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arrogant," and "like a slap in the face." He defines the demeanor of American culture by the psychology of its high art: "coiled, tense, arrogant, lean, ungenerous, unsensuous." He underlines the word "harshness" and insists on the "pictorial violence" of the irregular polygons. The suggestively aggressive tone used throughout the article in praise of Stella, Andre and Judd has a recherché quality. Are we discussing art or war? The words are "ferocious," "bluntness," "insulting," "powerful," and in one paragraph:

By 1966, Stella had been under the gun for five years. The paintings are the most explicitly violent Stella has ever made. Forms interpenetrate as if by naked force; spiked sharp edges abound, colors verge on the hysterical (my italics). 3.

Is it just coincidence, or is this a description of the political mood in the United States during the last part of the decade? It is in this context that Leider says of Pollock, the ultimate source of all art after 1958: "When you feel [the paintings] getting too arty for you, give them a whack or two" (my italics).

This brute force, this image of physical violence, is what is known as the "American" part of American art, as well as representing the repressive character of American domestic and international policy.

Judd reveals this in his writing, where he is just as convinced as his "enemies" of the primacy of American art, the absolute necessity for abstraction, the idea that art must be nonreferential, that it must be powerful, that all that matters is "quality" and "specificity"——read the uniqueness and special existence of the art object apart from the world. It is especially relevant that Judd becomes upset with the idea that American art and its international primacy has something to do with American economic and political power. This is in keeping with the division of art and the world. It is with this in mind that we can view Judd's ethnocentric statement about art in America being international art and the best thing that could happen is for art everywhere to be like American art.

American art is the best art, and any art could be great if it was like American art——those are the assumptions. The possibility that artists in other countries wouldn't want to make art the way it's made in the United States——that such an art might be meaningless to them——is not considered. Judd's dodge is to rename American art "international," and explain the dominance of art from the United States in this way: "A few artists simply decided to do first-rate work" (Writings, pg. 220).

Judd reviles nationalism while glorifying the spurious internationalism of the United States. His statement against U.S. involvement in Vietnam (pp. 218-19 and reprinted from a Denver newspaper) is ambiguous in this respect: what was the war in Vietnam if not a national liberation struggle? Was it that he was simply against U.S. involvement and not for the Vietnamese? Judd considers that "only religion is more primitive than nationalism"——is this his view of the struggles in Africa and the Middle East? It is easy for the beneficiaries of U.S. economic power and political influence to ask small colonized countries to stop being so "primitive" and give up nationalism. By being international they will, in effect, become American.

[[image]]
Donald Judd, Untitled, 1973, stainless steel, amber plexiglass over grey enamel, 8 boxes each 6 x 27 x 24".

Judd cannot admit that there is such a thing as American art, although he is quick to notice signs of "Europeanism." His immediate ambition in the early '60s was to do away with all those "European" influences. If he can imagine a "European art," why can't he imagine an "American art"?

In fact, Judd has been influenced by the most European minds of the '60s, notably Robbe-Grillet (especially his "to see objects, actions, words and events which are described, without attempting to give them more or less meaning"). The reason Judd vehemently opposes the "European" influence is that all the "idealism," transcendence and "Cartesianism" is unbecoming to a powerful, blunt, pragmatic, new-intellectual, just-doing-my-job American artist like himself——and perhaps like-minded colleagues. The different between the Abstract Expressionist and the artist of the '60s, is that the latter wanted to become normalized and neutralized, and not be some crazy outcast, wildly slinging paint around. The new artist wants money and prestige, a job in the social bureaucracy as an artist. Andre "naturally" places metal squares next to one another, Judd hangs boxes on the wall in a "practical manner." The artist wants to be considered "normal."

Finally, Judd's art is about "what he knows," that is, it never ventures outside its own context. It is clear what this has meant for art: a turning from the realm of experience which used to engage and involve the viewer in an act of discovery. Art is a dumb exercise operating out of a contextless knowledge, where differing opacities of plexiglass and the valencies of metals are offered as "meaningful" explorations of "real space." What is it that must be kept unknown? What is it that must be banished from anything having to do with art? What is the artist afraid of discovering, or uncovering in his work?

I'm not part of any of those [non-Western] cultures nor any religion, unless I'm part of the industrialized middle class, which seems to be too empty to be a culture, but is one of course, a lousy one. (Writings, p. 222)

For once, the cynical evaluation which illuminates his social and cultural heritage is right on the mark. The emptiness which typifies Judd's hollow shell finds its source in the "lousy industrialized middle-class culture." It reflects his class origins but easily negotiates with a supposedly "classless," tunnel-vision art history. Emptiness here is dualistic. On one hand, it has a meaning within a class analysis, and on the other, it functions in the art world to repudiate the reality of class. These two meanings create a tension which becomes a dynamic in Judd's sculpture. "Of course, finally, I only believe in my own work" (p. 181). Which means that in order to transcend his class and empty culture, Judd must believe in and want to be embraced by the timeless, classless ideal of the art world, a world which will secure a place for his "practical" boxes and stacks inside the unreal esthetic sanctuary of the museum.

1. But compare this: "Any political statement, either by declaration or incorporation into a context, can be art" (Writings, pg. 208). This is a one-shot deal in favor of Hans Haacke, and there is considerable ambiguity in the use of the word "can".

2. When Judd is in a bad mood, perhaps when a museum has not turned out to be the apolitical determiner of quality that it should be, he lashes out: "museums are charities that are monuments to the rich" (Writings, pg. 89). One would then wonder why he would want to be included in one.

3. Curiously, Leider revels in the positive virtues of coldness, smartaleckness and humorlessness by attacking some "negative" qualities in Johns, i.e. cleverness, irony and paradox.

Transcription Notes:
Some notes in this article make reference to italics, which are included in the original text, though not marked in the transcription.