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Volume 16 - 2008 Lehigh Review

2008 Art is a Symbol: Conceptualism and the Vietnam War Michael King

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This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Lehigh Review at Lehigh Preserve. It has been accepted for inclusion in Volume 16 - 2008 by an authorized administrator of Lehigh Preserve. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Art is a Symbol: Conceptualism and the Vietnam War

by Michael King

32 rt is a symbol. It serves as a visual man- ifestation of the ideas that shape an age, despite perceived distance and removal from that reality. Jackson Pollock, argu- Goodman Campus ably the most influential American The 500-acre site was given to A Lehigh during the 1960’s by artist, suggests, “The modern art- tation. It can be perceived from Bethlehem Steel in an agree- ist cannot express this age, the countless perspectives, based on ment that involved Lehigh airplane, the atom bomb, the ra- a viewer’s experience regarding giving up specific property to dio, in the old forms of the Renais- reality. Gleizes and Metzinger Moravian College. sance or of any other past culture.” present an essentially romantic Though Pollock was refering to view of creating art, one in which the 1940s and 1950s, his insight there are no rules. The only limits remains relevant in understanding are those within an artist’s mind. the art created during the Vietnam Subsequently, Williams and Gle- War. Upon first glance it may ap- izes argue that, “The truly modern pear as though conceptualism, the artist, the artist of the future, ‘will April 12, 1944 major American artistic movement fashion the real in the image of his of the 1960s and 1970s, demon- mind, for there is only one truth, Eighty-one Lehigh Engineers strated indifference toward the ours, when we impose it on every- find out that their recent de- conflict, but this claim could not one.’” This realization liberated ferment from the WWII draft be further from the truth. Con- artists, so that they could expose had been rescinded and even ceptualists of the Vietnam War era pieces of themselves in their graduating seniors are eligible looked to new means and tech- artwork and essentially dominate niques to convey the ideas and to perspective. The individuals who for service. analyze the events that inspired communicated through art during their motivations. To understand the Vietnam War adhered to these the relationship between this attributes outlined by Gleizes and particular artistic movement and Metzinger. the Vietnam War, one must first examine the artistic movements Art During the World War II Era that dominated American creative though over the course of the 20th With the spread of Adolf Hitler’s century. oppressive juggernaut throughout Europe, many of the continent’s Modern Art prominent artists sought refuge across the Atlantic in the United When the artists Albert Gleizes States. Subsequently American and Jean Metzinger published the art experienced significant influ- book, On Cubism, in 1912, they un- ence from the exiled artists and knowingly established a standard thinkers who were in the midst of for what it meant to be an artist in embracing the Surrealist aesthetic the modern world . In On Cub- as prescribed by the movement’s ism, the duo suggests that a work founder André Breton. Breton of art is open to a fluid interpre- claimed that, “Surrealism rests on

33 the belief in the supe- Hostile letters between rior reality of certain the Assistant Secretary forms of association of Defense and an Eth- hitherto neglected, in ics Committee Member the omnipotence of the about the Vietnam War dream, and in the disin- Memorial Wall, Cour- terested play of thought.” tesy of Special Collec- Influenced heavily by the tions, Lehigh Univer- work of Sigmund Freud, sity Libraries. Breton embraced the idea of psychic automatism. artistic movements. Psychic automatism can be In response to the described as a reconcili- evolving cultural ation of sorts between the context, the calcu- conscious and unconscious lated chaos of ab- realms of human existence stract expression- through permitting the con- ism took the then tent of dreams and other de- sacred ideal of sires to permeate one’s con- psychic automa- scious work. This practice was tism to a new lev- an attempt to depict the need el. Unlike their to expand the limits of human predecessors, reality in response to political the abstract and cultural turmoil that had expressionists consumed Europe. Though the neglected con- Surrealists tried vehemently to scious thought ensure that their work retain a all together sense of purity amidst American and allowed unconscious culture and influence it was not thought alone to manifest itself on canvas. meant to be. The different cultural Action painting, the primary technique of the abstract settings required new artistic forms. Art historian expressionists made famous by Jackson Pollock, Matthew Gale suggests, “This signaled the institution- paralleled the dynamism of modern life. That is, the alization of Surrealism in America where exhibitions apparent unpredictability of throwing and dripping passed outside the control of the movement. It was to paint onto canvases served as a reaction to the com- establish a pattern, which divorced the paintings from placency of the populace. Furthermore, the tech- their theoretical and experimental roots.” Despite the niques were a testament to constantly fluctuating geo- introduction of new ideas to American art the situation political demands. A visual style that challenged the was bleak. To refresh and save art from itself artists definition of what constituted art despite exhibiting had to look for new motivation. an undeniably torrid melody, abstract expressionism conveyed its cultural influences through aggressively Art Post-World War II emotive color and dynamic patterns of paint applica- tion. Although nonrepresentational, abstract expres- In the wake of World War II, the United States sionism was nevertheless a revolutionary reaction to entered a period of economic prosperity and social the world surrounding the artists. complacency. Half way around the world the Soviet In the mid to late 1950s and 1960s, artists turned Union emerged as a nuclear superpower threaten- away from abstract expressionism and began forging ing US dominance with nuclear war. This complex art out of images to which popular culture had already geopolitical backdrop led to the emergence of new grown accustomed. Though not necessarily intended

