Hegemony and the Spread of Dominant Art Practices

Abstract

Applied to global cultural practices, hegemony refers to the impact of a dominant national culture upon a subordinate one. The shifting patterns of cultural dominance in art between France and the United States between 1930 and 1960 will serve as a focus from which to make a more theoretical point concerning cultural hegemony. Among the central concerns will be the reasons for replacement of the French based School of Paris, which dominated the art in New York and Paris in 1930 by American Abstract Expressionism in 1960 as the dominant art practice. Are such shifts in the paradigms of art practices essentially driven by external factors: technology, political and economic or other non-artistic considerations? Contrary to this view I will argue that the primary factor in evolving patterns of dominance in art is the changes generated by invention of new paradigms, as it is in science and other important aspects of culture. I argue that hegemony's role in initiating changes in art practices is thus less important than the continuous new flow of inventions in art. Alternative views of Serge Guilbaut, who analyzed shifts in French-American culture in the context of cold-war politics after World War II, and Jean-Pierre Saigas, who argues that it is the »art scene« rather than nations that determines which art is dominant provide a context for the discussion.