Iacobcursuri

Mike KelleyMike Kelley a devenit oficial Saint Mike - i pentru un artist a crui oper a fost att de nrdcinat n demoni i perveri, care este o poziie periculoas pentru a fi inch Anul trecut, marele LA artist a luat propria via la vrsta de 57, pentru motive care raman obscure. Exist magnetism n tragedie, i ntins Kelley retrospectiva a lua acum peste MoMA PS1 (dup originare la Muzeul Stedelijk din Amsterdam) este doar ultimul dintr-un val nentrerupt de omagii care au aprut de la moartea sa (am scris despre cel de la Watermill centru de anul trecut). Noua expoziie, ambiios este n acelai timp uimitor i un pic enervant - este ciudat s vezi pe cineva a crui oper a fost motivat att de puternic de un fel de cultural anti-autoritarism, avnd n vedere complet tratamentul Great Man. Spectacolul umple cea mai mare parte a cldirii PS1, de la subsol umed, n cazul n care un film de ru augur joac n ntunericul din sala cazanelor vechi, la galeriile ndeprtate de la etajul al doilea, n cazul n care exist o recreere parial a epic su, mai multe pri , multimedia "zi se face" spectacol din 2005, centrarea pe o serie de viniete psihosexuale stranii filmate inspirate de vechile poze de album liceu. n ntre, vei obine un tur plin de multele forme pe care munca lui Kelley luat: sculpturile realizate din animale jalnice, murdare umplute primul care l-au atras atenia la sfritul anilor 1980, o serie uimitoare de lucrri denumit "Complexul Educational" (1995), pentru care el a creat diorame c topit toate colile pe care le-a participat vreodat ntr-un labirint interconectate;-perioade de ntrziere lui, de mare producie "Kandor" de lucrri, care de spin o serie de sculpturi i animaii amuzante i dement dintr-un element de obscur de mitul Superman, Omul de descoperire Steel din oraul su natal extraterestre presupune distrus, miniaturizat de un personaj negativ i depozitate sub un clopot de sticl - o metafor pentru modurile n care formativ amintiri te bntuie. Kelley a spus c el nu a fost cu adevrat interesat de Freud - sau, mai degrab el a fost interesat de Freud ca un literar, mai degrab dect o influen filosofic -, dar lucrrile sale au un cadru teoretic care se simte necontenit freudian: Peste i peste, se uit la o parte a memoriei, obiect , sau experien care se simte ru sau crud i apoi construiete ceva n jurul ei, genernd energie stranie. Ca urmare, activitatea sa poate simti, uneori, la o dat dur nefiltrate i hiper-metodic, intim i overthought. Unele piese sunt de neneles fr o nelegere a unora (de obicei bizar) care stau la baza intelectual: O camer are-latrin cum ar fi de recreere Kelley a guru psihanalitic Wilhelm Reich "Orgone Energy acumulatoare," o invenie menit s elibereze orgasme psihice, un alt lucru, un perete- instalare, picturi perechi de broate de desene animate i prostituate transsexuale, juxtapunerea a face cel mai sens de umplere atunci cnd ai citit c Kelley este inspirat de cont psihanalitic Bruno Bettelheim a basmului "The Frog Prince", ca o metafor pentru repulsie sexual. Cu toate acestea, n cazul n care interesele cele mai evidente sunt straniu i trauma, cheia sub acoperire la locul de munc Kelley stabilete n alt parte n ntregime, n ceva mai puin evident: dialogul su cu arta feminist. El a sosit n Los Angeles pentru a studia arta la mijlocul anilor '70, n urma lung a micrii de arta feminist, i a fost feminism care a fcut mrturisiri intime i materiale de ambarcaiuni exprimate-off licit, spre deosebire de rafinamentul mai macho de sculptur industriale care era atunci la mod. ntr-un interviu cu Lynn Hershman Leeson, Kelley a descris o dat opera lui ca o form de estetic "cross-dressing", pentru c a atras pe aceste strategii (una din camerele n planul su de "Complexul Educational" este etichetat "Sculptura Soft" Art. femei. ""), teoria artei feministe a fcut, de asemenea, o contientizare de partea ntunecat a "privirii de sex masculin", o parte inevitabil a discuiei. Obsesiile Kelley sunt necrutor, sarcastic masculin, tot iconografie carte de benzi desenate i agresiune punk - dar ele sunt obsesiile masculine contieni de partea lor ntunecat, condus din nou pe ei nii, parodiind nii, ndoial ei nii, conceput ca constrngeri i ecrane de dorine reprimate i unnamable . ntr-o lucrare deosebit de bizar la PS1, Kelley introduce colecia sa de capace de la licenios revista de umor "Sex la Sexty," pline de desene animate femei grase i slavering brbai horndog, ntr-o reea ntre ptrate de culoare parfumat de tip industrial de mai Colorfield pictura, formnd un hibrid, construcie multi-panel. Acest lucru poate fi o glum despre machismo infamant de scena abstract pictura, dar, n acelai timp, actul pare ntr-adevr s fie un fel de mod ciudat i torturat de rscumprare "Sex la Sexty," care, evident, a avut loc o anumit fascinaie real pentru Kelley - a scris o introducere pentru un compendiu de MAG pentru "carti sexy" colectare Taschen lui. E ca i cum n cazul n care acest lucru relicv copilrie grotesc a trebuit s fie pus n carantin n mod adecvat, astfel nct umor ciudat ar putea fi cuprins ntr-un fel de tabr mod teoretic.

