Art & Its Institutions

Susan Hiller

Thomas Struth

Janet Cardiff

Fred Wilson

Louise Lawler

"The notion that art should provide a window on the world has been well established at least since the mid-fifteenth century, when Leon Battista Alberti laid out the principles for representing space through the system of one-point perspective. Conceiving the picture plane as a stage on which objects were arranged in diminishing scale, the artist drew the eye into the painting and hence away from any of the distracting apparatus that might have dispelled the illusion."

Heartney begins this discussion with art's ability to create descriptive space. But she fails to mention that this point in history also marks the rise of the autonomous work, no longer does painting simply serve architecture, incidentally this also elevates the individual.

How do institutions maintain the status quo?
How do they accommodate change?
What will the contents of the MOMA look like when hispanics dominate U.S. population in 2050? A similar case may be said for Algerians in Paris.
As cultural demographics shift, what challenges does the institution face?

Art & Globalism

Cai Guo-Qiang

Chen Zhen

Andreas Gursky

Julie Mehretu

Alfredo Jaar

Mark Lombardi

Globalization reflects a post cold war world that has been radically monetized and encouraged by technology. Like art, globalization is about communication. What many of these artists are communicating is a contradiction of loss during a bountiful period. The individual is being rendered anonymous, a sense of alienation abounds. Alfredo Jaar, Julie Mehretu, Mark Lombardi, and Andreas Gursky point to the larger powers of finance and policy. The struggle for identity and individual values that were so important through much of the Twentieth Century are now subsumed by broader forces. Economics has a great deal to do with the shifting global structure and the pluralistic art scene. With the rise of the BRIC's (Brazil, Russia, India, and China) American hegemony is coming to an end. Eurocentric dominance is shifting to include the previously overlooked. Are these other cultures really overlooked? Or is it exponent of assimilation, we only perceive them to be overlooked because of our position?

A globalized world infers decentralization, unilateral negotiation, lack of consensus.

Critique Criteria

Hi Emily, I apologize for not completing this portion of the assignment on time. After reading many reviews, I think I have a pretty good grasp of the art review genre. Most writers tend to follow a similar model, unless they have an unusual agenda. While the art review reflects the basic structure of formal analysis, it tends to be more casual than an academic paper. So instead of reading a dry analysis of some postimpressionist painting to a fauveist work, the art review enjoys brevity and personal touch. Its kinda like an art weatherman. The critic attends the show and typically follows this rubric:

Description: What does it look like? Format. Scale. Color.

Analysis: How does it function? Artistic intent? Goal? Historical/contemporary relationships.

Judgment: Is it effective? Do I like it?

It is then left to the critic to adjudicate cultural value. The critic is both empowered and troubled, presiding over an expressive culture. Art is the most sophisticated form of communication and it is here that the critic must establish a discernible palette. It is their responsibility to cull from the herd, promoting talent and discouraging the rest. Thus a reciprocal set of relationships is established where power is concurrently granted and subsequently used to champion the best work. Ideally, a meritocratic system of critic and artist, both reliant on the other for support and service.

Abstract Art

Fred Sandback

Christopher Wilmarth

Martin Puryear

Martin Puryear


Richard Serra

Brice Marden

Jackson Pollock

Robert Ryman

Carrie and I had a few questions to prompt the class discussion. Kirk Varnedoe outlines a history of abstract art since Pollock, one that comes to include a surprisingly broad expressive range.

Why abstract art?

What relevance does it have today?

What is unique to the expressive possibility of abstraction?

What are the challenges of making abstract work?

What gives abstraction life?

Is abstraction more dependent on its own history?

How is abstraction different from design?

The Body and Identity

Where does the history of self portraiture fit into the search for identity? With the historical rise of the individual, identity has become a essential as a marker of place.

How does the tradition of plastic arts differ from performance?

Chuck Close

Lucian Freud


I find it interesting that the history of performance, via Kaprow and Happenings started with an interpretation of Pollock. In The Legacy of Jackson Pollock, Kaprow takes a Rosenbergian position by arguing for the performative value as opposed to the formal. He sees the Pollock's gesture as an extension beyond the picture frame, a move into common space. The indirect presence of the body in Pollock's work has become a spring board for performance and body related art.
Marina Abramovic


Chris Burden

Martin Kippenberger

Rineke Dijkstra


The Grotesque Body, how do we deal with the other? This passage recounts the history of horror shows, carnival encounters with cultural aberrations. The treatment of the other as spectacle. How do ethics account for the other? At what point do we move from spectacle to understanding and compassion?

Laura Kalman uses unconventional jewelry/performative wears to investigate our challenged relationship to the body. Aestheticizing skin disorders with gold and gems transforms our understanding. How do precious materials engage a new discussion of these disorders? What debt does she owe Hannah Wilke and Ann Hamilton? In what ways has she expanded that discussion? Is Kalman more focused on the transgressions of ornament or the body?

Post-humanism

More than scientific reality, the ethical implications of a post-human culture are frightful. Will we all end up like Ted Williams? Frozen in hope for an indestructible apparatus to carry our mind. That suggests a Cartesian understanding of physiology, which may be dreadfully wrong. Without an end, or one that extends well into the future, how do we find meaning? Definition requires an end. A period marked by elapsed time.

As biological creatures we have a fundamental relationship to the natural world. How would a transhuman reality shift that relationship? Is it an inevitable enhancement, like improving one's home or car? Unless broadly accessible, which seems unlikely in a capitalistic economy, the impending social situation between the "haves" and the "have nots" would be potentially disasterous. Communities would become segregated between the enhanced and natural, leading to segregation. Would this reverse the democratization process? Baseball has recently dealt with a similar problem. It's now apparent that the last fifteen years have been marred with illegal steroid and HGH use, tainting the accomplishments of an entire generation. The implicated players will likely not be a part of the hall of fame, their achievements must judged differently.

Manifesto

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mhUP7EHyeL0

Re-Digitizing the Digital

Contention: Is it possible that the digital revolution only apparently empowers the individual by providing access to a networked world?

As information/knowledge is centralized we are trading many languages (each possessing a unique vocabulary + semantic structure) for a lingua franca. Each language offers the potential for a special take on “reality.” Six thousand languages were spoken at the beginning of the 20^th century, one hundred years later less than half remain. As suggested in 1984, “Newspeak” is the official government controlled language that eliminates synonyms in an effort to streamline communication. The ethos of economy favors compaction, and while efficient, the ability to express nuanced difference diminishes with each elimination. As the condensation continues, humans become less expressive, less able to name, to describe, and thus to know.

Digitization depends on quantifiable data. This is a primary tool that makes a corollary possible, globalization. Globalization requires homogeneity, threatening character and individuality. The poetics of life cannot be explored through binary code. The human hand must reassert itself as a new emphasis is placed on qualitative value. The idiosyncratic expression captured in a hand wrought gesture suggests a singular interpretation. To account for the evanescent moments in life, we must maintain diversity, promote the foreign and relish the incompatible fragments of translation. Binary language amounts to white and black, 1 and 0, victory and defeat, positive and negative, friend and foe. The modern world, centralized and interchangeable, must revert to gain value. Grey is a value between absolutes. Quantifiably inaccessible, the space between seeks to re-digitize the digital.