ARTHI 5770 / MFA 5070

“Why I Am Not a Painter”: Frank O’Hara, Art, Poetry, & Criticism

David Getsy, Art History, Theory & Criticism [email protected] Terry R. Myers, Painting & Drawing, [email protected]

School of the Art Institute of Chicago Fall 2012 graduate seminar Thursdays 1-4pm, MC1501

Course Description The seminar will examine the artistic culture of the 1950s and 60s through the pivotal and contradictory role of the poet and MoMA curator Frank O’Hara. Central to the history of American poetry but often overlooked in his importance to modernist art criticism, O’Hara established a hybrid practice based on blurred boundaries. Focusing on his collaborations with artists, the seminar will provide an in-depth analysis of O’Hara’s multiple practices including poetry, art criticism, and curation. Emphasis will be placed on his relation to Abstract Expressionism, and his cultivation of such artists as Larry Rivers, Jasper Johns, and Elaine de Kooning. Through O’Hara’s example, we will seek to address the difficulties, pleasures, and rewards of bringing the visual and the verbal into intimate contact; and we will consider his unique position as a poet, Elaine de Kooning, Frank O’Hara, 1962 critic, curator, and visual collaborator as a pioneering model for today.

Course Structure Each three-hour session will focus on the presentation and discussion of required texts and student research. Students will be evaluated on the basis of their preparation, attendance, and critical engagement with course readings and concepts in addition to formal written assignments.

There is one required textbook: Donald Allen, ed., The Collected Poems of Frank O’Hara (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995)

All other readings will be made available via the course homepage on the SAIC portal. Students should refer to the syllabus for page numbers of reading assignments.

Evaluation 1. Attendance and participation All students are expected to attend class meetings prepared to discuss the required readings. This is a discussion-based class, and all students should regularly and productively contribute to class discussions. Attendance at all class meetings is essential. More than two missed classes may be grounds for a “no credit.” See the full SAIC attendance policies regarding late registration and missed classes at http://www.saic.edu/life/policies/index.html#bulletin

Students are expected to be reading selections from the Collected Poems weekly. Each week, students should choose at least one poem from the book that informs the topic of that week’s discussions. 2. Leading course discussion Each week, teams of seminar participants will lead the discussion of the required readings. This should not be organized as a summary of the readings. Instead, it should be framed around discussion questions posed to the group. Teams are expected to prepare all visual materials and conduct background research necessary to lead course discussion. For each presentation, students will be required to prepare a Powerpoint/Keynote document. Your image presentation must be fully-prepared and ready to go. The professionalism of your presentations will be considered as part of the evaluation of your work. Do not expect to just grab things off of Google Image at the last minute or in class. 3. Research Project All students will engage in independent, original research on a topic relevant to the course themes. Presentations of research will commence 15 November 2012. All presentations will be 20 minutes in length (approximately 9.5 typed, double-spaced pages) and should be formally prepared, including all relevant visual material. Final papers are due on 14 December 2012 by 4pm. Master’s students in Art History, Visual and Critical Studies, and Arts Administration and Policy must submit a minimum of 5000 words, exclusive of endnotes and bibliography. Graduate students from other departments must submit a minimum of 2500 words, exclusive of endnotes and bibliography. All papers must include illustrations and be typed, double-spaced, and with standard margins. Students wanting to request alternate formats for the presentation of research should speak with the professors by 25 October at the latest.

Differently-abled students Any students with exceptional needs or concerns (including 'invisible' difficulties such as chronic diseases, learning disabilities, or psychiatric complications) are encouraged to make an appointment with the professor to discuss these issues by the end of the second week of the term so that appropriate accommodations can be arranged. Students with known or suspected disabilities, such as a Reading/Writing Disorder, ADD/ADHD, and/or a mental health or chronic physical condition who think they would benefit from assistance or accommodations should first contact the Disability and Learning Resource Center (DLRC) by phone at 312.499.4278 or email at www.dlrc.saic.edu. DLRC staff will review your disability documentation and work with you to determine reasonable accommodations. They will then provide you with a letter outlining the approved accommodations for you to deliver to all of your instructors. This letter must be presented before any accommodations will be implemented. You should contact the DLRC as early in the semester as possible. The DLRC is located on the 13th floor of 116 S. Michigan Ave. This letter must be presented to the instructor before any accommodations will be implemented.