Aa cum am trecut prin galeriile PS1, o femeie a condus un grup pe un tur, artnd la o mare negru-i-alb desen cerneal din seria "Sublime" (1987), reprezentnd un dicionar cu un craniu-de-mort de blocare exploataie coperta nchis, sub cuvintele, "Dac nu vrei s tii definiia, nu se deschide Dicionarul." "l iubesc att de mult," ghidul de comentat. "E un deteptule!" A fost doar o remarc dezinvolt, dar nc arat la adulare reductiv care nsoete adesea beatificare artistic. Pentru ca un lucru de genul asta nu este doar o glum, sau dac este, aceasta este o glum sensul Freud vorbete despre n "gluma si relatia sa cu Inconstientul": un mod indirect de a suprafa nelinitile i dorinele. Subtext al desenului este modul n care adevrul este marcat ca otrav, cum ncercarea de a defini termenii lumea ta sincer s-ar putea duce de fapt la unele locuri ntunecate - locuri ar putea s nu dorii s mearg. Mike Kelley este un erou acum, i o parte a canonului, dar dac nu eti un pic tulburat de el, atunci s-ar putea s nu fie n cutarea destul de greu.Adrian Ghenie: despre artist i spectacolul su de la SMAK 19 ianuarie 2011 Decembrie, de 2, 2010, al doilea muzeu spectacol solo al emergente, dar stimat, controversat, dar venerat n mod semnificativ artist romn Adrian Ghenie a fost deschis n Gent, i anume la SMAK (Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst), probabil una dintre cele mai importante i cu siguran, una dintre instituiile cele mai dinamice pentru arta contemporana din Europa. Expoziia rezumat, mai mult sau mai puin cuprinztor, lucrrile artistului produs pe o perioad de aproximativ doi ani, inclusiv cea mai mare parte pictura (mediu artistului de predilecie), dar, de asemenea, cteva dintre aa-numitele sale studii (colaje predominant negru, alb i gri de imagini i vopsea imprimate) i instalarea impresionant intitulat Dada camer. Din punctul de vedere al discursului critic de art, spectacolul de la SMAK este un foarte bun prilej de a aduce n discuie mai multe evaluri critice destul de neonorant de recent producia sa artistic. Astfel, o acuzaie mai mult i mai frecvent n ceea ce privete arta Ghenie este faptul c este uor: uor ca n natur a prea fcut rapid, uor de neles mesajul ca imediat sau n ceea ce privete coninutul i, ca unii pstra aceast, de asemenea, n vedere, uor s-i vnd. Toate acestea ar face, probabil, arta sa din ultimii trei ani sau cam asa facile i, prin urmare, oarecum irelevant, dac nu n mod clar plictisitor. Aproape ca i n cazul n care pentru a contribui la a dovedi aceste afirmaii drept, spectacolul de la Gent, la fel ca i cea de la Bucureti, deschis la sfritul anului 2009 la Muzeul Naional de Art Contemporan, nu aveau un titlu, precum i o problematizare curatorial grav a lui producie. Nu tiu dac acest lucru este de a deveni o strategie de PR sau o caracteristic conceptual asumat de ctre artist, dar ceea ce sunt sigur este c, din exterior, se pare ca n cazul n curatori sale par s cread la fel ca i detractorii si: c tot ce se poate face cu faptele lui este de a le atrn pe perei albi ca o adunare de obiecte de colectie realizate de ctre un tnr stea, fermector de pe scena artistic internaional, care de fapt nu au un coninut conceptual grav i dureros sau insightfulness intelectual. Cu toate acestea, eu cred c evalurile negative, mai sus de art Adrian Ghenie nu sunt ntr-adevr fondat i voi ncerca mai jos pentru a fundamenta poziia mea. De asemenea, o alt respingere de art tnrului romn este cu privire la un fel de manierism, de faptul c a presupune devenit blocat n redundana o reteta pictural, a cror utilizare ar presupune fie detectabile n cea mai mare a corpului su de lucrri. Acum, cred c S.M.A.K. expoziie n sine este de a face o treab destul de bun n infirme aceast perspectiv critic i voi ncerca, de asemenea, n continuare pentru a circumscrie scurt drum destul de simplu, dar convingtoare n care spectacolul este de a face acest lucru. S ia n considerare, n primul rnd, problema usurinta, din cele trei de mai sus evocate sensuri. Este adevrat i c nu are nevoie s fie un expert pasionat sau un pictor excepional calificat s-l realizeze, c Ghenie este pictura (atunci cnd spun "pictur", m refer la aciunea efectiv de a pune vopsea pe suprafaa pnzei ) destul de repede. Am argumentat n alt parte c acest rapiditate este asociat cu un efort destul de laborios de construire a lucrrilor, conceptual i al compoziiei, dar chiar c nu este neaprat de important aici. Mi se pare a fi mult mai util n acest moment amintirea faptului c istoria artei (de oricare fel ar putea fantezie sau favoare) cuprinde un numr destul de pictori, de lucru rapid i uor. Departe de inteniile mele s spun prin aceasta c Ghenie este egalul de Rubens, de exemplu. Cu toate acestea, n cazul n care acest tip de usurinta, nu este, evident, un argument solid pentru excluderea opera cuiva din istoria artei, ea cu siguran nu poate fi un argument solid pentru a nega relevana sau valoare eforturile artistice altcuiva. Lucrurile sunt destul de mult la fel n ceea ce privete lizibilitatea mesajului imediat lucrrile sale "sau coninut conceptual este n cauz, sau, chiar mai bine spus, n ceea ce privete caracterul simplu al aboutness lor (de a folosi una dintre cele condiiile cele mai utile inventat de ctre Danto) este n cauz. Nu e greu nimic criptic n picturile lui Balthus, dar ele sunt fermectoare, pervers i puternic; aboutness lui Courbet este abia voalat, dar acest lucru nu-i un pictor de unic folosin face i aa mai departe i aa mai departe. Mai mult dect att, n cazul n care este adevrat c arta contemporana este un domeniu n care multitudinea de reguli criterii, este la fel de important s se gseasc criterii adecvate pentru evaluarea unei anumite lucrri de art sau un organism de lucrri de art. Sau, Ghenie pare a fi n mod clar una dintre aceste artisti pentru care criteriul coerenei ntre mijloacele utilizate i aboutness destinat este mult mai important dect cel al adncimii de subtilitatea lui sau c a ermetismului de eleganta lui. i prin acest criteriu, cele mai multe din arta sa pare a fi destul de solid. n ceea ce privete problema usurinta cauzate de faptul c arta sa este unproblematically de colectie, cred c este de fapt legat de problema manierismul prezumat deja menionat. Desigur, bunul sim v va spune c colectorii ar dobndi mai repede lucrrile unui artist care se aseamn cu alte lucrri deja colectate. Cu toate acestea, n primul rnd, la fel cum este ru pentru un artist de a lucra n scopul de a v rugm s colectionari, este destul de inutil pentru el sau ea pentru a lucra numai n scopul de a induce n eroare sau de a le deranja. Aceasta este excepia cazului n care, desigur, proiectul artistic dezvoltat la un moment dat se concentreaz n mod specific, mai mult sau mai puin critic, cu privire la rolul de colector n lumea artei contemporane, cu privire la relaia dintre artist i colector sub auspiciile trziu etc capitalismului . Cu toate acestea, n general vorbind, este la fel de rod pentru un artist de a lucra cu colectorul n minte, deoarece este greu de cap pentru orice tip de discurs critic de a se debarasa (sau de a luda la fel de bine), art cuiva, pentru c vinde. n al doilea rnd, spectacolul de la Gent convingtor dovedit c arta Ghenie este n proces, n micare i, n opinia mea, cel puin, n curs de desfurare. Att din punctul de vedere al cromaticii desfurate i de cea a subiectului integrat, lucrrile realizate n 2010 i afiate la SMAK sunt semnificativ diferite de cele anterioare realizate de artist (de exemplu, cele care figureaz n catalogul su Hatje Cantz i c au fost expuse n spectacol MNAC). Nu, nu este o revoluie stilistic, el nu a abandonat figuraie n favoarea domeniul abstract, nici nu a dat cu totul la tonurile de gri prea mult discutate, alegerea de a picta cu pigmeni de rou, galben i albastru numai. Totui, o evoluie este vizibil n mod clar (camer Dada fiind evident simbol cea mai proeminent) i s inventeze brusc abordarea sa ca manierist, n aceste condiii, nu este la fel ca i, dar, de asemenea, nu att de departe de minimalizeaza Picasso pentru nu comutare stiluri de rapid suficient, sau de respingere Rauch din cauza utilizrii sale recurente de decadent - ca i otrvitoare n cutarea tonuri de culoare. n ceea ce privete expoziia n sine, a fost un display destul de convingtoare de putere pictural i de nelegere destul de personal din domeniul artei i de istorie, dei, trebuie spus, a fost un pic nghesuii i nu aveau, ntr-o anumit msur, unitate i coeren a naraiunii. Instalarea Dada Sala a fost, fr ndoial, piesa cea mai spectaculoasa din spectacol, inteligent i semnificativ plasat n aa fel nct unul ar putea experimenta, fie pe drum sau pe cale de ieire din expoziiei. Acesta const ntr-o reconstrucie, de dimensiuni doar puin mai mic, de First International Dada Trgul construit n Berlin chinuit din anii imediat dup sfritul primului rzboi mondial I. Dar, dac setarea general a obiectelor de la locul de desfurare artistic improvizaie este reprodus cu atenie, multe dintre obiectele care urmeaz s fie gsite n camer, precum i vopseaua ntr-un fel frenetic rspndit pe pereii i podeaua face referire direct la idiosincraziile i dileme propriile lui Ghenie. Instalarea se termin prin a fi un amestec de aproape suprarealist i destul de dezgusttor de referin istorice i studio artistic, conotaia att mndrie i frica, att orgoliul i nevroz. Aa cum sa ntmplat nainte n cariera sa, el arat nsui perfect contieni de sarcina istoric pe care artistul contemporan este mai mult sau mai puin forat s susin. De data aceasta, ns, de prestigiu fantomele istoriei i comarurile din trecut par s-l copleeasc i artistul este violent, dar probabil inutil ncercarea de a le cura: absent de la Dada camer n sine, el portretizeaz se vrsturi n mijlocul setarea neclar, ntr-un tablou gritor intitulat Devil 1. Diavolul / Rul este, de altfel, una dintre cele mai frecvent aluzie obsesiile