This work is shown in museums all the time. Maybe you haven't been to them. The St Louis Art Museum put on a huge show of Osage tribal art a few years ago. And what about the new Smithsonian Museum devoted to American Native art? The Art Institute of Chicago is about to open a huge new exhibition area for art of the Americas. I own some very nice Casas Grandes pots and other southwest art, Hopi, Acoma, Papago, etc. Some of it is considered magical by its makers but maybe only slightly so, not enough to keep it hidden in a kiva, and not enough to keep it off the market, as art, sometimes as ornamental, and sometimes as decorative. But if you think the best of this work is not regarded as art, try finding and buying, say, a good piece of MicMac quill work. Take lots of money. Even the standard contemporary Canadian native quillwork is expensive now, and rarely made anymore because it's so difficult to make in an era of wealth produced by the casinos. (Some tourist quill-work is made in "factories" and sold as the real thing).
Objects don't have anything except their material presence. Some people invest them with magic or artfulness but it's a form of make-believe. The tribal artisans invested their work with magic and we invest it with art. So everyone is alien to the work in real terms, in the sense of objecthood. The debate over the intrinsic magic or aesthetic nature of objects is pointless even though we'd like it to be otherwise. wc ----- Original Message ---- From: Chris Miller <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Wed, November 11, 2009 9:05:53 AM Subject: Re: Reading Dutton Chapter 4 : Thought Experiments Dutton denies the "evolution of these objects from magic to aesthetic" as he denies that "they don't have our concept of art". But we should also note that those "professional career artists" who work in traditional genres (Eskimo, Baule, Hopi, Balinese etc) do not qualify for display in art museums, even on a temporary basis. In our modern world, their work is only accepted as decorative. It doesn't seem to qualify for the notion of art as "the truth of beings setting itself to work" For example, in 2006 , there was great exhibit of Pre-Columbian pottery from Northern Mexico in at the Art Institute: http://www.artic.edu/aic/exhibitions/casas.html A few decades ago, this style was revived by Juan Quezada, creating a flourishing cottage industry in a small Mexican village near the old Casas Grandes archeological site. But regardless of their commercial or aesthetic success, their work is not going to be shown, even temporarily, in a major art museum, or discussed in magazines like 'Art in America'. Instead, some it was shown in the Field Museum of Natural History -- in both a special gallery for living ethnic artists, and the gift shop. A variety of contemporary as well as historic pieces is shown and discussed here: http://mountshang.blogspot.com/2008/11/transforming-tradition-pottery-from.ht ml ............................................................ My point is that the original, adornment (status), and magical (healing and power) purposes of tribal art, one so embedded in the work, is now almost irrecoverable, not only by their makers but by everyone else as well. They become artworks in the Western sense and as vague reminders of what was once integral to a culture. The evolution of these objects from magic to aesthetic is so thorough -- from magical to trade products to works of art-- that even their makers, who regard themselves as professional career artists, can't recover their original purposes. At best they now make symbols of ancestral magic, sentimental myth narration, exactly like the modern sculptor who carves a statue of Christ without for a second believing that the work IS Christ or can produce miracles. ____________________________________________________________ Weight Loss Program Best Weight Loss Program - Click Here! http://thirdpartyoffers.netzero.net/TGL2231/c?cp=dl108pyFro7PGiA7kTdQJQAAJz6c l_zTaptgNR5c8Mer1v9kAAYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAADNAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAEUgAAAAA=
