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Pulitzer Prize-winning cultural historian
MICHAEL KAMMEN, PH. D.
Lecturing on his book,
Visual Shock: A History of Art Controversies in American Culture
February 28 at Noon, Mercury Grill RSVP
Michael Kammen, the Newton C. Farr Professor of American History and Culture at Cornell University,
is a past president of the Organization of American Historians. He is the author or editor of
numerous works, including People of Paradox: An Inquiry Concerning the Origins of American Civilization,
which won the Pulitzer Prize for History, and A Machine That Would Go of Itself: The Constitution in
American Culture, awarded the Francis Parkman Prize and the Henry Adams Prize. He has lectured throughout the world.
VISUAL SHOCK: A History of Art Controversies in American Culture
Michael Kammen examines the nature, diversity, and persistence of major disputes generated by art and artists
and shows what has changed since the 1830s and why. He looks at the role of artists and patrons, local and
national governments, conservatives and liberals, and the media in creating and sustaining heated controversies.
Kammen's central themes include such questions as, What kind of art is most appropriate for a democratic society?
What should our relationship be to Old World criteria of excellence in the arts? How can we achieve a distinctively
American art? Why have so many controversies hinged upon issues of nudity, decency, and sexuality?
Why has public art (most notably sculpture) become so politicized that began in the late 1960s? He explores
the "death-of-art" debate since the 1970s and issues of censorship that have arisen over time.
Finally, he asks whether art controversies have invariably had a negative effect-noticing the
interesting ways in which minds have been changed and museums have overcome difficult episodes.
He also reminds us that when New York's Museum of Modern Art celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary,
President Dwight Eisenhower declared "as long as artists are at liberty to feel with high personal intensity,
as long as our artists are free to create with sincerity and conviction,
there will be healthy controversy and progress in art." Kammen agrees.
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