34 to be a critical movement in tone, the work of the President Lyndon Johnson. By the autumn of 1967, Pop artists did challenge established social institu- more than half a million US servicemen and women tions and structures. By appropriating elements that had been sent to serve in Vietnam, but because it was reflected popular tastes and trends, the Pop artists difficult for the public to recognize the importance conveyed a sense of irony as exemplified by, but not of Vietnam to American foreign policy, Johnson at- limited to, the work of Andy Warhol. A gifted tacti- tempted to saturate popular culture with pro-Vietnam cian of manipulation, Warhol used wit to demonstrate sentiment. his contempt for established values and practices. In President Johnson arranged for the White House a series of works known as Death in America, Warhol Festival of the Arts to be held on June 14, 1965. If he addressed the way in which the mass media reduces could win the favor of the painters, sculptors, writ- death to a trivial and meaningless happening. The ers, musicians, and photographers who were invited grotesque suicides and car accidents that Warhol through alleged interest in their work and recogni- reproduced from newspaper photographs initiated tion of their influence on American intellect, then it a shift in what was deemed acceptable to address appeared as though Johnson would have in a sense by contemporary artists. According to art historian legitimated his decisions as a leader by engendering Thomas Crow, “he was attracted to the open sores in respect and perhaps admiration on a personal level. American political life.” The Pop artists produced ar- Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Robert Lowell was one of tistic images that were directly referential, unlike the those expected to attend. In an effort to demonstrate subtle means pursued by the movement’s his contempt for Johnson’s insurgency into Vietnam predecessors. This perspective is vital Lowell publicly renounced his invitation stating, “I in understanding the movements that nevertheless can only follow our present for- emerged in the years to follow. eign policy with the greatest dismay and distrust.” He continued, The Origins of Conceptualism “Every serious artist knows that he The 1960s were characterized cannot by a shift in the foreign policy of enjoy the US government. The Kennedy public administration was preoccupied cel- with the “domino theory.” This ebration theory’s central principle was without that if a country fell to com- making munism the surrounding subtle countries would do the same. public com- Thus, when Ho Chi Minh’s mitments.” nationalist movement in Several other Vietnam was identified as notable art- embodying communist ists, including tendencies, President leading painter John F. Kennedy set the Mark Rothko and stage for massive US in- photographer volvement in the coun- Paul Strand, fol- try. Through a system lowed Lowell’s lead of military advisors, and denounced the Kennedy initiated event. The festival a prolonged con- took place despite flict that came to its tarnished image. fruition under Many of those in atten-

