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Contemporary Art - Are you lot just not that bothered?

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Glenn Close But No Cigar

11:42 / 01.11.06

Although I've only recently joined Barbelith (thanks, it's very nice to be here), I've been reading its boards for a while now, and it's struck me that while the level of debate on books, philosophy, comics etc is pleasingly high, this isn't mirrored in discussions of contemporary art.

There's several possible reasons for this. It may be that a far larger number of 'lithers are educated / self-educated in literature, philosophy etc. than in art and its theoretical context. It may be that relatively few 'lithers live in large urban centres with lots of galleries / a developed art scene, so will understandably have greater access to mobile cultural forms like movies, music etc. It may be that you're put off by the (received) idea that art is made for and consumed by a tiny elite. It may be that you just don't care.

So, a poll of sorts. Do you regularly visit galleries that show the work of living artists? Do you read art magazines - e.g. Artforum, or frieze? Do names such as Maurizio Cattelan, Matthew Barney, or Pierre Huyghe mean anything to you, and if so would you identify them as being as significant as, say, David Lynch, Jean Baudrillard, Gunter Grass, or Grant Morrison (insert your own paradigmatic figure here)?

To clarify, I'm not talking about the likes of Banksy, H.R. Giger, comic artists, outsider artist etc, but rather artists who are working within an intellectual tradition that you might, with a shudder, term 'fine art' (I realise that this kind of categorisation is fraught with problems, but we've got to start somewhere - there's still clear blue water between Wahol and the designer of the Campbell's soup can).

Thoughts?

17:11 / 01.11.06

I like 'fine art' and I adored the history of art aspect to my art A Level. At college I went to a lot of contemporary art exhibitions because I did a degree in contemporary art and it was my homework. I hardly ever go to galleries any more. Or in fact for that read never. Partly it's because I'm not in London, and although there are galleries here in Birmingham there is only one I know which would count as showing fine art, recently having a Lowrie exhibition. There's a contemporary art gallery which shows the work of local artists and I always look in the window of that.

Part of the problem is that I never know what to say, which was one of the reasons why I started The Painting Discussion Thread. I would like that to start again.

I like threads about contemporary art though. Start some?

19:46 / 01.11.06

I've fallen off the art bandwagon due to recently becoming a parent. In my circumstance, books (comic and otherwise), music and movies fit my newly sedentary lifestyle in ways that art doesn't. For instance, most art translates badly onto a 19" computer screen. A lot of subtlety is simply lost. Galleries aren't especially good places for wee grasping fingers to be set loose, so I haven't gone to any of the local studio crawls. I'm familiar with a lot of the more common names in art, Barney Frank just had an installation in the SF MOMA I believe, but that doesn't really do me any good if I can't see their works.

All Acting Regiment

14:34 / 02.11.06

I studied art for years, tried to be a painter, got a bunch of threads on here that people seemed to enjoy. I'm currently locked into an entirely negative and unconstructive headspace where I think that contemporary art doesn't really mean anything to anyone, apart from the people who already know what it means, and is thus entirely pointless. I mean no-one's even shocked by it anymore, it just seems to be a sequence of in-jokes for sarcastic middle-class people.

This is bollocks, obviously, but it's convincing bollocks, and it's stopped me from being as involved as I could be.

14:40 / 02.11.06

it just seems to be a sequence of in-jokes for sarcastic middle-class people.

I don't really understand. In what way? Can you give an example?

Glenn Close But No Cigar

11:27 / 03.11.06

I think that contemporary art doesn't really mean anything to anyone, apart from the people who already know what it means, and is thus entirely pointless. I mean no-one's even shocked by it anymore, it just seems to be a sequence of in-jokes for sarcastic middle-class people.

With respect, this is tosh.

Tate Modern is the most visited 'attraction' in the UK - not 'gallery' or 'museum', but 'attraction'. I find it hard to believe that everyone who passes through its doors is already 100% secure in knowing what contemporary art 'means' (rather an odd concept in and of itself), or that every visitor is a sarcastic member of the middle classes. Surely you're not denying that these people do not invest anything in /draw anything from contemporary art?

Also, I think the role of 'shock' in the history of art is greatly overstated. Very few artists have ever set out to 'shock' per se. In almost every case (from Caravaggio to Duchamp to Damien Hirst) there was something a great deal more complex and human going on than just pissing off the bourgeoisie.