care pot fi detectate n lucrrile sale picturale realizate pe parcursul anului 2010 (de cnd am discutat despre lucrrile anterioare ale lui Adrian Ghenie n alt parte, m voi concentra pe scurt aici, pe aceste cele mai recente). Bomba atomica este prezentat de mai multe ori sau se face aluzie n picturi care prezint straniu i ntr-un fel aloofly efectele distructive ale exploziei sale. Bomba este un simbol evident al rului i distrugere, dei crearea sa este rezultatul implementarea unor astfel de caracteristici definitorii ale rasei umane ca inteligen, creativitate i curiozitate. Pentru Ghenie, imaginea nor atomic este iconic pentru civilizaia noastr contemporan, pare s funcioneze, n opinia sa, ca simbol suprem care ne poate da un adecvat, n nelegere n profunzime a erei noastre. Cu toate acestea, el se apropie pictural imaginea de ciuperci atomice cu tue energice i mai ales gestual, rezultatul final fiind unele lucrri de art fr ruine senzuale. Nu exist bucurie colorat n aceste picturi, precum i exist un pericol, ei sunt, concomitent i deconcertant, vizual ncnttoare i sickeningly amenintor. Cu alte cuvinte, ele sunt lucrri care posed o aboutness destul de lizibil, dar profund paradoxal, arestarea i tulburtoare. Astfel, modul n care icoanele vizuale, mass-media pretinse ale erei atomice sunt reprezentate de ctre artistul romn ar putea face noi cred c a i chiar i reconsidere teza stabilit (datorit Hannah Arendt) a banalitii rului. Ghenie nu este departe de a ne convinge c romanticii au fost de fapt dreptate: ceea ce face rul cu adevrat periculos, nu este, de fapt banalitatea ei, dar sublimul mare a unora dintre exemplele sale de realizare.Maurizio CattelanMi-am imaginat c Maurizio Cattelan " All " , o retrospectiva care const din aproape orice lucrare el a fcut vreodat , suspendat prin cabluri i o grind cu zbrele din tavan - arGuggenheim arata ca o Clusterfuck total , o supernova strnit atunci cnd Madame Tussauds sa prbuit ntr-un Calder fabric i a explodat . De fapt , cnd am vzut primul aceste 128 de sculpturi , fotografii nrmate , tablouri, cai , cini umplute de dormit , o vac de zi , o veveri mort , manechine , numeroase autoportrete , i zorzoane asortate , toate plutesc n atrium , inima mea fan sa scufundat . Se prea sedarea , rare , i anticlimactic , mai puin Clusterfuck i uitare mai incipient .Dei n vrst de 51 de ani, vedeta de art italian - nscut este mult iubit de ctre curatori si colectionari , iar activitatea sa se vinde pentru milioane de oameni , criticii nu au fost un fel de Cattelan . Munca sa este de multe ori a respins ca o grmad de glumele vedere , o garnituri , i kitsch . El este considerat un artist de estrad mai mult de un artist , un joker impostor care i bate joc de sistemul pe care l face capabil s fie un joker milionar impostor . Este adevrat c munca lui poate fi extrem de inegal , dar am avut ncredere n el de cnd am vzut-o pentru prima dat , n 1994 : Instalarea a fost un mgar viu ntr-o galerie Greene Street. ( Vecinii url , iar spectacolul a durat o zi . ) De atunci , Cattelan sa , destul de des , ceea ce face un artist ar trebui s : a deschide podeaua de sub picioarele mele , i ia-m de locuri eu nu tiam erau acolo .A se vedea de asemenea :Cattelan pe propriul su de lucru i planurile sale post- Guggenheimn picioare n partea de jos a atrium , uitndu-se la el toate n procesul-verbal dup ce am ajuns , m-am gndit , Doamne , tipul asta se bici . ( El a fcut : Artnet.com fugit o revizuire negativ a acestui spectacol nainte de a se deschide . ) A fost prea drgu promovare a show-ului, de asemenea , a face lucruri , cum ar fi o piatra funerara care a citit cele din urm, spune presei c , dup acest spectacol ce voi retrage de la a fi un artist . Clovnerie face c mult mai uor s scrie off Cattelan ca un om dependent de utilizarea muzeelor ca material , unul care a fost declanat de ctre propria sa ideologie .Acest lucru de declanare nu este cu totul face lui . Din 1959 ,glorios Guggenheim a pus o capcan pentru artiti , i muli au czut n ea . Cu excepia pentru 2010 activat - vizitator instalare muzeu Tino Sehgal i transformarea Matthew Barney a cldirii ntr-un corp de vaselin - umplute care sa mutat prin intermediul ca un organism narativ nebun , aproape toate sondajele de aici sunt forate ntr-un format de - o singur bucat - per - arhitectural - bay , comandant telespectatorii pentru a pstra o distan moderat , ntrerupe , muta pe , i repeta , tot drumul la partea de sus a rampei . Acesta nu ar trebui s fie surprinztor c Cattelan -ar cuta cu disperare o modalitate n jurul acest format , ncercnd s nege un fel de sumare totalizatoare care de multe ori face ca artitii vizualiza retrospective ca fiind ngropat de viu . " Tot " este Cattelan intern fisurare , convulsii ntr-un mare atac de apoplexie spectaculos . Este dezvluirea complet , de confidentialitate , de auto - martiriu , atac de panic , i srituri - the- rechin laminate ntr-o singur , i este , de asemenea, un fel de capodoper .Aa cum am fcut drum pn la sol , letdown mea iniial sa transformat ntr -umplut patos uimire , intrigi , evoluie veneraie . Departe de a fi o explozie haotic one-shot , instalarea devine , pentru telespectatori , o arde lent . Obiecte noi vin n vedere , vei vedea munca de jos , apoi cerc n jurul i a vedea -l drept pe , apoi de sus . Aceasta multiplicare formeaz ecouri optice , modele de gndire , modificarea idei cu privire la ceea ce ai experimentat . Mizeria devine o plas . Lucrurile coeren , apoi sparge n afar . n ciuda atacului de materiale vizuale , obiecte intra cumva n vedere o la un moment dat . Cu toate acestea, toate n timp ce vedei incontient totul dintr-o dat , montarea totul mpreun la schimbarea configuraii i categorii .Fr comanda spaial , cronologic , sau textural , ne aruncat din nou pe propriile dispozitive . Mi-a plcut , nu de a citi explicaiile vnt care nsoesc , de obicei, sculptura conceptual . Aici , munca Cattelan este n traciune traumatizat , prevzute n stop-cadru a explodat vedere . Muzeul devine un Rembrandt sau Eakins descriere a unui teatru de operare , cu telespectatorii cerc n jurul unui cadavru deformarea . Cele nensufleite obiecte par a fi mai puin mort , mai locuit , phantomlike .Insiderii care cunosc aproape fiecare pies n vedere nu ar putea totui realiza ceea ce cutai la , lipsete o opera de arta aici , uitnd alii acolo , vznd lucruri vechi in moduri noi . Acesta poate fi greu pentru cei nefamiliarizai cu orice de acest lucru, deoarece ei vor pierde foarte mult n desi . Dar asta e ntotdeauna cazul n muzee ; Cattelan exagereaz doar aceast condiie . Noi telespectatorii , am putut vedea , s-au formeze propriile lor idei , scrie propriile cri personale despre Cattelan . Bnuiesc c cel mai mult n lumea artei va vedea " All ", ca nimic altceva dect o glum ironic , dar eu o vd ca o zon - ironie gratuit cu snge rece .Uit-te la JFK n sicriu , plutind n aer . Acesta nlocuiete moartea sa, cu ceva mai aproape de o ntrebare n curs de desfurare american cu privire la asasinarea lui . Full-size cal agat aproape de -podea cel mai mic piesa , primul i cel mai vizibil - ne d goliciunea jupuire c toi artitii trebuie s se simt atunci cnd expune munca lor . Dou fotografii cu minile mpreunate ieit din murdrie pe care le-am vzut n 1999 Bienala de la Venetia continua s m tulbure : Eu nc mai cred c a aparinut unui om real ngropat ( ca cei mai apropiati prieteni Cattelan m asigur au fcut ), i nu au fost pur i simplu minile animatronice ( ca aproape toata lumea crede ) . Sunt tantalized de vederea lui deviat - a lungul Papa Ioan Paul al II-lea , aici, odihnindu-se panic pe o platform . - Induce empatie art care deranjeaz , flummoxes , i scap de clasificare este un sprijin Cattelan . Vd nimicuri acidulate care ncnta , o imagine a unui dealer de art Randy francez el mbrcat ca un penis de culoare roz pentru o lun ,full-size Picasso figura creat pentru a saluta vizitatorii MoMA . Ca cineva speriat de huligani de fotbal , mi place monumentul de granit la toate jocurile Team England a pierdut vreodat . mi place , de asemenea, naintea mesei Foosball 21 - picior - lung pe care Cattelan , n mijlocul turbulenelor de imigrare in 1991 , amenajat pentru Africa de oaspei de munc pentru a juca o echipa italian . ( Chiar dac aici se poate desprinde ca doar o prostie suprarealist ornament de Craciun . ) Eu sunt fiul unui imigrant evreu care a plecat din Rusia i Germania s scape de moarte , i am fost recent fascinat de Cattelan miniatur Hitler ca copil supplicant .Cnd Thomas Pynchon a pus mpreun munca sa de o colecie , el a scris despre sentimentul greos de dorina de a face un Asta e ceea ce " All " este " rescriere perete - la - perete . " : Cattelan mcelresc tot ce a fcut vreodat , joc de-a v - s caute , n sperana de arta lui poate scpa cumva de efectele cicatrici de a fi att de vizibile . " Tot " este un artist trece printr-o mortificare intens a crnii , profanarea lucrarea vieii lui , fcnd acest mare mare pinata Maurizio de strlucire i de eec , n ordine , poate , pentru a aduce despre nvierea estetic . Nu-mi place de multe ori piese de oamenii pe care i iubesc . Asta-i ce prere am despre " All ". Cattelan este un artist foarte inegal , unul care a fcut o mulime de clunkers . O parte din mine vrea el ar fi rupt prin propria sa idee i cel puin instalate cteva piese n alt parte n muzeu (Hitler , poate ; calului cu capul blocat n perete , auto- portret , n care el se tarasca afara din podea ) . Cu toate acestea, " toate " este o expoziie care se repet cuvintele bntuit monstrului lui Frankenstein la producatorul ei : " Tu eti creatorul meu , dar eu sunt stpnul tu . " Multi oameni nu vor simi stpnit de Cattelan , dar eu sunt incantat de ceea ce a fcut . Eu stau pe rampe cu ochii n acest nor miasmatic de art plutitoare , vrjit , slbii , mulumit , i dornici ca el s se ntoarc pe cuvnt . Nu renunta .

