J. R. Jenkins

Picturing Socialism (eBook, ePUB)

Public Art and Design in East Germany

• Format: ePub

Produktbeschreibung

This vibrant history of the former German Democratic Republic's public art reveals a barely known but visually and theoretically rich cultural legacy. Picturing Socialism shows how works of art and design in the urban spaces of East Germany were the site of a sustained struggle between practitioners, critics and political leaders. This was not the oft-assumed conflict between artistic freedom and political dogma; at stake was the self-identity of the republic as socialist. Art and its relationship to architecture functioned as the testing ground for East Germany's relationship to socialist realism and modernism against the backdrop of Cold War competition from the neighbouring Federal Republic.

Picturing Socialism makes a timely contribution to the recent groundswell of interest in the legacy of East Germany's art and architecture, illuminating and elucidating the public art which has been lost or remains under threat since unification in 1990.

Produktdetails

• Verlag: Bloomsbury UK
• Seitenzahl: 264
• Erscheinungstermin: 24. Dezember 2020
• Englisch
• ISBN-13: 9781350067158
• Artikelnr.: 60752449

Autorenporträt

J.R. Jenkins is a design historian specializing in the design culture of the former German Democratic Republic. She writes widely on design and is the author of Picturing Socialism (Bloomsbury, 2021), and has written contributions in books such as Design, History and Time (Bloomsbury, 2019) and journals such as Design Issues. She teaches Design Contexts at Falmouth University, UK.

Inhaltsangabe

List of Figures List of Plates Preface Acknowledgements Glossary and
Abbreviations Introduction Part One: Reconstruction, Art and Ornament (1945
to 1963) 1. Modernism, Realism and Muralism - the Struggle for Art in
Post-fascist Germany 2. The Synthesis of Art and Architecture During the
Transition to Industrialized Building Part Two: Developing a Realist
Modernism (1959 to 1973) 3. Reconceptualizing the Place of Art in the
System-built Environment 4. New Socialist Landscapes and the Building of
Halle-Neustadt 5. Innovations in Socialist Public Art in Halle-Neustadt
Part Three: From the Monumental to the Unreal (1973-1990) 6. A Space of
Pure Possibility: The X. Weltfestspiele and its Impact on Public Art 7.
'Ultimately, Ordinary People Want to Have a Bit of Kitsch': How Socialist
Realism Looked Unreal Conclusion Select Bibliography List of Interviewees
Index