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How to Build a World Art: the Strategic Universalism of Colour Reproductions and the UNESCO Prize (1953-1968)

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How to Build a World Art: the Strategic Universalism of Colour Reproductions and the UNESCO Prize (1953-1968) Artl@s Bulletin Volume 10 Issue 1 Images in Circulation Article 6 How to build a World Art: The Strategic Universalism of Colour Reproductions and the UNESCO Prize (1953-1968) Chiara Vitali Ecole Normale Superieure de Paris, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/artlas Part of the Contemporary Art Commons, Cultural History Commons, European History Commons, Fine Arts Commons, Interdisciplinary Arts and Media Commons, Latin American History Commons, Museum Studies Commons, Photography Commons, Sociology of Culture Commons, and the Visual Studies Commons Recommended Citation Vitali, Chiara. "How to build a World Art: The Strategic Universalism of Colour Reproductions and the UNESCO Prize (1953-1968)." Artl@s Bulletin 10, no. 1 (2021): Article 6. This document has been made available through Purdue e-Pubs, a service of the Purdue University Libraries. Please contact [email protected] for additional information. This is an Open Access journal. This means that it uses a funding model that does not charge readers or their institutions for access. Readers may freely read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of articles. This journal is covered under the CC BY-NC-ND license. Images in Circulation How to build a World Art: The Strategic Universalism of Colour Reproductions and the UNESCO Prize (1953- 1968) École Normale Supérieure, Paris Chiara Vitali Abstract What role did UNESCO play in the art world of the post- war era? This article makes use of published and archival sources in order to clarify the utopia of a “World Art” that shaped UNESCO and led to the “Archives of Colour Reproductions of Works of Art”, a project of worldwide collect and diffusion of images of “masterworks” inspired by Malraux’s “Museum without walls”. This case study focuses on one particular aspect of the project, the “UNESCO Prize”, conceived by the Brazilian art critic and Marxist intellectual Mario Pedrosa for the 1953 São Paulo Biennial. Résumé Quel rôle l’UNESCO a- t- elle joué dans le monde de l’art de l’après- guerre ? Cet article puise dans des sources premières et secondaires pour clarifier l’utopie du « World Art » qui fa- çonnait l’UNESCO et conduisitMusée imaginaire à la création des « Archives des reproductions en couleurs des peintures », un projet à échelle mondiale de collecte et diffusion d’images de « chefs- d’œuvre », inspiré du de Malraux. Cette étude de cas se concentre sur un aspect particulier du projet, le “Prix UNESCO”, conçu par le critique d’art brésilien et intel- lectuel marxiste Mario Pedrosa pour la Biennale de São Paulo de 1953. Chiara Vitali is a student at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris in the Art History Department. She obtained her BA in art history at the University of Rome “La Sapienza” and her MA in Transnational History at the University Paris Sciences & Lettres. Artl@s Bulletin, Vol. 10, Issue 1 (Spring 2021) Vitali – How to build a World Art Introduction. Thinking Over the Artistic Impact of UNESCO from a Decentralised Perspective torian Akira Iriye also claimed that post- war global history, and in particular the 1950s, has been mis- guided by an approach too focused on the Cold War When the United Nations Educational, Scientific and thus on the rivalry between the United States and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) was created 4 and the Soviet Union. Politically and artistically in 1946, its officials had great ambitions for the role 1 reduced to a binary transatlantic opposition, the they could play in the “Art World”. In a world that complexity of post- war polycentric globalisation was perceived as in the process of globalisation, 5 still needs to be investigated. but not yet globalised, UNESCO had an important edge over other cultural institutions of the time : its This case study approaches circulation from a his- capacity of circulation. As an international organi- torical and materialistic perspective, joint with a zation of worldwide reach, their ability to operate transnational approach, as it already proved to be across borders was indeed an incredible asset, but effective in producing new research perspectives how could it be used in the fine arts field? Since along axes other than merely6 “Paris/New York” moving original works of art all around the world and “Western/non- Western”. This perspective is was too difficult, dangerous, and expensive in the the only one allowing to untangle two main con- post- war period, the answer was found in colour tradictions in the UNESCO political and artistic reproductions. Movable and light, reproductions position of the period : first, the one between UNE- could showcase modern art and the technical prog- SCO’s multicultural goals and universal rhetoric on ress in colour reprography all around the world, the one hand, and its deeply rooted eurocentrism7 meeting perfectly the utopian scope of UNESCO in on the other hand, especially when it came to art; its first decade: building2 a “One