Modeling the Holocaust: Models of Crematoria and Death Camps

The act ... and not the [association] tract is the fundamental datum in both social and individual psychology..., and it has both an inner and an outer phase, an internal and an external aspect. (George Herbert Mead 1934: 8)Always design a thing by considering it in its next larger context - a chair in a room, a room in a house, a house in an environment, an environment in a city plan. (Eliel Saarinen, Time Magazine, July 2, 1950)Nature provides the 'can', but culture and language provide the 'may' and 'must.' (RomHarrel993:5)The great British literary critic Frank Kermode once asked why we represent a clock as going 'tick-tock' when it is actually going 'ticktick.' On this observation he built an argument about human beings' compulsion to organize experience into beginnings and, even more strongly, into endings. The 'tick' of the clock was for Kermode 'a humble genesis'; the 'tock,' on the other hand, was a 'feeble apocalypse'! From the days of the Gestalt Psychologists there has been a fascination with the variety of ways in which the 'forward movement' of subjective experience is organized, whether spontaneously due to the ways in which brains have evolved, or under the active control of a culturally constituted person.1 The imaging techniques of neuroscienee are helping to deepen our understanding of how subjectivity is managed by the brain. The problem of how intersubjectivity is organized, however, is currently less amenable to these technologies. This is especially so in the case of the psychology of art. Because experiences with art are, as John Dewey (1934) argued, the most complete kind of experience - recruiting, as it does, sensation, perception, conception, judgment, emotion, memory, imagination, personal idiosyncrasy, cultural tradition, etc. - the making and the reception of 'Art' is therefore likely to be the most testing ground for the adequacy of any psychology's ontology. But what is the nature of the phenomena to be studied, and what particular categories best assist the inquiry?A strikingly obvious feature of subjectivity, and of intersubjectivity, is the apparent seamlessness or unity of the ways in which many different neural capacities are bound together into ongoing, interwoven, subject-centered fields of consciousness. Since William James, words like 'stream' are routinely used to indicate the forward movement of such fields of consciousness, particularly when considered from the point of view of their subjects (James, 1890). The degree to which a person is not engaging in centering reflection for passages of that stream has, on the other hand, been described using words like 'absorption' (Dewey 1934; Benson 1993, 2001) or 'flow' (Csikszentmihalyi 2008). When the experience is 'aesthetic,' in John Dewey's sense ofthat term, then absorption is one of its symptoms.We should remember that 'experience' for Dewey is not the same as is currently understood by that word. Contemporary usage tends to emphasize the subjective or private aspect whereas, for Dewey, experience is both subjective and objective and is to be understood as 'relational.' Experience is always temporally extended. Subject and object together produce experience. In this sense, it is a suitably equipped subject aesthetically engaging with an 'art object' that together generate the 'work of art.' The 'work of art' is an outcome in time of the dynamic give-and-take between a subject and an 'art object/event.' Late in his life Dewey wondered whether, instead of trying to recover and defend this understanding of 'experience,' he would have been better off using and developing the concept of 'culture.' The course of experience/culture has both public and private phases.In this view, experience streams, sometimes as a subjective phase, sometimes as an objective phase, which can in time achieve its own kind of 'form.' This form is one that unfolds over time with a beginning and a conclusion or, as the Pragmatists would say, a consummation. …

Holocaust survivor and witness accounts began long before the Second World War ended. Diaries, journals, letters, notes hidden, buried, and stuffed into jars or between floor boards were mostly lost and destroyed, but those that have been recovered express desperation to tell, to document, to bear witness, and to commemorate. This article records the oral history of holocaust survivors. Together with the countless thousands of testimonies that would be recorded during the next sixty years, these eyewitness accounts would change the face of research and education, not only in the field of Holocaust studies but across academic boundaries. Together with the countless thousands of testimonies that would be recorded during the next sixty years, these eyewitness accounts would change the face of research and education, not only in the field of Holocaust studies but across academic boundaries. The second half of the twentieth century saw a renewed interest in holocaust narratives.

Digital images in museums: Digital desires: What are museums up to?

