Critical condition (LA Times)

From today's LA Times, an article on the every-debated "status" ofcriticism, given blogs, anti-intellectualism, etc…
Critical conditionOnce almighty arbiters of American taste, critics find their power atebb tide. Is it a dark time for the arts, or the dawn of a new age? By Scott Timberg, Times Staff Writer
In the 1950 movie "All About Eve," the theater critic is a dapper,cynical charmer with the Old World moniker Addison DeWitt. He's nohero, but his wry assessments can make or break a production.Characters repeat his phrases throughout the film, in both scornfuland reverent tones.
Almost a half-century later, the television show "The Critic"presented an animated schlemiel, paunchy and balding, voiced by thenerdy comic endomorph Jon Lovitz. This character's influence on theworld in which he lives is nonexistent: His impact comes down toserving as the butt of jokes.
Does the 1994-95 series tell us something about the way Americans viewthose who make cultural judgments for a living? In the decade sincethat show's run, many critics report, they've gotten even lessrespect. Or ceased to matter entirely.
"You gets arts journalists together these days," says Doug McLennan,editor of Arts Journal.com and a longtime Seattle music writer, "andit's what they talk about: their declining influence. They say FrankRich was the last critic who could close a show." Most remember whenTime and Newsweek had full rosters of arts critics.
What happened? Besides the Internet and its rash of blogs, suspectedculprits include the culture of celebrity, anti-intellectual populism,stingy newspaper owners and what some critics say is a loss ofvitality or visibility in their art forms. While many lament thesituation, some think the decentralization of authority means the arts

Comments

, Jim Andrews

Thanks for Scott Timberg's "Critical Condition" at
http://www.calendarlive.com/galleriesandmuseums/cl-ca-critics22may22,0,42636
05.story?coll=cl-home-

The relation between artist and critic has always been tense.

But what is at stake? What's a critic good for besides pr and trading in the
market of reputation?

Walt Whitman said "great art demands a great audience".

There's something at stake to a great audience in what art does. Besides
entertainment. What is it? Ezra Pound said that "art is news that stays
news." Note how that idea references both the contemporary and beyond the
contemporary. Contemporary art can be intensely relevant to what's happening
now, but it's aware of the larger contexts of the events that continue to
reverberate through the corridors of eternal existence. Whether you think of
the corridors as in The Shining or Myst or whatever.

A great audience is involved in the construction of the meaning of a work of
art. There's the obelisk. And then there's the story it is part of. Works of
art may tell stories, but they're also involved with everyone in the culture
doing their bit to impart insight and meaning to contemporary life.

It isn't that the critic is irrelevant. It's that the culture cannot bear to
look.

The below quote from Timberg's article (he is quoting Andras Szanto) misses
the enduring point of criticism.

"In fact, anything now can be art, from a ray of light to a bit of feces in
a plastic box. But it has ultimately enfeebled the critic in that
traditional chest-thumping, oracular way, where he or she can prescribe or
pass judgment. If the very premise of the art world is that anything goes,
what do you base judgments on?"

Criticism isn't just about judgements on the value of art. It's also about
taking the poetics further, unfolding it, engaging with it, seeing where it
works as an instrument of thought and feeling and insight and where it
doesn't. Seeing what the poetics implies.

Thanks for pointing out the article, Marisa. Very interesting and worth
reading!

ja
http://vispo.com

, Marisa Olson

Jim, thanks for your comments.

I think there are a few other/additional points to make. They all sort
of revolve around the fact that the relationship between the critic
and the audience is often polarized. This, to me, is unfortunate,
becomes it places the critic in the position of being expected to
"bring something" to the work that the "audience" does not. It also
not only unfairly deitizes the critic, but it leaves artists making
work for critics and not for audiences. I agree that the critic should
be more involved in an unpacking of poetics than a passsing of
judgement (though many of us have to cop to passing judgement as a
result of a work's poetics, or lack thereof). But I think that a
reading of the rhetoric of a work (in any medium) has to consider how
the work positions itself in relation to its audience. When the critic
is divorced from the audience, no such reading can occur.

