Roger Kimball, Managing Editor of The New Criterion and author of The Long March: How the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s Changed America, has published a jeremiad about the state of the art world. It’s not that he’s saying anything that hasn’t been said by others, but the piece is a concise outline of the major issues that are cleaving the art world into warring factions. His starting point is the inaugural show in a new museum space at Bard College, but he could have teed off on any number of recent exhibits. (Read the full article here or an excerpted version on my blog Slow Painting.)
I’m pluralist enough to want all forms of expression to have a chance for a voice. The main issue for me regarding a lot of activities of the “insider” art world (the art mafia if you will) is the hegemony that inevitably shuts out other points of view. That’s the main reason I started blogging–to speak to issues I don’t think get enough air time.
As for a fix to the state of things, Kimball doesn’t offer much, not even a palliative. The organic view that a pendulum swing rectifies extreme positions over time—similar to the economic concept of a market correction—isn’t getting my vote. And given the increasingly overheated environment where money and hype seem to be in endless supply, I’m not sure where all of this will take us or how long this particular rocket shot will keep arcing upwards.
A great article. Thanks for pointing it out. I’m a pluralist too, and this jeremiad seemed a little mean-spirited—though you have to wonder how a jeremiad could avoid being so.
Still, the definition of art he prefers—”mastery of a craft in order to make objects that gratify and ennoble those who see them”—does arouse some nostalgia in me for a time when pleasing the senses (instead of exciting, repelling, or rebuking them) wasn’t hopelessly naive.
In poetry, the modernists are responsible for art that is “indistinguishable from the verbal noise that accompanies it,” but that has done little to change public taste and much to discredit poetry as obdurate and pretentious.
The real casuality in “the domestication of deviance, and its subsequent elevation as an object of aesthetic” is, as Kimball so smartly points out, art itself.
And I would call it, as he does, a tragedy, except that art seems finally invulnerable to our fashions. Some artists will always be immune or, more accurately, attuned to contemporary modes AND eternal ones.
Your comments are so good, I have to make sure everyone who comes to this blog reads this. Thank you for your insights and reassurances. I do think art has an indomitable quality, a little like the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park who find a way to propagate in spite of every effort to prevent it. Like the 50 years of claims that “painting is dead,” and we’re still waiting for the coroner’s report…
Hi Deborah. An outstanding trio of blogs. Kimball’s article is mostly a listing of common complaints about the contemporary art world. Nothing new there. More importantly he offers little hope for the future. Check out my post on Kimball’s article at http://madsilence.wordpress.com/2007/06/14/disaster-in-the-art-world/. Your comments are welcome.
I’m not sure what joefelso means when he states “art seems finally invulnerable to our fashions.” 20th century art has for the most part been fashion art, with many artists “one shot wonders.” The contemporary “classical realism” movement encourages a return to traditional artistic skills & reliance on historic art & artists for inspiration & guidance.
I think we need to escape the sphere of the museum curator, arts patron, gallery owner & wealthy collector (think Saathci) & look to our local home-grown artists & artisans for art that is uplifting & aesthetically pleasing. There’s a lot of good stuff out there if you look.
MadSilence
http://madsilence.wordpress.com
What a treat to be introduced to your blog. Thank you for contacting me. Yours is the only father/daughter blog I know of. What a concept.
Your take on Kimball’s article is an excellent introduction for someone just entering into this ongoing dialogue. And as for your final recommendation–a stepping away from the circus that is the art fair/art star scene and focusing on local home grown artists is exactly why I started my “slow” blogs, inspired by slow food and the Slow Citi movement.
I can’t speak for my blogging friend (whose name is not Joe Felso, but is a terrific blogger even though he remains unidentified) but I think what he meant by his comment was that there is something defiant about art–even if confined to a small segment of art makers at this point–that will not bow to fashion, the current trends, the canon that gets promulgated through art school education. I would put myself in that category. I’m defiant in my commitment to and search for transcendence. Funny thing, I keep finding more people who feel the same.
I’m adding your blog to my blogroll. I hope lots of my readers find their way to your site.
I really enjoyed the article too, the cynisism was amusing this time, not at all disheartening, probably because I’m in total agreement with Kimball’s analysis of the reasons for disasters like the exhibition he refers to.
He basically made the exact same point I made in my Master’s thesis four years ago (I wrote about provocative art), except I don’t see the situation as hopeless as he does. I actually find it quite funny that so many artists and other people in the art world think they are being subversive, when the game was already lost with Duchamp. This article inspired me to start reading art magazines again, and analyzing those hopelessly pseudo-intellectual texts to bits, revealing the posturing and mindnumbing art speak-jargon.
Thanks for linking to the article!
By the way, the only true subversiveness today is silence, or possibly what artists like you do, Deborah.
Jenny,
As always, I am heartened by your point of view. I too don’t see the situation as hopeless because there is something undefeatable operating here. And you have paid me the highest compliment. I will continue in my quiet subversive art making!