The difference, for me, between Television Delivers People, and Stop Bush, is this use of medium. Neither is terribly subtle, but Television Delivers People puts the viewer in the position of accepting its message as passively as they accept advertising, watching it scroll by on a screen.

Stop Bush, on the other hand, uses its material very casually. My reaction seeing it at the Whitney three years ago was very, very similar to yours: dude was pissed, no doubt. And this is why I find this (what I consider a very bad piece) forgivable: if you’re famous enough to do anything you want, well, maybe sometimes something’s more important than art. Okay. The problem, unfortunately, is that I don’t think it works.

The question of protest vs. propaganda is partly one of connotation and loading; when you say the word “protest” a lot of people imagine hippies with signs marching in the street, whereas “propaganda” implies not just mass distribution and one-sidedness (don’t get me wrong, I agree with you, it does imply these things), but also that it is in defense of the status quo, and also there’s a popular association with propaganda as a negative thing.

Protest doesn’t carry the same connotation for me as it does for you in terms of openness to dialog, or rather for me this connotation is linked to the dynamics of power: if you’re happy with the status quo, you don’t WANT dialog. If you’re protesting, you need dialog, because the potential outcome of dialog is change.

I guess I’m ultimately not that invested in the particulars of those two labels; whether it’s called propaganda or protest, I see them as analogous structures on opposite sites of the equation. Those in power get propaganda, and those with let’s say more potential than actualized agency, get protest. What I’m invested in, personally, is that these goals are not art goals. They’re another type of goal.

I think the difference, for me, between propaganda or protest art on one side and “real art” that happens to be derived from political subject matter on the other is like like the difference between pornography and figurative or even erotic art. Figurative art may or may not be sexual or erotic, but even if it is, it’s not meant to give you something to jack off to; it’s meant for aesthetic contemplation (even if eroticism is part of that contemplation). So similarly I’d say protest art or propaganda is meant to move the viewer to action (or inaction) or at least to dictate a very prescribed pattern of thought (“Bush is Doubleplus Ungood” or what have you), while what I think of as real or successful art derived from political subject matter encourages contemplation but isn’t intended to necessarily hand you a conclusion to take home or to the voting booth.

Yeah, that’s it. I hadn’t really considered this before writing here, but it’s making more sense to me now: propaganda and protest are similar in that they are NOT open-ended. If they’re inviting dialog, they’re certainly doing so with an agenda. They’re not saying, “Hey, let’s think about this,” they’re saying, “Hey you, think like this about this.” Whereas art, or I should say at least the kind of art I prefer, says more the former.

A’ight, rock on, sister.

I think of some of the work you’re describing (as less successful political art) as protest art rather than propaganda. Propaganda makes me think it has a mass distribution system behind it and less expectation of open dialogue. (Not that Serra isn’t plenty well-known or well-distributed, but the gesture was one of trying to take a persuasive political position against the administration at the time, and in a format where discussion rather than inculcation would be expected, although the museum’s role there is up for discussion too.)

In the case of Serra’s drawing, I remember that when I saw it at the Whitney, its impact seemed to be along the lines of “he must be really upset about this to step outside the usual context of his work” — the fact that he was using his drawing practice to step outside the more well-known trajectory of his sculptural work was a think that might break through to less politically active members of an art world audience. On a side note, this article reminded me of Serra’s early video piece, Television Delivers People — http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbvzbj4Nhtk

Thoughts? Totally curious.