Plagiarism Any degree of plagiarism will result in no credit for the course and additional institutional disciplinary action. The School of the Art Institute of Chicago prohibits "dishonesty such as cheating, plagiarism, or knowingly furnishing false information to the School" (Students' Rights and Responsibilities, Student Handbook). Plagiarism is a form of intellectual theft. One plagiarizes when one presents another's work as one's own, even if one does not intend to. The penalty for plagiarizing may also result in some loss of some types of financial aid (for example, a No Credit in a course can lead to a loss of the Presidential Scholarship), and repeat offenses can lead to expulsion from the School. To find out more about plagiarism and how to avoid it, you can (1) go to the portal, select the "Resources" tab, and click on "Plagiarism" under "Academic Advising and Student Success"; (2) go to the SAIC Web site, select "Departments, Degrees, and Academic Resources," then select "Libraries," then select "Flaxman Library," and then click on the plagiarism links under the "For Our Faculty" tab; or (3) read about it in the Student Handbook under the section "Academic Misconduct." http://www.saic.edu/pdf/life/pdf_files/rights.pdf The Faculty Senate Student Life Subcommittee has prepared a 28-page handbook entitled Plagiarism: How to Recognize It and Avoid It: http://www.saic.edu/webspaces/portal/library/plagiarism_packet.pdf. and Avoid Plagiarism: Quick Guide: http://www.saic.edu/webspaces/portal/library/plagiarism.pdf

Writing Center MacLean Center Basement, 112 S. Michigan Ave., B1-03 Monday - Thursday: 10:00 AM - 7:15 PM; Friday: 10:00 AM - 5:15 PM; 4:15 PM – 7:15 PM are designated as walk-in hours. To schedule an appointment with a Writing Center tutor, use the online sign-up system: http://www.supersaas.com/schedule/saic/writingcenter

Course Calendar All texts should be completed for the day under which they are listed.

30 August: Introduction Terry R. Myers, “Standing Still and Walking in Kassel,” [review of dOCUMENTA (13)], The Brooklyn Rail, forthcoming September 2012

6 September Just go on your nerve: Frank O’Hara’s everyday poetics Mark Ford, “1951: Frank O’Hara takes a job as sales clerk at MoMA,” in Greil Marcus and Werner Sollors, eds., A New Literary History of America (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2009), 814-19 John Ashbery, “Introduction to the Collected Poems of Frank O’Hara,” in Jim Elledge, ed., Frank O’Hara: To Be True to a City (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1990), 125-30 James Schuyler, “Frank O’Hara: Poet Among Painters,” ARTnews (May 1974): 44-45. Kenneth Koch, “A Note on Frank O’Hara in the Early Fifties,” in Bill Berkson and Joe LeSueur, eds., Homage to Frank O’Hara (Berkeley: Creative Arts Book Company, 1980), 26-27 John Button, “Frank’s Grace,” in Bill Berkson and Joe LeSueur, eds., Homage to Frank O’Hara (Berkeley: Creative Arts Book Company, 1980), 41-43 Joe LeSueur, “Four Apartments,” in Bill Berkson and Joe LeSueur, eds., Homage to Frank O’Hara (Berkeley: Creative Arts Book Company, 1980), 46-56 Alan Feldman, “Language and Style,” in Frank O’Hara (Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1979), 45–63 Frank O’Hara, “The Day Lady Died,” CP 325 Andrew Ross, “The Death of Lady Day,” in Jim Elledge, ed., Frank O’Hara: To Be True to a City (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1990), 380-91

13 September O’Hara and the art world I: milieu Russell Ferguson, In Memory of My Feelings: Frank O’Hara and American Art (Los Angeles: Museum of Contemporary Art, 1999) John Bernard Myers, “An Enduring Aesthetic,” in Paul Schimmel, ed., Action/Precision: The New Direction in New York 1955-50 (Newport Harbor: Newport Harbor Art Museum, 1984), 43-47 Carter Ratcliff, “Selfhood Paints a Self-Portrait,” in Paul Schimmel, ed., The Figurative Fifties: New York Figurative Expressionism (Newport Harbor and New York: Newport Harbor Art Museum and Rizzoli, 1988), 25-36 Robert Rosenblum, “Excavating the Fifties,” in Paul Schimmel, ed., Action/Precision: The New Direction in New York 1955-50 (Newport Harbor: Newport Harbor Art Museum, 1984), 13-17