World” sharing the secondly, the fact that despite its political orienta- same universal values. tions – Rachel E. Perry accurately pointed out the French interests in the Colour Reproductions proj- This paper takes as a starting point and as histori- 8 ect – UNESCO was also a “stage” for international cal and conceptual frame the works of the art histo- 9 visibility of the “Darker Nations”. Indeed, focus on rians Catherine Dossin and Béatrice Joyeux- Prunel, circulations and transnational mediators allows to who have highlighted the art diversity of the post- dynamize the centre-periphery paradigm and show war years and the polycentrism of this era, which other mechanisms of mimetism, rivalry and, above saw the emergence of new art centres on a global all, the agency of the “margins”. scale. Taking a transnational, material and quan- titative approach, they put into perspective the The focus on colour reproductions of paintings de- narrative of the “American Triumph” and of the ex- rives its meaning from this theoretical framework, clusivity of the Paris-New York 3axe, vehiculated by following the idea that writing art history from a much of today’s historiography. Transnational his- Global Community: The Role of International Organizations in the Making of4 the Contemporary World 1 Akira Iriye, This expression was commonly used by the officials of the “Arts and Letters Division”, , University of California PressAtlántico (Berkeley Frío and: Historias Los Angeles, Trans- as we can see in UNESCO’s internal correspondence: e.g. Internal memorandum ofth nacionales2002).5 Del Arte y La Política En Los Tiempos Del Telón de Acero Peter Bellew, UNESCO supervisor of the Colour Reproductions project, August 27 This premise is also that of Paula Barreiro López, ed., 1955.2 UNESCO archives, AG13, 7A145.01 (41-4). (Madrid: Brumaria, Julian Huxley, the first Director General, was a biologist whose world view was 2019).6 mainly based on evolutionary theories. His father, Thomas Huxley, was a close friend A recent publication encourages the study of circulation in a transnational perspec- of Darwin. His more famous brother was Aldous Huxley, the author of “Brave New tive in the art historyCirculations discipline, in the traditionally Global History more of focusedArt on the study of artistic “in- World”, the dystopian novel with eugenic sympathies published in 1932. Julian Huxley fluences” and “diffusion”. Thomas Dacosta Kaufmann, Catherine Dossin, and Béatrice thought that humanity’s progress towards a single, global and “enlightened” culture, a Joyeux- Prunel, Circulation , Ashgate Publishing (Farnham “One world”, was a necessaryJournal and of positive World History step in human evolution and that it was UN- and Burlington, Histoire2015). For de al’UNESCO. different Lesapproach Trente toPremières circulations Années. in art 1945- history, 1974 see also ESCO’s prerogative toThe accelerate Rise and thisFall process.of American Glenda Art, Sluga, 1940s- “UNESCO 1980s. A andGeopolitics the (One) of François7 Brunet, ed., (Chicago: Terra Foundation for American Art, 2017). WesternWorld3 of ArtJulian Worlds. Huxley,” 21, no. 3 (2010): 393–418. Chloé Maurel, (Paris: Catherine Dossin, Les Avant- Gardes Artistiques (1945- 1970). Une Histoire L’Harmattan,8 2010).Making Art History in Europe After 1945 Transnationale. (Farnham and Burlington: Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2015); Rachel E. Perry, “UNESCO’s Colour Reproductions Project: Bringing (French) Art to Béatrice Joyeux- Prunel, Thethe World,”Art Bulletin in (New York: Routledge, 2020); (to Artl@sbe published.); Bulletin Béatrice Joyeux- Prunel, “Provincializing Paris. Rachel E. Perry, The“Immutable Darker Nations. Mobiles : A People’sUNESCO’s History Archives of the of ThirdColour World Reproductions,” The Center- Periphery Narrative of Modern Art in Light of Quantitative and Transna- 9 99, no. 2 (2017): 166–85. tional Approaches,” 4 (2015), http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/artlas/vol4 Vijay Prashad, (New York: /iss1/4/. The New Press, 2008). 74 Artl@s Bulletin, Vol. 10, Issue 1 (Spring 2021) Images in Circulation Vitali – How to build a World Art global perspective implies taking into account all platform, he found a way to use it to promote Bra- material object conveying images, texts and also zilian geometric abstraction and, more broadly, ideologies and utopias. This object of study is an “geographically or politically disadvantaged” art- inherently transdisciplinary one, at the crossroads ists. Thus designed for “peripherical” artists, this Informel of art history, cultural studies, 10mass-media stud- prize was another element of his critical combat ies, and international relations. Already in 1989, against the aesthetics,14 that he considered Arjun Appadurai suggested that commodities, like a “mere international fashion”. The winner of the people, had “social lives” and that studying their prize was awarded with a somewhat unusual, but circulations11 implied recognising their political val- at the time, quite valuable currency: worldwide cir- ue. In a historical moment which saw the boom- culation of an image of the artwork, in the form of ing of easy- to- transport, reproducible exhibitions, colour reproductions.
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