There's come to be an interesting situation vis a vis the criticism of
media art, under the influence of a number of factors… In general,
there is a lack of viable arts publications as sustaining one in this
economic climate is difficult. Media arts publications are even harder
to come by, and most of those pay poorly if at all. For these reasons
and others (not the least of which is the perceived novelty of the
field and resultant dissonance), there is a lack of seasoned, educated
media arts critics. A look at recent NY Times pieces on new media art
(or the lack thereof) will provide a good example. The few good
writers do not seem to be getting assignments and one less-good writer
has unfortunately been given more there, lately, but all in all,
coverage is minimal. We've thrown ourselves into a self-critiquing
system which is wildly disproportionate in relation to, well, all
kinds of things… Some of us are over-educated and under-informed,
some of us look at a lot of work and can't find a means of critiquing
it, others of us are daunted by the technical and philosophical
vocabularies that pervade our field. The many processes of
appropriation, sampling, and reiteration that have come to make so
many great media artworks great does not make the system of critique
any more cohesive, wherein those who don't know their art history are
doomed to misrepeat it. There are, particularly on this list, a
handful of seriously talented, intelligent, and well-versed critics,
and so many of them are struggling against production barriers and
within faulty communication channels, so that the flow of ideas and
meaningful exchanges all to often becomes buried under other forms of
labor, if not under animosity and competition within the pecking order
of a rank struggling for classification.

My hope is that this will just get better with time, with pedagogy,
with the long view, etc.

Marisa

On 5/22/05, Jim Andrews <[email protected]> wrote:
> Thanks for Scott Timberg's "Critical Condition" at
> http://www.calendarlive.com/galleriesandmuseums/cl-ca-critics22may22,0,42636
> 05.story?coll=cl-home-
>
> The relation between artist and critic has always been tense.
>
> But what is at stake? What's a critic good for besides pr and trading in the
> market of reputation?
>
> Walt Whitman said "great art demands a great audience".
>
> There's something at stake to a great audience in what art does. Besides
> entertainment. What is it? Ezra Pound said that "art is news that stays
> news." Note how that idea references both the contemporary and beyond the
> contemporary. Contemporary art can be intensely relevant to what's happening
> now, but it's aware of the larger contexts of the events that continue to
> reverberate through the corridors of eternal existence. Whether you think of
> the corridors as in The Shining or Myst or whatever.
>
> A great audience is involved in the construction of the meaning of a work of
> art. There's the obelisk. And then there's the story it is part of. Works of
> art may tell stories, but they're also involved with everyone in the culture
> doing their bit to impart insight and meaning to contemporary life.
>
> It isn't that the critic is irrelevant. It's that the culture cannot bear to
> look.
>
> The below quote from Timberg's article (he is quoting Andras Szanto) misses
> the enduring point of criticism.
>
> "In fact, anything now can be art, from a ray of light to a bit of feces in
> a plastic box. But it has ultimately enfeebled the critic in that
> traditional chest-thumping, oracular way, where he or she can prescribe or
> pass judgment. If the very premise of the art world is that anything goes,
> what do you base judgments on?"
>
> Criticism isn't just about judgements on the value of art. It's also about
> taking the poetics further, unfolding it, engaging with it, seeing where it
> works as an instrument of thought and feeling and insight and where it
> doesn't. Seeing what the poetics implies.
>
> Thanks for pointing out the article, Marisa. Very interesting and worth
> reading!
>
> ja
> http://vispo.com
>
>
>
> +
> -> post: [email protected]
> -> questions: [email protected]
> -> subscribe/unsubscribe: http://rhizome.org/preferences/subscribe.rhiz
> -> give: http://rhizome.org/support
> -> visit: on Fridays the Rhizome.org web site is open to non-members
> +
> Subscribers to Rhizome are subject to the terms set out in the
> Membership Agreement available online at http://rhizome.org/info/29.php
>

, Jim Andrews

"Polarization" seems to be a key word in the current climate, doesn't it.
Not only between 'critic' and 'artist', perhaps, as you point out, but also
more broadly in society. Not only in matters of politics but also concerning
the distribution of wealth and the availability of good education, access to
knowledge and training in it, despite the rise of the Internet.

