Robert Cenedella
The Art World’s Last Angry Man
Robert Cenedella’s political satire is evident in his paintings but is also out of step with the art world today. A protégé of George Grosz, a Dada master of post-World War I Germany, Cenedella was an outsider to the art establishment from the beginning. After World War II art went in a very different direction, toward apolitical abstract expressionism, then Pop Art, then conceptual art. In the film, leading arts scholars and journalists confirm Cenedella’s contention that money and large corporate donors have acquired undue influence on what museums show and galleries promote. Cenedella, whose father was blacklisted for his left-wing views in the MaCarthy era, refused to adapt to this world, not only because of its insularity but also because of its deadly seriousness. Cenedella remains a humorist, but his humor is laced with anger about the world and the now commodified art world. With a music score by Donald Stark, The Art World’s Last Angry Man was never released due to a dispute with producers but parts of the film were incorporated into the 2016 film about Cenedella, Art Bastard.
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