Anyway, I'm increasingly of the opinion that it's actually totally fine for contemporary art to be only 'understood' by a small minority of practitioners / critics. If we can extend this courtesy to scientists (who, like artists, are pushing back the boudaries of what it means to be human), surely we can extend it to artists too?

14:28 / 03.11.06

interesting thread. ive just started a fine art course and there is something that annoys me about the contemporary art world. I think i understand what was said about the 'in joke' idea. There is a lot of art that is art for arts sake, commenting on art rather than on culture at large. I think also, that for those who dont produce art or who dont frequent the art world often, its hard to understand that contemporary art can be about the skilled abandonment of skill rather than producing a "masterpiece". If you understand what i mean, you would see this in the work of Tracey Emin or Jimmie Durham. I live in london and i do get sick of talking about art, although i dont know why. I like old spaces, dusty old museums better than the tate modern, the tate is more like an enterprise, bums on seats, than something genuinelly interesting. maybe thats why people dont post much about contemporary art, maybe it fades into capitalist consumer culture? did anybody go to frieze? it was like going christmas shopping. I liked all the insanely rich people in tracksuits smoking fags.

unheimlich manoeuvre

22:06 / 04.11.06

So, a poll of sorts. Do you regularly visit galleries that show the work of living artists? Do you read art magazines - e.g. Artforum, or frieze? Do names such as Maurizio Cattelan, Matthew Barney, or Pierre Huyghe mean anything to you, and if so would you identify them as being as significant as, say, David Lynch, Jean Baudrillard, Gunter Grass, or Grant Morrison (insert your own paradigmatic figure here)?

I have to admit I've never heard of Maurizio Cattelan, Matthew Barney or those art magazines. Would've said the same for Pierre Huyghe had I not seen him recently at Tate Modern. I went with a friend to see the Kandinksy exhibition and ended up chatting to a guy in the queue, he recommended it so I bought combined tickets. Absolutely glad I did. Wide eyed giggling wonderland it was too. Doubt my writing would do it justice really. Been a while since I've had that much fun dressed and level headed, though.

I'm not sure why pure/fine artisits aren't among my "paradigmatic figures"? That I've not studied art cannot be the reason. I did anthropology but that doesn't stop me reading poetry, politics, philosophy, economics or whatever grabs my attention. Perhaps it is in some way connected to the distinction between high and low art? Though I disagree with Legba/Allecto Regina completely.

I'm thinking of Pierre Bourdieu's Distinction: A Social Critique Of The Judgement Of Taste...
I dunno, what's your opinion?

All Acting Regiment

00:35 / 05.11.06

With respect, this is tosh.

Oh, absolutely. I'm talking personal silliness here.

18:48 / 05.11.06

Maurizio Cattelan is the chap who suspends stuffed horses from ceilings etc., isn't he? But I haven't heard of the others.

Contemporary artists whose work I enjoy... hmm. Cy Twombly (who is amazing), Howard Hodgkin. Jake and Dinos Chapman (thought their Goya work was great). But I find it quite hard to articulate why. Will go away and have a think. Obvious that the response to Hodgkin is about colour, form etc.

20:36 / 05.11.06

Do you regularly visit galleries that show the work of living artists? Do you read art magazines - e.g. Artforum, or frieze? Do names such as Maurizio Cattelan, Matthew Barney, or Pierre Huyghe mean anything to you, and if so would you identify them as being as significant as, say, David Lynch, Jean Baudrillard, Gunter Grass, or Grant Morrison (insert your own paradigmatic figure here)?

I don't read any art magazines, and although I do visit galleries, it's something I do rarely - not more than once every two months, I'd guess. I don't know the names of the artists whose names you've give above. I was tempted to say that it's an accessibility/comprehensibility issue - but then again Lynch and Baudrillard don't produce work that is easily read, though I do seem to come across discussions of their work more frequently in the media I consume than fine/modern artists. If I'm prepared to invest intellectual effort in understanding literature, films and so on, why not art?

