Privatizing the Commons: The Commodification of New Deal Public Art

New article by Lincoln Cushing: Privatizing the Commons: The Commodification of New Deal Public Art.

Lincoln Cushing is an important person in the world of political graphic art, having put together books on Cuban poster art and Chinese propaganda posters, both very enjoyable and interesting books. Lincoln is a librarian who had an earlier career as a printer and graphic designer. Labor and labor history are big interests for him. I have had the pleasure of working with Lincoln in a number of areas and am always happy to be able to direct people to new work by him.

This is quite an interesting article, and returns us to an important ongoing problem, from which our justifiable excitement about Obama’s victory has I think naturally distracted many of us. I don’t think Obama is going to be very strong on questions of the public sphere and privatization, unfortunately, despite how far along that road we’ve come by this point.