I could'nt have said it better myself. But that Is how I work.
mando
On Apr 27, 2009, at 5:53 PM, William Conger wrote:
I can't follow Saul's syntax. I understand his views re the
discourses, etc., but let's ask if working artists can make much
sense of such discourses. I know some can but so many, many more
cannot and there's no proven correlation between the evident
success of their work and their articulateness with the "economic,
social, and cultural circumstances" (and what is salient to each of
those categories?).
Very few, way too few, MFA artists are even modestly familiar with
the most basic literature in art history, let alone in other fields
like economics, sociology, and whatever culture-ology might be
(popularly termed culture studies). How does the typical
illiteracy among MFAs assure any "mark of success" in amalgamating
and making transparent the circumstances of culture? Mostly they
don't and instead rely on the preachings of incomprehensible
theorists to tell them what one-liner to illustrate today.
Besides, it's a simple truism to say that art deals with the
economic, social and cultural circumstances of its time. What
doesn't? The statement cannot be falsified.
I am one of those who is horrified by the general thrust in MFA
education that seeks to validate artists by how well their work
suits some pre-existing, vague and ill-informed summaries of
culture. Contemporary art has become illustrational, a means to a
separate verbal and lesser end. It is a common and inevitable
result of exaggerated academic infestation of studio practice. All
religious and secular art follows the same path to decadence. What
is needed now is a break from the talk, the over-verbalization that
was ushered in by those who mistook Duchampian wit for serious
"discourse". A new, incoherent -- unplanned and just going from
hunch to hunch -- beginning is needed. It's got to happen In the
studio, away from the talkers who prefer empty walls and many chairs.
I'll smugly guess that there's not a single artist alive who can
purposely engage the discourses of societal circumstances beyond
the most ordinary popular --and thus misleading -- newspaper/
magazine levels. What artist comprehends economics as fully as an
untenured prof at a second rate state school? Or astrophysics, or
neurobiology, or even, nowadays, art history?
When art serves something outside of itself, it remains behind
something else and is diminished by it. I prefer the belief that
art serves nothing, has no purpose, no meaning, and no
justification and therefore cannot be diminished by extrinsic
utility. It is as-if a surrogate human, creating its own purpose,
meaning, justification by existing. Call this Existentialism!
Whatever purpose, meaning, justification art attains is simply
itself -- ignudo -- made extrinsic as symbolic. And that becomes
the symbol of societal, economic, cultural circumstance. If it's
any good, art shapes the other more than the other shapes art; if
not, it's illustration, a puny, decadent cousin of the real thing.
WC
________________________________
From: Saul Ostrow <[email protected]>
To: "[email protected]" <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, April 27, 2009 2:07:27 PM
Subject: RE: Heidegger and Singularity-string
this is anecdotal information - it does not extend from the object
- nor i
does this aspect ability to identify something the economic,
social, and
cultural circumstances of its audience be a mark of its makers
success - this
is another Miller shell game - bait and switch - using the part
rather than
the whole - because he could not deal with the whole - which had to
do with
the successful work of art - and its ability to reflect the the
economic,
social, and cultural
circumstances of its audience - in which is often centuries after
the fact
its been fun - to know that nothing ever changes here
____________________________________________
Saul Ostrow | Visual Arts & Technologies Environment Chair, Sculpture
Voice: 216-421-7927 | [email protected]| http://www.cia.edu/
The Cleveland Institute of Art | 11141 East Boulevard, Cleveland,
OH 44106
Sent: Monday, April 27, 2009 12:40 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Heidegger and Singularity-string
I think Miller is right to claim that any made object can reveal or
point to
the societal context to which it belongs. He has an indisputable
position.
For instance, in the 18-19C, before paper clips, people pinned
their notes
together, using long pins. No doubt there were many pricked
fingers. So
there was a context begging for a useful object. We should not
assume that
the object precedes the context; often, the context precedes the
object. Art
can precede its context or be at one with it or follow it. How do
we make
those distinctions?
WC
________________________________
From: "[email protected]" <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Sent: Monday, April 27, 2009 10:53:35 AM
Subject: Re: Heidegger and Singularity-string
Miller writes:Saul, can you offer, as example, a single manufactured
object that does not
"continue to identify something the economic, social, and cultural
circumstances of its audience"?
Radiator brushes,button hooks,pencils,paper clips aren't quite
universal
enough. They presuppose
steam heat,boots,a need to write things down, and a need to
separate piles
of paper,itself a manufactored object. Wouldn't something like
string be
less identifiable? Also, Miller's question has no pertinence to
the problem
at hand,which is the way he usually conducts his arguments. I am
surprised
at the improvement in his prose, one might almost think he had engaged
someone else to write his responses.
Kate Sullivan
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