Possibly it's a prejudice towards the verbally based, "expository" modes of expression? Speaking for myself, I'm not a "visual" person, and I frequently find I don't approach new texts as visual phenomena to be *felt*, but rather as things to be *understood*. Obviously, this is personal to me. There's a number of occasions where I feel I have "got" an artists work in a way that I can't really explain, yet which I really value. Anish Kapoor and Sarah Lucas spring to mind here. Though as a rule, I'm not engaged in actively seeking out this material.

Possibly it's got something to do with a favouring of which every medium you use for personal creativity? i.e. most, if not all, of Barbeloids I know IRL write - blogs, comics, within academia etc etc. Perhaps this has something to do with it?

03:55 / 06.11.06

i like art, i just don't feel confident talking about it.

06:51 / 06.11.06

i like art, i just don't feel confident talking about it.

I am in more or less the same boat. To be more specific, I feel very comfortable talking about it in general company, but I feel like I may be out of my depth talking about it on the 'lith in a way that I would not be when discussing, say, music or politics or PoMo or comic books.

Part of this is that my ability to keep current on the gallery scene is limited. It's a two hour drive to LA, I only visit NY once or twice a year, and my local scene leaves something to be desired.

ONLY NICE THINGS

09:04 / 06.11.06

I think another issue may be the same issue that means we talk about TV and Film more often than we talk about theatre - although artists might be exhibited all over the shop, actual exhibits tend to be located in a single place. Even video art like Cremaster is made very expensive to buy and limited in availability to view, to maintain its status as art rather than commodity. The only Matthew Barney installation I've seen was in Between Cinema and a Hard Place, at the Tate Modern.

With that in mind, would it maybe be worth promoting the discussion of individual exhbitions, with contributions from people who know the artists but are not colocated withthe exhibition adding their more general thoughts?

Glenn Close But No Cigar

13:06 / 06.11.06

Haus, you make a fair point about video art usually being very expensive, and restricted to a small audience. Matthew Barney, though, released a portion of the Cremaster cycle on DVD recently, yours for £10.99 on amazon... Good to see him addressing this issue.

Valence, I'm very glad you enjoyed the Pierre Huyghe show so much. I really think he's one of the best thinkers we have at the moment, and very Barbelith friendly.

London-based 'lithers might want to check out this show: here

16:45 / 06.11.06

Hi all - I'm new here...
I come from a pretty traditional fine art (canvas painting) background - and am currently doing an MFA with a digital media concentration (not to be confused with, say, Pixar style animation or something - our program is definitely in a theoretical 'fine art' intellectual vein).

I wonder about the notion that fine art is necessarily a thing in a gallery/museum that is primarily a *visual* experience. In our seminar we've been talking about Joseph Kosuth among others. Kosuth may be the prototypical 'in-joke' kind of artist ("Art as idea as idea"). But one interesting thing about him is that he was largely text-based. Even when he created a visual *thing* - the position he took was always more like a critic or a philosopher.

So, although some work, like Matthew Barney's, is to a large extent visual (visceral) - there are other approaches to 'fine art.' There's also stuff like Rhizome.org that doesn't usually function in a gallery at all...

06:14 / 07.11.06

To clarify, I'm not talking about the likes of Banksy, H.R. Giger, comic artists, outsider artist etc, but rather artists who are working within an intellectual tradition that you might, with a shudder, term 'fine art' (I realise that this kind of categorisation is fraught with problems, but we've got to start somewhere - there's still clear blue water between Wahol and the designer of the Campbell's soup can).

Not as much as there used to be, though, and it's shrinking all the time. Also, I think if anything, Banksy's more often than not considered to be on the same side of said water as Warhol. Serious, respectable galleries increasingly show his work, and the works of people like Shepherd Fairey or even Coop, alongside more conventionally "fine art" fare.

You could also look at things like the superflat movement, which blurs the lines between post-Warhol Pop Art and Japanese pop culture to the point of nonexistence, and which remains very well respected by collectors and critics, or Marcel Dzama's experiments with producing commercial pop culture artifacts, or you could look at the increased prominence of the design arts in the recent MoMA renovation. The line between commercial art and fine art has been blurring more than usual, in the last few years especially, and commerce seems to have lost a lot of its taint. It's my experience that more artists and gallery owners, especially younger ones and especially ones outside of NYC, look at things like Dwell or Juxtapoz or even XLR8R as much as they look at old standbys like Artforum, which has been increasingly criticized for being provincial and out of touch.

