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The Cultural
Cold War
by Miles Mathis
When artists are made the slaves and the tools of the state, when artists become chief
propagandists of a cause, progress is arrested and creation and genius are destroyed.
President Eisenhower, 1954
Eisenhower said the above in his Freedom of the Arts address at MoMA for its !
th
anniversary gala.
"es, MoMA and the #oc$efellers could even afford to hire the %resident to read their scripts. Although
he was intending to condemn #ussian realism and promote Abstract E&pressionism, we can now see
that his words were upside down, as usual. Most of the '
th
century was upside down to the truth and
this is (ust one more e&ample. For his words are a perfect description of Modernism and its purposeful
subordination of art and artists to politics, )heory, and financial speculation. )his subordination was
not engineered from Moscow. *t was engineered from +ew "or$ ,ity and -,. And it turned out to be
even worse than Eisenhower warned. *f progress had only been arrested, how happy we would now
be. -ue to the engineered collapse of art in the '
th
century by speculators, propagandists, paid
academics, and +ew.World./rder architects, we have regressed no one $nows how many centuries.
before0 )ate 1ritain 23
th
century gallery
after0 %ace 4allery, '2'
We can see from these before and after photos what Eisenhower5s freedom of the arts really meant. *t
meant the freedom of art to devolve from something large and beautiful into something small and
meaningless. *t was an early e&ample of +ewspea$, telling you one thing while selling you the inverse.
)his has now been proven. *t is no longer a theory or an opinion. -ocuments have been declassified,
agents have gone on record, and fully researched boo$s have been written. We now $now e&actly
which artists were slaves 6all the famous ones7 and which artists were propagandists 6all the famous
ones7. We can only guess at the genius destroyed, since most of it was never allowed to see the light of
day. )housands of talented artists have been suppressed, ignored, slandered, and ultimately lost to
history. 8ome 9uit, some $illed themselves, and others (ust faded out.
* have referenced the wor$ of Frances 8tonor 8aunders in three previous papers, including her 233!
article in the :ondon Independent and her 2333 boo$ Who Paid the Piper/The Cltral Cold War.
While using parts of her research, * nonetheless mentioned several times that * found her wor$ to be a
probable diversion. *n other words, * thin$ it is li$ely the boo$ was either suggested by *ntelligence,
overwritten by them, or written in full by them with only her byline. * come to this conclusion from
several facts, which * will now share with you. )he first curious fact is that this boo$ which is sold as
an e&pos; of the ,*A managed to be reviewed by top mainstream sources, including the :ondon Ti!es
and the "ondon #e$iew of %oo&s. <er initial article also managed to get published by the :ondon
Independent. 8ince *ntelligence owns the :ondon press (ust as it own the =8 press, we must assume
*ntelligence is trying to spin information that has already been lea$ed.
With more research, that is precisely what * found. 8aunders admits that much of the information in
her boo$ was lea$ed or published in various places decades earlier, and though it has been suppressed
since then and is now barely remembered, it means her research is not new. *n this conte&t, her article
and boo$ appear to be the somewhat late effort to spin old information, for reasons un$nown to me. *t
seems to me they would have been better off $eeping 9uiet about it, but * don5t $now what undercurrent
they might have been trying to 9uell in the late 233'5s. %robably they $now their own (obs better than *
do.
Another thing that leads in this direction is her bio, which is almost non.e&istent. 1oth parents were in
the 1ritish peerage, which is in itself a red flag in this case. )he first thing on her bio is this ,*A
e&pos;, which she produced at age 3. 8o there is an >.year gap in her bio, from age 2 to age 3. 8he
then became an editor at the 'ew (tates!an, another red flag. <er own boo$ ought to tell us that, since
it admits most of these (ournals had been ta$en over by *ntelligence soon after WW 6or even before7.
1ut the warning is even easier to hear when we find that 8aunders was at the 'ew (tates!an under the
leadership of *an <argreaves, a big supporter of )ony 1lair. 1lair, li$e 1ush and /bama, was (ust a
puppet of *ntelligence.
1ut it is the content of the boo$ that is the real indication it was written to whitewash and spin
information. Although she and her editors manage to compile a lot of old evidence that someone li$e
me can use to his own purposes, most people reading the boo$ will not be able to ta$e the information
they receive and sew it into their own shirts. Most readers will ta$e the information as 8aunders gives
it to them, and 8aunders is careful in most cases to ma$e *ntelligence loo$ not.so.bad.after.all.
* have already shown in my previous papers how ridiculous the main thesis is0 that Modern Art was
sold as part of the ,old War, to combat ,ommunism and the bac$ward ideas about art professed by the
#ussians. * agree that the 8oviets were wrong about (ust about everything, including politics and art,
but that doesn5t ma$e the =8 position right. 8aunders helps sell the peculiar idea that a government
either has to outlaw decadent art?as the 8oviets did?or promote it wildly, as the =8 did. 8he helps
those she 9uotes at *ntelligence gloss over the possibility that we might have done neither. We might
have promoted the American art of the time in proportion to its merits. . . which was not much. /r,
since we were supposed to be an e&ample to the world of free.mar$et capitalism, we might have let the
free mar$ets promote the art of the time, letting the buyers and the public decide its merits. *nstead, we
chose to propagandi@e it to the greatest e&tent possible, outdoing any propaganda <itler or 8talin ever
dreamed of. We then tried to sell this propaganda as pure simply because it was ours. )heir
propaganda is manipulationA our propaganda is (ust 5fair promotion5 of 5free enterprise.5
* have shown the main thesis of the boo$ is false, since the art they chose to promote wasn5t chosen
based on merit, much less on its ability to fight ,ommunism or ma$e the =8 loo$ creative. )he wor$s
were chosen because the #oc$efellers had already invested in them, and the #oc$efellers controlled
both the museums and the ,*A. )hat information is buried in the boo$, but since it isn5t highlighted or
stressed, readers will tend to miss it.
*n this paper * wish to continue pulling apart the boo$ by concentrating on chapter 2B, "an9ui
-oodles. *t is in this chapter that 8aunders finally gets to the paintings of %olloc$, #oth$o, de
Cooning, Motherwell, and others. 1efore we get to the analysis of the te&t, let me (ust say that * agree
that the Abstract E&pressionists aren5t very decadent. * have always found them more boring and
pointless than decadent. )hey tie into the ad(ective decadent not in the way -uchamp did before
them or Warhol would after them. )hat is, they don5t obviously try to tear down culture by any direct
attac$. )hey still give you colors and shapes, some of which might be called interesting in a small way.
<owever, they are decadent in the sense that they were used by critics and others to continue the
destruction of art, by the loss of old conventions. )hey aren5t !orally decadent, they are aestheti)ally
decadent. )hey represent the decay and loss of old standards, old conventions, and all the means the
artist historically used to create beauty, meaning, depth, and subtlety. #emember, Abstract
E&pressionism wasn5t and isn5t sold as (ust another artistic possibility. *t was sold by critics li$e
,lement 4reenberg as the historical repla)e!ent for old aristocratic art?meaning high realism. Even
the artist Ad #einhardt?4reenberg5s archenemy?said that Abstract painting was the last painting
that anyone could paint. )he new art was promoted as superior in every way, immediately
mothballing all art that had come before. *t was the art of a new century, the art of AmericaD, the art of
the future, blahblahblah. 8o in promoting Abstract E&pressionism and Modernism in general, the
salesmen in *ntelligence were at the same time forbidding the old realism.
8aunders5 boo$ and )om 1raden5s lengthy 9uotes in it only tell you about the promotion sideA they
forget to tell you about the suppression side. )hey forget to tell you that while they were promoting
Modernism, they were implicitly forbidding anyone from painting the old way. )he old painting was
dismissed as outdated, regressive, undemocratic, and generally small minded. +o, they didn5t outlaw
realism, but any artist of the time who wished to be noticed got the message very clearly0 do not paint
in the old way anymore. *f you do, we won5t li$e you.
* will be told that was a blessing0 we didn5t want any more of that +a@i realism or ,ommunist realism.
We didn5t want that arid, stiff, poster.art, selling the party.line. 1ut again, that $ind of argument creates
the illusion of only two possibilities. "ou are led to believe that you must either promote poster.art
realism that glorifies the 8tate, or you must promote Modernism. * beg you to remember that all of the
high realism before 23'' falls into neither category. *n arguing against Modernism, * am not
promoting 8oviet realism or +a@i illustration. )he mainline argument in the boo$, li$e the argument of
the '
th
century, is a finessed argument. *t presents the choice as being between one of two categories,
and real art isn5t in either category.
1arnett +ewman Eac$son %olloc$
1ut let us return to Abstract E&pressionism. Abstract E&pressionism was chosen as the lead for the
boo$ for the same reason it was chosen as the lead for the ,*A. 8ince the decadence of AE is far less
obvious than the decadence of most other Modern Art, the ,*A and 8aunders can dodge the decadence
9uestion. Most people thin$ of decadence in terms of moral decadence. *f they even $now what
aesthetic decadence is, it doesn5t mean anything to them. 8o most readers will loo$ at a %olloc$ and
say, well, * don5t li$e it, but * don5t see how it is decadent. *f the ,*A wants to promote that to combat
,ommunism, /C. Most readers won5t understand why the 8oviets were saying AE was decadent,
why they were banning art, or why the =8 was promoting it. As long as the ,*A can spin this as some
patriotic crusade, most people will give them a pass.
1ut what 8aunders and the ,*A are leaving out is the other art of the '
th
century, which *ntelligence
also promoted. 8aunders $eeps your eyes on %olloc$ and #oth$o, and off -uchamp, Man@oni,
Fontana, +itsch, Fuinn, <irst, and the ,hapman 1rothers. 8ince thousands of promoted '
th
century
artists?including many in 23!'5s and B'5s?have e&plicitly and vocally been trying to be both morally
and aesthetically decadent, it must loo$ odd to argue that Modern art is not decadent?as 8aunders
does in chapter 2B. *t is a mystery to me how '
th
century art can be promoted as gloriously decadent
for 3' years, but when a ,ongressman or <arry )ruman says he doesn5t li$e it because it is decadent, he
is a philistine.
