13. More Degenerate Art, Please! w/ Sarah Jaffray

Описание: What makes art politically dangerous to fascism—and why does empathy now count as transgression?

Today I'm joined by art historian, educator, and curator Sarah Jaffray for a wide-ranging conversation about modern art, fascism, and the politics of perception. Starting from the Nazis’ infamous “Degenerate Art” campaign, Sarah traces how artists in the aftermath of World War I deliberately abandoned realism, narrative, and institutional aesthetics in order to resist authoritarian power.

We explore why fascist movements obsess over image control, why abstraction and disorientation can be politically subversive, and how artists make the invisible visible—in part by slowing us down and drawing out deeper levels of attention. We discuss Dada, Surrealism, New Objectivity, Otto Dix, and George Gros alongside contemporary struggles over AI-generated art and outcome-driven creativity.

We talk a lot about time: the time art requires, the time empathy needs, and the way authoritarian systems try to eliminate both. Sarah argues for art as witness, process, and lived testimony in the face of political dehumanization.

Part Two of this conversation, [available now on Patreon](  / antifascistdadpodcast  , continues into practical guidance on aesthetic freedom and creative survival under pressure.

Antifascist Dad is out on April 26! You can preorder [here](https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/bo....

Notes

[About — Sarah Jaffray](https://www.sarahjaffray.com/about-1)

Barron, Stephanie, ed. “Degenerate Art”: The Fate of the Avant-Garde in Nazi Germany. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1991.
https://www.getty.edu/publications/vi...

Bauhaus-Archiv Museum für Gestaltung. “Bauhaus History 1919–1933.”
https://www.bauhaus.de/en/das_bauhaus...

Benjamin, Walter. “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction.” 1935.
https://www.marxists.org/reference/su...

Dixon, Paul. “Uncanny Valley.” Encyclopaedia Britannica.
https://www.britannica.com/science/un...

Dix, Otto. “War (Der Krieg), 1929–1932.” Dresden State Art Collections.
https://skd-online-collection.skd.mus...

Evans, Richard J. The Coming of the Third Reich. New York: Penguin, 2003.
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/bo...

Gross, George. “Background and Biography.” Tate.
https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/g...

Harrison, Charles, Francis Frascina, and Gill Perry. Primitivism, Cubism, Abstraction: The Early Twentieth Century. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1993.
https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/97803...

Hitler, Adolf. Speech at the opening of the Entartete Kunst exhibition, Munich, July 19, 1937.
English excerpts reproduced at:
https://research.calvin.edu/german-pr...

Holbein, Hans (the Younger). “The Ambassadors.” National Gallery, London.
https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/pa...

Kandinsky, Wassily. Concerning the Spiritual in Art. 1911.
https://www.guggenheim.org/artwork/3483

Lawrence, Jacob. “The Migration Series.” Museum of Modern Art.
https://www.moma.org/collection/works...

Nochlin, Linda. “Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?” ARTnews, 1971.
https://www.artnews.com/art-news/retr...

Riley, Bridget. “Lecture and Interviews.” Tate Britain Archive.
https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/b...

Rothko, Mark. “Rothko Room.” Tate Modern.
https://www.tate.org.uk/visit/tate-mo...

Schulz-Hoffmann, Carla, and Judith C. Weiss, eds. Neue Sachlichkeit / New Objectivity. Munich: Prestel, 2015.
https://www.prestel.com/books/neue-sa...

Tate. “Dada.”
https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms...

Tate. “Surrealism.”
https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms...

Velázquez, Diego. “Las Meninas.” Museo del Prado.
https://www.museodelprado.es/en/the-c...

Walker, Kara. “Artist Overview.” Tate.
https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/k...

Winckelmann, Johann Joachim. History of the Art of Antiquity. 1764.
English edition via Project Gutenberg:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/21891

00:02:03 Vanity Fair's Anti-Fascist Portraits
00:07:17 Interview
00:08:22 What Makes Transgressive Art Impactful?
00:11:04 In the Elevator With Art That's Transgressive
00:12:59 Art in the Age of AI
00:18:34 Art and the Uncanny Valley
00:22:51 The Shift in Modern Art History
00:30:12 The Degenerate Art Exhibition