Propaganda art in wartime

Résumé du document

The Roman philosopher Horace wrote that "the purpose of art is to inform and delight". Indeed, this statement is the principal purpose of propaganda. Propaganda is the dissemination of information aimed at influencing the opinions or behaviors of people. It is a systematic attempt to shape perceptions, and manipulate cognitions to achieve the desires of the propagandist and the commissioner (the State). Propaganda is an appeal to emotion rather than an appeal to intellect. It is a pure act of persuasion. Committed art isn't just a way to denounce the abuses and to take a stand on an issue. In a sense, propaganda is also a kind of committed art. Indeed, acting as a buffer between the horrors of reality and the individual's perceptions of the world, art allows people to see and understand social problems, and to prevent them from manifesting in some situations. Art helps to inform and educate society on controversial issues, and can also be used to change people's perceptions about certain issues.

Extraits

[...] Clement Greenberg, a critic of political art, believed true art “should attend to purely artistic concerns; to make, in effect, abstract art which would be immune to political exploitation”. This theory of an artist totally uncompromised ideological and politically seems unobtainable in our contemporary arts. Moreover, in our modern culture, the indoctrination occurs through the use of advertising, television or the way news is reported. And this indoctrination is more difficult to identify. So, do you think it's time to question all the beliefs we cherish and all the information that is presented to us? [...]

[...] War posters were one the most popular forms of propagandistic art during the two world wars. Wartime propaganda helps people to adjust to unfamiliar conditions and to change their priorities. The artists often use mass cultural visual codes (such as those promoted in movies or advertisements) to represent warfare. This “hollywoodization” has been to make war seem familiar and at the same time to “glamorize” it by exploiting the habits of fantasy and desire generated by mass entertainment." During wartime, we can observe that the role of traditional arts as painting, sculptures or theatre, diminishes, while art with easily read messages such as posters flourishes. [...]

[...] After the two world wars, the propaganda art in wartime became more and more common. Both the Korean and Viet-Nam wars induced many works of art protesting the government involvement in foreign conflicts. The United States and the Soviet Union both used propaganda during the Cold War. Even during the democratic revolutions of 1989 in Central and Eastern Europe, propaganda became a weapon in the hands of the opposition. For example, printed and hand-made political posters appeared on the Berlin Wall. [...]

[...] Propaganda is a true weapon in wartime. But we also could have talk about the art of propaganda, that is to say the styles and techniques of propaganda. Traditionally, society tries to separate political and cultural issues, but art seems to serve as a mean of combining political messages into a cultural forum. Art incorporating strong political and social messages serves the propagandists purpose of facilitating the spread of information and opinion. I would like to instigate the debate on the problem of external influences on artistic style. [...]

[...] In the twentieth century, propaganda was present in all the spheres of society, by the aim of the state to control everything. But I have chosen to study propaganda art in war time because we can observe during these periods an explosion of this activity, most of the time under the artistic form of posters, or painting and graphic art. So, we're going to see the different purposes of the posters of propaganda in wartime. First, familiarizing a situation helps the individuals to accept unusual and uncomfortable situations such as war, famine or disease. [...]