Visual Politics: The Art of Engagement, November 20, 2005 - March 5, 2006, New Wing, First Floor, Gibson Family Gallery and Plaza Gallery, San José Museum of Art. Circulated to: Katzen Art Center at American University, Washington, DC, April 9-July 29, 2006.

Visual Politics: The Art of Engagement (2005-2006)

Having volunteered to serve in the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, which defended the Spanish Republic against the fascist Franco regime in 1938, Irving Norman’s experiences as a machine gunner changed his world-view profoundly. He returned from the war committed to becoming an artist.

Norman painted Rebellions and Revolutions in 1970, the same year as the Kent State University tragedy, when a student was killed by a National Guardsman during a Vietnam War protest. In this dramatic scene, a surging mass of protesters holds aloft a lifeless, outstretched corpse that refers to a martyred victim of the Kent State riot.

This object was included in the following exhibitions:

• Visual Politics: The Art of Engagement , 11/20/2005 - 7/29/2006

• Image Dimensions: 90 x 96 in. (228.6 x 243.84 cm)

This object has the following bibliographic references:

• Selections: The San Jose Museum of Art Permanent Collection. Selections: The San Jose Museum of Art Permanent Collection San Jose Museum of Art. San Jose, CA, 2004
  Page Number: 160-161
• Dark Metropolis: Irving Norman's Social Surrealism. Dark Metropolis: Irving Norman's Social Surrealism Crocker Art Museum, Irving Norman Trust. Sacramento, CA
  Page Number: 117
• Art of Engagement: Visual Politics in California and Beyond. Art of Engagement: Visual Politics in California and Beyond San Jose Museum of Art and University of California Press. Berkeley California, 2006
  Page Number: 52

This object is a member of the following portfolios: