Art Criticism in Chicago – Dazed and Confused. A review of the panel discussion at the School of the Art Institute on November 22, 2011 by Diane Thodos
I came to the auditorium at 112 S. Michigan with high hopes for an engaged debate on art criticism in Chicago and expected a lively discussion about the recent book The Essential New Art Examiner – a republication of seminal essays from the Chicago-based magazine which began in 1974 and ended in 2002. I had been a writer for the New Art Examiner in the late 90s until its demise and was rather itching for a conversation. But this was not to be. There were glints of subjects that could have sparked rich topics of conversation – Jim Yood the moderator had started out by saying the NAE had “challenged authority and power” – but for the most part the panel proved that art criticism in Chicago does nothing of the sort today, and worse still would simply have no idea of what this meant. As far as the conversation went the pot never got to simmering let alone boiling.
For me this is a rather sad state of affairs. I had to wonder how the “elephant” in the room – major issues surrounding art world power, control and impenetrable art theory – remained invisible to most of the seven panelists. What seemed more visible were the “emperor’s new clothes” – art writing that responded to the kind of and inbred art world thinking that pours out of art schools like SAIC. This is the situation that has displaced critical consciousness and inquiry. Perhaps I was wrong to be surprised considering the style of the media and blog-based writing reflected by most of panelists– Jason Foumberg of New City, Abraham Ritchie and Steve Ruiz of Artslant.com and Lori Waxman of the Chicago Tribune.
In saying so I do not wish to overlook the considerable efforts of two of the panelists – Kathryn Born and Terri Griffith- who do not profess art world training but whose indispensable efforts brought the recent Essential New Art Examiner into existence. Students in art departments all over the country retained their old copies of the NAE because they got dynamic art discussions and answers which they could not find on the pages of Artforum or Art in America. We live in a time of commercial and institutional – dare I say corporate – influence which makes independent structures with alternative points of view, like the NAE had once offered, rare and valuable particularly today. Creating the new book is an important step in sustaining this value. One of the panelists, the former NAE editor Ann Wiens, was thorough in discussing the particular 1980s art world background she came from. She was interested in bringing in “lots of peoples points of views” to the NAE and mentioned the time she spent working with the New York art critic Donald Kuspit. Her answers to questions were well grounded and brought a sense of Chicago art history that was useful, stressing the magazine’s importance to the city as the only source “chronicling the work being made at the time “and “interested people who mattered in our community.”
Aside from this most of the discussion was lost in space. I could not grasp the basis out of which most of the panelists interpreted art, and perhaps this is because they write for media formats and publications that don’t demand it. There was the sense that the younger writers are looking for answers but do not know where to find them. In an art world lacking critical consciousness and suffering from amnesia about its history it’s easy for writers to cling to self-reference and the centralizing mechanisms of the mass media. This makes the art world boring and complacent. Plenty of descriptive art writing abounds, but there is no stabilizing force which allows coherent meanings or interpretations to emerge. I could not discern how these writers linked art with human experience or life outside of the artist’s self-proclaimed intentions. Most of the writers on the panel had started their careers after the NAE had disappeared, which goes some way in explaining the loss of a “center” for the discussion of art in Chicago. The NAE was a “town square” to use Ann Wiens’ metaphor, where artists could meet and discuss – it was a focal point for debate. Jim Yood as moderator was talkative and humorous, but his questions offered no real challenges or issues of controversy. Conversation was mostly anecdotal and nostalgic, ever cycling around details of the New Art Examiner’s past without hitting any target of deeper interest or sparking debate. Finally things came to life during the question and answer session by a few older members of the audience. One question brought up discussion of the time when Kathryn Hixson, the last editor of the New Art Examiner, had mismanaged the magazine to the point of bankruptcy and how this continues to remain a sore spot for many who knew how important the magazine was to Chicago’s ever-fragile art infrastructure. The NAE was originally created as a bulwark against censorship “without fear or favor.” In its last days it looked more like an imitation of Artforum.
I was alarmed by the incuriousness of the panel as well as the SAIC students in the audience. The narcissistic attitudes of artists have been deeply inbred by countless art programs over the past 30 years. This has lead, for the most part, to a fairly uncritical acceptance of what is being taught. Donald Kuspit once said we have gone beyond self-censorship to self-ignorance, which makes for quite an Orwellian situation. The framework of power over what is considered art – disseminated from art school to gallery to museum – is effective because it is invisible. For all of the contemporary art world’s claim to being “liberal” and “progressive” it is deeply conservative at heart, and the panel discussion was point in case. Yes the doors to the auditorium were open, but in a sense the public was not really invited. We live in an art world – I would call it a “post-art” world – where meaningful human content and experience is ignored and where the purveyors of culture don’t seem to know the difference and couldn’t care less. That is the real crisis.
Diane Thodos is an artist and art critic who lives in Evanston, IL. She has written for The New Art Examiner Art on Paper, and Dialogue magazine among others. She currently writes for Artcritical.com and Neotericart.com and has written numerous artist catalogue essays. She is a 2002 recipiant of a Pollock Krasner Foundation Grant and had a 2009 retrospective at the National Hellenic Museum in Chicago in 2009. She is represented by The Kouros Gallery in New York City where she exhibited in 2011. The Thomas Masters Gallery in Chicago, the Alex Rivault Gallery in Paris, and the Traeger/Pinto Gallery in Mexico City also represent her.
Category: Articles, Reviews 49 comments »
December 5th, 2011 at 9:28 am
Was this a review of the panel discussion? Seems more like a continuation of the agenda Thodos came to the discussion with as evident from the flyer she handed out after the discussion.
December 5th, 2011 at 10:49 am
Not having been at the discussion, I cannot comment on that; but I would like to reinforce Diane’s view–and by inference Donald Kuspit, and I would include Hockney and Fischl–that the art establishment now is so self-referential in a gauzy theory-driven way that hearty discussion and strong interaction with the public are impossible.