-uchamp Man@oni <irst
G* can5t even show you +itsch, since you may have (ust eaten. *f you search on him, be warnedH
When the 8oviets say this art is decadent, they are out.of.touch and bac$wards and regressive and anti.
democratic.
+o, they have (ust read the artists5 own press releases, where they brag about how decadent they are.
%ainters and writers have been bragging about their decadence since the time of 1audelaire, so when
we see historians li$e 8aunders clic$ing their tongues at those who have found it decadent, we can only
laugh.
)his is not to say that * thin$ -uchamp or any of the rest should have been banned. )hey should have
(ust been ignored. 8ince it is too late for that, they must be e&posed for what they were0 closeted
fascists destroying art on purpose, at the behest of even more closeted masters in *ntelligence.
* must say this goes for the Abstract E&pressionists as well as the -adaists before them and the
postmoderns after them. Although they may not have been as decadent as some, they were still
fascists. %olloc$, Motherwell, ,alder and 1a@iotes were all members of the American ,ommittee for
,ultural Freedom GA,,FH, which was an /rwellian name for yet another ,*A organi@ation. )he
figurative artist 1en 8hahn called it the A,,Fuc$. Although its stated purpose was to promote art as
free e&pression, it actual purpose was to promote the art the #oc$efellers had invested in, and since
these memberIartists had been invested in, they were happy to (oin that promotion. <owever, this
promotion also entailed the anti.promotion of everything else, so that abstract painting became the new
religion. As 8aunders puts it,
The Museum of Modern Art, described by one critic as the overgeared cartel of Modernism, held tenaciously to
its executive role in manufacturing a history for Abstract Expressionism. Ordered and systematic, this history
reduced hat had once been provocative and strange to an academic formula, a received mannerism, an art
officiel.
* encourage you to have that 9uote in mind as you re.read my undertitle 9uote from Eisenhower.
#ather than being the antithesis of propaganda or slave art, the art of the 23!'5s 6and after7 was actually
its perfect representation. *t was part of a manufactured history promoted by a cartel. *t was official
art. +ot only was it promoted by the state, but it was promoted covertly by a secret state agency. *f
nothing illegal or unseemly was going on here, why $eep it all in the dar$J
'ew *or& Ti!es art critic Eohn ,anaday said, an un$nown artist trying to e&hibit in +ew "or$
couldn5t find a gallery unless he was painting in a mode derived from one or another member of the
+ew "or$ 8chool GAbstract E&pressionismH. And %eggy 4uggenheim?a #oc$efeller competitor?
apparently had an even better grasp of the situation, saying the entire art movement had become an
enormous business venture. Gp. KLH.
8ince these leading artists of the +ew "or$ 8chool li$e %olloc$ and Motherwell were members of ,*A
organi@ations, they could not have been on any long leash. )hese were dogs leading their masters,
yapping and leaping. Almost a decade before the A,,F, #oth$o and 4ottlieb had founded the
Federation of Modern %ainters and 8culptors in 23L', which was already fiercely anticommunist before
the =8 declared war on Eapan. #oth$o and 4ottlieb led these efforts to destroy ,ommunist presence
in the art world. Gp. KKH )his by itself proves two things. /ne, in earlier chapters, ,*A agents li$e
)om 1raden told us that the =8 had secretly promoted leftist artists during the ,old War to fight
,ommunism. )his was supposed to be ironic or something, but it turns out to be false. )he few artists
that had ever been red or pin$ hadn5t been pin$ since the 23'5s. )he ones sold to us as leftist after
WW weren5t leftists then, and weren5t leftists before the war. *t wasn5t Mc,arthy who turned them, or
new.found patriotism. *t was the desire to get noticed by the #oc$efellers and MoMA. #oth$o and
4ottlieb were acting as little Mc,arthys in 23L', purging the artworld of opposition. 8o much for
freedom of e&pression. )wo, we were also sold the idea that this art propaganda only started after the
war, as part of the ,old War. 1ut we see that isn5t true, either. *f #oth$o and 4ottlieb were founding an
anti.,ommunist artist organi@ation in 23L', then this whole program couldn5t have been started after
the war or by the ,*A. )here was clearly covert promotion of Modern art before the war, by pre.,*A
intelligence as well as by MoMA.
8o the argument of 8aunders and the ,*A doesn5t add up. +either does their attac$ on )ruman and the
post.war ,ongress. Although * normally don5t have much use for <arry )ruman, when he says Modern
art loo$s pathetic compared to #embrandt or <olbein, * can only agree. 8aunders 9uotes him as saying,
The !utch masters ma"e our on modern day daubers and ham and egg men loo" #ust hat they are.
)hat is simply a true statement. 8aunders doesn5t try to refute it by any cogent argument or direct
comparison, putting a %olloc$ ne&t to a #embrandt, for instance. 8he only (umps immediately into
this0
Those European vanguardists ho had fled the $ascist #ac"boot ere no startled to find themselves in an
America here modernism as once again being "ic"ed about. This as, of course, consistent ith the cultural
fundamentalism of figures li"e Mc%arthy, and part of the confusing process by hich America, hilst advocating
freedom of expression abroad, seemed to begrudge such freedoms at home.
