Criticism and philosophy have been merging art into history for some time now. Like an overgrown child, art has needed acculturation. Writers have suggested how deeply artists such as were embedded in American myths. How easily their protests, anxiety, and detachment turned into the triumph of modern man. Art critics mean all this as, well, something less than a compliment.
Art reduces easily to history, the history of a commodity culture.
Postmodern critics use that to see through a nation and its heroes. The old school actually used it to celebrate America's triumph, in the world and the marketplace. This show turns things around. Art does not become politically charged. Rather, history itself becomes part of American culture, up for sale.