Criticism, journalism: things are tough/awesome all over
April 24th, 2009 by Tom 2 CommentsI enjoyed last night’s Junto discussion on art criticism in Philadelphia but I’m puzzling over some fundamentals. The larger context went mostly unspoken.
All journalism everywhere is in deep sheep dip right now because print newspapers are dying.
At the same time, everybody’s a critic (ahem) thanks to the Interwebs.
Which means we have an overwhelming supply of armchair critique of everything— art, politics, sports, everything— but our supply of profoundly well-informed criticism is perhaps in danger.
But that last is far more an issue for politics (if you can’t afford to send stringers to Pakistan, your information is limited) than for art (there are people who choose to invest 20 hours a week in art, on their own dime).
Also, why is this discussion so centered on Philly? Who cares about locality? Okay, it’s an important color in the palette, but it’s not everything. And other media have already gotten the message that it doesn’t matter so much anymore.
Craft artists have moved en masse to Etsy. They can sell their work, they can get discovered. And criticism and commentary happen everywhere people care enough about the work. Geography is mostly irrelevant, except insofar as it informs the style of the work itself.
And I’m talking about craft artists who produce functional objects. The need to be in the same room with it before you buy it should be greater, not less, than the need to stand in a gallery with a painting. So why must fine art sales, and fine art criticism, be local? And dependent on the expense of galleries and print publication?
Local artist Katie Henry produces both sewn paintings and bags. To my knowledge her sewn paintings have sold only on a local basis, while it is completely impossible for her to keep a handmade bag in stock for more than eight seconds. But I suspect this is mostly because her paintings haven’t been listed on Etsy (hey, the lady’s busy enough as it is).
So why hasn’t fine art really arrived on Etsy yet? It could be as simple as a marketing decision on Etsy’s part. Perhaps a wise one. But that’s just an opportunity for someone else.
April 24th, 2009 at 10:25 am
Nice Post, Tom. I can appreciate what you are saying about the local issue becoming less of one, and I agree it is interesting that the conversation lastnight stayed so focused locally. I feel like that was likely a result of how the conversation was framed, from the starting point of what’s happened/ing in Philly.
But it might have been more than that…
I heard something really important about the fact of ‘local’ in the conversation, that I think is undeniably essential to the subject, ‘Art Criticsm’, despite the very valid point you raise above about the changing face of the bigger picture of journalism/criticism.
I’d like to suggest that the sense of frustration around being successful in this discipline IN PHILLY validates in an important way the ‘local’ focus of the discussion. Perhaps an awkward Etsy analogy will help here: it seems to me that before Philly (art, artists, crticism, critque, etc.) can even get listed in the ‘marketplace’ (which has that global reach), it needs to have a ‘product’ of some sort to list.
In other words, the focus on the fact of the ‘local’ seems like an attempt to work out just what it is that’s going on here, a search for a way to define THAT so it might be coherent enough to be digested/reacted to by the larger global community. From the histories recounted lastnight it seems as if Philly’s been moving towards THAT, but the lack of *something* to contextualize it all makes us somewhat less viable on the larger scale.
Sure individual publishers have that global reach through the wonders of the interwebs. Libby and Roberta are a shining example to your point here. Additionally, individual artists are putting their work out to the larger global community through the digital realm. However, in this thing called the ‘Art World’, without that special *something* to hold it all together it just doesn’t quite work the same way. And its clear that whatever that *something* might be for Philly, it’s gonna be a whole lot about what’s happening HERE.
So it starts to sound like i’m suggesting that the Art World goes unaffected by this shift you bring up. But that can’t be quite right…
Just some thoughts. Thanks again to P’unk, and special kudos to Rick, for starting this conversation.
May 1st, 2009 at 9:21 pm
Art always has been, and will be for some time to come, a business of brick, mortar, society and sex and, like it or not, I don’t see that changing soon. If you want art on the walls, artist talk, academic perspective, beer, wine, music and live bodies: Thursday May 14th, 6PM to Midnight, AREA 919.
Please put me on your email list for events. Best regards, Michael