35 dance used the event as a The Students’ Army Training Corps “was estab- ever that his stance paralleled platform to publicly vocal- lished at Lehigh University on October 1, 1918, the conceptualist identity as ize their opposition to the and was continued until December 11, 1918.” aforementioned. Even before war. As President Johnson Here the announcement is being read in front Lowell rejected his invitation to reflected: “Some of them of Packer Church. Lehigh Register 1918-1919. the White House Festival of the insult me by staying away Courtesy of Special Collections, Lehigh Univer- Arts, artists had begun to imple- and some of them insult me sity Libraries. ment anti-establishment ideology by coming.” Instead in their work. In March of 1964 a of improving Johnson’s former minimalist and one of image and promoting the first artists to be labeled American involvement a conceptualist, Donald Judd in Vietnam, the White said, “I’m totally uninterested House Festival of the in European art and I think it’s Arts was a spectacle over with.” Instead his influ- of political protest that ences came from elsewhere. embodied the motiva- Judd suggested that he did not tions of many Ameri- want rationalism to be incor- can artists. porated into his work. Judd Several practicing contemplated what it meant artists embraced the to be an artist at a time when, ideas promoted by “the humanity of any individual Robert Lowell and his subject had just been cast in counterparts. In do- doubt by massive demonstration ing so they formed of the inhumanity of the human an artistic collabora- species.” For Judd, and other tive unlike any the artists like him, the answer to world had yet seen. this question came in the ironic Known as the con- metaphors that conceptualism ceptualists, these offered. radicals embraced Donald Judd used his dis- minimalist tenden- tinct processes to comment on cies, and forged the state of US foreign affairs. a new kind of art. Primarily based within the me- These individuals embraced the dium of sculpture, Judd turned to means to an end as the art. They conventional materials including believed the process, not the fin- the art.” To fully comprehend the sheet metal and plywood, to con- ished product, was where the key influence real world events had on struct his finished products. After to pure expression existed. The the work of the conceptualists an acquiring the desired materials, conceptualist aesthetic included analysis of the ideals embraced he would draw up meticulous blue highly abstract paintings with by these artists is necessary. prints that he would pass on to an seemingly no subject matter, as outside source. This source, usu- well as easily recognizable ob- Art as a Means of Political Dissent ally an industrial engineer, would jects that served as a record of then create geometric sculptures ideas. In his Paragraphs on Con- To say that Robert Lowell was based on Judd’s designs. For the ceptual Art (1967), Sol Lewitt ex- solely responsible for the emer- most part Judd’s sculptures con- plains, “What the work of art looks gence or organization of the sisted of identical cube-like or cy- like isn’t too important. The idea conceptualist movement would lindrical pieces to which he would becomes a machine that makes be false. It must be noted how- apply one color of paint. Fellow

36 artist Frank Stella, who worked refrained from imposing the Of his influences the concep- very closely with Judd, described modernism inherent to the pro- tualist Robert Morris explained, their kind of work as having, motion of its capitalist agenda on “I was making objects that were “no background or foreground. other sovereign states, then there involved with some kind of pro- Each piece is a kind of unit, but it world would have been a more cess or literary idea of history or locks together into what I think is stable environment marked not state that an object might have basically a stable or symmetrical by conflict but by the simplicity other than just that visual one.” situation.” This extreme visual of solidarity. These sentiments Morris recognized the signifi- simplicity and repetitive unity is were echoed in the work of Robert cance of contextual events. Like suggestive. Echoing a society’s Morris. Judd, Robert Morris need to sarcastically lambaste the failed rationalism that had manifested itself through the Vietnam War, Judd used a reduced rationalism to create work that demonstrated not only simplicity, but also beautiful order and equality. Per- haps Judd was trying to convey the belief that less is more. That is, if the United States

(Right) The Lehigh Student Army Training Corps circa 1915-1919. Courtesy of Special Collections, Lehigh University Libraries.

(Above) Lehigh Student Army Training Corps members during training circa 1915-1919 with Bethlehem Steel in the background. Courtesy of Special Collections, Lehigh University Libraries.

