Guest post by Marita Sturken

Of the many seismic changes signaled by this election, one is surely a change in the aesthetics of American political culture. Not only is Obama telegenic in a way that we have not seen in decades, but the aesthetics of his campaign and of the image economy that emerged around his candidacy signal a new kind of aesthetic, one that is embedded within a contemporary image culture of pastiche, play, and savvy image-making.

Let’s take, for instance, this flyer, which was handed out by volunteers in Pennsylvania in the last get-out-the-vote push (it was created by the Pennsylvania Democratic Party, not the Obama campaign). The flyer has a very specific informational intent (its reverse side gives information about voter rights and explicitly counters the misinformation campaigns intended to confuse voters), yet it is a strikingly visual document. It is derived from a poster that was made in support of Obama by Shepard Fairey, a street artist who became know for his Andre the Giant graffiti in cities such as New York, who has since made his name through a clothing line and his Obey Giant logo.

Fairey is emblematic of a new kind of cultural producer, at home with commerce and cultural politics simultaneously. In the new edition of our book Practices of Looking, Lisa Cartwright and I analyze the widely circulated Fairey-Obama posters (one features “Hope” and one “Change”) as both evocative of the historical image of JFK and as deploying the visual style of graphic poster design used by the Bolshevist agitprop artists of the 1920s. The graphic newsprint-like reproduction gives the work a sense of political urgency, playing with the idea of the image (and political figure) with mass appeal. The aesthetics of the image convey the spirit of progress and hope experienced both in the early Soviet context and in the Kennedy era. Contemporary viewers might be expected to read the poster’s graphic style as evoking a very modern kind of hope and optimism recoded within a savvy postmodern culture. The elegance of the poster is worth noting, with its deployment of a blue that is lighter than the stars and stripes blue, and a yellow warm tone—evoking yet not fully using the conventions of the red, white, and blue.

Of course the Obama logo (seen on the flyer) has already received significant attention (it’s been referred to as the “hardest working presidential candidate logo”) with its clever play on the “O” of Obama with the image of a sunrise evoking change, and its color scheme subtly signifying patriotism and the flag. Simple, evocative, smart. It was designed by Sol Sender of Sender LLC in Chicago in collaboration with mo/de, and was used in highly adaptable ways in the campaign. This week’s post-election coverage signals that the “O” will be played with throughout Obama’s tenure in office in headlines, political cartoons, and images (see, for instance, the cover of this week’s New Yorker).

It was amusing to hear that when Bush showed Obama the Oval Office for the first time this week, he took him on his standard tour of the kitschy artifacts in his personal collection on display there (one can see this tour on the White House homepage). Presumably the tour included his painting A Charge to Keep, which depicts a lone cowboy riding his horse up a hill followed by a pack of riders, an image from a pulp cowboy story about a thief fleeing a posse that Bush had mythologized as the lone “determined horseman” who has a “difficult trail.”

One can only imagine the aesthetic disconnect the president-elect might have felt in that moment, and perhaps in quietly “measuring the curtains” he might have considered for a moment what kinds of images he would take with him to the White House.

Sidney Blumenthal has written on Salon.com about the “peculiar aesthetics propagated in the age of George W. Bush” with its “contradictory styles of softening nostalgia and hardening cruelty.” Blumenthal saw the Bush kitsch as a rejection of the Reagan-era kitsch of patriotic sentiment, stating that “under Bush, kitsch has been transformed from sentimentality to sadomasochism.” The kitschy (and brutal) cowboy aesthetic of the Bush Administration has finally run its course, and a new aesthetic, one that rejects kitsch for a nuanced play off the visual codes that evoke America, is emerging in its place.

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Guest post by Aric Mayer.

Let me just come out and say it. Barack Obama’s landslide victory on Tuesday is the greatest moment in politics for my generation. This is the fifth presidential election that I have voted in, and it is the first where I feel as though the country is being moved by the collective will of its younger citizens. As an eyewitness to many of America’s great domestic tragedies over the past eight years, this election affects me deeply and I can’t write outside of the relief and hope that it brings.

With that said, all is not champagne corks and confetti.

I want to draw your attention to two images by Alan Chin taken in Chicago at the Grant Park celebration where Barack Obama gave his acceptance speech as president elect.

Here the viewer stands alone while looking out over empty railroad tracks at Grant Park with the Chicago skyline spreading across the horizon. In the distant center, the letters USA are shining off of one of its buildings. As a symbol, a city represents the best of human cooperation and achievement. There is promise ahead. And it is going to take real work to get there.

In his acceptance speech Obama looked tired and sometimes grim. He knows what is ahead. Obama has often quoted Reinhold Niebuhr, the moral philosopher who wrote about the destructive nature of power and how it is sometimes necessary to use it even as it corrupts you. Obama inherits two lengthy and costly wars, the near bankruptcy of our own domestic policies, an American economy in free fall and a world economy that appears to be teetering on the edge of the unknown. But as dark as this may seem, the alternative was even darker. John McCain’s last efforts at character assassination and fear mongering left him in the isolated position of having nothing to win but a completely fractured constituency.

The election on Tuesday was won in part through the unprecedented turnout of minority and young voters. It ultimately came down to a contest between the nuanced, hopeful and inclusive pluralism of Barack Obama and the entrenched fears of a segment of conservative white working and middle class voters that was the final platform of John McCain’s candidacy. In contrast to the fear being spread by the McCain campaign, Obama focused on statesmanship, policy and the choice of pragmatism over idealism in forming a new government in America. In a theatrical paradox, while drawing huge crowds Obama frequently played down the drama to the extent that newspaper editorials began to call him boring.

What was happening though was not boring at all, but was and is a ground shift towards pluralism, nuance and complexity with aesthetic consequences. As Obama’s campaign traced its arc from the Democratic Convention until Tuesday night, he clarified his message by moving away from the inflammatory and the incredible and towards the gritty and the pragmatic. To live in a multidimensional society we must recognize that while our own positions are uniquely ours, they do not make up the entire country. The post baby boomers who had such a powerful impact on this election have been accused of self absorption and narcissism, frequently by baby boomers themselves. But there are advantages to self absorption within context, for it reveals the limits of self. It helps to know oneself in order to make room for one who is unlike you. At the heart of this is an acceptance of the “other” and a grass roots rejection of fundamentalist divisions along ethnic and racial lines. What is emerging in America is a more truly plural constituency. At the same time, the depiction of the American Dream as a place and an experience where you can have it all is being replaced by pictures of collapsing markets and a very uncertain economic future. The Great Depression and the New Deal brought us documentary realism. It remains to be seen what will emerge for us out of the current growing crises.

In the second image, Obama is surrounded by waving American flags. It is a triumphant moment, framed by reminders of danger. The bullet proof glass is already in place. In the back left the letters USA appear on an electronic ticker, the same lettering that streams up to the minute data of the market turmoil. There is a balance of hope and realism.

We need to cultivate this balance. Obama wrote it into his speech. While warning us of the difficulties ahead, he still took the time to remind us that there will be children and a new puppy in the White House. A new generation in American politics begins.

A complete slideshow of Alan Chin’s images from Grant Park on November 4 is available at BAGnewsNotes.

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