In this sad state of affairs, digital art is situated. Sometimes it is quite
remote. Art for the monied. Yet on the net, where there is a world of
people, just who it is for is often mysterious, and the audience is among
the educated.

The really popular computer art is entertainment oriented and as savage as
the day (is long). Counter Strike, for example. A global network playing
terrorist versus counter-terrorist shooting at one another 24x7x365.25.

Even within net.art the divisions and rivalries are acrimonious.

It seems like there's a lot of work to do. The critics can be very useful in
this regard.

ja
http://vispo.com

> —–Original Message—–
> From: Marisa S. Olson [mailto:[email protected]]
> Sent: May 22, 2005 8:52 PM
> To: [email protected]; [email protected]
> Subject: Re: RHIZOME_RAW: Critical condition (LA Times)
>
>
> Jim, thanks for your comments.
>
> I think there are a few other/additional points to make. They all sort
> of revolve around the fact that the relationship between the critic
> and the audience is often polarized. This, to me, is unfortunate,
> becomes it places the critic in the position of being expected to
> "bring something" to the work that the "audience" does not. It also
> not only unfairly deitizes the critic, but it leaves artists making
> work for critics and not for audiences. I agree that the critic should
> be more involved in an unpacking of poetics than a passsing of
> judgement (though many of us have to cop to passing judgement as a
> result of a work's poetics, or lack thereof). But I think that a
> reading of the rhetoric of a work (in any medium) has to consider how
> the work positions itself in relation to its audience. When the critic
> is divorced from the audience, no such reading can occur.
>
> There's come to be an interesting situation vis a vis the criticism of
> media art, under the influence of a number of factors… In general,
> there is a lack of viable arts publications as sustaining one in this
> economic climate is difficult. Media arts publications are even harder
> to come by, and most of those pay poorly if at all. For these reasons
> and others (not the least of which is the perceived novelty of the
> field and resultant dissonance), there is a lack of seasoned, educated
> media arts critics. A look at recent NY Times pieces on new media art
> (or the lack thereof) will provide a good example. The few good
> writers do not seem to be getting assignments and one less-good writer
> has unfortunately been given more there, lately, but all in all,
> coverage is minimal. We've thrown ourselves into a self-critiquing
> system which is wildly disproportionate in relation to, well, all
> kinds of things… Some of us are over-educated and under-informed,
> some of us look at a lot of work and can't find a means of critiquing
> it, others of us are daunted by the technical and philosophical
> vocabularies that pervade our field. The many processes of
> appropriation, sampling, and reiteration that have come to make so
> many great media artworks great does not make the system of critique
> any more cohesive, wherein those who don't know their art history are
> doomed to misrepeat it. There are, particularly on this list, a
> handful of seriously talented, intelligent, and well-versed critics,
> and so many of them are struggling against production barriers and
> within faulty communication channels, so that the flow of ideas and
> meaningful exchanges all to often becomes buried under other forms of
> labor, if not under animosity and competition within the pecking order
> of a rank struggling for classification.
>
> My hope is that this will just get better with time, with pedagogy,
> with the long view, etc.
>
> Marisa

, ryan griffis

Jim and Marisa both make very thoughtful statements on the issues
brought up in this article in my eyes…
my questions about it, other than those raised by both of them, are why
a discourse around the "death of criticism" (or art, or net.art or
whatever) makes any sense to anyone. i mean, if Greenberg represented
the epitome of high criticism, that was only 50 years ago. how can that
even be given the status of a tradition that could expire?
i think it could be useful to look at all of this in terms of the
political and psychological economy in which it operates… not that i
have such an analysis. but it seems kind of convenient, and, as both
Jim and Marisa allude to, highly complicit in commodity fetishism. if
we look at the "rise" of blogs and the "decline" of print, it's easy to
miss the continuities that create stability, as well as the small
developments that create instability.
i know it's more dramatic to look at deaths and ends and beginnings and
such, but i think saying that critical discourse is dead because of
technological change seems absurd. was it ever "alive" in that sense?
i think Hickey's ego says it all:

