Eastern Michigan University’s Art Department is partnering with Central Michigan and Wayne State universities to present Subverting Modernism: Cass Corridor Revisited 1966-1980. The event features a lecture by Vince Carducci, Envisioning Real Utopias in Detroit, as well as a film screening of “Images” about Cass Corridor artwork.
The film “Images,” by Kathryn Brackett Luchs and Shaun Bangert, features the artists of Cass Corridor.
In the 1960s, Detroit was amid a revolution and Detroit artists joined in, rebelling against the then-current modernist style and creating post-modern art.
The film, along with the exhibit, will showcase the hidden beauty of Detroit’s art scene and shed new light on an area that usually doesn’t receive much credit.
“The work of the Cass Corridor artists is important because it demonstrates that high quality, meaningful art can and was created in locales outside New York City,” EMU art history professor Julia Myers said. “A fact that has been consistently ignored by art historians with their New York-centric bias.”
Subverting Modernism is a collaborative effort that took several years to complete, with most of the work coming from WSU’s Art Collection. The exhibition is divided into eight sections: The Critique of Pure Painting and Sculpture, Minimalism/Industry, Complexity, Violence, Destruction, Decay…and Renewal, Vulnerability, Shelter, Music/Dance/Industry and Nature/Geometry.
A 100-page catalog will be provided to exhibit attendees.
The exhibit features Myers’ research on artists from Detroit. Since Detroit is not usually considered an art hub, this exhibit acknowledges how much work is being done and how important it is that this work is recognized.
The exhibit will take place from March 11 to April 28 at the EMU Art Gallery in the Student Center. The film will be shown at 5:30 p.m. on March 27 in Halle Library Auditorium.
For more information or high resolution, printable images of works in the show, contact Myers at jmyers@emich.edu or the Art Department’s Gallery Programs Director Greg Tom gtom@emich.edu.
