[bazoom42]

This is an even crazier claim. Modern art was created by Braque, Picasso, Duchamp, and many others, primarily in Europe, and it was established as a major artistic movement a long time before CIA existed.

The more realistic claim is that CIA promoted abstract expressionism which is a primarily American 1950s art movement which is of course a sub-movement in modern art.

[Atlas667]

You are right, I just repeated it wrong, see my original comment. I do claim they established abstract expressionist art, but that is also beside the point. This art would have existed either way.

The wider claim is that they controlled the dissemination and narrative around art and the humanities in the US and around the world in order to inflate the opinion of the United States while promoting narratives about the Soviet Union that even the CIA knew were false, as stated by them in released memos.

This is the claim: that large sections of the art and humanities were funded and controlled by the CIA for propaganda purposes.