For Hickey, art criticism lost its luster and excitement the same
timeart did. "There was a sense that things had a forward tilt," he
saysof American art after World War II, when it seemed to be moving
towarda consummation. "Jackson Pollock changed the way the world
looked,Andy Warhol changed the way the world looked."
But the high couldn't last forever, and the power went to the curators.
"I'm like Wolfman Jack," Hickey groans. "The times have passed me by."

how did JP or AW "change the way the world looked" exactly? how
convenient to label oneself a visionary of the past (aligned with
heroic notions of the male genius/rebel of course), that helped get us
where we are, while simultaneously shirking any responsibility for it.
Poor Dave.
as the Minutemen (the band, not the xenophobes on the border) sang:
"Maybe partying will help."

, Eduardo Navas

Hi all,

This is a rather interesting thread. I shall contribute my two cents.

I just attended a conference at LACMA on Saturday, which included Christiane
Paul, Andrea Fraser and Ricardo Dominguez amongst others. The conference
was called "Institutional Critique." I will spare you the details and
simply say that Andrea Fraser ended her presentation by stating that
Institutional Critique was a failed project. Now, here we have another
moment of an ending. Why?

Part of it I believe has to do with the fact that the art institution is not
able to understand how culture is changing with new technology and the new
forms and possibilities for criticism that are arising due to the rapid
exchange of information. The crisis of criticism that is entertained in the
LA Times article is an attempt at controling discourse. It is a way of
saying that there is too much noise and the filters are no longer
functioning properly. Blogging has been one of the greatest problems for
the institution of criticism. And what has the press done? The smart
ones… Join them. Check Le Monde, Ils sont tres intelligent, aussi:
http://www.lemonde.fr/web/blogs/0,39-0,48-0,0.html
This newspaper is not only offering their newspaper correspondents' blogs,
but also allow you to have your own blog. This is the next level of
production/consumption. The French are allowing discourse to run, like
Foucault would approve. The LA Times newspaper article is trying to control
discourse because it sees criticism getting out of control and when
something is out of control it is always better to proclaim it dead to
regain control over it. This is what has been done with painting in the
past and look where it is.

Here is what I think about blogs from a previous piece I posted on NAR:
http://www.netartreview.net/monthly/0305.3.html
"Today, blogs follow the evolution of the newspaper writer, the newspaper
reader, and the rise of the collaborator. Blogs have pushed the idea of the
collaborator (as Benjamin saw it) in unexpected ways. For instance, because
blogs function on a network (the Web which runs on the Internet), these are
able to perform as platforms for not only feedback on printed media that is
newspapers and magazines (which now also have online version of their
publications), but also as places where to simply exchange ideas with other
writers. Communities of bloggers (this is the name given to those who write
on weblogs) flourished beginning around 1997;2 and recently, blogs have
become an important part of the World Wide Web

, Rob Myers

On Monday, May 23, 2005, at 07:23AM, ryan griffis <[email protected]> wrote:

>But the high couldn't last forever, and the power went to the curators.

DJ #1: Are you going to the cinema tonight?
DJ #2: I don't know, who's the projectionist?

Curators are better subjects for criticism than artists because they better reflect the critical ego; it is easier for critics to see themselves in curators than in artists. This is where auteur theory comes from as well, and another reason why so many writers tolerate the most inept examples of installation and performance despite the general public's continuing disinterest.

The main problem with criticism, as demonstrated by "Art Since 1900", is that art has become either irrelevent for or irritating to the actual practice of art criticism. It seems that art really needs throwing away and replacing with something better, something more amenable to criticism.