* almost doubt that 8aunders wrote those particular sentences. Fran$ly, * would bet they were inserted
into her draft at some point by *ntelligence. Most of 8aunders5 boo$ is on or least near the mar$, and
even where it is off she in only subtly turning you from the truth. 1ut here, all subtlety is gone. )he
fact that )ruman preferred #embrandt to %olloc$ has absolutely nothing to do with Eoseph Mc,arthy
and his ,ommunist witch hunts. )ruman didn5t disli$e %olloc$ or any of the others because they were
,ommunists. <e says it very clearly in his own words0 he disli$es them because they don5t impress
him in any way as artists.
1eyond that, promotion of the Abstract E&pressionists or other Moderns had absolutely nothing to do
with freedom of e&pression. * am all for freedom of e&pression, and * thin$ all people who are creating
art for their own prposes should be allowed to do it. 1ut that doesn5t mean * thin$ they should be
promoted by the ,*A (ust because they have done it, or made rich and famous because they have done
it.
#emember, freedom of e&pression applies to the audience as well. )he audience should be free to
e+press their disli$e for Modernism if they honestly do disli$e it, without being attac$ed as philistines.
8aunders?or whoever wrote those sentences?is implying that those li$e )ruman who disli$ed
Modernism were $ic$ing it about or denying the artists freedom to create. 1ut neither )ruman nor
anyone else ever suggested Modernism should be banned. Almost without e&ception, those in
,ongress or in the press who were against Modernism in the early years were simply ma$ing the
argument that it shouldn5t be promoted with ta&dollars. )hey thought the =8 should either be
promoting really fine art or no art at all. )here is no (ac$boot involved in either idea. *n reality, the
(ac$boot involved is in forcing people to li$e Modernism when they don5t0 ta$ing their ta&dollars under
the threat of (ail, then spending that money to promote art they strongly disli$e, as part of e&pensive
propaganda initiatives their representatives haven5t voted on. That is what is anti.democratic.
)he (ac$boot is also involved in funding decades of domestic propaganda for Modernism in maga@ines,
trade (ournals, professional (ournals, academic (ournals, boo$s, )M, and film. )he (ac$boot is involved
in telling several generations of art students they cannot create any realism and be ta$en seriously. )he
(ac$boot is involved in calling the art mar$et pluralistic and free, and then consciously e&cluding any
form of realism from that mar$et for many decades. )he (ac$boot is involved in a century of bold lies,
by which artists and the public are told Modernism is being promoted to advance freedom, encourage
e&pression, celebrate diversity, and air important political issues, when in fact we find the opposite has
always been true. After the unmas$ing, we see that Modernism was promoted mainly to protect the
investments of the #oc$efellers, but that when there was an agenda beyond that purely financial one, it
was an agenda of destabili@ation, stupefaction, li9uefaction, misdirection, and obliteration. *t was the
century.long program of ta$ing everything solid in art, atomi@ing it, and selling us bac$ the fragments
at a vicious mar$.up.
:arge parts of chapter 2B in 8aunders5 boo$ loo$ to have been inserted later by e&ternal hands. 4reat
swaths of it don5t even parse li$e her common sentence structure. /n p. !N, we get this0
This as not a propitious time for modernists. Most vulnerable to the attac"s of the !ondero caucus &in the
%ongress' as a group of artists that emerged in the late ()*+s as the Abstract Expressionists. . . . They ere
lin"ed by a similar past, most of them had or"ed for the $ederal Arts -ro#ect under .oosevelt/s 0e !eal,
producing subsidi1ed art for the government and getting involved in left2ing politics.
)he problem with that argument is that ,ongress was almost as marginali@ed in the late 23L's as now.
+o one was listening to #ep. -ondero or anyone else in ,ongress. )hen as now, ,ongress was (ust a
bac$board against which *ntelligence hit its tennisballs. 8aunders admits that on the ne&t few pages,
where we are reminded that by 23LB, a whole gaggle of critics 6already being underwritten by the
#oc$efellers in various ways7 were praising these artists to the s$ies. *t is these critics who were being
read by academics and gullible progressives. )hose interested in art weren5t reading the ,ongressional
record, they were reading Partisan #e$iew and Co!!entary and the 'ation?and assuming, naively,
that these maga@ines were independent. 8aunders also admits that %olloc$ got his centerspread in "ife
Maga,ine in 23L3 than$s to the ,*A pressuring <enry :uce. 8o to say this was not a propitious time
for Modernists is (ust hooey.