20 September O’Hara and the art world II: criticism Frank O’Hara, “Art Chronicles I-III,” in Standing Still and Walking in New York (Bolinas, California: Grey Fox Press, 1975), 126-51 Frank O’Hara, “Short Reviews 1953-55,” in Bill Berkson, ed., What’s With Modern Art?: Selected Short Reviews & Other Art Writings (Austin: Mike & Dale’s Press, 1999), 7- 24 Frank O’Hara with Larry Rivers, “How to Proceed in the Arts,” in Art Chronicles 1954- 1966 (New York: George Braziller, 1975), 92-98 Lytle Shaw, “Proximity’s Plea: O’Hara’s Art Writing,” Qui Parle 12.2 (Spring 2001): 143- 78 Frank O’Hara, interview with Edward Lucie-Smith [1965], in Standing Still and Walking in New York (Bolinas, California: Grey Fox Press, 1975), 3-26 Frank O’Hara, “Alex Katz,” in Art Chronicles 1954-1966 (New York: George Braziller, 1975), 142-48

27 September Poems open, impure, and between Frank O’Hara, “Personism,” in Standing Still and Walking in New York (Bolinas, California: Grey Fox Press, 1975), 110-11 Frank O’Hara, “Statement for The New American Poetry,” in Standing Still and Walking in New York (Bolinas, California: Grey Fox Press, 1975), 112 Paul Carrol, “An Impure Poem About July 17, 1959,” in Jim Elledge, ed., Frank O’Hara: To Be True to a City (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1990), 373-79 Charles Altieri, “Varieties of Immanentist Expression,” in in Jim Elledge, ed., Frank O’Hara: To Be True to a City (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1990), 189- 208 Frank O’Hara, “Second Avenue,” CP 139-50 Joe LeSueur, “Second Avenue” in Digressions on Some Poems by Frank O’Hara (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2003), 34-36 Frank O’Hara, “Notes on Second Avenue,” in Standing Still and Walking in New York (Bolinas, California: Grey Fox Press, 1975), 37-40 Alan Feldman, “Coherence: Second Avenue,” in Frank O’Hara (Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1979), 64–70 Josh Robinson, “‘A Gasp of Laughter at Desire’: Frank O’Hara’s Poetics of Breath,” in Robert Hampson and Will Montgomery, eds., Frank O’Hara Now: New Essays on the New York Poet (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2010), 144-59 Further reference: Hazel Smith, Hyperscapes in the Poetry of Frank O’Hara: Difference / Homosexuality / Topography (Liverpool: University of Liverpool Press, 2000) Frank O’Hara, “Transcript of USA: Poetry,” in Bill Berkson and Joe LeSueur, eds., Homage to Frank O’Hara (Berkeley: Creative Arts Book Company, 1980), 215-23

4 October Jackson Pollock and Abstract Expressionism Frank O’Hara, “Jackson Pollock,” in Art Chronicles 1954-1966 (New York: George Braziller, 1975), 12-39 Joe LeSueur, “Digression on ‘Number 1, 1948’ and Jackson Pollock: A Monograph,” in Digressions on Some Poems by Frank O’Hara (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2003), 34-36, 197-204 Frank O’Hara, “American Art and non-American Art,” in Standing Still and Walking in New York (Bolinas, California: Grey Fox Press, 1975), 97-98 Lytle Shaw, “Gesture in 1960: Toward Literal Situations,” in Robert Hampson and Will Montgomery, eds., Frank O’Hara Now: New Essays on the New York Poet (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2010), 29-48 David Sweet, “Parodic Nostalgia for Aesthetic Machismo: Frank O’Hara and Jackson Pollock,” Journal of Modern Literature 23.3/4 (Summer 2000): 375-91 Anthony Libby, “O’Hara and the Silver Range,” in Jim Elledge, ed., Frank O’Hara: To Be True to a City (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1990), 131-55