37 idea art, the conceptualists practiced Students playing leapfrog other forms as well. While it would be outside the Alumni Memorial exceedingly difficult to compile a defin- Building, 1915-1919, Courtesy itive list of artists whose work was influ- of Special Collections, Lehigh enced by the Vietnam War, Frank Stella University Libraries would be included. Stella looked to the articulated pure geometric abstraction practiced creative by several Europeans between the two world wars to thought develop his technique. He idolized Piet Mondrian, through whose paintings consisted of a variety of rectangular uncon- forms painted in solid colors. In 1965 Stella produced ventional the painting Empress of India. A canvas dominated sculpture. In 1968 Morris by four identical chevrons positioned differently in used his Untitled (Tan Felt) to articulate his belief relation to each other, Empress of India conveys his in the anti-form. The work was constituted of a num- exploitation of the conventional use of rectangular ber of felt strips that would never be placed in the canvases “to make quite sure that his pictures bore same position twice and thus presented differently ev- no resemblance to windows.” This vehement opposi- ery time the work was photographed or exhibited to tion to referencing modern entities demonstrated his the public emphasizing the importance of the process. work’s “self-contained” style. He confessed: “I began When coupled with the recognition of the influence to think too that it might be necessary also for me to of real world events on the interpretation of art, the have something different to say.” Stella further com- aforementioned realization of working both inside and municated his need to express his own style through outside the limits endemic to his pieces demonstrated the manner in which he painted his canvases. The the genius of Morris. Empress of India showcases four triangles painted It is likely that the ideas manifested in the art in different hues of brown and red with solid white created by Robert Morris were influenced by the lines separating both the different triangles from Vietnam War. He claimed, “I’m always aware of that each other as well as particular geometric regions of thing there in front of me. It’s not a matter of being each triangle. This emphasis on separation coupled lost.” Alluding to his awareness of environment, Mor- with a dark, gloomy color scheme evokes a feeling ris’ suggests his artistic intent was subtle. “I think of of loneliness and even desperation. These sensa- them as having this difference between what one sees tions are compounded by the use of powdered metal away from them and what one sees closer.” Morris’ paint, which gives the work an iridescent sheen. This forms reflect the influence anti-war sentiments had reflective quality speaks volumes about the personal on his psyche. Though making direct reference to his message on which Stella was fixated. Stella’s intro- sculptures, the previous statement can be regarded as spective tendencies related to a generation. Greg a call to disregard initial perceptions and to embrace Landon, a private in the U.S. First Infantry Division in the knowledge acquired from a closer examination Vietnam, echoed this dread when he wrote “Morale of of subjects. This approach is a response to the failed the men is fairly good considering the situation we’re rationality that had consumed American social and in, but there is an underlying gloom.” Using a simple political practices as exemplified by the war in Viet- technique, Stella’s Empress of India manifests the nam. This idea parallels the ideals pursued in the emotions that had colored his world-view. This work much larger anti-war movement. In other words, Mor- chronicled the general feelings of loss and shame to ris was enabled by the horrors unfolding in Southeast which Stella connected that had permeated society as Asia to challenge the idea of establishment in general. a result of the disillusioning Vietnam War. Despite ab- Morris’s work is a vehement critique of the flawed stract means, the conceptualists had indeed demon- rationalism that Donald Judd similarly believed had strated their frustration with Vietnam through painting corrupted modern man. and sculpture. Though sculpture may appear to have dominated To connect the world of high art to the real world 38 “Never Again”, a piece on Isolationism, Cour- Lehigh Bachelor: House party issue April 1941, Cour- tesy of Special Collections, Lehigh University Libraries tesy of Special Collections, Lehigh University Libraries

events of the 1960s, artist Leon Golub wrote: “This you are likely to stay below the sophistication of the is not political art, but rather a popular expression apparatus you are attacking.” Confirming their estab- of popular revulsion . . . but essentially the work is lished aesthetics, Haacke articulated the conceptualist angry against the war, against the bombing, against desire to create works that addressed themselves to President Johnson, etc.” Though there were excep- individuals through thought. It was the responsibility tions, most practicing artists of the 1960s believed it of a viewer to apply the content of a painting to their was taboo to directly address social issues in their life experience. He continued, “It is emotionally grati- work. The conceptualists adhered to this aversion to fying to point the finger at some atrocity and say this realism and turned to abstraction to communicate the here is the bastard responsible for it. But, in effect . . feelings of the American public regarding Vietnam. . appeals and condemnations don’t make you think.” Hans Haacke claimed: “If you make protest paintings, These artists were not practicing arbitration. Instead 39 their works were the products of standards, that is the emphasis Conceptualist Performance prophetic intent. these artists placed on process over finished work, exempli- Describing the artistic atmo- A Coordinated Effort fied the “popular revulsion” that sphere of the 1960s and 1970s demanded articulation. Through French artist Daniel Buren pro- As the Vietnam War reached its their unity the artists featured claimed, “Art is the safety valve of height in the late 1960s, the art in this exhibition fixated on the our repressive system. As long as world committed itself to respond- responsibility of art to manifest it exists, and, better yet, the more ing to the issue. In the autumn of meaning through forms “beyond prevalent it becomes, art will be 1968, a major exhibition of con- reality.” To convey the solemnity the system’s distracting mask. ceptual art opened at the Paula of the Vietnam War these artists And a system has nothing to fear Cooper Gallery in New York City had to “create these kinds of styl- as long as its reality is masked, as arranged by peace activist Ron ized forms which are so brutal that as long as its contradictions are Wolin and painter Robert Huot. A they jump beyond the stylization.” hidden.” Buren believed that, in coordinated effort to fundraise for In their own manner, conceptual- general, artists concealed com- the “Student Mobilization Against ists like Donald Judd, Robert Mor- mentary deep within the images the War” campaign, the show con- ris and Frank Stella embodied the they produced. Instead they al- tained pieces from fourteen lead- modernist principles outlined by lowed the infinite forms of beauty ing artists, including Donald Judd Gleizes and Metzinger to address to confront viewers upon initial and Robert Morris. Wolin and the Vietnam War. The abstraction contact with any particular piece. Huot offered a statement summa- in which these three men sought The work of many conceptualists rizing the artists’ thoughts regard- refuge, however, may not have is in keeping with this tradition. ing the manner through which resonated with Americans the There were those, however, who their work lambasted the war: way they would have liked. Their promoted a distinctly political fla- These fourteen non-objective critique of rationalist tendencies vor through their respective me- artists are against the war in instilled in another conceptual- diums. Hans Haacke was one of Vietnam. They are supporting this ist faction the importance of the the few artists who implemented commitment in the strongest man- process in successfully conveying this remarkably straightforward ner open to them by contributing ideas. It was this other more ac- ambition. major examples of their current cessible group of artists that truly A direct critique of the Vietnam work. The artists and the individ- captured the public’s eye. War, Haacke’s bold contribution ual pieces were selected to pres- to the “Information” show of 1970 ent a particular aesthetic attitude, at the Museum in the conviction that a cohesive group of important works makes the most forceful statement for peace. An inventive anti-war action that raised more than thirty thou- sand dollars for the campaign, the exhibition was a testament to the character of the pieces on dis- play. The aversion to conventional

The city of Bethlehem welcomes home World War I soldiers at the war’s end in 1918. Cour- tesy of Special Collections, Lehigh University Libraries.

40 Parade for World War I soldiers upon their return home in 1918. Courtesy of Special Collections, Lehigh University Libraries.

Burden offers insight into the political significance of body art. Drawing technical influence from action embodied by the abstract- expressionists and the absurdity of the Surrealists, Burden set out to challenge complacent indiffer- it also championed physical action ence through a catharsis of fear of Modern Art in New York City as a form of artistic expression. that demonstrated the aggres- was his effort to “challenge the In keeping with conceptual- sion that characterized 1960s and political status quo.” An interac- ist thought, a number of artists 1970s politics and society. Rather tive piece that required the par- turned to body art as a means of than directing that aggression to- ticipation of visitors, Haacke’s creative exploration. Theatrical wards another individual or inani- work consisted of ballot boxes for in nature, body art accentuated mate object he used his “flesh as “yes” and “no” votes placed under the pivotal conceptualist belief material,” which surely accentuat- a plaque that read “Would the fact that the process was indeed the ed his aims. In the late 1960s Bur- that Governor Rockefeller has not main property of art. Furthermore den experimented several times denounced President Nixon’s In- body art is a testament to the with dragging his naked body dochina policy be a reason for you exhaustion of other forms. Those through broken glass and nails. not to vote for him in November?” who practiced body art believed Before an audience in 1971 Bur- This confrontational work chal- that they had no choice but to den shot himself through the arm lenged the very idea of what con- make their own bodies a canvas, and in 1974 his work culminated stitutes art by reducing the piece because more conventional forms with what he called Trans-fixed. to strictly a thought and process. of art could not accurately illus- For Trans-fixed Burden had assis- Hans Haacke’s Visitors’ Poll is trate the needs of the time. The tants crucify him to the back of a representative of a transitional widespread aversion to rational- Volkswagen that was then driven form of conceptualism. Making ism professed by these artists can around a motorway for more than reference to the notion that art be attributed to their disgust of two minutes with the majority should embrace a call to political the Vietnam War. of the sequence photographed. and social reform on literal levels, The work of American Chris Perceived by many as acts of self- 41 mutilation, Burden’s antics were not a plea for sym- Vietnam War protest outside the Pentagon in Wash- pathy. With a world-view colored by the Vietnam War ington D.C., Morrison doused himself in gasoline and his work chronicled the extreme intensity of the era lit himself on fire. While it is unlikely that Morrison and a nation’s habitual violence. The visual language considered himself an artist, his actions nevertheless Burden employed parodies the traumatic condition demonstrated an intention to express, and thus must that the US government had forced upon the populace be regarded as inherently artistic. The premise of as a result of its military involvement in Vietnam. It is art is representation. Though it assumes an abstract indeed rather derisive in tone. Through damaging the physical quality, the act itself possesses the potential human body, Burden’s work ironically mocks tradition- to communicate a distinct message. Self-immolation al value judgments regarding the sanctity of the is transcendental. A human flesh. friend of Morrison said, “Norman was preoccupied with Viet- nam and sometimes