And we see from the 9uote above that other things in this chapter don5t add up. Although all bullets for
the boo$ tell us it blows the whistle on ,*A influence after the war, it is clear these people were being
promoted and subsidi@ed before the war and before the ,*A was ever founded. :oo$ again, these
artists were subsidi@ed under the +ew -eal. )he +ew -eal was before the war, in the 23N'5s. As
another e&ample, we $now ,lement 4reenberg was promoting Modernism fiercely before the war, and
again, 8aunders admits it, 9uoting from his Avant.4arde and Citsch article of 23N3 in the Partisan
#e$iew. )hat is before the war and before the ,*A, so none of this started in 23LK. -espite the fact
that Partisan #e$iew and 4reenberg were saying the same things?at least regarding art?in 23L> that
they were saying in the 23N'5s, why are we supposed to believe they were bought in the 23L's and
independent in the 23N'sJ *t is pretty obvious they were bought all along. After 23LK, the #oc$efellers
paid 4reenberg and Partisan #e$iew via the ,*AA before that they paid them directly.
Although we now $now 4reenberg was (ust a puppet, he was pathetic, talentless puppet. And if * hear
one more time about how 4reenberg was a brawling, boo@ing, one.man slugfest, * thin$ * am going
to cough up a lung. 4reenberg was a short, bald, paunchy little creep even when he was young, and he
loo$s li$e the $ind of guy who only punched women and those in lower weight classes.O
My favorite story is how 4reenberg started shoving the tiny Ma& Ernst, only to get cloc$ed by the
long.armed +icholas ,alas. *n 23B2, the ! year old 4reenberg got caught with a left (ab from the !K
year old de Cooning and wasn5t able to respond. From my research, none of these fights ever got past
one punch, so as usual it loo$s li$e a lot of posturing by armchair critics and fighters. -espite the fact
that 4reenberg is a minor character in her boo$, 8aunders implies he?of all the people who pulled the
#oc$efeller oars 6e&cept possibly the )rillings7?was the most unctuous, the most reviled, and the most
insincere. Which gives me an opening * missed the first time * counter.criti9ued Avant.4arde and
Citsch. ,oming to 4reenberg from the assumption that Modernism was trying to sell itself as leftist
and progressive, * hadn5t been able to understand his assertion that the avant garde belonged to the
ruling class, or that it had always remained attached Gto this ruling classH by an umbilical cord of
gold. 1ut now that * understand that 4reenberg was actually a conservative and a fascist, * see what
he means. <e is constructing a subtle apologia for his groveling at the feet of the #oc$efellers. Art
had always belonged to the ruling class, according to 4reenberg, so why should he or his artists have
any 9ualms about accepting their goldJ
:eaving aside the moral or political aspects of that idea, we see a huge contradiction here. *f the avant
garde belongs to the ruling class, then the famous division of the avant garde from old aristocratic art
evaporates, doesn5t itJ )his division?which 4reenberg helped to manufacture?has been one of the
defining divisions of the century, being used to (ettison any and all realism from the new definitions. *
was personally e&cluded from the upper echelons of contemporary art based on that manufactured
division. * was told my art was aristocratic and therefore outmoded, based only on its use of old
forms and conventions?li$e figuration, representation, and attention to techni9ue. 1ut if both the old
art and the new art belong to the upper class, then this slur against realism collapses. )he old art is
then not frowned upon because it is aristocratic. *t is frowned upon because the new aristocrats li$e
#oc$efeller choose to frown on it. An art that belongs to the elite is then at the mercy of the elite. *f
they decide to redefine art to suit their portfolios, artists and critics can only go along. )his is what
4reenberg is really saying, in his nearly illegible way.
1ut bac$ to 8aunders5 boo$. )he more * reread chapter 2B, the more it loo$s li$e a palimpsest, written
over and written over again. *t undercuts itself and then the undercut is re.undercut. We see this most
clearly in the way %olloc$ is dealt with. Although the main line of the boo$ would lead most people to
dismiss %olloc$ as a ,*A creation, someone underneath the top layer of this boo$ is trying to save him
with all the rest. We hear the tired superlatives once again0 that %olloc$ was the great American painter
Gso says 1udd <op$insH, the <emingway of painting, the real American, the cowboy, the hard.tal$ing
heavy drin$er with the grittiness of Marlon 1rando and the brooding rebelliousness of Eames -ean.
1ut then that sales pitch is destroyed in one sentence, where we are reminded that all of this is bun$0
%olloc$ couldn5t ride a horse and left Wyoming as a child. And this reminds us he was also terrori@ed
by self.doubt 6hence the drin$ing7, couldn5t hold his boo@e, and?li$e 4reenberg?was short, bald and
unattractive. %olloc$ had nothing in common?even on the surface?with Marlon 1rando or Eames
-ean, much less Eohn Wayne. <e was neither a rebel nor a tough guy, spending his afternoons?li$e
Woody Allen?in therapy. <e saw his drip period as a lar$ and a mar$eting ploy, and felt guilty for the
undeserved fame. <e preferred his earlier wor$, and wished he were allowed to pursue figuration.
)his is the reason he went off the wagon after the <ans +amuth photoshoot in 23!' and 9uit doing the
drip paintings. )he photoshoot made him feel li$e a big phony.