Further reference: Frank O’Hara, “Robert Motherwell,” in Art Chronicles 1954-1966 (New York: George Braziller, 1975), 65-79 Clement Greenberg, “How Art Writing Earns Its Bad Name,” in John O’Brian, ed., Clement Greenberg: The Collected Essays and Criticism, vol. 4: Modernism with a Vengeance (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993), 135-44

11 October Frank O’Hara and homosexuality in the 1950s Frank O’Hara, Love Poems (Tentative Title) (New York: Tibor de Nagy Gallery, 1965) Joe LeSueur, “Homosexuality,” and “At the Old Place” in Digressions on Some Poems by Frank O’Hara (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2003),37-48, 53-58 Vincent Warren, “Frank,” in Bill Berkson and Joe LeSueur, eds., Homage to Frank O’Hara (Berkeley: Creative Arts Book Company, 1980), 74-76 Stuart Byron, “Frank O’Hara: Poetic Queertalk: review of Collected Poems of Frank O’Hara,” in Jim Elledge, ed., Frank O’Hara: To Be True to a City (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1990), 64-69 Rudy Kikel, “The Gay Frank O’Hara,” in Jim Elledge, ed., Frank O’Hara: To Be True to a City (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1990), 334-49 Bruce Boone, “Gay Language as Political Praxis: The Poetry of Frank O’Hara,” Social Text 1 (Winter 1979): 59-92 Terrell Scott Herring, “Frank O’Hara’s Open Closet,” PMLA 117.3 (May 2002): 414-27 Wayne Koestenbaum, “Jasper Johns: ‘In Memory of My Feelings’ — Frank O’Hara, 1961,” Artforum 32.7 (March 1994) further reference: Lytle Shaw, Frank O’Hara: The Poetics of Coterie (Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 2006) Anne Hartman, “Confessional Counterpublics in Frank O’Hara and Allen Ginsberg,” Journal of Modern Literature 28.4 (Summer 2005): 40-56 Roel van den Oever, “‘A common ear/for our deep gossip’: Selfhood and Friendship in the Poetry of Allen Ginsberg and Frank O’Hara,” Amerikastudien 53.4 (2008): 521-33 Gregory Bredbeck, “B/O—Barthes’s Text/O’Hara’s Trick,” PMLA 108.2 (March 1993): 268-82

18 October Neutrality: O’Hara and gender Frank O’Hara, “David Smith: The Color of Steel,” ARTnews 60.8 (December 1961): 32-34, 69-70 David Getsy, “On not making boys: David Smith, Frank O’Hara, and gender assignment” [manuscript] Maggie Nelson, “Getting Particular: Gender at Play in the Work of John Ashbery, Frank O’Hara, and James Schuyler,” Women, the New York School, and Other True Abstractions (Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 2007), 49-95 V.R. Lang, Poems & Plays with A Memoir by Alison Lurie (New York: Random House, 1975). TBD Frank O’Hara, “V. R. Lang: A Memoir,” in Standing Still and Walking in New York (Bolinas, California: Grey Fox Press, 1975), 86-87 Jim Elledge, “The Lack of Gender in Frank O’Hara’s Love Poems to Vincent Warren,” in Peter Murphy, ed., Fictions of Masculinity: Crossing Cultures, Crossing Sexualities (New York: New York University Press, 1994), 226-37 Further reference: Frank O’Hara, “David Smith,” in Art Chronicles 1954-1966 (New York: George Braziller, 1975), 53- 64

