Abstract
This section explores white property in relation to visual, performance, and textual artifacts about the arts and arts education conceptualized as discursive materials. The chapters in this section trace specters of whiteness revealed through encounters with discursive materials as curricula for K-16 arts learning, teacher preparation, and professional development. This section also turns to popular productions of whiteness and its values, embedded within the rhetoric of the arts and found within traditional arts environments and practices such as exhibitions, critical essays, public spaces, and communities. In this introduction, we frame what we mean by discursive materials through two examples from popular visual culture and visual art that were noteworthy at the time we wrote this chapter. Our discussion of these two examples reveals themes of curriculum and pedagogy, countervisuality, and embodied orientations that resonate with the chapters in this section. Our introduction concludes with an invitation to consider these chapters as inspiration for educational practice dedicated to critical reflection and as informed resistance of the arts as white property.
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- 1.
For a complete reproduction of the open letter to the Whitney and list of demands, see Alex Greenberg in “‘The Painting Must Go’: Hannah Black Pens Open Letter to the Whitney About Controversial Biennial Work” in Artnews (March 21, 2017). Retrieved May 31, 2017, http://www.artnews.com/2017/03/21/the-painting-must-go-hannah-black-pens-open-letter-to-the-whitney-about-controversial-biennial-work/
- 2.
See Siddhartha Mitter and Christina Sharpe, “‘What Does It Mean to Be Black and Look at This?’ A Scholar Reflects on the Dana Schutz Controversy” in Hyperallergic. (March 24, 2017). https://hyperallergic.com/368012/what-does-it-mean-to-be-black-and-look-at-this-a-scholar-reflects-on-the-dana-schutz-controversy/; Coco Fusco in “Censorship, Not the Painting, Must Go: On Dana Schutz’s Image of Emmett Till” in Hyperallergic. (March 27, 2017). https://hyperallergic.com/368290/censorship-not-the-painting-must-go-on-dana-schutzs-image-of-emmett-till/; co-Curator, Christopher Lew in conversation with Andrew Goldstein. “Why Dana Schutz’s Emmett Till Painting Must Stay: A Q&A With the Whitney Biennial Christopher Lew.” Artnews. (March 20, 2017). https://news.artnet.com/art-world/whitney-biennial-christopher-lew-dana-schutz-906557
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Smith, S.S., Carpenter, B.S. (2018). Discursive Materials of Racism and the Arts in Education: Narratives, Performances, and Material Culture. In: Kraehe, A., Gaztambide-Fernández, R., Carpenter II, B. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Race and the Arts in Education. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65256-6_10
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