Which brings us to a curious outcome of my research on %olloc$. )urns out %olloc$ spent some time
pursuing )heosophy, attending retreats in ,alifornia with Crishnamurti. )hat of course brings us bac$
to the paper that started all this, where * show that )heosophy was founded as a (oint pro(ect of
=8I#ussian *ntelligence. 8o even before Modernism was infiltrated by the ,*A, it had long been
infiltrated by *ntelligence through )heosophy and its offshoots. /ther artists who were influenced by
)heosophy include #oth$o, Mondrian, Candins$y, 1rancusi, Clee, 4ropius, -elauney, 8criabin, and
8choenberg.
8ince )heosophy was founded in 2>K!, it would seem difficult to connect it to the #oc$efellers. )he
#oc$efeller fortune was (ust being made at that time, and most assume the first #oc$efeller was too
busy creating his monopoly to bother with spiritualism. 1ut those who assume this would be wrong.
#oc$efeller not only followed Mive$ananda in the 2>3'5s, he is one of the ones who brought him here.
Mive$ananda, li$e Crishnamurti, was one of the early importations of the )heosophists. What most
people don5t $now is that Mive$ananda was a freemason. *t is not widely publici@ed, but it is admitted
even at Wi$ipedia. <e was educated at the 4eneral Assembly5s *nstitution, now $nown as the 8cottish
,hurch ,ollege. )his is curious, since this college taught a liberal Western education.
Mive$ananda5s favorite professor was from )rinity ,ollege. Also of interest is the fact that when
Mive$ananda came to the =8 for the first time in 2>3N, he went straight to <arvard and the waiting
arms of William Eames. 8ee my previous papers for the importance of that fact. )o get you started,
remember that Eames was a )heosophist and a mentor of 4ertrude 8tein.
1ut bac$ to 8aunders5 boo$. <ere5s another strange contradiction in chapter 2B. /n page !B, we learn
of an e&hibition in 23LK called Advancing American Art. We are told that speeches in ,ongress
$illed it after it got to Europe. )his is supposed to be evidence of the power of the reactionaries in the
<ouse, including #ep. -ondero. 1ut 8aunders, in the previous paragraph, had (ust admitted that the
show?which included wor$s by /5Ceefe, 4ottlieb and 4or$y?had already been to %aris and %rague,
where it was a ma(or success. *t was such a success, we are told, that the #ussians had to
immediately organi@e a competing e&hibition. 8o we see the contradiction already. We are told that
,ongressmen $illed the show, but if they had $illed it, it would never have left +ew "or$. *t opened
first at MoMA before moving to Europe, and a proper $illing would have prevented it from ever
being shown at all, here or abroad.
What we learn if we delve deeper is that ,ongress voted funds for the show in the amount of P!','''.
With that money, K3 paintings were bought, and the funds also had to include travel e&penses to Europe
and :atin America. Which means the average price paid for an oil painting was about P!''. 8ince
most were bought through galleries, each artist got about P!'. We are told the itinerary after %rague
included 1udapest and an undetermined venue in %oland. )hat sounds fishy to me, since what ma(or
art e&hibition goes to Europe without a firm itineraryJ )he great success in %rague also turns out to
be pushed, since it is admitted that the opening attracted 2,''' visitors. )hat sounds pretty paltry to
me, considering the show was supposed to have received advanced promotion from critics and
accolades from ,@ech %resident 1enes. *f the %resident was in favor of the e&hibition, why wasn5t it
shown at one of the +ational 4allery venues in %ragueJ Why was it relegated to an art cooperativeJ
)he story completely unwinds when 8aunders admits that after the show was canceled, the paintings
were sold off at a 3!Q discount as surplus government property. WhatJ )hat means each painting
fetched about P! on the open mar$etD )wo 9uestions are begged by that0 27 if the e&hibitions were
such a success, why was no one interested in buying this e&citing new wor$J We $now most of the
lots went to small museums in /$lahoma, 4eorgia and Alabama. *f the wor$s were so good, why
didn5t any of the ma(or museums bid on themJ Apparently it wasn5t only )ruman who didn5t care for
this wor$. )he directors of 33Q of the museums in the country also passed, even at a bid of P!. 7 *f
the government and the ,*A believed so strongly in Modernism, why did they sell off these wor$s for
almost nothingJ )he ,*A agents themselves should have been bidding these wor$s up into the
thousands, rightJ +o. )he ,*A believed in Modernism to the tune of less than P!, and the rest is
bluff.
1ut of course this means the whole story was manufactured. *t wasn5t the philistinism of )ruman or
-ondero or 1usbey that $illed this show. )hat story was created after the fact as spin. )he show went
to Europe and :atin America as planned and bombed on its own lac$ of merits. *f the show really had
so much critical and academic support bac$ in the =8, the paintings would have sold to critics and
academics. Anyone can afford P! for a painting, even a lowly art critic.
)he reason these early shows failed while later shows didn5t is that the ,*A hadn5t yet assumed total
control of the press in 23LB. 8ome maga@ines and newspapers were still printing honest opinion at that
time, which obviously got in the way of the propaganda machine. 1ut within a couple of years, that
changed completely. Whereas <earst5s 'ew *or& -ornal./!eri)an and "001 maga@ine had panned
the show in 23LB, the ,*A soon brought them onboard. And once the media was spea$ing with one
voice, it didn5t matter what )ruman or any ,ongressman thought. )he newspapers could be instructed
not to report it, or to report it with a strong spin. *f the newspapers got a hundred letters from readers
panning the show and one e&tolling it, they would print the one and throw the other hundred in the
trash. )hat is how things wor$ to this day.
