THE MISEDUCATION OF THE AMERICAN MIND

THE STATE of education in this country has become so poor or willfully misleading that even approved literary critics don’t seem to know what’s meant by populist art.

NOTE: It’s not best-selling genre novels cranked out by giant conglomerates. Neither is it paint-by-numbers superhero movies appearing in cinema chains: mindless products also distributed by gigantic conglomerates. Real populism recognizes that authentic culture is a grass roots phenomenon. From the people upward, not imposed by some bureaucracy or other from the top down.

Twentieth Century populism was a left-of-center aesthetic, without being doctrinaire about it. Many populists were in effect liberal centrists, including John Steinbeck, Frank Capra, Carl Sandburg, William Grant Still, Aaron Copland, and many others.

An example of a populist painter who definitely was on the left– populism, in taking a big-picture view, often references politics– was Mexican artist Diego Rivera, best known for murals depicting broad swaths of society. Such as the one at the Detroit Institute of Arts. (See above image.)

What of New Pop Lit?

Our roots are in the underground writing scene. Both NPL editors are from the tough industrial town of Detroit. Populism is part of our aesthetic and our ethos– though not exclusively. However much our vibe now is more retro modern, we’re never going to abandon the “pop” part of the New Pop Lit equation. Just saying.

-KW