Being an unnatural state for humans, this ignoring of the total human condition in order to focus and bloat a very small part of phenomena, it cannot last. It is certain that we must get to benchmarks such as Form and Content, Truth and Beauty, guts and intellect. I wonder only what it will take. Seriously, must we wait yet another generation, or will the idea sweep through current curators, critics, and patrons due either to intrinsic need or boredom with the current, lightweight pseudo-intellectualism?
December 5th, 2011 at 1:34 pm
I concur with you Robert and happen to agree with Diane on this one. The panel discussion’s topic was Chicago Criticism: Past, Present and Future and I don’t think that was really addressed. The past was discussed in reference to NAE pleasantries, the present was more of a laundry list of people’s doings and the future wasn’t tackled at all. James Yood’s questions were repetitive which caused overlapping in the panel’s answers. The 3 younger writers didn’t add much to the discussion first because they really have no memory of the NAE and secondly because the “future” of criticism wasn’t mentioned. It would have made more sense for the entire panel to have been associated with the NAE in some form or fashion especially since the main topic was the publication of the new NAE book. We ran out of time but I wanted to ask the question: In the 80s and 90s the NAE was the main source for art criticism and art related stories in Chicago…we now have many more sources (mostly online) but is there one or two sources in Chicago now that rivals the NAE?…or what do we consider to be the main source now? The panel also made me realize that the SAIC has a heavy hand in the Chicago art scene.
December 5th, 2011 at 1:37 pm
In response to Richard Kooyman’s comment – if he interested in agendas, perhaps he can comment on why SAIC did not invite Derek Guthrie to speak on the panel. After all he was one of the original founders of the NAE and was seminal in bringing about the publication of the new book which was discussed. Isn’t this, after all, strange? It’s on the paper and you can get get more from Derek’s Neotericart October interview – back to the home page and at the bottom. The soft censorship of omission is alive and well and it is a very effective mechanism for distracting us from the huge disconnect that is happening between the public and the art world.
December 5th, 2011 at 2:39 pm
Being new to Chicago I found the panel informative and interesting from a historical perspective. I thought the panel was well balanced from the two people who organized the book, to several people who worked at NAE over the years to younger panel members who may or may have not been affected by the NAE. If you were there to just dig up ghost of the past you probably would be disappointed but I found Steve Ruiz’s comment that he’s never opened a copy of the NAE indicative of how things have changed over the years.
What was obvious from Thodos’s comments and some of the history explored on the panel is that there is a lot of bad blood over things that have happened in the past during certain people’s reign at the NAE.
What Thodos’s or Stanley’s personal taste in art or the type of student the SAIC generates has to do with the panel discussion I’m not sure,but it reminds me of that great Greg Brown lyric where he says “World peace is surely on the way once us old fuckers get out of the way.”
December 5th, 2011 at 2:49 pm
There will be be on Jan 28th 2012 a one day symposium at de Kalb. I invite
all to attend. This symposium will not be hamstrung by the political correctness that drained the SAIC seminar from meaningful analysis. The politics of the staff room at SAIC hijacked the seminar in a outrageous
display of self interest in an attempt to gain prestige by suppressing the
dynamic and values that the New Art Examiner established and were dismantled by Katherine Hixson. So the dismantling was Honored. I never associated Art with dismantling except when hired as a political weapon.
when that happens it becomes propaganda, disinformation or advertising
take you pick. This will not happen in de kalb see you there Jan 28th.
December 5th, 2011 at 3:31 pm
Thank you Diane for your insightful article on the recent panel discussion. As a member of the front guard of the NAE I welcome an open house, lively debate, thoughtful criticism and gutsy replies. Let’s focus on the present state of the Visual Arts in Chicago and move forward so we can begin to define what is significant in art criticism today and what is crucial to an appreciation of Art through education, participation and fearless
expression of values. See you on 28 January.
December 6th, 2011 at 8:13 am
Richard, I see, gets it wrong. When he says “What Thodos’s or Stanley’s personal taste in art or the type of student the SAIC generates has to do with the panel discussion I’m not sure,but it reminds me of that great Greg Brown lyric where he says ‘World peace is surely on the way once us old fuckers get out of the way.’”
Having clearly stated we are going beyond the panel to the state of criticism today, Richard’s defense of the status quo, which I’ll simplify as postmodern subjectivism hooked into identity and power politics, misses the critical point: we need to move into the future with assertiveness. Perhaps, in looking back, we can move forward, in the sense that the past at least had benchmarks around which to base arguments. These benchmarks were visual appropriateness (line, shape color, technique, placement) and the desire for significant content. With these internalized, I trust young artists to find their way into the future, not repeat the small focus and flimsy criteria of most current critics and curators.
December 7th, 2011 at 4:24 am
Hi,
I would like to comment on this discussion because I agree wholeheartedly with the sentiments expressed here. I have been considering getting involved in art criticism because I think this city has some wonderful artists that are completely overlooked, while these charlatans steal the limelight -which by the way, generally coincides with sales, grants, and reviews that typically reinforce more of the same -to the point where this lackluster art is being collected and shipped out all over, to represent Chicago art.
I did not go to the panel discussion, nor would I have liked to. I was a young art student in the nineties, but we went to shows and I am familiar with the NAE. I can only imagine what a self -congratulating experience this might have been for the panel and the hidden agenda of these institutions. They are all in bed together creating this new tenet of contemporary art-lite. It’s like the new version of the Paris Salon of the nineteenth century, except Duchamp has replaced David. It really makes me sick, but it’s not only happening here, but in every city.
I don’t want to go on forever, which I could. It seems that there needs to be a new NAE or obviously under a different name, but a new forum- in print- where artists and honest critics can be brash and not be defined by political, corporate, or financial interests. I would love to contribute or get involved in this type of project. I think a lot of people I know feel the same way, but are either to lazy or afraid to do anything about it. But no one has to hold their breath waiting for change; if we stay silent, nothing will.
