The Tammy Manifesto and the Politics of Representation

• Main Author: Hughes, Leah R
• Format: Others
• Published: Scholarship @ Claremont 2015
• Subjects: Kentucky; cars; representation; Marcel Duchamp; class; American Art and Architecture; Theory and Criticism
• Online Access: http://scholarship.claremont.edu/scripps_theses/520; http://scholarship.claremont.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1609&context=scripps_theses

The artistic is always political, even if not overtly so—each work carries with it the histories of the artist, the means of production, the subject matter, and the many art historical precedents that overlap and diverge to constitute the theoretical circumstances surrounding it. Since I began translating my lived experience into artworks, I have become interested in the ways in which my personal politics have affected the choices I have made in material and narrative substance. This is a deconstruction of the politics of representation as a method for better understanding the art historical context in which contemporary materials- and performance-based art work exists and to conceptually develop the work I want to produce in the future.