When is Artification?Roberta Shapiro &Nathalie HeinichAbstractHow do people do or make things that come to be seen as works of art? In other words, when is there artification? The answer to this question is simultaneously symbolic, material, and contextual. It has to do with meanings, objects, interaction, and institutions. We seek to define not what art is nor how it should be considered, but how and under what circumstances it comes about by way of methodical observation and inquiry in a variety of fields. Circus acrobats, breakdancers, fashion designers, chefs, graffiti artists, printers, photographers, and jazz musicians are some of the examples we explore. This pragmatic and empirical perspective enables us to present a typology of forms of artification and examine its sources as well as the questions of de-artification and obstacles to artification.Key Wordsart, artification, artists, categories, legitimation, pragmatic sociology, recognition, social change, valuation1. Addressing an old issue in a new wayOur title pays homage to Nelson Goodmans famous article of 1977 When is Art?[1] It is indicative of the descriptive turn in analytical philosophy that was then taking place in the realm of aesthetics. By denying that art can be defined by its essence, Goodman argues that art is a category that must be defined by reference to context and usage.As sociologists we are very sympathetic to this perspective as it redefines things and beings in terms of process and context. In posing the question When is artification?, we would like to take the pragmatic stance a step further. In our own professional creed, this has a specific consequence. It puts action to the forefront, both in its own right and as a gauge of the values and meanings that are relevant for the actors. In taking this stance, we also focus on how art is engaged in social change on a par with many other social activities.Seeking to understand what art people cherish and admire has long been an important purview of the sociology of the arts. Although this is certainly of interest, it is not our main concern. We take a materialistic view and first observe what people do and how they do it, the things they use, the places they go, the persons they interact with, the things they say, and the norms they abide by. How, through this nexus of action and discourse, do people do or make things that gradually come to be defined as works of art?There is no straightforward answer to this question. The solution is to be found on many interrelated levels and is simultaneously symbolic, material, and contextual. Art emerges over time as the sum total of institutional activities, everyday interactions, technical implementations, and attributions of meaning. Artification is a dynamic process of social change through which new objects and practices emerge and relationships and institutions are transformed. In order to understand this process, we must first describe it, and this may only be achieved by methodic observation and inquiry in the field. Thus, our stance is neither essentialist nor normative, but descriptive and pragmatic. We seek not to define what art is nor how it should be considered, but how and under what circumstances it comes about. We want to map the processes through which objects, forms, and practices are constructed and defined as artworks and see what consequences this emergence has. How do these processes develop? What specific actors and institutions are involved? How do they give birth to productions that are meaningful not only for specialized minority groups, such as artists, patrons, curators, and sociologists, but to the point that the status of these productions as art becomes common knowledge and goes unquestioned?The paragon of such a social transformation is the advent of the very notion of art and the elevation of a professional group of painters to that of high-status artists, first in the royal courts of Renaissance Italy, then in France and all of Europe. Throughout the Middle Ages, sculptors and painters belonged to guilds and were part of the mechanical arts. They were craftsmen situated in the lower ranks of a very hierarchical social order. As they fought to gain independence from the guilds and thus be defined as practitioners of the liberal arts, they were likened to poets rather than manual workers.[2] Their personal worth was gradually recognized and they gained status and prestige over a span of centuries. The modern system of the arts, based on conceptions of the artist as genius and the uniqueness of the aesthetic experience, was stabilized with new institutions devoted to the arts and the development of a specialized market controlled by intermediaries in the nineteenth century.[3]Since then, countless other groups of people, objects, and activities have undergone transformative evolutions that can be compared to this inaugural process. Until quite recently, it characterized the institutional arrangements of Western societies alone but has now expanded widely. Artification has continued and goes on before our very eyes. As sociologists, it is our job to conduct inquiries, and then analyze and shape data documenting these cases, and seek to understand their limitations. Thus we attempt to build a theory of artification as social change based on the greatest possible accumulation of empirical data.A large part of the data we draw upon comes from original monographs discussed at the meetings of a research seminar we organized regularly in Paris from 2004 to 2008. Many of these are due to be published in a book on which this paper is based.[4]Other data come from our readings of the literature in sociology, anthropology, and cultural history. Overall, our materials constitute a corpus of research on changes affecting painting, printing, crafts, cartoons, graffiti, tribal art, outsider art, cult objects, national heritage, photography, cinema, theater, circus, breakdancing, magic, luxury fashion, gastronomy, and jazz, a seemingly motley collection of phenomena that we hope to demonstrate are, in fact, connected by a coherence we call artification.In this paper we do not address substantively the questions mentioned previously; those are taken up in detail in the monographs. What follows is an attempt to theorize across the data to discover what the artification process is and is not, where it comes from, and how to classify its manifestations, before concluding with some thoughts about contrary trends such as de-artification.2. What artification is notBefore proceeding further, a few words are in order about our conception of what artification is not. First, we do not use artification as a metaphor and thus disregard assertions comparing things to art or people to artists. Although the historical importance of the category of art explains the success of such comparisons, observation in the field has shown their practical impact to be minimal.[5] The power of metaphors to institutionalize art is next to nil.Second, our inquiry must be differentiated from recent research that focuses on specifically exclusive world views based on scholarly informed perceptions of art. By contrast, our work has a wider scope, including discourse and practice on both popular and cultivated levels. Thus, the problem of artification has little to do with artialization, a term created by the philosopher Alain Roger to define a specialized world view that constructs nature into landscape through the perceptual framework of art.[6] Likewise, we take Edouard Pommiers remarkable book about scholarly discourse on art in the Renaissance as one among many sources that document different types of change during that period.[7]Furthermore, our corpus does not include controversial cases that are part of an artified world, as are common in the field of contemporary art. Nor is our inquiry directly concerned with the sociology of taste. Indeed, our assumptions are shaped not by axiology, based on what value social actors attribute to things, but by pragmatic description. How does the whole roster of actors involved define these things?Finally, and this is probably the most important distinction of all, artification is not to be confused with legitimation. This is a point we cannot stress enough. Despite an apparent similarity, the two concepts are quite different. Indeed, we contend that the concept of artification is a theoretical and empirical advance over legitimation, and we would like to demonstrate that here.The dominant legitimacy paradigm would have us study various gradings of value that are indicators of low culture versus high. This is not what we are addressing here. We direct our attention to a prior phase during which non-art is transformed and constructed into art. This is why our corpus does not include material about arts commonly considered low-ranking, such as nave painting or pop art, or the process of relabeling that led to their recognition as high art, or monographs, such as Howard Beckers, about marginal artists and mavericks and their subsequent acknowledgement as legitimate artists.[8] We also bypass a large portion of the sociology of art and culture, such as the Bourdieusian theory of domination and cultural theory. Bourdieu used the concept of legitimation (or canonization) as a touchstone for his work on the artistic field, while research in cultural theory tends to insist on symbolic boundaries and hierarchies. The main limitation of these important works is their near-exclusive focus on classification and hence their difficulties in explaining change.The paradigm of artification we propose puts the emphasis on material aspects and concrete situations of change in a dynamic and pragmatic orientation based on the observation of actions, relationships, material, and organizational modifications. Indeed, we take artification to be an all-encompassing process of change, both practical and symbolic, of which legitimation is merely a part and a consequence. The attribution of meaning, recognition, and legitimation are all results of concrete transformations.Meaning is the consequence of activity.[9]In addition, the valuation of art creates a process of circular causation. The artification of an object necessarily brings about legitimation of that object. Conversely, the desire to secure legitimacy for a practice that someone deems unjustly undervalued may, in turn, spur a process of artification. Nevertheless, it remains not only that artification and legitimation are distinct processes, but that the former, rooted in materiality, encompasses the latter.3. Processes of artificationSo whatisartification? We see artification as a process of processes. We have identified ten constituent processes: displacement, renaming, recategorization, institutional and organizational change, patronage, legal consolidation, redefinition of time, individualization of labor, dissemination, and intellectualization. Without entering into a full description and analysis of these ten processes nor addressing all of them, we will give a few brief examples.[10]Extracting or displacing a production from its initial context is a prerequisite for artification. This happened when jazz was first transcribed in musical notation, when film broke away from its initial site at fairs, when graffiti was photographed and published in books, and when breakdancers left the street for the stage.Terminological change is a second modification. In the case of painting in France, the wordimagiers(image makers) that designated craftsmen was progressively replaced by that ofartistesduring the eighteenth century. This example also highlights the institutional change seen in the shift from the guilds to the Royal Academy and changes in classification, such as the shift from the mechanical to the liberal arts and changes in the hierarchy of pictorial genres. Under the Academy system, the king bestowed pensions on a very small elite of painters; now, the institutionalization of government grants provides for endowments. These support systems enhance the perception of an ontological difference between art and those activities deemed unworthy of such official monetary support. In France today, government support favors the artification of circus, magic, and breakdancing.Legal consolidation is another important step. French painters confirmed their new status in the courts in the seventeenth century and writers and composers were granted intellectual property of their work in the nineteenth century. In the United States, legal decisions that culminated with the end of censorship restrictions in the 1960s furthered the artification of cinema.Another significant process is the individualization of labor. As painting moved from the masters workshop to the painters studio, it underwent a continuing process of individualization; by the nineteenth century, activity that was once collective progressively became solitary. When breakdancing first appeared on stage in France, most choreography was collective; today individualauteurschoreograph hip-hop ballets.Finally, discursive reinforcement and the intellectualization of practice are an essential part of artification. Biographies of painters were first published in the Renaissance, art critique was first published in the eighteenth century, and academic art history developed dramatically during the nineteenth century. These elements intensified the growing trend toward the intellectualization of the relationship onlookers and painters have with paintings. In France, media discourse on breakdancing took an aesthetic turn by 1992, with journalists referring to art and art history rather than to the social and cultural traits of the dancers. In turn, the content of hip-hop ballets has become increasingly reflexive.4. The many origins of artificationWhat are the spheres of social life in which conditions have proven to be the most favorable to artification? As we shall see, artificatory practices spring from multiple sources.Craftsmanship comes to mind first. As we already mentioned and is now well known, painting served as the exemplar for the modern system of the arts based on the autonomy of the artist. The prerequisite for this was the refusal by painters to be considered menial laborers and their collective break from the craft guilds during the Renaissance period. Sculptors followed in their stride. Centuries later, traditional artisanship has again been the source from which arts and crafts emerged, as did photography in the 1800s and graphic arts in the 1900s. The path from craftmanship to art implies professionalization, intellectualization, and a trend toward authorization, that is, the individualization of production. Objects are understood to express personal intention; they are nominal and original; and the makers signature appears as a synthetic marker of these mechanisms.Artification also emerges from industry. Film started as a modest endeavor in fairs and rapidly rose to the rank of a million-dollar industry in the 1920s. Although there were attempts to make artistic films at the very onset of cinema, well before World War I, motion pictures began to be considered as art by the general public much later in the century. This happened first in Europe and then in the United States in the 1950s, when film directors progressively adopted new aesthetic norms before breaking away from the industrial studio system. Independent film production grew and directors gained greater control over the production process. Comparing professional critics film reviews in the 1930s with reviews published forty years later, Shyon Baumann showed the change over time and how contemporary assessments of film are now informed by the perceptual framework of art.[11]Video games are another industry that seems to be undergoing artification before our eyes. Some creators are famed individuals trained in major art schools, winning important distinctions (the three authors of video games dubbedChevaliers dans lOrdre des Arts et des Lettresby the French Minister of Culture in 2006), and their products are identified as coherent bodies of original work. Historically the products have gone the path from low-brow to middle-brow, from shoddy arcades haunted by adolescents to sophisticated games for adults in domestic environments. Critical discourse has developed in academia and in various media, and there is an ongoing scholarly discussion about the artistic nature of video games, not least in this journal.[12]The spheres of leisure, fun, free time, travel, and tourism give rise to artification, as well. Photography as a middle-brow art studied by Pierre Bourdieu and associates[13]arose from pursuits such as these. To some degree this is also true ofart brutand self-taught art.[14] Considering tribal art and primitive art as works of art in their own right has meant rejecting the perceptive framework that Western collectors of curios and travel souvenirs had long imposed.[15]Entertainment is an important source of artification and many activities travel the path from entertainment to art. The first films were shorts shown at peep shows at fairs in the 1890s. Even after technological progress and organizational complexity lent the medium greater autonomy, for decades movies were considered coarse amusement completely devoid of artistic qualities. Similarly, jazz, magic, circus, and breakdancing were long defined as simple pastimes; they are now seen as performing arts. Jazz, in particular, underwent major transformations around World War II. Artistic complexity, the emergence of the virtuoso soloist, the growing importance of critical discourse, and other transformations contributed to the redefinition of jazz as art.[16]In recent years, magic, circus, and breakdancing have ceased to be defined as purely playful, childish endeavors and have integrated the canons of theatrical and choreographical representation.[17]Similar mechanisms are at play in the visual arts. Comic books, once the sole province of children, have now morphed into elaborate graphic novels, and some have secured eminent critical acclaim.