A Justice Site
Mirror Sites:
CSUDH Habermas UWP
California State University, Dominguez Hills
University of Wisconsin, Parkside
Created: May 18, 2001
Latest update: May 18, 2001
jeannecurran@habermas.org
All paintings are copyrighted. They may be reproduced, with acknowledgment to the artist, on personal web pages, not for commercial use, and may be printed by faculty and students for use in teaching.Alterity: Nazism and Dominance of the "Other"
Germany as Hitler was staging it.
Made with Corel Photo House on a PC. Copyright by Jeanne Curran, May 2001.This painting has reference to Laclou-Labarthe's book on Heidegger, Art, and Politics, in which he speaks of Hitler's fascination with film, and his vision of the Second World War as a film he could produce through his direction and the daily news. The painting includes Laclou-Labarthe's vision of Auschwitz as an industrialized plant for the extirmination of human waste, in which humans are viewed as waste. The clover leaf, so typical of our modern freeways, signifies Hitler's fascination with the technology of production and distribution. And the railroads, yes, the railroads. Well, they are a signifier of enlightenment as an oxymoron. The closer we came to the kind of technical distribution the enlightenment saw as a part of our scientific utopia, the close we came to the means of building and operating an Auschwitz. And we did not lack for people who saw the means to both. I thought of this as the bright and cheerful side of Enlightenment that facilitates our denial of the "other" which is always part of our own identity.
References:
Heidegger's Nazism and Spivak's Post-Colonialism and Their Meaning to Us Today from Laclou-Labarthe's Heidegger Art, and Politics.
Teaching Essay: Sociodrama and Understanding Alterity We may not all bleed the same. The meaning of Heidegger's refusal to acknowledge Auschwitz as extermination and its meaning in terms of DuBois' double consciousness.
Art as Transformative Discourse:
Granddaughter
Scanned from a HP on a PC, from photograph of original oil pastel drawing.
Copyright: By Allan Knox, CSUDH, May, 2001.Allan Knox did this oil pastel drawing in a class on criminology in which we were discussing peacemaking and approaches to mutuality. Convinced that he could not draw, Allan appeased me by passing the time creating this drawing of his grand-daughter. Because we are quite serious about art as a tool for transformative discourse, I sat down with him, as the class sauntered out, and showed him techniques for working with oil pastels. Using some of the new techniques, we finished up his drawing, and I offered him my drawing pen for his signature. I will always remember a special link to that signature: "Granddaddy."
Allan was so pleased with what his work meant to him, that we packed it in an empty tablet and sent it home with him. He framed it and sent it to his granddaughter and her family. He framed it, and packed it well, to be sure that his granddaughter would always have this symbol of how much he loves her. The simple tool of drawing to express that which is most often captured only by poets in our language carried this gift to loved ones far away.
Allan had a large photograph of the drawing framed for us and for himself. It will hang always in our office to remind us of the power of teaching.