In fact I think that critics would be even better subjects than curators and that art criticism would be that more amenable object, indeed the perfect object. Let criticism drown in its own reflection…

For a more coherent argument, with some pointers on how to escape the current closed world of criticism, I highly recommend "What Happened To Art Criticism?" By James Elkins:

http://www.prickly-paradigm.com/authors/elkins.html

- Rob.

, Jim Andrews

"Polarization" seems to be a key word in the current climate, doesn't it.
Not only between 'critic' and 'artist', perhaps, as you point out, but also
more broadly in society. Not only in matters of politics but also concerning
the distribution of wealth and the availability of good education, access to
knowledge and training in it, despite the rise of the Internet.

In this sad state of affairs, digital art is situated. Sometimes it is quite
remote. Art for the monied. Yet on the net, where there is a world of
people, just who it is for is often mysterious, and the audience is among
the educated.

The really popular computer art is entertainment oriented and as savage as
the day (is long). Counter Strike, for example. A global network playing
terrorist versus counter-terrorist shooting at one another 24x7x365.25.

Even within net.art the divisions and rivalries are acrimonious.

It seems like there's a lot of work to do. The critics can be very useful in
this regard.

ja
http://vispo.com

> —–Original Message—–
> From: Marisa S. Olson [mailto:[email protected]]
> Sent: May 22, 2005 8:52 PM
> To: [email protected]; [email protected]
> Subject: Re: RHIZOME_RAW: Critical condition (LA Times)
>
>
> Jim, thanks for your comments.
>
> I think there are a few other/additional points to make. They all sort
> of revolve around the fact that the relationship between the critic
> and the audience is often polarized. This, to me, is unfortunate,
> becomes it places the critic in the position of being expected to
> "bring something" to the work that the "audience" does not. It also
> not only unfairly deitizes the critic, but it leaves artists making
> work for critics and not for audiences. I agree that the critic should
> be more involved in an unpacking of poetics than a passsing of
> judgement (though many of us have to cop to passing judgement as a
> result of a work's poetics, or lack thereof). But I think that a
> reading of the rhetoric of a work (in any medium) has to consider how
> the work positions itself in relation to its audience. When the critic
> is divorced from the audience, no such reading can occur.
>
> There's come to be an interesting situation vis a vis the criticism of
> media art, under the influence of a number of factors… In general,
> there is a lack of viable arts publications as sustaining one in this
> economic climate is difficult. Media arts publications are even harder
> to come by, and most of those pay poorly if at all. For these reasons
> and others (not the least of which is the perceived novelty of the
> field and resultant dissonance), there is a lack of seasoned, educated
> media arts critics. A look at recent NY Times pieces on new media art
> (or the lack thereof) will provide a good example. The few good
> writers do not seem to be getting assignments and one less-good writer
> has unfortunately been given more there, lately, but all in all,
> coverage is minimal. We've thrown ourselves into a self-critiquing
> system which is wildly disproportionate in relation to, well, all
> kinds of things… Some of us are over-educated and under-informed,
> some of us look at a lot of work and can't find a means of critiquing
> it, others of us are daunted by the technical and philosophical
> vocabularies that pervade our field. The many processes of
> appropriation, sampling, and reiteration that have come to make so
> many great media artworks great does not make the system of critique
> any more cohesive, wherein those who don't know their art history are
> doomed to misrepeat it. There are, particularly on this list, a
> handful of seriously talented, intelligent, and well-versed critics,
> and so many of them are struggling against production barriers and
> within faulty communication channels, so that the flow of ideas and
> meaningful exchanges all to often becomes buried under other forms of
> labor, if not under animosity and competition within the pecking order
> of a rank struggling for classification.
>
> My hope is that this will just get better with time, with pedagogy,
> with the long view, etc.
>
> Marisa


+
-> post: [email protected]
-> questions: [email protected]
-> subscribe/unsubscribe: http://rhizome.org/preferences/subscribe.rhiz
-> give: http://rhizome.org/support
-> visit: on Fridays the Rhizome.org web site is open to non-members
+
Subscribers to Rhizome are subject to the terms set out in the
Membership Agreement available online at http://rhizome.org/info/29.php