Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_Cold_War

The Cultural Cold War was in a set of propaganda campaigns waged by the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War, with each country promoting their own culture, arts, literature, and music. In addition, less overtly, their opposing political choices and ideologies at the expense of the other. Many of the battles were fought in Europe or in European Universities,[1] with Communist Party leaders depicting the United States as a cultural black hole while pointing to their own cultural heritage as proof that they were the inheritors of the European Enlightenment.[2] The U.S. responded by accusing the Soviets of "disregarding the inherent value of culture," and subjugating art to the controlling policies of a totalitarian political system, even as they felt saddled with the responsibility of preserving and fostering Western civilization's best cultural traditions, given the many European artists who took refuge in the United States before, during, and after World War II.[2] Through officially sponsored programs and covert initiatives, both superpowers tried to persuade foreign audiences that their political and economic systems represented the future of modern civilization[1]

Western civilization in contrast, celebrated individuality and freedom of expression. Some valued artist during this time include Jackson Pollock and Alexander Calder who were celebrated for their abstract work. The idea of abstract art and creativity emphasize the capitalistic values of progressiveness and freedom of expression. The CIA supported this because propaganda during the Cold War with the Soviet Union, this new artistic movement could be held up as proof of the creativity, the intellectual freedom, and the cultural power of the US. Russian art, strapped into the communist ideological straitjacket, could not compete.

'Examination of the rising success of Abstract Expressionism in America after World War II, therefore, entails consideration of the role of the leading museum of contemporary art—The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA)—and the ideological needs of its officers during a period of virulent anticommunism and an intensifying "cold war."'

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