December 7th, 2011 at 12:23 pm
I’ll give anyone a free drawing if they can explain to me just what Robert Stanley’s statement “postmodern subjectivism hooked into identity and power politics” even means?
December 7th, 2011 at 11:30 pm
Richard,
I do not understand your defensive tone here. I looked up your work, which I like, and it would seem to me that you would agree with what is being said here. I would rather not speak for anyone else, but in terms of the general topic, have you read any art criticism being produced in this city? Do you see at as anything more than pomp and fluff?
December 8th, 2011 at 12:07 pm
Joe,
I am defending the idea of moving forward. Isn’t that what art is about? How do you judge and compare art writing and criticism from the past to the present and predict what it will be in the future? I have no idea. What I do know is that there is so much new online art writing, new formats where to read writing and criticism ( who cares what the difference is?)that I can’t even keep up with it all. Can that be a bad thing? I don’t think so.
What I am defensive of is Thodo’s sentimental notion that the art world and art criticism was better when Derek Guthrie ran the NAE. Maybe it was good. Maybe it was really good for the time but times change and for Thodos to make the charge that people like Foumberg, Richie, Ruiz and Waxman are looking for answers but “don’t know where to find them” is just silly talk. Hey ask them your question, I don’t need to defend them, but I’m not buying into Thodo’s idea of an art world apocalypse.
December 8th, 2011 at 6:01 pm
In response to Richard Kooyman – yes I do see an Orwellian situation that is a big problem in the art world – and you may well not. Personally I would not use the word “apocalypse” to describe the condition of the art world – I would use it for real life existential problems like global warming, famine, etc. But if you want to continue discussing your point and care about the conversation I really suggest you read a copy the Essential New Art Examiner – and with all genuine good will I would hope that Foumberg, Richie, Ruiz, and Waxman would want to to read it too. I would be very interested to know their thoughts about the essays. The book relates much of the history Chicago art world and gives some pretty refreshing perspectives and means of critical discussion. Your statement about me saying “not knowing where to find the answers” is not silly talk. I had a discussion with one of the panelists before the lecture who was very hungry indeed to find some sources to help him find direction in his writing – he got a copy of the book that night. That’s a good starting point. Give it a try.
December 9th, 2011 at 1:09 pm
For such a small community that can ill afford to adopt such a divisive and petty position over and over again, we certainly do a very good job of doing so.
Who knows what machinations went on behind the scenes, if any did at all. We seem to love the idea that there is someone brokering power, pulling strings and setting up obstacles for those left out. In reality, if we only look a little closer, we may find the those obstacles are easily seen and avoided. Often, they are there because we have put them there ourselves.
Did the SAIC intentionally exclude Derek Guthrie from the panel to avoid messy politics? Maybe … or maybe they just made a decision to not dredge up those skeletons from the past. The bigger question is, as a community, do we need to address the issues that were bubbling during the tenure of NAE, the issues that contributed to its demise or should we just move on? Given that those issues are, at minimum, almost a decade old at this point, it serves no good to look back. In the bigger picture the NAE ended because it’s time was done. The landscape for art criticism and an art-focused publication had changed. Ironically as we were being told that the world was turning into a global village, the art world was shifting towards a more concentrated model that seemed to focus on a few major cities around the globe. Regionalism became a dirty word. We now hear that Regionalism may be coming back into vogue. “Look and live local” is the word of the day. Only time will tell if the paradigm has truly shifted.
Were there things that the NAE did that were valuable to artists living and working outside of the ‘centers’? Absolutely. Those are the things we should be focusing on. There almost always is something to be gained in looking at some of this past writing.
Was there mismanagement involved in the demise of the NAE and were there hurt feelings left after the magazine folded? It seems so. Undoubtedly mistakes were made and some people were rubbed the wrong way during the run of a magazine that lasted some 28 years. Is there any value for the Chicago/Midwestern Art Community in churning up that history? Certainly not. Do we need to focus on that aspect of the magazines run? We would be much better served looking for the valuable contributions, looking to see if those contributions are still missing.
It is time to move on; as some have said, it is time for Chicago to grow up. There is no ‘crisis of criticism’ here. The challenges facing this community are many but they are most certainly not rooted in a lack of writers or a lack of outlets for that writing. In many ways, the age if the internet has taken care of the writing/outlet issue. The biggest challenge facing this community is a lack of support. We don’t support each other, we snipe at each other. We have a diverse community but, due to financial and structural realities, it is a very dispersed community that is often difficult to navigate. Financial support is difficult to come by for artists and the galleries that show them. The people who buy art just don’t buy it here.
We need to begin to foster the idea that the most effective way to support the arts in the Midwest is buy art here. Almost any show in one of the younger galleries could be had for $20,000.00 – a pittance in art-world dollars. That money would do wonders for the artists career and for the gallery showing the work. Art purchased here would be a direct cash infusion to the scene, a scene that, right now, effectively has no marketplace. Go find some work that you like and buy it. We don’t even like to discuss selling work here, as if the sale of something automatically sullies the work. It costs money to make work, to run a space, to show the work after it is made. Yes, we need to grow up, time to move on.
Michael Kaysen
December 9th, 2011 at 4:54 pm
Kaysen,
If Thodos is correct that a lack of historical consciousness is a problem (or a symptom of some larger problem) for artists and art writers alike, how do you suppose that a conscious forgetting the past will remedy the situation?
I agree with your remarks about local support. But, the same actors who have taken up residence within the Academy have also done much to break the tradition of real commerce–supplanting it when possible with a web of NFP funding administered by fellow travelers.
A shifting has occurred: from the individual to the group; from the commodity to the dematerialized practice; from the specialist to the generalist; from the experienced to the youthful.
Chicago is now filled with part-time, multitasking, people in their 20s and 30s, who will claim, while moving from friend’s apartment to friend’s apartment, to be artists, teachers, gallerists, writers and curators at once. How is expertise within any one field ever to be developed? How can such a broad dispersion of effort (often gratis) ever manage to sustain itself–let alone subsidize the purchase of some other person’s work?