We see another bold contradiction on page !>, which starts off, 8upporting left.wing artists was
familiar territory for the #oc$efellers. 8aunders then repeats the story we all $now about -iego
#ivera being hired to paint a mural for #oc$efeller ,enter. #ivera paints :enin into the mural, +elson
#oc$efeller as$s him to remove it, #ivera refuses, and #oc$efeller pays him off and destroys the mural
with (ac$hammers. 8aunders gives us the ,*A spin here, which is that despite that, the #oc$efellers
continued to support left.wing artists. /f course she doesn5t pursue the obvious conclusion here, which
is that the #oc$efellers promote left.wing artists only as long as left.wing means Modern. *f left.
wing has any real political meaning?as in supporting either 8ocialism or #epublicanism?the
#oc$efellers run li$e the wind. )hey only support lefties that aren5t really lefties. All the #oc$efeller
artists who are sold as lefties turn out on closer inspection to be righties sold as lefties. )hey are
fascists posing as Mar&ists. *n my previous papers we saw the same thing with E@ra %ound and many
others. 8ometimes, as with %ound, the fascists posing as Mar&ists then pose as fascists, (ust to be sure
you are well and permanently confused.
/n page B2, the tug of war between 8aunders and her invisible re.writers continues, as she re.lea$s
the information that most of MoMA5s trusteesIdirectorsIe&ecutives are from *ntelligence, the invisible
writers come on the page and spin that, and then she comes bac$ and despins it. For the reader, the
entire chapter is li$e riding a yo.yo. We are told that in addition to +elson #oc$efeller, the
*ntelligenceItrustees included Eohn Whitney, William 1urden, #ene d5<arnoncourt, William %aley,
Eoseph Merner #eed, %orter Mc,ray, 4ardner ,owles, Eun$ie Fleischmann, ,ass ,anfield, /veta
<obby, and )om 1raden. And although she lists the actual lin$s to *ntelligence, the invisible writer
then pops in and says,
Of course it could be argued that this congruity revealed nothing more than the nature of American poer at the
time. 3ust because these people "ne each other, and #ust because they ere socially 4and even formally5
en#oined to the %6A, doesn/t mean that they ere co2conspirators in the promotion of the ne American art.
WhatJ "es, that is e&actly what it means, 1uddy. "ou have to be $idding me with sentences li$e that.
8aunders is too good a writer to be caught writing that. ,ongruityJ 8ocially en(oined to the ,*AJ
What the fuc$ does that meanJ *s the ,*A now a cotillionJ 8aying that (ust because these people were
in the ,*A and running MoMA doesn5t mean the ,*A was running MoMA is li$e saying that (ust
because these clothes are on my body doesn5t mean * am wearing them. *t is the dastardly attempt to
dodge the definition of words. /nly an organi@ation as untouchable as the ,*A would even thin$ to put
such an argument in print.
)he invisible writer is so confident, he ne&t sends you to Eva ,oc$croft5s 23KL article in /rtfor!2
which is of course one of 8aunders5 primary sources for this 2333 boo$?but does nothing to spin it
e&cept to preface it as a rumor. 1ut since the ,*A5s )om 1raden has since confirmed large parts of
that article, and since documents are referenced showing these people5s official lin$s to *ntelligence and
the government, none of this is a rumor, and hasn5t been for decades. *n fact, that is why 8aunders5
boo$ was allowed to go to press, and why it was allowed to be reviewed by ma(or media outlets in
4reat 1ritain0 the ,*A needed to spin it, because it was now common $nowledge. "ou don5t need to
spin rumor, since you can dismiss it as rumor. "ou only need to spin things that are documented and
ma$ing the rounds.
)he confidence of the invisible writer is again apparent when he allows 8aunders bac$ on the page
immediately to undercut him. As proof that MoMA5s support for Abstract E&pressionism was not
lin$ed to the ,*A or the ,old War, Michael Cimmelman is 9uoted from 233L telling us that MoMA
didn5t get involved in collecting or showing Abstract E&pressionism until the late 23!'5s. 1ut 8aunders
comes bac$ in the ne&t sentence to show that is an outright lie. 8he proves that not only was
Cimmelman paid to say that by MoMA, but that it is easily refuted by the record. 8aunders 9uotes
from the Museum5s own catalogs to show that it had been collecting all the big names since 23L2. 8he
finds a particularly damning entry in 23LL, in which the Museum sold off certain of its 23
th
century
wor$s to buy more %olloc$s, Motherwells, and Mattas.