Art education is commonly interpreted as education in the production and appreciation of art objects. The major emphasis in practice has been upon the production of works of art, while the appreciation of art has been neglected. Recently, educators have recognized that neglect, and they have turned their attention to teaching for appreciation of art work or to esthetic education.' 2 3 4 Their aim, in general, is to improve the responses the people make to the visual environment, including works of art. Before art educators can decide if improved responses have been made, however, they need to know how people respond to works of art before those people have received formal instruction in art appreciation. Basically, investigators have used two methods of estimating children's responses to art objects. First, many investigators have noted those art works that people prefer. The second method of investigation analyzes the verbal statements that the subjects offer about works of art. Both methods of investigation have revealed valuable information about responses that people make to art works. Picture preference studies give general information about the choices people make. Essentially, the picture preference investigations show that subjects who are trained in art tend to prefer the art work preferred by art experts.5 6 Further, these studies indicate that subjects' preferences change with age.7 For instance, several studies conclude that older subjects prefer more realistically depicted art work than do younger subjects.8 9 It is important to note, however, that most picture preference studies do not give specific information about which aspects of the art objects influenced the subjects' choices. Several preference investigators do attempt to explain what influenced the subjects' choices by examining only the art work that was chosen by the subjects.'? It is possible that the reasons for preference inferred by inspecting only the art objects are different from the reasons the subjects would say influenced them. Consequently there seems to be a need for research which will uncover the factors that the subjects themselves consider to be the primary influences affecting their preference for certain works of art. Several investigators have attempted to meet this need by examining the verbal responses that subjects make to works of art. Some researchers concerned with verbal responses describe the aspects of the art work which the subjects say influence their choices, while other investigators describe the kinds of statements the subjects make about the art work.'2 13 In general, these studies also have weaknesses. Frequently, the subjects are asked to respond to extremely small black and white reproductions of colorful originals.'4 It seems evident that responses to size, detail, and color may be influenced by the inaccuracies of small reproductions. Furthermore, many subjects are asked to respond only to the art object they like.5 16 Hence, we have no way of knowing what causes people to dislike certain art objects. In addition, several studies fail to indicate how the responses were solicited.'7 18 Obviously, the method of solicitation may have conditioned the subjects to respond to certain ways or to

To construct such a theory it is first of all necessary to define certain theoretical entities (terms) and relations. Just now, I suggested that such a theory would ‘look like’ familiar anthropological theories, such as the theory of exchange, or the theory of kinship, but that it would replace some of the terms of such theories with ‘art objects’.However, this raises immediate difficulties, in that ‘art objects’, ‘works of art’, or ‘artworks’ may form a readily identifiable class of objects in some art systems, but this is hardly true of all of them, especially not in anthropological contexts. In effect, if we make ‘the ,work of art’ the corner-stone of the anthropological theory of art, the theory itself becomes instantly otiose, for reasons which have already been alluded to.

Will to the Original: Platonism in Henry James’ <i>Roderick Hudson</i>

Forensic means of investigating the circumstances of a case involving objects of fine art are considered. Pre-criminal and criminal situations are distinguished. Illegal actions in the sphere of circulation of objects and works of art are investigated. Attention is focused on the crime provided for in Art. 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, which may include objects and works of art. In this regard, the following concepts are analyzed: “misleading”, “deception”, “breach of trust”, “theft”. It is proven that conducting a comprehensive forensic art examination at the initial stage is necessary to establish the subject of the crime under Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. General scientific methods are used — comparison, juxtaposition; analysis, synthesis, analogy; logical methods: deduction, induction; empirical method — review of criminal legislation; forensic methods — structural-functional; building versions; private expert methods: art criticism and handwriting examination. Scientific novelty lies in: 1) clarification of the subject of the crime, according to Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, related to objects of art; 2) in the classification of objects of criminal attacks in order to clarify the circumstances of the commission of crimes related to objects of art; 3) in optimizing the forensic recommendation for the appointment of a comprehensive forensic art history examination, necessary to establish the authorship, authenticity or counterfeitness of objects of art in the group of crimes related to objects of art.

The article analyzes the works of contemporary art, taking into account the features of their functioning. The main goal is to determine what changes have taken place in the basis of a work of art, which allows us to designate this object as an object of contemporary art. The results obtained lead to the conclusion that one of the features of a work of art is the lack of site-specificity. The specificity of the site is the affiliation of the work to a specific place and time: when the affiliation changes, the relations of the object, context and viewer also change. The level of site-specificity of works of art relates to their cultural circulation. Works of modern art are the result of a strategy of figurative saturation defined by a series of constant movements and remediation. The works of contemporary artists are marked with the transition from individual or serial discrete objects to manipulating populations of images using various methods of selection and "reframing”.&#x0D; Keywords: work of art, contemporary art, site-specificity, remediation, figurative saturation