December 9th, 2011 at 7:10 pm
Diane, I love you, but who the hell reviews a panel? I mean, Jesus, you review a book or an art exhibit, but now we’re reviewing panels?
My theory is that SAIC couldn’t do a flat-out promotional event about the book, so it was shrouded in a criticism panel. It was a promotional press event in disguise. There. End of conspiracy.
I vote we review art, not panels that talk about talking about art.
K
December 9th, 2011 at 10:13 pm
Dear Kathryn, Thanks for your input.
I have been writing for a long time – many reviews and artists essays, many in support of artists, many letters to the editor – and that is all well and to the good. I will always do so.
But the profession of art criticism itself also important to me, which is what motivated me to write about the panelists. Criticism needs a future too and getting alternative voices and debate – dialectic – matters. I want my words to make some space for this to happen. On that note I have been reading over The Essential and getting a lot out of it – some essays I had read before, others I have missed – still so relevant. Kudos to you for making it happen!
December 10th, 2011 at 4:23 pm
four .comments.
The reasons for the demise of the New Art Examiner are larger
than people involved. The values employed need attention without
vindictiveness . It would be instructive.
Panels need attention as they are cultural events.
It is good to have discussion I enjoy reading Neoteric Art Site .
hope to meet you guys either at Evanston art center 20the Jan or De Kalb
jan 28.
December 10th, 2011 at 10:54 pm
Richard’s difficulty with understanding my statement that our contemporary problem as “postmodern subjectivism hooked into identity and power politics” is precisely what Diane and several others are pointing out as having stopped, and continuing to slow down, progress in art and art criticism. Without understanding, there is no knowledge nor wisdom. I THINK the progressive point trying to be made here is that without benchmarks (a situation that postmodernism has inflicted upon many art schools, curators, and the powers-that-be), we have no solid way of moving forward. We will meander among the whimsical, the trite. and the overly-subjective. So, here, Richard, is something I found by googling the essential words from my description:
“Postmodernism’s essentials are the opposite of modernism’s. Instead of natural reality—anti-realism. Instead of experience and reason— linguistic social subjectivism. Instead of individual identity and autonomy—various race, sex, and class group-isms. Instead of human interests as fundamentally harmonious and tending toward mutually-beneficial interaction—conflict and oppression. Instead of valuing individualism in values, markets, and politics—calls for communalism, solidarity, and egalitarian restraints. Instead of prizing the achievements of science and technology—suspicion tending toward outright hostility.” (Stephen Hicks, Explaining Postmodernism, pp. 14-15)
December 11th, 2011 at 8:18 am
From Robert: “We will meander among the whimsical, the trite and the overly-subjective.” I somewhat agree with this but can’t imagine that the current generation of artists, curators, writers would describe their art world as such. The current art world is their norm and it may not appear “broken” to them but they do have their own set of obstacles. Every generation will see their art world differently…and will combat it in their own unique way.
December 11th, 2011 at 8:58 am
If Postmodernism was simply about being the opposite of Modernism as Robert Stanley suggests we wouldn’t have hundreds of books written on the subject. Hell, we are still arguing what Modernism was about let alone what the opposite of Modernism is.
December 12th, 2011 at 8:53 am
Spot on comment (#15) by Paul:
“Chicago is now filled with part-time, multitasking, people in their 20s and 30s, who will claim, while moving from friend’s apartment to friend’s apartment, to be artists, teachers, gallerists, writers and curators at once. How is expertise within any one field ever to be developed? How can such a broad dispersion of effort (often gratis) ever manage to sustain itself–let alone subsidize the purchase of some other person’s work?”
December 12th, 2011 at 11:17 am
Norbert’s observation applies outside of Chicago certainly in the UK.. The confusion between the business of presenting of art and the response to art is now an obsolete concept. . The game of power politics is now complete.It seems that publicity is art. it seems that strategy is also art. Money buys publicity and strategy. All that is left is the trickle down theory,
James Elkins in 2003 wrote an important Book. What ever happened
to Art Criticism.?
December 12th, 2011 at 3:13 pm
Paul, Norbert
First off, I’m not convinced that Thodos is correct, at least in the position that ‘a lack of historical consciousness’ is the big problem facing Chicago’s art scene. I am arguing for a real assessment of what we face today, not a dredging up of old issues that seem to be rooted in a more personal space.
Nowhere do I state that we should wholesale forget the past. On the contrary, I state that we should look at that past, find the value in it, identify what is missing and determine if there is anything to be gained in an attempt at resurrecting those past ideals. There have been calls to try to ‘bring back the NAE’. We need to ask if this is necessary (even possible) or if this is just the result of a bit of nostalgia for times past. Would it be nice to have a periodical that once again addressed the art produced and myriad of the art practices rooted in the vast spaces between the two coasts? Of course! I would find that fascinating. It seems there would be value in taking stock in what is happening outside of ‘the centers’. Is that periodical sustainable in today’s marketplace? Doubtful. We can barely sustain the marketplace for actual art production in these hinterlands. How will you be able to sustain a magazine?
The shifts in the art world that you reference have not just taken place in the Midwest, they have happened everywhere. If one pays any attention to the blogging/writing/tweeting conversations that take place outside of this city and it’s immediate environs, one fairly quickly is aware that the same issues kicked around here are kicked around elsewhere. Chicago is not the only place ‘filled with part-time, multitasking people in their 20s and 30s who claim to be artists, teachers, gallerists, writers and curators’. Additionally, the idea that this demographic represents the lions share of the people working and showing here is overstated. The range of work being produced here is diverse, as one would hope in a city this large. Chicago should be able to accommodate this diversity. The fact that this city seems unable (unwilling?) to do so points to a major weakness in the ‘scene’, a weakness rooted more in economics than either aesthetics or criticism.