Glenn Close But No Cigar

11:39 / 07.11.06

I've got huge problems with the idea of Banksy being a 'serious' artist. Sure, some (rather crappy, actually) galleries have shown his work, but think about it for more than a moment and it's confused drivel.

While I of course understand that contemporary art's boundaries are increasingly blurring with other fields (including science), I'm wary of celebrating this plurality of approach for its own sake. Just because something exists in a grey area does not make it radical, or worthy of attention. Most 'Art+' (i.e. Art+Fashion, Art+Design) resembles a particulary boring pre-op transexual.

You're right that we should ditch Artforum, though. Frieze is much, much better.

12:01 / 07.11.06

I've got huge problems with the idea of Banksy being a 'serious' artist. Sure, some (rather crappy, actually) galleries have shown his work, but think about it for more than a moment and it's confused drivel.

Can you explain this a bit more? I'm not clear what you mean by confused drivel and I have thought about it quite a lot. Do you mean that the galleries don't know what they are doing? That Banksy's work is drivel?

I'm interested as to what it is about Banksy that gives you problems. Is it because he's an artist that works on the street? That his work is based in illegality? That you personally just don't really rate the work he does?

If he was not an artist borne out of urban street art, but had been 'taught' art at college would you feel differently? Is it his links with activism that you reject?

Glenn Close But No Cigar

12:22 / 07.11.06

I'm interested as to what it is about Banksy that gives you problems. Is it because he's an artist that works on the street? That his work is based in illegality? That you personally just don't really rate the work he does?

If he was not an artist borne out of urban street art, but had been 'taught' art at college would you feel differently? Is it his links with activism that you reject?

I've absolutely no problem at all that Banksy's work 'works on the streets', or is 'based in illegality' (Jean-Michel Basquiat, who I think is amazing, was producing graf/fine art in the 80s).

Equally, I've no problem with artists without an art school education. I've no idea whether Banksy went to art school or not (although I suspect he did), but it's worth poiting out that the 'urban streets' on which he first displayed his work were in Hoxton, East London, which is a gentrified, former working-class area full of graphic design companies, loft apartments, fashionable bars etc. Hardly the 'hood.

Again, equally, an artist having links with activism is fine by me, and may produce some great work (Picasso, Thomas Hirschhorn etc).

No, my problem is that it's 'political' art for idiots, without much to recommend it aesthetically beyond a shallow pop charm. Look at his slogans: 'Always lie to the police'. Does that apply to Myra Hindley? Smiley faces on riot cops? Wow, man, it's like Paris '68 crossed with Acid House! A shoppng trolley in Constable's 'Haywain'? Like, he really skewered our fantasies of a bucolic England! 'Subverting' Paris Hilton CDs? Shit dude, I'd never realised that she was an absurd agent of The Spectacle before.

At best, Banksy is Art-lite. At worse, he is the Coldplay of visual culture.

Enough. There's a thread on this already. Go check out Maurizio Cattelan if you want really radical art.

14:38 / 08.11.06

Yes there is but you haven't posted in it, so I couldn't go there to find out what it is that bugs you so.

Glenn Close But No Cigar

14:57 / 08.11.06

Priestess, haven't I outlined the reasons for irritation above?

17:10 / 08.11.06

Yes indeed you did, thank you. I've got a couple of things to say so I'll post them in the Banksy thread.

Meanwhile can I thank you for pointing me in the direction of Maurizio Cattelan? I've been googling him and he's fascinating.

21:49 / 08.11.06

If we can extend this courtesy to scientists (who, like artists, are pushing back the boudaries of what it means to be human), surely we can extend it to artists too?

Totally peripheral point, but science is usually sponsored for practical purposes and can lead to technological change and therefore has a concrete, practical dimension that is felt and influenced by day to day life. I'm not sure that contemporary art has anything like the same potential to impact our world.

Basically scientists and artists aren't quite the same kind of occult group.

21:50 / 08.11.06

I am a fan of some contemporary art, by the way.