25 October The New York School: the second generation and beyond Elaine de Kooning, The Spirit of Abstract Expressionism: Selected Writings (New York: George Braziller, 1994). TBD B. H. Friedman, “Two Images, Two Moments in Art History,” in Paul Schimmel, ed., Action/Precision: The New Direction in New York 1955-50 (Newport Harbor: Newport Harbor Art Museum, 1984), 49-52 Paul Schimmel, “The Lost Generation,” in Paul Schimmel, ed., Action/Precision: The New Direction in New York 1955-50 (Newport Harbor: Newport Harbor Art Museum, 1984), 19-41 Judith E. Stein, “Figuring Out the Fifties: Aspects of Figuration and Abstraction in New York, 1950-1964,” in Paul Schimmel, ed., The Figurative Fifties: New York Figurative Expressionism (Newport Harbor and New York: Newport Harbor Art Museum and Rizzoli, 1988), 37-51 Redel Olsen, “Kites and Poses: Attitudinal Interfaces in Frank O’Hara and Grace Hartigan,” in Robert Hampson and Will Montgomery, eds., Frank O’Hara Now: New Essays on the New York Poet (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2010), 195-210 further reference: Terence Diggory, “Questions of Identity in Oranges by Frank O’Hara and Grace Hartigan,” Art Journal 52.4 (Winter 1993): 41-50 Frank O’Hara, “Helen Frankenthaler,” “Reuben Nakian,” and “Growth and Guston” in Art Chronicles 1954-1966 (New York: George Braziller, 1975),121-27, 80-91, 134-41

1 November Double entendre: O’Hara with Larry Rivers and Jasper Johns Frank O’Hara, “Larry Rivers: A Memoir,” in Standing Still and Walking in New York (Bolinas, California: Grey Fox Press, 1975), 169-73 Frank O’Hara, “Larry Rivers: The Next to Last Confederate Soldier,” in Standing Still and Walking in New York (Bolinas, California: Grey Fox Press, 1975), 95-96 Gavin Butt, “The Gift of the Gab: Camp Talk and the Art of Larry Rivers,” Between You and Me: Queer Disclosures in the New York Art World, 1948-1963 (Durham: Duke University Press, 2005), 74-105 Larry Rivers with Arnold Weinstein, What Did I Do?: The Unauthorized Autobiography (New York: Thunder’s Mountain Press, 1992), 228-45, 463-67 Nick Selby, “Memory Pieces: Collage, Memorial and the Poetics of Intimacy in Joe Brainard, Jasper Johns and Frank O’Hara,” in Robert Hampson and Will Montgomery, eds., Frank O’Hara Now: New Essays on the New York Poet (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2010), 229-46 Marjorie Perloff, “Watchman, Spy, and Dead Man: Johns, O’Hara, Cage and the ‘Aesthetic of Indifference,” Modernism/Modernity 8.2 (2001): 197-223 Jill Johnston, “The Dioscuri,” in Jasper Johns: Privileged Information (New York: Thames and Hudson, 1996), 115-178. (In particular, pp. 155-163)

8 November “Mothers of America let your kids go to the movies!”: O’Hara, film, and music [viewing: Alfred Leslie and Frank O’Hara, The Last Clean Shirt (1964)] Frank O’Hara, “Ave Maria,” CP 371-72 Jim Elledge, “ ‘Never Argue with the Movies’: Love and the Cinema in the Poetry of Frank O’Hara,” in Jim Elledge, ed., Frank O’Hara: To Be True to a City (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1990), 350-57 Frank O’Hara, “Comedy of Manners (American),” in Standing Still and Walking in New York (Bolinas, California: Grey Fox Press, 1975), 165-68 Michael Magee, “Tribes of New York: Frank O’Hara, Amiri Baraka, and the Poetics of the Five Spot,” Contemporary Literature 42.4 (Winter 2001): 694-726 Daniel Kane, “Frank O’Hara, Alfred Leslie and the Making of The Last Clean Shirt,” in Robert Hampson and Will Montgomery, eds., Frank O’Hara Now: New Essays on the New York Poet (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2010), 163-77

Further reference: Olivier Brossard, “The Last Clean Shirt,” Jacket 23 (August 2003) Will Montgomery, “‘In Fatal Winds’: Frank O’Hara and Morton Feldman,” in Robert Hampson and Will Montgomery, eds., Frank O’Hara Now: New Essays on the New York Poet (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2010), 195-210 Frank O’Hara, “New Directions in Music: Morton Feldman,” in Standing Still and Walking in New York (Bolinas, California: Grey Fox Press, 1975), 115-2 Andrew Epstein, Beautiful Enemies: Friendship and Postwar American Poetry (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006)

15 November PRESENTATIONS

22 November Thanksgiving break: no class

29 November PRESENTATIONS

6 December CRITIQUE WEEK: no class

13 December PRESENTATIONS