04w11:2 Art Chairs Posted March 8th, 2004 by timothy. 0 Comments Good Reads Mailing List | 2004 week 11 number 2 (art chairs) ——————————————————————— Good, better, best | Artblog.net http://artblog.net/index.php?name=2004-03-05-08-31-good “John Massengale (‘a recovering architect’) has an interesting post that talks about connoiseurship. Even though the topic is furniture as it relates to urban design, it has a few points that could be applied to art and art criticism. […] Most art schools teach how to invoke unprecedented reality, which is a better term for what this is usually called: originality. An artist ought to be generating at least some unprecedented reality or he’s not doing his job. But by emphasizing the novel, the art world has become fashion-driven. The cutting-edge art school experience has the students graduating with little more skill than they entered with, but with a finely-tuned art-world fashion sense. The blows to sincerity and integrity have been palpable. This is why I favor craftsmanship and connoiseurship – I believe human concerns ought to be addressed by art not just intellectually, but formally. Otherwise, you get the results that you often see on the gallery wall: art that does to your soul what sitting in the Mies chair does to your back. ” A Bag Is a Bag Is a Bag | Charlie Finch http://www.artnet.com/Magazine/features/finch/finch3-4-04.asp “Arties were lined up at the Elizabeth Dee Gallery on Saturday night to see the latest video from Alex Bag, whose droll, if increasingly formulaic, shape shifting was intercut with graphic, wallsize excerpts from the Paris Hilton sex tape. […] What makes this show worth seeing is not just the titillation, but the formal, esthetic dominance of the Paris Hilton sex video in a gallery context. […] Bag powerfully questions the whole fine-art enterprise, including her own efforts, that we art addicts experience today. On one wall, in one Chelsea cube, she argues that all the arch tributes to Kurt Cobain, all the Patty Chang-style contortions, all the Matthew Barney pinheaded grotesqueries are one raindrop compared to the cultural impact of a dick-hungry Hollywood heiress on the internet. ” A chance for amateurs to mumble ‘Huh?’ | Dave Barry http://tinyurl.com/yu4uh “Whenever I write about art, I get mail from the Serious Art Community informing me that I am a clueless idiot. So let me begin by stipulating that I am a clueless idiot. […] I saw ‘Chair’ at Art Basel, a big show on Miami Beach. It attracted thousands of Serious Art People, who wear mostly black outfits and can maintain serious expressions no matter what work of art they are viewing. This is hard, because a lot of Serious Art consists of bizarre or startlingly unattractive objects, or ‘performances’ wherein artists do something Conceptual, such as squirt Cheez Whiz into an orifice that has not been approved by the Food and Drug Administration for snack toppings. But no matter what the art is, a Serious Art Person will view it with the somber expression of a radiologist examining X-rays of a tumor. Whereas an amateur will eventually give himself away by laughing, or saying ‘Huh?’ or (this is the most embarrassing) asking an art-gallery person: ‘Is this wastebasket a piece of art? Or can I put my gum wrapper in it?’ ” http://goodreads.timothycomeau.com —————————————- Long urls made short by using TinyURL (http://www.tinyurl.com) To remove or add yourself from this list, email tim@instantcoffee.org emailed by Timothy on Monday 08 March 2004 @ 9:28 PM
