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By David Sullivan
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Friday, 10 August 2007 |
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The
prophetic description of anonymous warfare, the blankets of darkness and death
dropped over civilian populations still resonate. To the degree we realise the
truth expressed in this work, Guernica stands as possibly the greatest painting
of the 20th Century.
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By Workers International League - Portland
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Monday, 16 April 2007 |
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A recent event in Portland
Oregon highlighted the interest that average people have in the ongoing
events in Oaxaca, showcasing the dormant political energy that many
are desperately trying to direct into action.
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By Leon Trotsky
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Monday, 08 January 2007 |
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“Art can neither escape the crisis nor partition itself off.
Art cannot save itself. It will rot away inevitably — as Grecian art rotted
beneath the ruins of a culture founded on slavery — unless present-day society
is able to rebuild itself. This task is essentially revolutionary in character.
For these reasons the function of art in our epoch is determined by its
relation to the revolution.” Leon Trotsky, 1938.
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By Alan Woods
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Thursday, 29 September 2005 |
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Yesterday was the anniversary of the death of Andre Breton, one of the most outstanding literary representatives of surrealism, who tried to link art with revolutionary politics and collaborated for a time with Leon Trotsky. Alan Woods wrote this piece commemorating the great artist. |
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By Jordi Martorell
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Tuesday, 14 September 2004 |
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On Sunday evening, September 12, thousands gathered in London’s
Trafalgar Square for the screening of Sergei Eisenstein’s revolutionary
film “Battleship Potemkin“ and to hear the Pet Shop Boys and the
Dresdner Sinfoniker string orchestra. The presentation was accompanied
by reminders of the many demos that have been through the square, with
quotes from Marx and Engels. |
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By Harry Whittaker
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Friday, 27 August 2004 |
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It comes as no surprise to the art world that the recent Hopper
Exhibition at the Tate Modern was an outstanding success. Harry
Whittaker wrote this review while the exhibition was on. |
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By Didi Cheeka
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Wednesday, 12 November 2003 |
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Wole Soyinka is a prominent Nigerian playwright, and in 1986, he became
the first African writer ever to be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. In
October 1965, Soyinka was arrested for allegedly seizing the Western Region
radio studios and using them to publicly dispute the published results of the
recent elections, but in December of the same year, he was acquitted. Didi
Cheeka of the Workers' Alternative Editorial Board looks at the ideas and
works of this well known writer.
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By Didi Cheeka
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Wednesday, 12 November 2003 |
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In Part Two of his article, Didi Cheeka shows how Soyinka's works express
the struggle for " the liberation of the individual, for the individual, by
the individual and the removal of general liberation for the mass of the people".
It arises from the petit-bourgeois intellectual's conception of human nature in completely individualistic terms, divorced from
all social being. It is, nevertheless, a tribute to Soyinka that at the height
of the ethnic cleansing that presaged the Nigeria/Biafra civil war he was shrill
in his condemnation of the perpetrators. He paid for this with 27 months in
detention. Again he protested against the brutal repression of students in 1978.
But his individual and petit-bourgeois approach has now led him to have
illusions in the present party of government, the PDP. |
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By Alan Woods
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Wednesday, 23 July 2003 |
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Alan Woods continues his series on Art and Revolution. This is the first
part of a five part article that looks at how the French Revolution affected
British poets. It struck Britain like a thunderbolt affecting all layers of
society and this was reflected in its artists and writers. |
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By Alan Woods
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Wednesday, 23 July 2003 |
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In their youth, Wordsworth and Coleridge were profoundly affected by the
revolutionary fervour unleashed by the French Revolution. But as Bonaparte
crushed the most radical elements they became disillusioned and moved back to
the right. This is a phenomenon seen many times in history, where the
intellectuals and artists (with some notable exceptions) swing to the left and
right with the ups and downs of the revolution. |
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By Alan Woods
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Wednesday, 23 July 2003 |
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Unlike Wordsworth and Coleridge, Byron remained loyal to his youthful revolutionary fervour. His
innermost nature was revolutionary, but his weakness was his Romanticism. This was reflected in
his admiration for Napoleon, just as later Romantics were to become admirers of Stalin without
understanding what he really stood for. |
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By Alan Woods
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Wednesday, 23 July 2003 |
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Unlike Byron, who was adopted by the British establishment after his death,
Shelley (1792-1822) was always an outcast. This is no accident. He was
undoubtedly the most consistently revolutionary of all English writers. From his
earliest years he defended the most advanced revolutionary-democratic views,
including militant atheism and republicanism, but also socialism. It is no
accident that the name of Shelley was kept alive by the working class when it
was out of favour with the "respectable" reading public in England. Indeed, the
latter met the news of his death with complete indifference. |
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By Alan Woods
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Wednesday, 23 July 2003 |
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Robert Burns (1759-1796) the poet needs no further introduction. But
Robert Burns the revolutionary democrat is another matter. It is a matter of
great regret that nowadays it seems to have become the fashion among certain
left circles in Scotland to renounce Burns. To some degree this is
understandable. After his death, Burns was hijacked by the Scottish
Establishment, who turned him into a harmless icon. |
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By Alan Woods
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Monday, 14 July 2003 |
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Goya was one of the
greatest artists of all time. His paintings
are a priceless document of the history of the Spanish people. He painted the
world in which he lived, and he painted it in terms of uncompromising realism.
His entire outlook was shaped by great historical
events - the French revolution, the Napoleonic wars, the ferocious struggle for
national independence and the movement for liberal reform that followed it, a
movement that was brutally crushed by the forces of darkness, obscurantism and
reaction. This article is part of an important new series by Alan Woods called
Art and revolution. |
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By Alan Woods
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Monday, 14 July 2003 |
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In the second part of his article Alan Woods deals with the profound
changes in Goya's paintings in his later years. The Peninsular War transformed
the whole situation in Spain overnight - and with it, Goya's art. In place of the sunlight there was darkness,
instead of colour, only different shades of black. This impenetrable darkness was
only an expression of the all-pervading blackness he saw all around him. The
reason for this astonishing transformation cannot be found in art. It is a
direct reflection of the processes at work in society. |
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By Alan Woods
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Monday, 30 July 2001 |
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We publish here the transcript of a speech by Alan Woods on the subject of the relationship between
Art and the Class Struggle. The speech was given at a Marxist Summer School in Barcelona (Spain),
in July 2001. |
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By Alan Woods
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Thursday, 14 December 2000 |
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On
December 2000 we published this article on Marxism and Art by Alan Woods
on our sister web site, www.trotsky.net. |
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Art & Literature 