[18] Graffiti has also become more refined, while involving a wider socio-demographical spread than at its inception, as well as engaging an array of institutions in the art world, such as galleries, museums, and publishing houses. In all these instances, artification concurs with the social elevation, sophistication, and coming of age of both producers and consumers, the individualization of production, and the advent of the author. Works are evaluated in terms of objective criteria of beauty[19]rather than solely in terms of the subjective pleasure they provide, and this forms the basis for a novel experience in these spheres: aesthetic appreciation.Several practices we have observed lie astride the spheres of leisure, showmanship, and sports. As a rule, practitioners of trapeze,[20]circus horseback-riding,[21]or breakdancing[22]must arrange their actions according to social conventions other than those that qualify as gymnastics or buffoonery if they seek to be defined as artists. Physical prowess, sheer virtuosity, or stark facetiousness are detrimental to the transfiguration of a practice into art. In theater as in sports, virtuosity must become an aesthetic, and gesture must command grace in order for the incorporated technique ofarsor skilled making to turn into that accomplishment of beauty we call art. Magicians and circus routines become individualized and are attributed to the creative genius of specific actors; feats of dexterity are recast as creations and interpretations. Thus the consolidation of the improvised jazz solo in the 1940s consecrated widespread social recognition that black musicians possessed artistic sensitivity (called "soul").Technique points to manual dexterity but it also signals the expertise necessary in maneuvering tools, machinery, and equipment. For it to be metamorphosed into art, technique usually must be made invisible. This is evident in the case of architecture and in fine art crafts. Architecture was classified as a fine art in the various tables of knowledge drawn up during the eighteenth century.[23] But in the contemporary understanding of the word, neither architecture nor crafts can be said to be accomplishing a process of artification. Rather they are in a state of perpetual tension between art and technique, and are acknowledged as art (rather thanartes) only to a degree. Batrice Fraenkel, who interviewed the highly skilled printers of the Imprimerie Nationale in Paris in 1997 before it was dismantled, showed that limitations in both technique and the division of labor put insuperable obstacles to the artification of traditional type-setting.[24]Photography gives an interesting examplea contrario, in that one of the factors contributing to photographys promotion to the rank of art seems to rest on an at least a partial emancipation from technical constraints. Soon after the invention of the medium in 1839, photographers starting using soft focus, thus departing from the convention of clarity in representation. This particular method of producing blurred pictures came to signify the conventional means of conveying an artistic quality to the images.[25] Finally, new techniques in the mode of new devices give birth to novel artistic objects and practices, as research on phonographs,[26]video, and Internet art[27]has proven.Artification also derives from science, at times intertwined with group interests. Heated public debate surrounded the founding of the Muse du Quai Branly in Paris. The political interests of the French central government, in particular of Jacques Chirac, President of the Republic from 1995 to 2007, locked opposing anthropologists and art historians in power struggles. The end result was the dismantling of the ethnological Muse de lHomme founded in 1937 in favor of the Muse du Quai Branly and a new museological policy. The new museum exhibits as art such things as tools, trinkets, household items, and other like objects that the previous institution had defined as ethnographical artifacts.[28] In the realm of contemporary art, museology is another example. As curators assert themselves as the authors of the exhibits they organize, this area of expertise shows a growing trend toward artification.[29] Cookery is yet another instance in this sphere. Recent developments in physics and chemistry that derive from the food industry are essential sources of artification in contemporaryhaute cuisine, with the scientific rationalization of culinary production as the basis ofavant-gardecreations invented by chefs like Ferran Adri, Pierre Gagnaire, and Heston Blumenthal.[30]Religion is an obvious fount of artification. But although the transformation of religious artifacts and activities into art has been studied abundantly in the case of Europe from Antiquity to the Renaissance, it is hardly acknowledged in other times and places, although an ongoing process of artification affects objects and practices of devotion in societies throughout the world. Frank Myers has shown how the complex transformation of ritual objects of Aboriginal peoples into Australian contemporary art represents the hybrid collaboration of numerous agents.[31] Similarly, Gilles Tarabout describes the metamorphoses of cult practices in southern India and their promotion to the status of art.[32] In both instances, as in the case of the support granted by Canada to Inuit sculpture,[33]political entities and national governments place high stakes on artification. Thus cultural productions that formerly were known only within the boundaries of small communities, and eventually to a few scholars and experts, are now art forms that are celebrated worldwide and have come to represent the status and identity of nation states. In an interesting contrast to these situations, Emilie Notteghem observed on an infinitely smaller scale the artification of cult objects in contemporary France. The process is complex (objects must be both desacralized and aestheticized), but here there are no strong community, economical, or political stakes. This may explain why artification is fragile in this case and why some objects she observed periodically regain their ritual status.[34]Artifacts designed for political purposes may be reconstructed as art when their primary function as agitprop begins to wane, as in the case of murals.[35] The related sphere of social work has a longstanding history as a seat for trends toward artification. Community and social workers encourage their constituents to engage in various practices for reasons of social melioration. Some practices tend to become artified, such as graffiti,[36]theater,[37]modern dance,[38]and breakdancing.[39] The personal connections of certain social workers with the art world and their professional worldview concerning art as social good contribute to this trend.Finally, misdemeanors or criminal acts may become engaged in a process of artification. Graffiti is a case in point.[40] It is undergoing a complex process of sustainability, aestheticization, individualization, and legalization as its status changes progressively from vandalism to art.In this section we have briefly reviewed the spheres of crafts, industry, leisure, entertainment, sports, technique, science, religion, politics, social work, and illegal practices. Hence, we observe that there are many parts of social life from which artification may derive (we have identified nearly a dozen) and that artification is not marginal, but a mechanism much stronger and diversified than we might have initially thought. So let us now turn to the specific ways in which this mechanism operates and observe the results that it yields.5. A typology of artification and resistance to artificationWe identify four types of artification: durable, partial, ongoing, and unattainable. The first type is simply what we define today as art, for it is, in fact, the outcome of a process of artification that has provenboth comprehensive and enduring. This is the case in painting, already mentioned above. Let us add literature, music, and dance. These were already part of the liberal arts, and their makers did not go down as difficult a path as did painters and sculptors from the Renaissance to the eighteenth century in asserting their creative powers. Nevertheless, they did struggle at length for their autonomy, as Norbert Elias study of Mozart illustrates so well.[41] During the Enlightenment, artists of these core disciplines went through a process of consecration,[42]and during the Romantic period, these arts were redefined as vocational and grounded in a requirement of artistic individuality.[43] In the Western world, their status as art now goes unquestioned throughout society.The second type comprises stabilized cases of partial artification. In some instances, artification is incomplete but does not seem to have cause to expand further without favorable conditions. This is the case with architecture, which never fully attained the status of a fine art because of technical and utilitarian constraints, and with many crafts forever in limbo between art and artisanship, or art and industry, such as bookbinding or the making of stained-glass windows. In other instances, recognition, not utility, is at stake. The artist has crossed the four circles of recognition by peers, critics, merchants and collector, and public acclaim, as defined by art historian Alan Bowness,[44]but is either acknowledged for only part of his or her production or by only part of the potential public. For example, only the sectors of photography labeled fine art photography or of film labeledcinma dauteurare recognized as art. Other genres are defined by profound intra-group differences. Comic book readers range from mundane teenage consumers to highly cultivated collectors of rare books. The world of bullfighting is characterized by an uncompromising alienation between aestheteaficionados and militant opponents.[45]The third type touches on cases of artification that are recent, barely accomplished, and in progress. Outsider art andart brutfall into this category, as do readymades. All have gained recognition from critics and museums barely one or two generations after appearing in the public sphere. In pursuits such as curating contemporary art exhibitions, breakdancing, and graffiti, the artification process seems to be on the verge of completion; it is taking place before our very eyes. In these instances, the concept of artification manifests its relevance most particularly by revealing phenomena that otherwise would have gone unnoticed.Finally, there are cases where the process encounters obstacles that seem insuperable and the accomplishment of artification seemsunattainable under present conditions. Indeed, some practices host sporadic artificatory movements that do not come to fruition because of the socio-economic arrangements that are contrary to the traits that have historically constituted art as an institution. Thus we can venture that pursuits such as typography, gastronomy, oenology, gardening, or perfumery, while perhaps being qualified as arts in a metaphorical sense, will not garner recognition for their producers as full-fledged artists in an enduring, institutional, and universal fashion in the near future; nor are their works commonly acknowledged throughout society as oeuvres to be presented for purely artistic appreciation.[46]Assuming that artification is a dynamic, ongoing process, this typology is open-ended. Which example belongs to which type is fluid and may change depending on various contexts. If the market economy disappeared and restaurants did not have to make a profit, or if a new mode of production for haute cuisine emerged, a consummate artification of gastronomy might endure. One could also imagine that if there was major inclusion of outsider art and graffiti in fine art museums, and their producers controlled dissemination and sales, they would be completely artified. But opposite trends could also prevail, and artification could be arrested.This brings us to a last important question. Are there contrary processes, processes of counter or de-artification? Can we identify cases where a legitimate art has lost its acknowledged status? Although there seem to be very few cases in point, our investigating procedures may be at fault. Calligraphy, gardening,[47]and elocution may well be de-artified practices, provided historical research establishes that they were indeed institutionalized arts and notartes, that is,virtuoso crafts demanding high levels of skill but not defined by claims to originality. Nevertheless, recent research does reveal cases of de-artification, although it is difficult to evaluate how definitive they are. Diana Crane described how the transformation of French haute couture into an elite luxury industry now controlled by international financial conglomerates has entailed a loss of artistic autonomy for fashion designers.[48] Emilie Notteghem, in her study of objects of the Catholic cult in contemporary France, revealed just how flexible the system of artification is when it comes to objects of religious reverence. Items enter and exit the system; they may return for a while to the world of ritual, and then re-enter the art system and be redefined as museum pieces.This case of intermittent artification discovered by Notteghem is reminiscent of a comparable situation in a very different society: the intermittent heritagizationof artifacts observed by anthropologist Pierre Centlivres in Afghanistan. Centlivres noted how, on some occasions they considered appropriate, tribal elders would borrow back artifacts that their tribes had donated to the National Museum of Kabul and were on exhibit there. These examples underline the importance of the general process of resistance against artification (and, by the same token, resistance against heritagization). Resistance to artification is a built-in, structural component of the artification process.One of the most dramatic instances of such a trend resulted in the acute deheritagization and de-artification by voluntary destruction in 2001, when the Taliban government dynamited the monumental Buddhas of Bamiyan in Afghanistan, on the grounds that they were idols. Clearly, the result of heritagization and artification can be highly volatile in certain contexts. In the case of the Buddhas, it hinged on many factors: the general worldview held by the Taliban, the manner in which radical clerics defined a particular cultural production (the Buddhas), issues of power between ethnic groups and regions, and international politics. There, action against artification can be understood, among many other meanings, as leverage in power struggles and a particular instance of action against westernization.[49]Resistance to artification can be internal or external. In cases more familiar to us, such as those based in contemporary France, observation suggests that internal resistance originates from potential artists and members of their family, while external resistance comes from sponsors or administrators and is rooted in a variety of values. When producers and their close relations refuse the move toward art, they do so typically in the name of family values (outsider art), working class values (outsider art, jazz), and solidarity among peers (breakdancing). In all these instances, artification appears to social actors as the process of social differentiation and stratification that indeed it is. They would prefer to evade this, for in artification they see a risk to group cohesion. Institutional or corporate actors also may put forth obstacles to artification, often in the name of quality and consistency (maintaining standards) in order to defend group interests (keeping the outsiders out).In France, government bureaucratic practice provides an interesting example of de-artification. The category of national heritage (le patrimoine) implemented by the public administration oflInventaire(a department of the Ministry of Culture) was initially invented for the census of historical monuments construed as masterpieces of artistry. It has been progressively extended to include non-artistic objects, such as milestones, farmhouses, and various popular artifacts such as tombstones.[50]What are the conditions necessary for artification and the obstacles to its achievement? Luxury and upper class activities that produce objects that are easy to transport, enhance individuality, and secure autonomy to the maker seem to be among the prime conditions for the realization of artification, as in the case of easel painting and luxury fashion. But it is true that the practices of lower class groups, or of partially socialized groups, like youth and inmates, also undergo artification. Such is the case for jazz, hip-hop, graffiti, or self-taught art. In those instances, favorable circumstances seem to be a tightly knit network of cooperation, collective organizations, and a rich corpus of critical discourse.Avant-gardeinitiatives give impetus and visibility. Government support and long-term cultural policies consolidate the artification process.Nevertheless, the inferior social status of its practitioners, audience, or public is indeed an obstacle to artification and does seem to slow its progress. Other hindering factors are the utilitarian nature of a practice (crafts, architecture), dependence on clientele (architecture, gastronomy, fashion), technical constraints that put physical prowess before artistry (sports, magic), or limitations to transportability (gardening, graffiti). Artification thus appears as a major indicator of a general trend toward the valorization of art in modern Western societies, both at the level of common sense and for philosophical inquiry.[51]Our inquiries into artification follow a nonsubstantive orientation, common to analytical philosophy and the social sciences. According to this perspective, there exists no art in-itself (en soi), grounded in an essentialist definition that would enable us to describe how social actors experience art for-themselves (pour soi), but only historically situated, collectively accepted, and relatively stabilized conceptions of what social actors understand by the word art. The nominalist turn in analytical philosophy has unpacked the question what? into an array of queries such as for whom?, under what conditions?, and when? In this perspective, art is not a given but the sum total of all possible operations of artification. Going back to Nelson Goodman, we may now proceed just one step beyond the question we started with. Art is when artification has happened.[52]Roberta Shapiroroberta.shapiro@cee-recherche.frRoberta Shapiro is a sociologist at the Institut Interdisciplinaire dAnthropologie du Contemporain (LAHIC-IIAC) at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (EHESS) in Paris, France. She works in the areas of art, cultural sociology, and urban sociology. She has published numerous papers on marriage and the city, and cultural forms and social change and is the co-editor ofL'artiste pluriel(Septentrion, 2009).Nathalie Heinichheinich@ehess.frNathalie Heinich is Research Director in sociology at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Paris, France. She is associated with the Centre de Recherches sur les Arts et le Langage (CRAL) at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (EHESS). Her main research areas are the sociology of art, the sociology of values, and the sociology of identity. She has published a large number of papers in scientific journals and nearly 30 books, includingThe Glory of Van Gogh. An Anthropology of Admiration(Princeton University Press, 1996).Published on April 5, 2012.

