Star Wars: return of the sixties, or, Martha Rosler versus the Empire striking back
The most violent of the forces of globalization, imperialist colonization – whether as military, economic or cultural invasion – has provided the subject for American artist Martha Rosler's critiques and projects over the course of nearly fifty years of artistic practice. This article provides an original account of the significance of Rosler's return, during the American ‘war on terror’ in the 2000s, to her previous anti-war photomontage series, originally produced in the 1960s and 1970s during the American war in Vietnam, entitled Bringing the War Home. Through a critical examination of the concept of the reboot as operative within both the Bush administration's policies and the meta-critique of such policies which Rosler's activist art strategies deploy, this article situates these photomontages within the artist's overall practice, particularly her work appropriating popular cultural forms, formats or artefacts, as well as her work critiquing forms of American military imperialism, especially in Chile.