*n probably the last attac$ of name artists upon an American museum, we see in 23! a group of fifty
including realists Edward <opper, ,harles 1urchfield and Eac$ :evine publishing a #eality
Manifesto against MoMA, accusing it of propping up unpopular art for dogmatic reasons. #eading
the manifesto, it is clear these artists had no idea of the real reason this art was being promoted. 8ince
my realist friends and * still had no idea until recently, this is not surprising. )he #oc$efellers and ,*A
were not unmas$ed until the mid 23K'5s, and then only partially. 8ince that unmas$ing was in
/rtfor!, no realist would have been e&pected to see it. )hey were unmas$ed again in 233! by
8aunders, but that was in :ondon, and you could count the number of outspo$en realists there on one
hand. * would have e&pected to hear something from the 8tuc$ists on this, but haven5t. )he article at
the Independent seems to have only hit the web recently, and that is where * discovered it. * don5t $now
of any realist since )homas <art 1enton who is as outspo$en as * am, so * suppose it is up to me to lead
the first serious charge since 23!.
Motherwell Matta
As part of that charge, we can borrow some firepower from Ad #einhardt, a painter of little talent from
the time in 9uestion, who we would have li$ed to have sicced on ,lement 4reenberg. #einhardt would
have pounded him into a meaty pulp. #einhardt was a sort of anti.Agnes Martin, being famous for his
all blac$ canvases. <e was also the anti.Agnes in that while she was semi.catatonic, he was a volcano.
<e claimed to be painting the last paintings that anyone can paint, so he was as full of air as the ne&t
Abstract E&pressionistA but he is useful at least as a provider of interesting 9uotes against his fellow
airmen. #einhardt called #oth$o a 3oge maga@ine cold.water.flat.fauve, and %olloc$ a 4arper5s
%a,aar bum. 1arnett +ewman was the avant.garde huc$ster.handicraftsman and educational
shop$eeper. <e called art criticism pigeon droolings and ridiculed ,lement 4reenberg as a phony.
<e said the museum should not be a counting house or amusement center, which means he would not
be comfortable in the Whitney, 4uggenheim, MoMA, %ompidou, )ate or 8aatchi 4allery. "ou almost
have to li$e the guy, no matter what you thin$ of his art. Although not much of a painter, he was at
least not a bootlic$er of the elite, and he was the only Modern artist to participate in the March on
Washington for blac$ rights in 23BN. We may suppose the others were polishing their medals.
/f course, this is the reason you haven5t heard of #einhardt before now, despite the fact he was
producing pretty much the same thing as everyone else. )he others $ept 9uiet and (ust pissed in the
fireplace or something. <e was foolish enough to thin$ he was actually a real person, and therefore the
owner of his own life.
)o wrap this up, let us return to the boo$. #ussell :ynes gives us a good 9uote to end with0
The Museum no had, and as delighted to have, the hole orld 4or at least the hole orld outside the 6ron
%urtain5 in hich to proselyti1e7though this time the exportable religion as home2gron rather than hat been
in the past its primary message, the importable faith from Europe.
)hat is from his history of MoMA, and he is tal$ing about the year 23!'. *t was upon reading this
unparsable sentence that * finally figured out what the European e&hibitions were all about. *t wasn5t
about fighting ,ommunism or showcasing democracy. *t was about e&panding the mar$et. *n order to
drive the prices of their investments up, the #oc$efellers needed to manipulate not (ust the =8 mar$et,
but the European mar$et as well. 8ince the population of Europe was at that time about N times that of
the =8, the #oc$efellers could 9uadruple their mar$et for new art by e&panding operations into Europe.
=ntil the end of the war, Europe was too unstable for anyone to thin$ of pursuing art mar$ets there, but
as soon as hostilities ended, the #oc$efellers saw their opening. <iding this move under the flag was
the perfect cover. 8amuel Eohnson5s patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel fits this ploy li$e a
hand in a glove.
8ince the recent +8A scandals have proven that we are being watched at all times, * will turn straight
into the camera for this final paragraph, tal$ing to the agents directly. *t occurs to me you may be as
surprised as all my other readers to discover the true story behind Modern art. %erhaps you have never
cared enough about art to loo$ closelyA or perhaps you cared but?li$e me?(ust couldn5t see through
the many layers of veils. * beg you to as$ yourself if this is really what you signed on for. Maybe you
feel (ust as used as the rest of us. 8ince * have shown that patriotism was (ust a cloa$ here, your
patriotism doesn5t matter. Art history wasn5t $illed on the altar of patriotism or =8 political interests, it
was $illed only to enrich people that were already billionaires. "ou may say, "ou are right, * don5t
care about art. *ts loss means nothing to me. 8o substitute what you do care for instead of art. For the
truth is, everything is being destroyed to enrich those who are already billionaires, and the destruction
is always (ustified under the cloa$ of patriotism. /ur health is being destroyed, the oceans are being
destroyed, the fertility of the land is being destroyed, our water 9uality is being destroyed, our privacy
is being destroyed, our very self.determination is being destroyed, and in each case those doing the
destroying are hiding behind the flag. 8o * as$ again, is this what you signed on forJ *t isn5t what *
signed on for when * s9uee@ed through the birth canal.
O:i$e theater critic :ionel Abel, who was about !5!. *t ta$es a real macho man to attac$ a theater critic. After that,
4reenberg went out and stole coo$ies from a girl scout.