Endnotes[1]Nelson Goodman, When is Art? inThe Arts and Cognition, eds. David Perkins and Barbara Leondar (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 1977), pp. 11-19.[2]Martin Warnke,The Court Artist: On the Ancestry of the Modern Artist(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993); Nathalie Heinich,Du peintre lartiste.Artisans et acadmiciens lge classique(Paris: Minuit, 1993).[3]Harrison and Cynthia White,Canvases and Careers.Institutional Changes in the French Painting World(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1965, 1992); Larry Shiner,The Invention of Art: A Cultural History(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001).[4]Nathalie Heinich and Roberta Shapiro (eds.),De lartification.Enqutes sur lepassage lart(Paris: Ehess, 2012).[5]Nathalie Heinich,LArt contemporain expos aux rejets. tudes de cas(Nmes: Jacqueline Chambon, 1998).[6]Alain Roger,Court trait du paysage(Paris: Gallimard, 1997).[7]douard Pommier,Comment lart devient lArt dans lItalie de la Renaissance(Paris: Gallimard, 2007).[8]Howard Becker,Art Worlds(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984).[9]Stephen Mennell, Anne Murcott and Anneke van Otterloo,The Sociology of Food(London: Sage, 1992), p. 17.[10]For a more complete description, see N. Heinich and R. Shapiro, Postface. Quand y a-t-il artification? inDe lartification,op.cit. (2012).[11]Shyon Baumann,Hollywood Highbrow.From Entertainment to Art(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2007).[12]Aaron Smuts, Are Video Games Art?Contemporary Aesthetics, 3 (2005); Grant Tavinor, Definition of Videogames,Contemporary Aesthetics, 6 (2008); Grant Tavinor, Video Game as Mass Art,Contemporary Aesthetics, 9 (2011).[13]Pierre Bourdieuet alii,Photography.A Middle-Brow Art, originally published 1965 (Stanford University Press, 1990).[14]Vronique Moulini, Des oeuvriers ordinaires. Lorsque louvrier fait le/du beau,Terrain, 32 (1999); Gary A. Fine,Everyday Genius.Self-Taught Art and the Culture of Authenticity(Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2004).[15]Benot de lEstoile,Le Got des Autres. De lexposition coloniale aux Arts premiers(Paris: Flammarion, 2007).[16]Paul Lopes, Diffusion and Syncretism. The Modern Jazz Tradition,Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 566(1999), pp. 25-36; Olivier Roueff, Domestication du got et formation du champ du jazz en France, 1941-1960,Actes de la recherche en sciences sociales, 181-182 (2010), pp. 34-59.[17]Graham M. Jones,Trade of the Tricks. Inside the Magician's Craft(Berkeley: University of California Press, 2011); Roberta Shapiro, The Aesthetics of Institutionalization: Breakdancing in France,The Journal of Arts Management, Law and Society, 33, 4 (2004), 316-335; Magali Sizorn, De la course au trapze aux Arts Sauts, inDe lartification,op. cit. (2012).[18]Mausby Art Spiegelman (New York: Pantheon Books, 1986), the only comic book to be awarded the Pulitzer Prize (in 1992) is the most obvious example. See: Thierry Groensteen,The System of Comics(Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2007); and Vincent Seveau, La Bande dessine, inDe lartification,op. cit. (2012).[19]In this section we take the word beauty as a compendium for all the aesthetic qualities as seen from the standpoint of the beholder.[20]Magali Sizorn,op. cit.(2012).[21]Caroline Hodak,Du Thtre questre au cirque. Commercialisation des loisirs, diffusion des savoirs et thtralisation de lhistoire en France et en Angleterre, 1760-1860, Thse dhistoire (Paris: EHESS, 2004).[22]Roberta Shapiro,op. cit. (2004), and Roberta Shapiro, Du smurf au ballet, linvention de la danse hip-hop, inDe lartification,op. cit.(2012).[23]Larry Shiner,op. cit.pp. 81-86.[24]Batrice Fraenkel, Limprobable artification de la typographie, inDe lartification,op. cit. (2012).[25]Franois Brunet,Photography and Literature(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009); and La photographie, ternelle aspirante lart, inDe lartification,op. cit.(2012).[26]Sophie Maisonneuve, Between History and Commodity: The Production of A Musical Patrimony through the Record in the 1920-1930,Poetics, 29 (2001), pp. 89-108.[27]Nathalie Heinich, La vido est-elle un art?,Giall. Revue d'art et de sciences sociales, 5 (1995); Jean-Paul Fourmentraux,Art et Internet. Les nouvelles figures de la cration(Paris: Cnrs, 2005); Frank Popper,Art of the Electronic Age(London: Thames & Hudson, 1997).[28]Benot de lEstoile,op. cit.[29]Nathalie Heinich and Bernard Edelman,LArt en conflits. Luvre de lesprit entre droit et sociologie(Paris: La Dcouverte, 2002); Nathalie Heinich, From Museum Curator to ExhibitionAuteur: Inventing a Singular Position, inThinking About Exhibitions,eds. Reesa Greenberg, Bruce Ferguson and Sandy Nairne (London: Routledge, 1996).[30]Isabelle de Solier, Liquid nitrogen pistachios: Molecular gastronomy, elBulli and foodies,European Journal of Cultural Studies, 13 (2010), 155-170.[31]Fred Myers,Painting Culture: The Making of an Aboriginal High Art(Durham: Duke University Press, 2002).[32]Gilles Tarabout, Passages lart. Ladaptation dun culte sud-indien au patronage artistique, inLEsthtique: Europe, Chine et ailleurs, eds. Y. Escande and J. M. Schaeffer (Paris: You-Feng, 2003).[33]Nelson Graburn,Ethnic and Tourist Arts: Cultural Expressions from the Fourth World(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1976).[34]Emilie Notteghem, Frontires et franchissements. Les objets du culte catholique en artification, inDe lartification,op. cit.(2012)[35]Francesca Cozzolino, Les murs ont la parole: Sardaigne,Le Tigre, n 1, March (2007), 50-55.[36]Virginie Milliot, Quand lart interroge lespace public. Le graf, le travail social, lart contemporain et le politique, inLart contemporain, champs artistiques, critres, rception, eds. Jean-Pierre Saez and Thierry Raspail (Paris: LHarmattan, 2000).[37]Serge Proust,Le comdien dsempar. Autonomie artistique et interventions politiques dans le thtre public, (Paris: Economica, 2006).[38]Emily E. Wilcox, Dance as lIntervention. Health and Aesthetics of Experience in French Contemporary Dance,Body and Society, 11, 4 (2005), 109-139.[39]Roberta Shapiro,op. cit.(2004) and (2012).[40]Marisa Liebaut, Lartification du graffiti et ses dispositifs, inDe lartification,op. cit.(2012).[41]Norbert Elias,Mozart. Portrait of a Genius1991 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993).[42]Paul Bnichou,Le Sacre de l'crivain(Paris: Jos Corti, 1973).[43]Nathalie Heinich,Llite artiste. Excellence et singularit en rgime dmocratique(Paris: Gallimard, 2005).[44]Alan Bowness,The Conditions of Success. How the Modern Artist Rises to Fame(London: Thames and Hudson, 1989).[45]Nathalie Heinich, Framing the Bullfight: Aesthetics versus Ethics,The British Journal of Aesthetics, 33, 1 (1993), 52-58.[46]There is a body of literature, particularly in the realm of "everyday aesthetics" that upholds that productions such as these are art. Although space lacks to develop a full discussion of this point, there are a number of reasons why we disagree with the reasoning that leads to this conclusion. First, the argument is normative and essentialist. We are asked to recognize art as the hidden truth of everyday pursuits. Second, it is non-realistic. Working conditions, legal and symbolic status in society, organizations and institutions, critical discourse, economic exchange, and similar aspects of life in society are completely disregarded. Finally, the manner is rhetorical and moralizing; these authors seek to persuade. See, for example, Glenn Kuehn, How Can Food Be Art? inThe Aesthetics of Everyday Life, eds. Andrew Light and Jonathan M. Smith (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004), pp. 94-212; ref. on pp. 194-195: Food is art; I am convinced that this is true. Problems arise, of course, when I try to convince others just how food can be art. One might call this author an experiential activist. His stated goal here is not to describe reality, but to persuade others to feel differently about it.[47]Above, we mentioned gardens in reference to an ongoing discussion in the realm of the aesthetics of everyday life. Does the experience of gardens warrant our defining them as art? (See Thomas Leddy, Mara Miller, David E. Cooper) Here, we mention gardens a second time, but in an historical perspective; gardens, like architecture, were classified as fine art in eighteenth century tables of knowledge.[48]Diana Crane, La mode, inDe lartification,op. cit.(2012).[49]For a detailed discussion of this very complex issue see Pierre Centlivres, The Controversy over the Buddhas of Bamiyan,South Asia Multidisciplinary AcademicJournal(2008),http://samaj.revues.org/document992.html.[50]Nathalie Heinich,La Fabrique du patrimoine(Paris: Maison des sciences de lHomme, 2009).[51]Jean-Marie Schaeffer,LArt de lge moderne. Lesthtique et la philosophie de lart du XVIIIe sicle nos jours(Paris: Gallimard, 1992).[52]We are thankful to the editors Ossi Naukkarinen and Yuriko Saito for their critical reading and thought-provoking comments on this article.

