Cold War, media, and popular culture

Artists during this period asserted their individual identity, but also brought mass produced objects and mass media into their art.

Browse content

We're adding more content all the time!

Mel Casas, <em>Humanscape 70 (Comic Whitewash)</em>
Mel Casas, Humanscape 70 (Comic Whitewash)

Through heroes like Captain America and Superman, Casas explores the relationship between media and identity.

Rafael Tufiño, <em>La Plena</em>
Rafael Tufiño, La Plena

Originally made as a backdrop for the 1957 film La Plena, this mural celebrates the people and music of Puerto Rico.

Fashion & alienation in 1960s New York
Fashion & alienation in 1960s New York

At this party, everyone has the same face and seems profoundly alone.

<em>If All the World Were Paper…</em>
If All the World Were Paper…

From the Manhattan Project to nursery rhymes, a collision of art and science.

Rauschenberg’s Homage to JFK
Rauschenberg’s Homage to JFK

A portrait of a president transformed by tragedy.

JFK and the power of media
JFK and the power of media

Go backstage at the 1960 Democratic National Convention with photographer Gary Winogrand.

Transcendence and Cold War
Transcendence and Cold War

Spirituality and transcendence were important postwar themes expressed in Rothko's work.

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial

A powerful accumulation of names is inscribed on slabs of reflective stone that cuts into the earth on the Mall.

Protesting the Vietnam War, with lipstick
Protesting the Vietnam War, with lipstick

This sculpture, installed on the Yale campus during Vietnam War protests, was never meant to be permanent.

Television nation
Television nation

The “father of video art” argued that electronic communication, not transportation, unites the modern world.

Icon and irony: Jasper Johns, <em>Flag</em>
Icon and irony: Jasper Johns, Flag

The American flag is a potent symbol that has different meanings for different viewers.

From wire to weightlessness
From wire to weightlessness

Asawa was interned in World War II, but we must be careful about interpreting her artworks as related to that trauma.