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Originally Posted by choke
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The article says the CIA acted in the manner of rennaissance princes. Not exactly: Borgias and Bentivoglios hired artists and had them work full time. Anyway... the european avant garde was highly politized. From Picasso to Aragon they flirted and connected w/ the communist party. Otoh Dali, the original midia shockster, and Duchamp were never communists. Both went to America. Duchamp went to live and work in NYC. Both abhorred abstract expressionism and that particular american avant garde; the euros had left optical dynamics and were working w/ symbols, double meaning of words, icons. There was a cultural war but not communist x capitalist culture; it was surrealism x abstractionism. Greenberg was the american critic connecting the painters who were on that bus to Europe. Their hegemony did not last long: another american movement, very influenced by Duchamp´s ready mades succeeded... minimalism. NYC was already the avant garde capital and Paris was gone forever.
Dali and his ant eater in Paris.