I agree with the supposition that the ‘tradition of real commerce’ has been broken, hence the apparent collective reluctance to even broach the subject of sales or the selling of work. However, I don’t think that was the ultimate intent of the NFP system but more of a result of trying any approach to survive in a very hostile marketplace. The NFP system comes out of the Culture Wars of the 1980′s and, it seems to me, has not really done a whole lot of good to improve the situation for the individual artist. In fact, in my opinion, it has reinforced the idea that artists should be ‘doing it for the love of the game’. Of course, we do! I ask you, though, wouldn’t it be nice to be able to sustain at least a portion of the practice with sales? Don’t artists need to be able to acknowledge that reality?
It is not easy (nor should it be) to make intellectually engaging work over a long period of time. It is that much more difficult without financial (marketplace) support. It is no mean feat to run an engaging space showing challenging work; one that can operate within this marketplace without losing sight of the creativity, discovery, the adventure and intelligence involved in the making and exhibiting of art. That is, after all, why we choose take part in this game.
mk
December 13th, 2011 at 7:26 am
From Michael:
“Chicago is not the only place ‘filled with part-time, multitasking people in their 20s and 30s who claim to be artists, teachers, gallerists, writers and curators’. Additionally, the idea that this demographic represents the lions share of the people working and showing here is overstated. The range of work being produced here is diverse, as one would hope in a city this large. Chicago should be able to accommodate this diversity. The fact that this city seems unable (unwilling?) to do so points to a major weakness in the ‘scene’, a weakness rooted more in economics than either aesthetics or criticism.”
So true. I do think that the 20 and 30 year olds do get more play…reviews, articles, overall more attention, etc. As you say Michael Chicago should be able to accommodate all levels of an artist’s career. Chicago needs to give artists something to grow into. I do think things are getting better here.
December 15th, 2011 at 4:07 am
This topic continues to bring about some interesting dialogue and debate, even after I thought it was dead several posts back. Not that much has been said about the actual topic at hand, instead, it has a fallen into a tone of “one-upsmanship”, which is divisive and self-defeating. Thank you for all of the interesting points of view here, certainly this type of dialogue would not be featured in print. However, it does open up some crucial questions regarding art criticism and identity.
To begin with, not to be trite, but what is “art”? Sounds silly, but there is no definitive answer, is it simply “form and content” or “skill and expression of human imagination”, or to define it at all, creates a situation where what is non-art is also art? As an art critic or an artist, I would hope that you have your own answer, and from that your own point of view. Now, say, what if we disagree- Does one art form or taste or opinion now lack consensus, therefore relegated to non-art? Do we need arbiters of taste? Why is this important?
Really, what is at stake here? Does art even matter if it is nothing more than a distraction, a “cultural outing” hidden somewhere in the back pages of Time Out or the Reader, amongst the ads after the all the movie and restaurant reviews? Is it important that art has public support, an audience? Is our art a reflection of our society, can we relate to it, does the art or artist have integrity (and wonder why no one is “buying” anything)? Is that a just pile of garbage?- no, that’s an installation, fool.
We have come to a serious crisis indeed. At some point, we have to come to a consensus of what “art” is. Everything cannot be “art”, otherwise, we would not need a word for “art”. By putting something, on display, in a white cube, like a gallery, we are confronted with an art object. Too often, we question, if, it is indeed, that, -why is this thing being exalted? Is this interesting, does this require an instruction manual to tell me that this is important art?
To me, this is why art criticism is important. Critics are not only mapping the external manifestations of what we are considering art, but by writing style and content, creating a certain precedence for what should be exemplary and worthwhile, otherwise, it appears as propaganda and pure fluff (what are the motivations, then?). Without a focus, with a general lack of consensus, we undermine our own artists by acquiescing or even turning a blind eye to this type of critical validation. Our artwork is devalued and marginalized by this, yet, ironically, we wonder why the public at large doesn’t embrace it.
Maybe like you, maybe not, I have an ambivalent point of view. I am an artist and I do the kind of work that inspires me. If I am no longer inspired, I move on to something else that does. As a critic, which we all are to some degree, I am moved by work that displays inspiration and integrity of the artist, even if I don’t necessarily like it. I am not about platitudes or dogmas, or art for art’s sake, for that matter. I am hinting at something much larger, that we can do something about. We can empower ourselves, and not fall into this trap of divisiveness and such. Want an art scene? We can create one together, but by playing king of the hill, eventually, it gets lonely, and, it’s a long way down from the top, pal.
Local art needs to be supported and embraced, foremost. With insightful criticism and dialogue, we may find that we have more to gain by working together to create a stronger arts community. Let it be provincial, let it be itself, let it be something. Let it be.
December 15th, 2011 at 9:31 am
With response to Joe’s excellent words and question what is Art.? My fallback position is art is visual language.No matter where the language
is spoken or where it is from it can articulate wisdom and beauty. Usually
the problem is the local warlords who frequently have provincial attitudes
and control the agencies of patronage/ government.
December 15th, 2011 at 10:13 am
Thank you all for the wonderful and insightful discourse here.
Art is whatever the art world power says it is at any given point in time. I may not always agree but I do accept this fact. My definition of art is important to me but irrelevant in this larger picture.
December 15th, 2011 at 3:57 pm
I see that the New Art Examiner symposium at Northern Illinois University on January 28 has been mentioned. For those of you interested, it will be held in the Boutell Memorial Concert Hall in the Music Building, and will run from 10:00 am to approximately 6:00 pm. Admission is free of charge, although lunch is on your own! Directions to the campus and a map of the campus buildings can be found here – http://www.niu.edu/visit/maps/index.shtml
December 15th, 2011 at 5:19 pm
Norbert why is your defination of art irrelevant in this larger picture?
December 15th, 2011 at 6:57 pm
Joe – You have done a great job parsing the real issue here. Your intuition about the art world situation -how profoundly it has become estranged from communicating with the public – has hit the target. I really wish one of the panelists that I wrote about had stated your case.
