The CIA and the Art World: The Cultural Front of the Cold War
19.99 €
15.99 €
In stock
The CIA and the Art World: The Cultural Front of the Cold War
19.99 €
15.99 €
This book by British journalist and documentary filmmaker Frances Stonor Saunders presents for the first time shocking evidence of CIA manipulation of cultural policy during the Cold War. It is well known that the CIA funded and coordinated right-wing intellectuals and organizations. What is less well known is that Langley actively recruited people of left-wing views to alienate American and Western European intellectuals from the ideas of communism and to induce them to fight against the USSR. Communist views were sometimes allowed - provided they were anti-Soviet. The CIA-created and supervised "Congress for Cultural Freedom" with offices in 35 countries was the main mechanism and platform for this activity, which involved such famous writers and philosophers as George Orwell, Bertrand Russell, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Arthur Koestler. Russian immigrant composer Nikolai Nabokov (the writer's cousin) served as secretary general of the Congress for Cultural Freedom. Thus the CIA took over the functions of the Ministry of Culture: the "new age of enlightenment" was to be the "American Century." In an attempt to create an attractive "American culture" in opposition to Soviet and European culture, the American government clandestinely patronized a little-known art movement, Abstract Expressionism, which later grew into one of the most expensive movements on the market. Full of intrigue and betrayal, this scandalous story of the CIA's subversion of culture reads like a detective story.
See also:
- All books by the publisher
- All books by the author
- All books in the series Realpolitik