One ongoing activity in teaching is the bestowing of values upoii art works. might be said that students can study art in order to learn about the relationship between art objects and value statements attributed to them. In such study, one of the most frequent questions students ask about art is, Why is the work of value?' educational purpose of exploring questions is to understand what about art is valued and upon what grounds the evaluation of a work rests. Oftentimes, if students learn the former without understanding the latter, they are merely being indoctrinated or conditioned to accept the values of another. In order to understand the values associated with art, students must learn to understand the evidence which supports these values. Such evidence has traditionally been sought by analyzing the characteristics of a work of art. In this paper, I shall argue that there is more than one question which must be accounted for in understanding judgments of art. Evidence which supports claims involving different questions cannot be found exclusively in the work. Consequently, relying solely on the characteristics of an art object as a basis for concluding why the work is of value is educationally misleading. Such judgments do not account for the role of people in establishing criteria for why art objects are valued. people-object relationship, however, is the foundation upon which an understanding of the evaluation of art is constructed. emphasis upon the work of art as a source of evidence to support value claims is suggested in the often cited distinction between preferences and judgments of art (Ecker, 1967). Preferences are likes, values, or attitudes which are attributed to a work. Although they may be elicited by the features of a work, they indicate more about a viewer's dispositions towards a work of art than the work of art itself. Preferences are based on psychological reports, e.g. The work of art feels good or reminds me of X, rather than on an analysis of features of a work. Hence, differences in preferences are not reconciled by appealing to such features. In contrast, judgments of value are supported often by evidence observed in the work. If two people in a gallery disagree about the value of a work, they may look, for example, at the order or lack of order in the work to determine why it is either good or bad. Accordingly, one of the viewers might support his or her judgment of the goodness of the work by pointing to the curving line which permeates the picture and holds together everything in its path. Thus, the distinction between preferences and judgments enables a viewer to dislike a work which is judged to be good without being selfcontradictory, e.g., It is a good painting but I do not like it. Paul Ziff (1962) has underscored the need to base statements concerning the value of a work on what can be observed in the work. Ziff contends that nothing can be a reason why a painting is good or bad unless it is concerned with what can be looked at in the painting, unless it is concerned with what can, in some sense, be seen (p. 162). emphasis on citing the observable characteristics of a work as evidence to support value judgments frequently leads to the use of formalistic reasons as to why a work is good, e.g., it is good because it is balanced. For instance, if one considers the examples cited by Ziff of evidence supporting value judgments in his article, Reasons in Art Criticism (1962), it will be found that they are exclusively formal, for he considers the function of criticism to call attention to the form of works of art. This emphasis is consistent with the propensity for formalism which is reflected in contemporary art and in contemporary art criticism (Greenberg, 1978). question of why a work is judged to be good, involves more than one kind of

The purpose of the article is to consider performance as a means of creating an art object in the creativity of contemporary Ukrainian artists. The research methodology. An analytical method is used to collect and study theoretical material about the "Birth of Birth" artistic action, which opens the unique "Cosmogony" project, the exhibitions "Artarmor", "Shards of the Sun", art objects – "River-Love ", "The World through Rose-Coloured Glasses", "Friend", "Equilibrium", "Ladder", "Movement of Suprematism", "Wind Rose", "Confrontation opposite Bessarabka", and others. A hermeneutic method is applied to interpret the principle of performance as a means of creating art objects in the work of modern Ukrainian artists, while a theoretical method is used to summarise the results. The scientific novelty of the paper is that for the first time the principle of performance is studied as a means of creating art object in the creativity of contemporary Ukrainian artists. Conclusions. The article examines performance as a means of creating art objects in the context of the work of modern Ukrainian artists, using the example of the works of A. Logov ("Sun Fragments" project), P. Antyp ("Cosmogony" project), P. Bevz, Yu. Vakulenko, N. Bilyk ("Artarmor" project), D. Iva ("Bronze Ant"), V. Padun and L. Padun ("The World Through Pink-Coloured Glasses"), O. Lidahovskyi ("River Love", "Equilibrium", "Ladder "), O. Zolotariova ("The Movement of Suprematism", "Wind Rose", "Confrontation opposite Bessarabka"), O. Hodunov ("Friend"), mural "The Call of the Family", created by Ya. Vlasenko-Bernatska and Yu. Abramova. The art object, having its own artistic and functional features, in the work of modern Ukrainian artists acts not only as a new art form, but a means of communication that combines a mixture of different materials, methods, painting can be combined with graphics, sculpture with installation, performance may be accompanied by a video sequence. In the context of modern socio-cultural reality, an art object is a response to the surrounding events, it is a challenge and a reflection at the same time. Invoking the principle of performance, which has elements of visualisation, spectacle, play, mass, Ukrainian artists emphasise the creation of art objects that, in the modern cultural situation, reflect their vision of modern reality. The main feature of the art object is the absence of a canon or any rules in the process of its creation, a sculpture of an unusual shape can be combined with paper and wood. The main thing is the idea that the artist conveys to the recipient

Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2000. 128 pp. $62.50.Hubert Locke's examination of Jewish Holocaust from perspective of a Black Christian immediately conjures varied responses, depending on perspective of reader. Were it not for his stellar credentials in area of Holocaust studies as a respectful outsider, cynicism and suspicion might be primary responses. In any case, he anticipates and addresses these attitudes as well as stereotypical responses which often accompany an examination of Holocaust and its significance for those outside of Jewish community. While some may find discussion to be repetitive and very basic for those knowledgeable in field of Holocaust studies, Locke's simple approach is germane to his stated goals.Rather than a corrective to interpretation of any specific historical Holocaust events, his examination is an analysis of nature of Holocaust studies and its import for another historically marginalized group, African-Americans. In it he attempts to interpret significance of Holocaust for a group of people who have experienced incomparable, but equally devastating experiences of suffering in United States.The framework by which Locke chooses to communicate his message suggests that his audience is much broader than he originally proffers. The book is categorized by a series of common problems related to issue of Holocaust studies which he then connects to similar historical scenarios of African-Americans. While Locke is careful to address specific questions raised in Holocaust studies, such as why didn't Jews of Europe resist their destruction (p. 21), and how could some European Jews allow themselves to be used as tools of Third Reich in their administration of concentration camps (p. 23), he connects these to similar questions in Blacks' slavery experience -- why didn't more captive Africans resist slavery when they had greater numbers (pp. 20-21) and why did some slaves allow themselves to be used as tools of masters (p. 18).This approach by Locke is not a reductionistic attempt to equate experiences of Jewish victims of Holocaust and African-American slaves; rather, he provides reader with an identifiable framework from Emmanuel Levinas for understanding and empathizing with the other by admitting that we interpret and evaluate experiences of others in light of our own self-centered interests (p. …

This article presents some concluding thoughts from the authors. It argues that no book can claim finality and closure regarding Holocaust studies and that the ending(s) of the Holocaust itself have not yet reached finality and closure, and probably never will. It details four Holocaust-related incidents illustrating that fact. Like the Holocaust itself, the field of Holocaust studies does little to encourage optimism about humanity's future and progress. Both entail darkness and invite despair. This book is but a fleeting episode in history's unfolding, and the ending(s) of both will come only with time's passage.

