Re: [-empyre-] Sense and sensibility

["G.H. Hovagimyan" <ghh@thing.net>]

gh comments:

The art world has three spheres of influence, the academy, the  
museums and the market. This is also the social structure or  
organizing principal that reflects the current capitalist societies  
of the Western democracies. The most recent manifestation in the art  
world is the art fair. This is pure market or more precisely a  
hypermarket. As an artist I participate in these realms but without  
much enthusiasm. I teach sometimes but dislike the demands of  
education. In new media we are simply teaching computer skills. More  
to the point media artists tailor their work and theories to attract  
more students to their classes.  And the Museums are dependent upon  
courting collectors to donate their collections on the one hand and  
attracting star curators on the other. Those artist advance who fit  
into whatever organizing principal or theory a particular curator is  
enamored. It was hoped that the internet would provide a vehicle for  
radical discourse that  went around these systems. This would be  
similar to the alternative space movement of the 1970's that provided  
a free experimental arena for some time.  The cries of "elitist"  
often come from left wing social activists who view the world with an  
us or them lens. This means that unless your art work is subsumed to  
a radical cause and advances that cause you are called an elitist.   
Of course there are other radical critiques such as the "Yes Men"  
that fit perfectly into the globalism-entertainment matrix.

So my question is this; is it possible to create art and be an artist  
while functioning outside to the three main spheres?  Obviously I  
believe so because that is what I do.  The larger question is this:  
if one is part of a culture and chooses to critique the culture in  
their art work who is the audience? In other words aren't we all  
simply salesmen plying our wares to various clients such as the  
chairman of our academic department or the students or up and coming  
curators or the wealthy art collectors? Where is the spirit of  
anarchic freedom that is the real arena of art?


G.H. Hovagimyan
http://nujus.net/gh/
http://post.thing.net/gh/
http://spaghetti.nujus.net/artDirt
http://spaghetti.nujus.net/rantapod






On Jan 9, 2007, at 8:56 PM, Christiane Robbins wrote:

>  However, when we look at the stratification of public and private  
> education( on all levels) coupled with the recession of public  
> funding for the arts in public education here in the USA ( in favor  
> of vocational training  directives if any at all ) and the  
> relatively entrenched value offered to art/media practices in  
> private schools