your motivation and methods. Secretly giving piles of money to the weirdos you successfully identify as being the leaders of artistic movements to amplify those movements can't be all that bad.
The question of the day is if you were the CIA trying to do the same thing today, who and what would you fund?
I would fund things which make people less susceptible to manipulation and more equipped to think for themselves.
Because I believe in democracy not as a political tool but as a fundamental right. I don’t wish to use democracy to gain more power.
But maybe that’s why I’ll never be in that position, to make that choice.
I wouldn’t because the CIA is explicitly barred by Congress (Title 50 U.S.C. § 3093) from conducting influence operations intended to affect American public opinion since the Intelligence Authorization Act of 1991.
Betteridge’s law prevails. A fun read, but not as fun as the title suggests.
tl;dr Modern art existed before the CIA and even CIA predecessors did not originate it, but they did push it abroad to show that America is great because we put up with modern art made by socialists depite most americans disliking both the art and the artists
The interesting thing to me is, despite it being hard to imagine today, back then this was actually a strange thing, and did actually serve as a demonstration of American freedom of expression.
Hard to imagine today because this kind of weird art comes from just about everywhere with a few exceptions now.
Interesting to read about how it actually was the work of a few elite institutions that made this happen. Agreed the CIA angle is a bit weak, to me it's more a story about the Rockefellers and their compatriots who funded this stuff.
But I mean is this something that is supposed to be shocking or revelaing? All countries want to promote their culture so they win the soft war and influence. You think people just magically started liking kpop in the us? Look up what the south korean gov planned and how it worked out overall.
It is interesting they were taunting the Soviets by saying "look our artists are so free even we dont know wtf they are making but we support them!" rather than "look how amazing modern art is" lol
Exactly, it is a weird title. Modern art is as much of a "psy-op" as:
and just about anything. Cultural "warfare" is a different ballgame. K-Pop and K-dramas are "cultural warfare" from Korea. J-pop and anime from Japan (here's a clickbait title: Was Studio Ghibli a Japanese Psy-Op?). So is Thai Food and avocados. Anything that makes the country look good or even become more well known outside its borders can be considered a "psy-op". But not in the sense that any reasonable person would interpret the term...
That said, the article is still interesting and I wouldn't ignore it just because the dumb title.
More likely it was a money laundering operation disguised as a psyop.
Is calling everything a Psy-Op a Psy-Op?