Also I agree with you that the ego element in discussion about art has no real point – larger issues are at stake. To follow up on your suggestion – I do believe in a participatory art scene – feel free to e-mail me at dthodos@ameritech.net. There are some interesting things happening that I think you may like to know about.
December 15th, 2011 at 8:26 pm
Oh please. When has art not been estranged from the public? One may feel estranged even pissed off at the art world, that is a matter of taste. But this longing for an art world walking hand in hand with the ” public at large” is a Hallmark moment that has never happened. Thankfully so! Also you can’t have an art scene built on consensus while insisting we use only your idea of beauty.
December 16th, 2011 at 12:23 am
To me, art is not necessarily beautiful, and equally, beautiful things are not necessarily art. It is nice to know that some people still equate art with lofty ideals such as Beauty. I think that you are pointing to a larger issue of aesthetics, which I do have an interest in.
I believe in democracy. I think everyone has a voice that should be heard, even if we don’t agree. I don’t insist my ideas are something we can agree upon. I do think that it is an illusion of pluralism that gives this notion that anything goes, when in fact, it appears quite the contrary. There most certainly are disingenuous forces at work with a different agenda and misinformation. Sometimes we must lift the veil to see through the nature of actions of others. Is it mere coincidence that the power structure is designed this way?
From my research, the public was not always alienated from art. The Paris Salon of the nineteenth century brought record breaking crowds. Each year major museums also have blockbuster art shows. The public is very interested in art, even longs for it. It may be sort of an elitist game, and there may be multiple art worlds and art scenes, but at the heart it is what people look to for more than decoration and pretty pictures. The artist alone in the cave communicating with the spirits and drawing with a burnt stick. Andy Warhol lost in the supermarket.
December 16th, 2011 at 9:14 am
Derek,
My definition of art is irrelevant in the larger picture because I have no say-so in what gets shown in the museums and galleries, what gets printed in the art mags, what gets taught at the art schools, what becomes the new art fad, etc, etc.
December 16th, 2011 at 12:04 pm
Norbert you created Neoteric Art Site and it has good conversation more
than the places where you have no influence. Where else to find good conversation.? Facing a similar problem way back 1974 we published
as you do.We had a statement of purpose which I think is as relevant
today as then.
The New Art Examiner is a non-for-profit organization whose purpose is to examine the definition and transmission of culture in our society;the decision making processes within museums and schools and the agencies of patronage which determine the manner in which culture
shall be transmitted:the value systems which presently influence the
making of art as well as its study in exhibitions and books,and,in the visual art millieu.
December 16th, 2011 at 2:31 pm
Kaysen -
Full disclosure: I was not (in the 1980s) a New Art Examiner fan. As a visual artist, I wanted to see pictures of artwork. Because the “big” NY mags had more and better pics (even if contained in ads) they were more appealing.
Having written that, I do believe that there is a “crisis in criticism” here and now.
(1) Literacy: In Chicago, public high school graduation rates and public literacy both hover around 50-60 percent. Of those people able to read and write, many are not able to read and write at a level sufficient to allow participation in art criticism.
(2) Competence: In order to comment upon an artwork it’s necessary to see it; in order to understand an artwork’s position relative to other artworks it’s necessary to look across the whole of the area of Chicago, over a period of time.
I’ve observed that Chicago has very few people who are willing and/or able to go out and see most if not all of what is put on display. If not unique to Chicago, it is problematic that:
(a) “Chicagoland” covers such a large geographic area;
(b) Public transportation, here, is difficult and dangerous at times;
(c) Public roadways and parking are often no better than (b).
(3) Tenure: All too often, when the education is complete and some basic literacy and competence have been developed, people leave. Why ought Chicago to be in the same category as Omaha or Boulder and not comparable to NY or LA?
(4) Politics: Chicago is, in a manifold sense, a monument to central planning. And those people who do stay in Chicago tend to have been accepted into her institutions; it’s not a city of, or for, mavericks. “Community” can be defined in an exclusive sense.
(a) Teaching: Hours and tenure-track are not unrelated to personal relationships with existing faculty members; said relationships are often founded on political consensus;
(b) Funding: As above, reference receipt of public and NFP money.
(5) Conflict of Interest: In a “community” of multitasking practitioners who are linked to one another by the perception of shared interest and actual physical relationships, how can impartial judgments be made? What’s the end result of years of partiality in hiring, in funding, in criticism?
(6) Loss of the Fourth Estate: The Press, which was meant to exercise oversight, has crumbled. It’s not only the loss of the Chicago Tribune’s attention which is at issue; and, yes: Newcity has kept local coverage alive for years.
Critical distance, impartiality, is in the end something of a luxury, really. Who can afford not to have some relationship or occupation which presents a conflict of interest? Who can afford to develop adequate literacy and competency? To what position can some well-meaning writer in his/her 20s or 30s aspire?
We exists at a time when print struggles, and on-line media has as yet failed to offer a viable alternative revenue stream capable of sustaining a full-time critic in the visual arts.
+ + +
Kaysen, I don’t have the time to finish the outline. Add the bad weather, the high taxes, the violent crime, etc., to the list. No one factor but rather the synergy thereof create the “Chicago problem.”
I don’t see a willingness on the part of the potential audience (for visual art and its criticism) to demand more and better; and I find less than perfect self-awareness in most local critics and artists.
Germanos.
p.s. Thank you Marszalek.
December 17th, 2011 at 1:07 am
In response to Joe,
You have hit the target again with your insight that “democracy” is an illusion in the mainstream art world and that there are disingenuous forces at work.
Also I have always agreed that the public has engaged in art – it was that engagement which gave art it’s meaning – think of the Armory show from a century ago. Richard – in comment #32 – has dodged the argument by using some tired cliches which miss the point. The contemporary mainstream art world has, to a very large extent, disengaged from caring to engage the public- older artists included. This became most apparent in the postmodern period with the rise of conceptualism and theory-driven art which has now has staked out a vast amount of the territory in the top positions- in education and museums, among dealers – everywhere. Everything Artforum covers must be conceptual. Even Art In America – which occasionally pays homage to traditional and Modernist canons – liberally dips into the same field for new faces. It’s everywhere, like a virus, and that is a problem.