Glenn Close But No Cigar

22:20 / 08.11.06

Boboss, I think, with respect, that you're missing my point. It goes without saying that the direct human impact of, say, a scientist researching a cure for cancer is different in many ways from an artist researching the human condition, but it's worth entertaining the thought that much scientific research won't yeild a quantifiable human good for many years, just as much art won't. We still haven't felt the full impact of E=MC2, just as we still haven't felt the full impact of Cubism. One might easily draw a parallel between theoretical physics and some areas of contemporary art, in that they are understood and appreciated by a necessarily small elite now, but will have a wider impact and audience (is that the right word?) in the future. The point, essentially, is that both have their cutting-edges, both of which are vital, and both of which should not be blunted by the notion of having to have popular appeal.

11:48 / 09.11.06

I don't mind contemporary art (CA) being only understood by a select few, and I can see how culture(s) might benefit over the longer term as their thinking filters down, but I think you should consider the fact that it is very hard to quantify the ways in which CA benefits culture, and perhaps even more difficult to pin down exactly what we mean by benefit here. The benefits of the products of science are rather a lot easier to track and measure, and that being the case I think the case for scientific elites is a fair bit stronger than the case for artistic elites.

I do think there are other reasons to argue for artistic elites, however.

Glenn Close But No Cigar

21:12 / 15.11.06

Well, yes and no. If we're talking about 'the invention of the human', art (in its widest sense) is as important an evolutionary mechanism as science. Having said this, a C.P. Snow-like 'two cultures' conversation would be a step backwards, so please let's not go there.

What's really intriguing me is that this thread hasn't had a new comment added in days and days. Maybe you lot just don't care...

21:48 / 15.11.06

I have been following it. I was actually waiting to see what you said in reply to Boboss.

It's a valid point you have and I don't know the answer. I think people have demonstrated an interest, but perhaps not as big a one as they have in other areas.

ONLY NICE THINGS

07:20 / 16.11.06

Perhaps if you started some threads on contemporary art, rather than talking about whether or not "you lot" care about it, there'd be a bit more interest, Zahir? For example, what makes Catellan more than a reasonably amusing gag artist? There could be a thread on that, begun with pictures and examples and bit of biography, and going from there. If no contributors, perhaps no interest.

Glenn Close But No Cigar

12:15 / 16.11.06

Haus, I'll answer your question about Cattelan with something I wrote a while back that you can find here

ONLY NICE THINGS

14:19 / 16.11.06

Right. Or you could start a thread about him. In which you link to that article, if you feel like it.

Glenn Close But No Cigar

14:50 / 16.11.06

Haus, I think you're being a bit rude. It's pretty obvious that the reason I started this thread was to investigate a particular lack of discussion on Barbelith about a particular cultural form (or forms). Likewise, it's pretty obvious that addressing 'lithers as 'you lot' is intended as affectionate, rather than as offensive. Sure, one good way of stimulating discussion of contemporary art would be to begin a few threads on it, which I'll do in due course, but I think pointing this out in what's hard not to take as an aggressive tone isn't very helpful to anybody.

ONLY NICE THINGS

15:08 / 16.11.06

Likewise, it's pretty obvious that addressing 'lithers as 'you lot' is intended as affectionate, rather than as offensive.

Ah, well. Here I'd disagree. I don't think that is obvious, pretty or not. Nonetheless, I am sure your intentions were benign. My intention, however, was also benign, if misunderstood - not to ask you to tell me where I might read about Catellan, but to suggest that you talked about Catellan.

So, I apologise if you felt I was being rude, and look forward to seeing if there is indeed the will to discuss fine art on Barbelith. I think you're quite right that a good way to discover this would be to start some threads on fine art.

23:16 / 27.11.06

Ha! The one day I decide to pop into the art forums and find this topic is also the day I get a phone call from our local art gallery letting me know I've won a membership pass for a year.

It looks like I'll get a chance to go more often to the gallery. But my poor city, while provincial capital, just isn't that big. While the art gallery does its best, it's not going to be the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

i like art, i just don't feel confident talking about it.

Me neither, especially given my lack of knowedlge on art history itself. (Tangent point! Can anyone recommend a good book that details the different movements and their origins? Maybe I should start a new thread, it's something I've been meaning to read up on forever)

What's really intriguing me is that this thread hasn't had a new comment added in days and days. Maybe you lot just don't care...

I think it's just Barbelith's pace. It's not exactly a mile-a-minute message board. There's a decent amount of posters but a lot of the time some threads meander along instead of vaulting into triple-digits over a week.

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