MASTER Anul ISTATUTUL I PRACTICA CRITICII DE ART

Bibliografie:

Bogdan Iacob, Criza internaional a criticii de art

n cadrul literaturii internaionale de specialitate din domeniul artei din ultimele aproximativ patru decenii, pare a exista un consens cu privire la existena unei crize a criticii de art. Mai exact, criza criticii de art const n faptul c, n peisajul practicii artei contemporane, criticul de art a pierdut puterea de convingere i marea influen pe care se presupune c o avea n asociere cu ceea ce numim acum, n mod caracteristic, modernism. Totui, aceast criz de autoritate nu vine fr paradoxuri. Astfel, n timp ce influena criticului a sczut n mod dramatic, totalul textelor critice scrise i publicate n lumea artei contemporane a crescut constant. n cartea sa scurt, dar foarte incisiv, What Happened to Art Criticism?, James Elkins i rezum condiia astfel: The combination of vigorous health and terminal illness, of ubiquity and invincibility, is growing increasingly strident with each generation.[footnoteRef:2] [2: Elkins, James, What Happened to Art Criticism, Chicago, Prickly Paradigm Press, 2003, p. 6]

Lipsa de impact a criticului n lmea artei per ansamblu, n ciuda proliferrii de texte critice, care ar putea fi tocmai consecina lipsei lor de o real relevan, ar putea veni ca un oc pentru cei obinuii cu crtiticismul greenbergian din era modernist. Totui, nu ar trebui s se fac greeala de a se crede c aceast condiie de slbiciune a fost rezervat doar criticului de art contemporan. Dup cum Elkins demonstreaz mai departe, criticul de art autoritar este mai degrab o anomalie istoric dect o figur puternic, specific perioadei istorice a avangardei (trzii). ntr-adevr, n general, la o scal istoric, the history of criticism shows that many, perhaps most, decades since Vasari have lacked a strong critical voice.[footnoteRef:3] [3: Ibidem, p. 58]

Totui, nu poate fi lsat la o parte realitatea faptului c n zilele noastre criticul de art pare a-i fi pierdut puterea de a-i exercita misiunea fundamental, asumat istoric i tradiional atribuit. Astfel, theorizing and judging were principal goals of art criticism from Diderot to Greenberg.[footnoteRef:4] Cu exact aceste dou majore operaii intelectuale criticul de art contemporan este pus n imposibilitate de a lucra. Sau, cel puin, criticul de art este att de des, poate ntotdeauna, n circumstanele artei contemporane, pus n situaii n care ar putea, la rndul su, s teoretizeze i s emit judeci de valoare, dar demersurile sale intelectuale sunt catalogate ca irelevante de nsi natura proteic a artei din zilele noastre. De aceea, dac anything goes mai mult sau mai puin (o aseriune care a devenit de la sine neleas pentru muli dintre cei care abordeaz fenomenul cultural al produciei artistice contemporane), nu exist criterii solide conform crora un tip de teoretizare sau de judecat de valoare poate fi fixat i acceptat ca fiind mai bun dect altul. [4: Ibidem, p. 56]

Mai mult dect att, criticul de art este acum cel mai slab actor de pe scena artei. Puterea artistului este indiscutabil, de vreme ce acesta este cel ce produce bunurile de pe piaa de art specific i obiectele de atenie din mediul profesional. Puterea publicului este, din nou, evident, acesta fiind puternic, dac nu fr niciun motiv, atunci pentru c notorietatea poate, n mod evident, intensifica comerul. Curatorul, un agent recent, dar ambiios, al pieei de art i al lumii artei, este mputernicit de propria-i abilitate de a media, de a ajuta artistul s ctige banii disponibili pe pia (colecionarul) sau notorietatea i recunoterea profesional (marea instituie public). Publicaiile de art, pe de alt parte, sunt factori care, de asemenea, faciliteaz n aceste aspecte, precum i nite mecanisme de publicitate infulente. Totui, criticul este ntr-o poziie mai fragil.Ironically, the critic wields the least power of anyone in that industry. When a critic writes for a catalogue, its arranged and paid for by the same people who are exhibiting the artist hes reviewing. When he writes for a journal or newspaper, he is covering an exhibition the reader already assumes is worthy of mention. The critic thus has no real chance to write about an artist if the artist isnt already established.[footnoteRef:5] [5: Groys, Boris, Art Power, London and Cambridge, Massachusetts, MIT Press, 2008, p. 123 ]

Cu un public care i-a pierdut interesul pentru ceea ce scrie (sau spune) criticul, poate deoarece criticii scriu att de mult i n attea locuri, cu un artist care i-a pierdut ncrederea n relevena i necesitatea suportului teoretic oferit de acesta operei sale, profesia de critic de art pare, n mai mult dect ntr-un singur sens, condamnat. Cu greu mai reuete cineva n zilele noastre, dup cum observ un autor, s i mai ctige existena din scris texte de critic de art. i ntr-adevr, de ce s-ar ntmpla aa? Nu exist nicio modalitatea ca acetia s contribuie semnificativ la producerea banilor n lumea artei, deci de ce ar trebui ca lumea artei s le plteasc sume de bani mai semnificative? Artitii nsi par a fi neles situaia:The critics textso most artists believeseems less to protect thework from detractors than to isolate it from its potential admirers. Rigorous theoretical definition is bad for business. Thus, many artists protect them-selves against theoretical commentary in the hopes that a naked work of artwill be more seductive than one dressed in a text. Actually, artists prefer formulations that are as vague as possiblesau s aleag s vorbeasc pentru ei nii, cel mai mult n termeni empirici, angajai biografic i empatic retorici despre producia lor.Ca s fim mai direci, criticul este inutil. Din ce n ce mai mult cataloage de art, din ce n ce mai multe reviste de art, din ce n ce mai multe publicaii de diverse statute au nceput s existe n ultimele cteva decenii. Dei criticul este acum un personaj de care ne putem lipsi la vernisaje, ca i de discursul su, chiar dac este, dup cum s-a mai spus, ultimul invitat la petrecerea de dup vernisaj (aceasta este mai mult dect o glum, de vreme ce petrecerea de dup deschidere a devenit astzi unul dintre cele mai importante i lucrative ritualuri din lumea artei), totui i se cere s scrie despre art (cteodat, chiar s i gndeasc cu privire la ea). Deci, la drept vorbind, ar trebui spus c rolul criticul a fost diluat, dar nu a disprut complet, fiind n schimb redus la un actor minor, un fel de chelner care face cltitele s par mai apetisante i probabil puin mai scumpe flambndu-le n faa clienilor restaurantului.n orice caz, tranziia de la vocea puternic din criticismul greenbergian modernist la criticul de art contemporan ca personaj aprope superfluu, dar tot mai capricios i cu un discurs complicat, a fost ocant pentru o mare parte a lumii artei contemporane. Una dintre cle mai importante platforme de analiz a schimbrilor din art i de scriere despre art lansat de ctre practicile de art contemporan, a fost reprezentat, la mijlocul i la sfritul anilor '60, de revista Artforum din S.U.A. Unii dintre cei mai proeminei exponeni ai criticismului autoritar greenbergian au gravitat n jurul acestei reviste, i, la decenii dup vrful de glorie al publicaiei, nc se mai raporteaz la schimbrile criticii de art n termeni dramatici. Exprimat ntr-un volum publicat la sfritul mileniului[footnoteRef:6], viziunea lor este prezentat i analizat de Hal Foster n colecia sa de esee Crime and design. Astfel, el observ cum [6: Newman, Amy, Challenging Art: Artforum 1962 1974, New York, Soho Press Inc., 2000]

several [modernist type, left behind by the evolution of art itself] critics rehearse how they drew aesthetic lines in the sand, only to see them washed away by loathsome developments: Fried by theatre corrupted art, Leider by knee-jerk politics, Rose by money mad art market and so on[]Some witnesses swear to the high stakes involved Krauss: What was at stake was the faith of cultural experience; Leider: If you dont hold this line, then you were going to be in some part responsible for the collapse of the culture[footnoteRef:7] [7: Foster, Hal, Crime and Design, London and New York, Verso, 2002, p. 117]