Adjudicating the Debate Over Two Models of Nature Appreciation Sheila Lintott (bio) It seems commonplace to point out that we aesthetically appreciate a wide variety of objects: that is, art objects are not the only good candidates for aesthetic appreciation.1 We know from experience that one can aesthetically appreciate not only Georgia O'Keefe's White Trumpet Flower, but also a white trumpet flower. Similarly, we can aesthetically appreciate both a pictorial representation of the human form and that form instantiated in certain prime specimens. We do so, moreover, without classifying either flowers or human beings as art objects. Yet, the paradigm of aesthetic appreciation today, in both everyday life and in educative contexts, is the appreciation of art, which explains why we tend to try to understand what makes aesthetic appreciation appropriate in terms of what makes art appreciation appropriate. This approach may not be entirely mistaken, for beginning with the familiar is always a good plan. However, it must be done with care, otherwise important differences between our relationships with the art we appreciate and with the nature we appreciate may be overlooked, thereby obscuring salient differences in the appreciation of each. In this essay, I focus on the issue of the appropriate aesthetic appreciation of nature and offer an overview of a contemporary debate on the topic. I begin with a general discussion of art and nature appreciation. I then summarize Kendall Walton's theory of appropriate art appreciation and explain his skepticism regarding the possibility of appropriate and inappropriate nature appreciation. Next, I discuss two models according to which Walton is mistaken, as the philosophers who present these models, Allen Carlson and Noël Carroll, do so to illustrate how nature appreciation can be properly considered appropriate or inappropriate. It may seem that given the recent proliferation of models of nature appreciation, the last thing we should seek is yet another model. However, in the end, I shall argue the need for a new and different kind of model, one that is a revisionist and extensionist model of nature appreciation. [End Page 52] Art and Nature Appreciation Concerning the perceptual activity of the audience, how we ought to appreciate artworks is largely uncontroversial. Perhaps this is why Carlson opens his attempt to understand the aesthetic appreciation of nature with a presentation of the aesthetic appreciation of art, explaining that "with art objects there is a straightforward sense in which we know both what and how to aesthetically appreciate."2 Although not all artworks offer "straightforward" examples of aesthetic appreciation, Carlson's general point is reasonably motivated. As Kendall Walton succinctly explains: "Paintings and sculptures are to be looked at; sonatas and songs are to be heard. What is important about these works of art, as works of art, is what can be seen or heard in them."3 That we ought to look at paintings and listen to sonatas seems obvious for at least two reasons. First, via formal education and informal interactions, we have grown familiar with the conventions of art appreciation; second, such conventions find experiential reinforcement when, for example, our auditory sense is tickled by a Mozart concerto.4 Underlying our relative lack of confidence when it comes to nature appreciation is the obvious fact that nature, unlike art, is not an artifact. Nature was not made by beings like us; it was made neither for our use, nor for our entertainment, nor for our appreciation.5 As Carlson puts it, "art objects are our own creations; it is for this reason that we know what is and what is not part of a work, which of its aspects are of aesthetic significance, and how to appreciate them" (ANE, 41). We need, therefore, a model of nature appreciation that will serve as a source of education regarding how best to appreciate nature and will offer the confidence we lack and the guidance we seek. It might seem that we should simply apply our knowledge of art to nature appreciation — that is, appreciate nature as if it were art. However, as numerous philosophers have noticed, this approach is mistaken.6 The mistake is both theoretical and practical. Theoretically, it is a category error...

The object of research in this article is the ex-libris sphere of Ukraine in the period from the beginning of the 1990s to the present day. Ukrainian ex-libris actually began to exist in 1991, when it became possible to speak about the Ukrainian bookplate as a phenomenon of art rather than about it as a segment of Soviet graphic art. It has headily changed its character and started a different transformation since the early 1990s. Over the past 20 to 25 years, the Ukrainian bookplate not only has come out of the shadows, turning into a valuable work of art, but also has received several new roles, inheriting the stages of transformation that took place in other countries. If earlier the book plate mainly served as an identifier of the owner, had mainly an informative function and was hidden from the eyes of the public, now it has become not just a work of graphic art, but an art object that, due to its typological diversity and specific artistic qualities, quickly acquired the status of not only an exhibited work of mini-print, but also a collectible. Ex-libris is more often exhibited, it is collected by artists, graphic artists, bibliophiles, and patrons. It has become a kind of an instrument for intercultural dialogue, promoting international communication. The change in the functional charac-teristics of ex-libris, the expansion of the circle of customers, the rapid growth of inter-est in the bookplate, and the increase in demand for it provoked a change in the status of the bookplate among artists themselves. If earlier the book platewas only one of the pages of the creative biography of a number of artists, now there are many masters who specialize in it, who have turned it into the main object of their professional interest. The commercialization of the phenomenon has developed: EL has become a kind of a pass to the international art space for young artists. The Ukrainian cultural field re-ceived its center of popularization of the bookplate as a self-valuable work of art of small-form graphics in 1993, when the Ukrainian ex-libris club was created in Kyiv. In the winter of 1993/94, the first international exhibition Woman in Ex-Libris” was held in the Ukrainian capital. In 1994, the international ex-libris competition Many Reli-gions – God Is One was organized. Since the beginning of the 1990s, there has been a clear tendency to separate several leading schools. The most original, with characteristic stylistic features, schools of the modern Ukrainian bookplate became Lviv, Odessa, Kyiv, Kharkiv. There are also several hotbeds of ex-libris popularization in Ukraine, with great professionals in the field of mini-print, but they are few to speak about inde-pendent schools: Luhansk, Mukachevo, Severodonetsk, Sumy, Chernihiv, Chernivtsi. In today’s art space of the country, the bookplate owes its survival primarily to collec-tors and patrons, and its main, perhaps, the only, way to preserve it in the art world is to transform it into an instrument of intercultural dialogue, integration into the internation-al field, without losing its national identity.

“The Bag Is My Home”: Recycling “China Bags” in Contemporary African Art