For thirty years as an art critic I have asked hundreds of museum going people if they have visited the Museum of Contemporary art in Chicago. Without hesitation they have expressed their boredom and disinterest in most of what the museum has to offer – not having the capacity to relate to human life or experience with any depth or comprehensibility – a reality that is denigrated by Richard’s flippant comment about “the masses.” Yes exhibits at the MCA like William Kentridge, Chuck Close and Calder had memorable and even emotional impacts, but these come once in a blue moon. The vast number of shows at the MCA and at other conceptual art venues like the Renaissance Society and the first floor exhibit rooms of the Renzo Piano wing at the Art Institute leave audiences bored and unengaged. Joe – you are so right to mention Warhol in closing – when “Business art is the best art” for our art institutions the audience couldn’t matter less.
December 17th, 2011 at 8:24 am
DT,
I’m flippant because your crusade seems silly. Who is this mystery “public” you insist is disenfranchised? Are you asking Joe the Plumber what he thought of the latest MCA exhibit or MCA members? Has the general public disengaged, or after years of being taught that art really isn’t important they have simply stopped trying hard enough?
We need to be factual when bringing complaints to light. You complain that “everything” Artforum covers must be conceptual. Their 2011 November issue has scores and scores of gallery ads dealing with real objects and paintings of ‘things’. They have an article on the Modernists influenced film ‘Le Havre’ (I recommend it highly), one on the very real fact of home foreclosure, another on the never conceptual sculpture of Alina Szapocznikow and then the rest of the issue is filled with the Romantic Modernist paintings of Cy Twombly.
Maybe the exhibits at the Renaissance Society and the RP Wing simply aren’t your taste. That’s cool, but art is not the enemy here.
December 17th, 2011 at 1:33 pm
Institutions and mags are going to show what’s important to them (and what’s “important” is open to interpretation)—there is no mystery here. It may appear that one agenda is being pushed more than another agenda…WE all have agendas but at the end of the day it does balance out to some degree. There is always need for change (no matter how ridiculous or wrong some may thing that change is) to keep moving forward.
December 17th, 2011 at 3:07 pm
It is obvious to me that Richard has already drunk the Kool-aid, which is why discernment of the problem remains, as I have said before, invisible. His dismissal of the public as being nothing but ” Joe the Plumbers” proves my point about the inconsequentiality of audience. Regarding MCA members – my question regarding exhibits at the MCA was posed to many people who had memberships – and then some! Anila’s work – from what I find on the internet, is supported and written about as conceptual with a strong feminist based-theory direction- not Modernist. As for Twombly – is it retrospective or just the bloodless minimalist current work? If a retrospective then I am glad – maybe a small change is happening at Artforum . I would challenge or encourage anyone reading these posts to get a copy of The Essential New Art Examiner and read it- or you can read my interview with the New York art critic Donald Kuspit on many the same kinds of topics at http://web.me.com/dianethodos/Site/Complete_Kuspit.html
Kuspit is going to review the book the Essential New Art Examiner. I would like to suggest to the panelists – Jason Foumberg of New City, Adam Richie and Steve Ruiz of Artslant.com and Lori Waxman of the Chicago Tribune -to consider writing a review about the book -after all it came from here and its history belongs to this city.
December 18th, 2011 at 1:04 pm
Paul G..
I need to respond to a very few things:
I am not in agreement with you on several of the points made above and that is fine; we can agree to disagree. However, to claim that this is not a city for mavericks is just plain wrong. The majority of current exhibition spaces exist BECAUSE of mavericks.
Alderman Exhibitions
Slow
65Grand
Peregrine Program
CoProsperity Sphere
New Capital
Julius Ceasar
Adds Donna
Lloyd Dobbler
EbersMoore
Roots and Culture
Western Exhibitions
Happy Collaborationists
Whot It Is
Antenna
Cobalt Studio
Defibul8tr
This is a short list off of the top of my head. The range is of popularity and work of the spaces listed is wide. I’m sure I have left many out (apologies) and there are apartment spaces that come and go …..
Speaking of ‘historical awareness’, Chicago has a long history of alternative spaces. We were doing it here long before it was hip. What is more maverick than that?
To the peeps on this thread claiming that ‘someone is keeping people and positions out of circulation’; bunk! I run my own space. I show what I want. No one enabled me; I did it with the help of other artists and friends who live and work in this area. We took it upon ourselves to MAKE IT HAPPEN. That goes for most, if not all, of the spaces listed above.
Diane, I don’t really understand what axe there is that you feel you need to grind but, if you’re going to do it, at least get the names right: it’s Abraham Ritchie, not Adam ……
If you feel your views and positions regarding the production and exhibition of art are not being properly represented, open a space. Write something and publish it. Start a magazine. No one will stop you except maybe the marketplace but, all of us face that reality. Thankfully, we have not yet reached the place where jack-booted thugs close a business because that business does not fit the program. When we do, I will be right there with you pushing back.
No one tells me what to show; it is my decision and I will NEVER give up that editorial position by obtaining NFP status. I will live and die by my calls. I have my own standards in place to avoid what I feel may be ‘conflicts of interest’. Let me tell you, in a small community where we all know each other and many try to support one another, those conflicts can quite easily arise.
It seems to me the one real barrier left to break is the barrier between the various museum boards, Contemporary Art Societies, Contemporary Art collectors and the local producing artists and galleries. We must begin to push against the idea, the perception that ‘nothing of value happens here’. If we can dissolve that barrier, we are on the road to better things.
mk
December 19th, 2011 at 2:27 pm
I agree with Paul G. he uses the word barrier I use word glass ceiling.