Lehigh Bach- elor: “Lehigh Fall House Party”, Courtesy of Spe- cial Collections, Lehigh University Libraries

he made people uncomfortable. You don’t like to be re- minded constantly that your country is dropping napalm bombs on other people.” Mor- rison did exactly that. By sacrific- ing his own life he exacerbated an already bit- ter debate regarding the legitimacy of the actions of the US government in Vietnam. Although Morrison’s Furthermore, his irrational processes accentuated death was indeed a sacrifice for a cause much greater the destructive capability of the modern world that than his own existence, it must not be denied that one had been highlighted by the larger anti-war move- of the most basic human instincts is self-preservation. ment. To recognize the artistic nature of Chris Bur- Therefore, his distinctly irrational behavior placed den’s actions is to modify one’s perception of art. Morrison in the company of the conceptualists as it A Quaker and father of three children, thirty-one serves as a critique of the alleged rationalism prac- year old Norman Morrison was an unsuspecting ge- ticed by the war making United States. Moreover, nius. On November 2, 1965, as part of a larger anti- Morrison’s self-immolation challenged the common

42 man to examine their moral constitution, which pro- need to extend humanist sentiments over the mili- moted Morrison to serve as the embodiment of the tary industrial complex. Through sculpture, painting, definition of an artist as suggested by Albert Gle- body art, and self-immolation, idea art forced society izes and Jean Metzinger. His actions were artistically to redefine its very concept of art. The creation of a beautiful, yet tragic. Unfortunately he would not be new artistic aesthetic, in keeping with suggestions of alone. Albert Gleizes and Jean Metzinger, was a response If Norman Morrison had potentially conceived the to the new culture that was emerging out of the Viet- idea of immolating himself from the Buddhist monk nam War. Pollock said, “The strangeness will wear who had done the same just a day before the Quaker off and I think we will discover the deeper meanings had publicly communicated his grief, then perhaps in modern art.” Conceptual art was transcendental. Morrison inspired Roger Allen LaPorte to do the same. It served as the medium through which emotional A twenty-one year old philosophy major at Hunter abstraction could be reconciled with the minimalist College in New York City, LaPorte was a member of introspection necessary to artistically approach the the Catholic Worker Movement, a “charitable and Vietnam War. The conceptualists understood that pacifist organization in New York City.” On the morn- representation was more than other artists had let it ing of November 9, 1965, just one week after Mor- be; therefore it is no surprise that their tendencies rison’s death outside the Pentagon, LaPorte “knelt were suggestively nonrepresentational. T.J. Clark cross-legged . . . in the posture of the Buddhist wrote, “Abstract art is perniciously lively, but always monks,” poured a gallon of gasoline over his head seemingly on its last legs. And it has to be protected: and proceeded to light himself on fire in front of the something is at stake in it: something the culture as United Nations building. A guard outside the build- a whole is still trying to sort out, of which art is an ing spotted LaPorte after flames had consumed him emblem.” This statement could not be any more and did his best to extinguish the blaze. LaPorte was accurate. Abstract art is the embodiment of all that transported to Bellevue Hospital where he died from society and popular culture cannot or chooses not to his injuries the next day. Given his pacifist tendencies comprehend. Art is a testament to the fact that emo- and involvement with a group opposed to the war in tions, objects, ideas, and events are indeed more than Vietnam, it can be surmised that he wanted his death what they may initially appear to be. The conceptual to inspire dissent within the United States as part of pieces produced during the Vietnam War demonstrate the larger anti-war movement. Even if this assump- a starkly aggressive atmosphere that enables viewers tion is wrong, LaPorte’s action remains a work of art. to connect with the era on a personal level. This need His use of not only his body but, more importantly, his for a truthful sense of awareness was one of the driv- life as a means of expression must be considered a ing forces behind the conceptualists’ insatiable desire response to the Vietnam War’s rational irrationality. To to express, which has influenced all subsequent art. view the deaths of both Norman Morrison and Roger The conceptualists’ emphasis on documenting preva- Allen LaPorte as works of art is not an attempt to de- lent ideologies will exist until the end of mankind, as base their lives. Their actions exposed a philosophi- it is through the demonstration of contextually appli- cal truth embraced by a larger artistic movement. cable ideas that history is preserved. That truth being that art could no longer be visually distinguished from reality. The conceptualists, most notably Morrison and LaPorte, had transformed life and death into art. Oscar Wilde once said, “We spend our days searching for the meaning of life. Well, the mean- ing of life is art.” Wilde’s words speak volumes when considered in relation to the fine art produced during the Vietnam War era. Though other forms may have been more easily understood, it was the work of the conceptualists that provided an accurate record of the

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