Catherine Sullivan, "Baby Jane/Amusement Infusion," production still, 2002. Performer: Michael Garvey. From "Big Hunt," five channels shot on 16mm film transferred to video, projected from DVD, 21 min 48 sec per channel, black and white, silent. © Catherine Sullivan.

Contests. Art Shows. Expos. Special Exhibits. Art Festivals. It’s crazy.

While they are called by different names, art educators often have a similar reaction: Someone has a big idea and wants student art to decorate a space. The number of art contests we see in the average school year can make your head spin. There are contests to make posters about everything from teeth to tap water to trash recycling. There are contests for holidays and anniversaries. There are even contests for exhibits that the student artists themselves can’t attend. I’m serious!

But contests, if there is a clear set of criteria that judges are using to pick the artists, can offer students and teachers a chance try new ideas and tap into themes, media, and forms of expression that may not see the light of day in an existing curriculum. Distinguishing between contests that essentially exploit students vs. participating in meaningful and interesting opportunities with them is part our work. Classroom time is never enough for many kids and creating works of art outside of school that utilize meaningful exhibition opportunites can actually enhance curriculum and student portfolios.

Contemporary art gives students a basis and starting point for looking at themes, such as Protest and Consumption, that can influence extra-curricular work dramatically. Artists such as Jenny Holzer, Nancy Spero, Michael Ray Charles and Kerry James Marshall, for example, can give students new insights into work that’s about race, activism, propaganda and stereotypes. Exhibit opportunities and contests can be a chance for students to get inspired by art outside of the planned curriculum.

How do you use (or not use) these kinds of “opportunities” in your own classroom?

Art21 often gets asked about the provocative nature of artworks by some of our featured artists. At the same time, we find conversations taking place, online and off, that touch upon how we—as educators, producers, viewers, and citizens—can make sense of the images we see.

Our comfort level with depictions of nudity, (homo)sexuality, prolific violence, political unrest, and the grotesque may waver from one work or movement to another. But art that instigates controversy nonetheless remains in our midst—difficult and perhaps irritating on one hand and psychologically expansive, moving, and even beautiful on the other. And clearly, the context and reception of art changes over time.

Otto Dix’s Stormtroops Advancing Under Gas (1924) and Nancy Spero’s Search and Destroy (detail, 1967)

Édouard Manet’s Olympia (1863) and Ida Applebroog’s Modern Olympia (after Manet) (1997-2001)

Anonymous cartoon courtesy of the Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia and Michael Ray Charles’s (Forever Free) Tommy Hilnigguh (1999)

Though now taught as key works on a modern art history syllabus, Courbet’s Origin of the World (1866), Picasso’s Demoiselles d’Avignon (1907), and most everything Warhol-related (but especially his car crash/electric chair silkscreens) once shocked their viewing publics to the core. And on it goes, from Richard Serra’s Tilted Arc (1981) and the controversies it raised around the nature and purpose of site-specific work; to the inflammatory tactics of the Young British Artists (YBAs) of the 90s; from Jeff Koons’ massive depictions of explicit sexuality with his then-wife (1989-1991); to Kara Walker’s room-sized installations reflecting her alternative vision of a sexually depraved and cruelly violent antebellum south.

So what is it about art and its capacity to shock us? Well, we were thrilled to find Color theory 8, A Shocking Negress?, a video by an educator and artist in Philadelphia named John T. In the video, he chronicles his “experiment” introducing the work of Kara Walker to his students, particularly her painting Negress Notes (Brown Follies) (1996-7). John’s engagement with Walker’s work prompts the questions: “Can a mere picture be shocking?” and “I very much like Kara Walker’s work. Does that make me a racist?” We hear from both him and his students as they debate the viability of the work and Walker’s intention to provoke or unsettle the viewer. Watch it here and if you have time, read the divisive comments on YouTube.

In tackling the issues surrounding controversial art, many additional questions echoing what John T. asks are raised. Over the next month, we will unpack some of them by introducing related posts by other writers weighing in from institutional, educational, and personal perspectives. In the meantime, let’s distill all of this inquiry down to a simple question:

Have you ever been shocked by a work of art and if so, why? What’s your take?

Check out The Blanton Museum of Art’s two exciting exhibitions featuring works by Art21 artists Richard Tuttle (Season 3), Michael Ray Charles (Season 1) and Hubbard + Birchler (Season 3).

Richard Tuttle’s Light Pink Octagon from 1967 is displayed in America/Americas, an ongoing exhibition with rotating works from both the American and Latin American collections at the Blanton. The exhibition shows works from North, Central and South America in a refreshingly new and unprecedented way. Works range from 1909 through 1985, exploring the differences and similarities in creative production throughout the continent and the continuous flow of ideas between borders. Tuttle’s Light Pink Octagon, from his Octagon series, has also served as an inspiration piece for Texan poets participating in the Blanton’s Poetry Project. Tuttle’s own interest in space and objects that cross the boundaries between painting, sculpture or drawing, has turned into poetic visions of shape and color that shed light on our own interpretations of this particular piece.

Michael Ray Charles and the artist team of Teresa Hubbard and Alexander Birchler make an appearance in Atelier 2008: Selections from the Department of Art & Art History Faculty at the University of Texas at Austin, just about to open in three days and on view through June 8, 2008. Atelier 2008 is the first faculty exhibition being organized by a guest curator (this year, James Elaine, from the Hammer Museum of Art in LA), and it opens a new format of triennial exhibitions that will display faculty work at the Blanton from now on. For more information on Michael Ray Charles’s painting (Forever Free) Jersey #9 (Cultural Value/Black Hand), 2003, and Teresa Hubbard+Alexander Birchler’s video Single Wide, 2002, visit the Blanton Museum’s website.

Caption: Richard Tuttle, Light Pink Octagon, 1967

Currently on view at the Gallery at the University of Texas at Arlington is Points of Convergence. Seven nationally-recognized contemporary artists, who received MFA degrees from seven different American university art programs, have been paired with seven emerging artists currently completing the MFA program at those same universities for the exhibition, which runs through Tuesday, March 4.

Work by Art21 artists Janine Antoni (Season 2), Michael Ray Charles, and Ann Hamilton (both Season 1) is shown alongside that of David Bates, Ross Bleckner, Enrique Chagoya, and more.

In conjunction with the exhibition, Michael Ray Charles gave an illustrated lecture about his work last Thursday, Feb. 21. If you happened to attend, please share your impressions or any photos you may have taken with us.

For more information or visit www.uta.edu/gallery.