December 23rd, 2011 at 4:48 pm
James Elkins who is on the faculty at SAIC wrote a book entitled What Happened to Art Criticism? This excerpt from a review of his book illuminates exactly the point of my critique.
Art criticism was once passionate, polemical, and judgmental; now critics are more often interested in ambiguity, neutrality, and nuanced description. And while art criticism is ubiquitous in newspapers, magazines, and exhibition brochures…. How is it that sifting through a countless array of colorful periodicals and catalogs makes criticism seem to slip even further from our grasp? In this pamphlet, James Elkins surveys the last fifty years of art criticism, proposing some interesting explanations for these startling changes.
“In What Happened to Art Criticism?, art historian James Elkins sounds the alarm about the perilous state of that craft, which he believes is ‘In worldwide crisis . . . dissolving into the background clutter of ephemeral cultural criticism’ even as more and more people are doing it. ‘It’s dying, but it’s everywhere . . . massively produced, and massively ignored.’ Those who pay attention to other sorts of criticism may recognize the problems Elkins describes: ‘Local judgments are preferred to wider ones, and recently judgments themselves have even come to seem inappropriate. In their place critics proffer informal opinions or transitory thoughts, and they shy from strong commitments.’ What he’d like to see more of: ambitious judgment, reflection about judgment itself, and ‘criticism important enough to count as history, and vice versa.’ Amen to that.”—Jennifer Howard, Washington Post Book World
December 26th, 2011 at 6:06 pm
T. S. Eliot wrote in ” Experiment in Criticism” (1929),
“f you read carefully the famous epilogue in Pater’s ‘Studies in the Renaissance’ you will see that “art for art’s sake” means nothing less than art as a substitute for everything else, and as a purveyor of emotions and sensations which belong to life rather than to art….”
Evidently critics have been arguing over how one writes for who about what longer than Thodos cares to acknowledge.
January 2nd, 2012 at 1:53 pm
Kaysen -
First, a quotation from Diane Thodos’ article at the top of the page:
“For all of the contemporary art world’s claim to being ‘liberal’ and ‘progressive’ it is deeply conservative at heart,”
Second, a quotation from your (# 41, December 18th, 2011) comment:
“Speaking of ‘historical awareness’, Chicago has a long history of alternative spaces. We were doing it here long before it was hip. What is more maverick than that?”
In answer to the “maverick” question which you’ve posed within the citation above: There is nothing “maverick” about opening an alternative art space within Chicago; “alternative” is itself a misnomer. You’ve stipulated to a “long history” of such spaces. And maintenance of tradition is, per Thodos, a core principle of conservatism.
+ + +
I’m struck by the fact that, in my viewing experience, the contemporary “maverick” galleries which you’ve listed:
Alderman Exhibitions
Slow
65Grand
Peregrine Program
CoProsperity Sphere
New Capital
Julius Ceasar
Adds Donna
Lloyd Dobbler
EbersMoore
Roots and Culture
Western Exhibitions
Happy Collaborationists
Whot It Is
Antenna
Cobalt Studio
Defibul8tr
(a) offer remarkably similar programming; and,
(b) offer programming which would not have been out of place in any of the venues which were lumped together as “alternative” spaces in the 80s, e.g.:
NAME
Randolph Street
ARC
Artemisia
SAIC’s Gallery 2
Hyde Park Art Center
Really, aside from those few artworks dependent upon some technological innovation, within Chicago’s “alternative” art world (and maybe within Chicago’s art world, period) there’s been almost no forward progress in a formal and/or ideological sense in the past 30 years.
Broadly, a consensus about the “rightness” of ideologies associated with the Left, e.g., Marxism, Feminism, multiculturalism, has come to inform a hybrid of Conceptualism and Poor Art which usually manifests in installation, performance and direct political action.
There’s very little left for the viewing audience to ponder about the theoretical ground which underpins most work. The targets are regular: masculinity, Capitalism, religion, etc. The revolutionary political action of the 1960s has been institutionalized.
+ + +
Thank you for the time and effort which you’ve invested in your response. Such resources as our energies are finite–and likely to come to naught if frivolously divided between too many projects. God help us if everyone needs to create their own publication in order to “participate in the dialogue.”
Germanos.
January 12th, 2012 at 12:31 am
In response to Paul
Thanks for your well articulated insight. If you want to get in touch with me about some future events along the track of this discussion, including a panel discussion with myself, Derek Guthrie, Terri Griffith, and Andrew Falkowski at the Evanston Art Center on Friday Jan. 20th starting at 6:30, get in touch with me at dthodos@ameritech.net. The Occupy movements are starting with few resources but their own will, and regarding the status quo I think that’s where we are too, (no matter that those who use – or should I say misuse – theory claim to, falsely, co- opt this position). As you can see from all the debate above there are quite a few voices that are fed up with what has been 30 years of the same kind of repetitious codes for art and their accompanying arguments. It is a good time – for those who can perceive the issues at stake – to show a willingness to speak up for them.
January 12th, 2012 at 2:05 pm
More information regarding the day-long symposium about the New Art Examiner on January 28 at Northern Illinois University is now available – please visit this page:
http://niucvpa.blogspot.com/2012/01/cvpa-to-host-new-art-examiner-symposium.html
We hope several of you will be able to join us for a spirited day!
March 24th, 2012 at 3:03 pm
A follow up event on Chicago art critisim will take place at the Evanston
Art centre april 15th. The Evanston Art Centre has offered free office space
to the New Art Examiner in thw hope that it will relaunch.
March 24th, 2012 at 4:15 pm
Perhaps the NAE may relaunch as an online publication in the beginning although many including yours truly will miss the paper, holding the pages, putting it down without having to upload or reboot the pc. Carrying it around the subway, buses or trains and handing it to a friend or interested person. We can continue to examine Art from all viewpoints, keep the dialogue going, moving forward and hopefully realize an intrinsic need in the human psyche to communicate with transparency and clarity, even if it takes awhile. Maybe an express way to begin the journey into the unknown.