Inutil s mai menionm, lupta a fost pierdut de critici n opinia autorilor aici menionai.Nu n ultimul rnd, Foster respinge ideea conform creia pierderea puterii i a influenei de ctre critica de art, la nceputul anilor `60, reprezint un simbol sau este un simpotm al unei catastrofe culturale. Ceea ce se ntmpl este doar c, n cursul dezvoltrii artei contemporane ca fenomen cultural, condiiile care guverneaz funcionarea produciei i a consumului cultural s-au schimbat. Vechiul tip de critic, care presupune destul de multe judeci de valoare i, pn la un anumit punct, instrumental n lumea artei, pur i simplu nu mai funciona ntr-o lume a artei pluralist, ca cea format n ultimele decenii. Mai departe, Forster consider c decderea modelului modernist de critic era inevitabil, avnd n vedere propria-i susceptibilitate la eroziune, dat fiind disproporia dintre ambiiile teoretice i ceea ce putea atinge n practic critica de art. Astfel, el statueaz c aesthetics was asked to carry too much of the weight of ethics and politics. That is, this milieu of artists and critics practiced a partial subsuming or sublimating of ethical and political questions into artistic and aesthetical debate[footnoteRef:8] [8: Ibidem, p. 118]

Printe cei care au abordat, chiar dac indirect, subiectul criticismului n lumea artei moderne i contemporane este istoricul de art german Hans Belting. El consider c nu exist o criz serioas a criticii de art, deoarece mai degrab lumea artei contemporane se confrunt cu o criz, sau, cel puin, cu necesitatea de a reformula radical istoria artei, n timp ce criticii au luat asupra lor sarcina de a teoretiza despre art. Mai mult dect att, nc exist metode de a practica o critic de art relevant, metode care i sunt la ndemn criticului de art onest, care nu are un ego tiinific augumentat. Printre acestea, Belting accentueaz descrierea evocativ, statund c good old ekphrasis has always remained in fashion[footnoteRef:9] [9: Belting, Hans, Art History after Modernism, Chicago and London, The University of Chicago Press, 2003, p. 17]

Totui, una peste alta, bibliografia occidental despre critica de art contemporan abordeaz subiectul din perspectiva conceptului de criz. Soluiile propuse pentru aceast criz, sau mai degrab aceast ghicitoare a criticismului contemporan, variaz de la autor la autor, alctuind un spectru larg de atitudini. Astfel, Elkins ptreaz lucrurile pe un trm al treburilor (intelectuale) serioase i prescrie o cale de aur ntreit relevanei culturale a textului critic. Criticul trebuie s se lupte pentru ambitious judgement, reflection about judgement itself i criticism important enough to count as history.[footnoteRef:10] Totui, atunci cnd vine vorba de a indica mijloacele prin care cineva poate atinge aceste deziderate, autorul devine n mod evident mai puin explicit i n mod cert mai puin precis, de vreme ce cartea lui concluzioneaz c in order for this to happen, all that is required is for everyone to read everything,[footnoteRef:11] orice ar putea aceasta s nsemne. [10: Elkins, James, op. cit., p. 84] [11: Ibidem, p. 85]

Cumva la sfritul spectrului de opinii menionat, Groys, care poate fi cteodat neltor, este mult mai relaxat, considernd c singurul rspuns la pierderea de putere instrumental a criticismului este de a mbria situia i chiar de a profita de ea. Astfel, el spune c, as a reaction to this situation, a bitter, disappointed, nihilistic tone pervades the art criticism of today, which clearly ruins its style. This is a shame, because the art system is still not such a bad place for a writer. Its true that most of these texts dont get readbut for this very reason one can, in principle, write whatever one wants. Under the pretext of opening up the different contexts of a work of art, the most diverse theories, intellectual takes, rhetorical strategies, stylistic props, scholarly knowledge, personal stories, and examples from all walks of life can be combined in the same text at willin a way not possible in the two other areas open to writers in our culture, the academy and the mass media.n final, cu o remarcabil onestitate, ironie i luciditate, Robert Storr se refer la condiia contemporan a criticii de art stabilind c criticul de art nc nu poate accepta s renune la nite scopuri, indiferent de ct de nerealiste apar ele a fi n practic. Astfel, existena profesional a criticului de art are sens atta timp ct acesta viseaz s exercite o influen de orice tip asupra lumii artei. De asemenea, criticul de art nc se lupt s scrie pentru bani, spernd s devin, de la un proletar srac al lumii artei, un fel de guler alb bine pltit (dei la o distan astronomic de ceea ce ar putea primi un artist, un galerist sau chiar un curator de pe urma jocurilor lumii contemporane a artei). n tot acest timp, Storr susine c un adevrat critic pstreaz nite minime standarde de onestitate profesional n timp ce navigheaz pe aceast cale dificil a acestui mediu complicat, n care este, inevitabil, marginalizat. Nu n ultimul rnd, n orice ar consta critica de art, if we [critics] have any sense[]we write for money: money upfront from editors as distinct from money on the side from art buyers and sellers[]And we write in order to exert that most elusive and ephemeral of things: influence.URL: http://www.anthropoetics.ucla.edu/ap0502/blood.htmAnthropoetics 5, no. 2 (Fall 1999 / Winter 2000)The Sacrificial Aesthetic: Blood Rituals from Art to MurderDawn PerlmutterThe concept of the "sacrificial esthetic" introduced in Eric Gans's Chronicle No. 184 entitled "Sacrificing Culture" describes a situation in which aesthetic forms remain sacrificial but have evolved from a necessary feature of social organization to a psychological element of the human condition. Gans concludes that art's sacrificial esthetic is essentially exhausted as a creative force and argues that the future lies with simulations, virtual realities in which the spectator plays a partially interactive role. His most significant claim is that "This end of the ability of the esthetic to discriminate between the sacrificial and the antisacrificial is not the end of art. On the contrary, it liberates the esthetic from the ethical end of justifying sacrifice." The consequence of the liberation of the ethical justification of sacrifice is the main concern of this essay.Throughout the history of art we have encountered images of blood, from the representations of wounded animals in the cave paintings of Lascaux through century after century of brutal Biblical images, through history paintings depicting scenes of war, up through the many films of war, horror, and violence. Blood is now off the canvas, off the screen and sometimes literally in your face. It is no coincidence that this substance has intrigued artists throughout history. Blood is fascinating; it simultaneously represents purity and impurity, the sacred and the profane, life and death.There are many expressions of the aesthetic that manifests itself in blood and flesh. The most familiar examples are evident in the current popularity of tattooing, piercing, branding and body modifications. These comprise the basic prerequisites for entry into the worlds of Modern Primitives, Vampire Culture, and The Fetish Scene. These highly ritualized subcultures evolved out of various aesthetic genres such as: Happenings, Body Art, Performance Art, Ritual Art, the Gothic Movement, and Hollywood. Originally the goal of these artists was personal transformation and attempts to reclaim the spiritual. The result was unconventional forms of the sacred manifested in art that attacked fundamental values of Western culture, provoking censorship on many levels of society. The culture war began. In this essay it will be argued that aesthetics now ideologically freed from ethical responsibility to society has evolved into an authentic sacrificial culture inclusive of ritual murder.The FleshA phenomenon in contemporary art has been occurring in which blood is no longer merely represented but is actually being utilized for various art forms. Performance artist Chris Burden did not paint or sculpt a crucifixion; in 1974 in a work entitled "Trans-Fixed" he had himself crucified to a car. In the 1970s Burdens art performances also included having himself shot with a gun, punctured, burned and run over by a car. Burdens body became the ultimate sculptural material, the ultimate object. [images/interview "Interview with Chris Burden" http://www.artnode.se/burden/] Artist GinaPane does art performances that consist of self-inflicted cuts to her body including her face. In 1971 she performed "Escalade non-anesthsie" in which she climbed a ladder that had blades attached to the steps. In 1972 in a performance entitled "The Conditioning (part I of "Auto-Portrait(s)," she laid down on an iron bed with very few crossbars that had fifteen long candles burning underneath. In 1974 in a performance entitled "Psyche" she kneeled in front of a mirror, put on make-up and proceeded to cut into her face with a razor blade. In 1975 in a performance entitled "Le corps pressenti" she made cuts between her toes with a razor blade so that the blood would create permanent stains on a plaster cast that her feet were resting on. [images "Gina Pane" http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Lofts/8344/gina_pane.html] In 1974, artist Marina Abramovic performed a work entitled "Rhythm O" in which "she permitted a roomful of spectators in a Naples gallery to abuse her at their will for six hours, using instruments of pain and pleasure that had been placed on a table for their convenience. By the third hour, her clothes had been cut from her body with razor blades, her skin slashed; a loaded gun held to her head finally caused a fight between her tormentors, bringing the proceeding to an unnerving halt."(1)The same year artist Petr Stembera performed an action entitled "Narcissus #1" in which he stood gazing at a self portrait which was placed on an altar surrounded by lit candles. Blood was drawn from his body with a hypodermic needle; then Stembera proceeded to mix the blood