Transforming the Vietnam War: Artists’ reuse of published images and the destabilization of interpretation (1960-1972)

Abstract

This paper is excerpted from the Introduction chapter of the author’s doctoral dissertation currently in process. The dissertation examines artworks produced by a trio of visual artists in the period roughly from the early 1960’s through the mid 1970’s who chose to draw on images created by photojournalists and television reporters chronicling the American Vietnam War. By appropriating mainstream images and changing only the context in which they appeared, these artists were making statements that likely would have been clear to anyone who encountered the works, and would have raised questions, at the very least, about what the editors who originally published these images meant to communicate about the Vietnam War.