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

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 Grosz 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, continues into practical guidance on aesthetic freedom and creative survival under pressure.

Antifascist Dad is out on April 26! You can preorder here.

Notes

About — Sarah Jaffray

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/virtuallibrary/0892362651.html

Bauhaus-Archiv Museum für Gestaltung. “Bauhaus History 1919–1933.”
https://www.bauhaus.de/en/das_bauhaus/21_history/

Benjamin, Walter. “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction.” 1935.
https://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/ge/benjamin.htm

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

Dix, Otto. “War (Der Krieg), 1929–1932.” Dresden State Art Collections.
https://skd-online-collection.skd.museum/Details/Index/334771

Evans, Richard J. The Coming of the Third Reich. New York: Penguin, 2003.
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/297974/the-coming-of-the-third-reich-by-richard-j-evans/

Gross, George. “Background and Biography.” Tate.
https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/george-grosz-1188

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/9780300055191/primitivism-cubism-abstraction/

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

Holbein, Hans (the Younger). “The Ambassadors...

Chapters

(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

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