Post image for I Think You May Have the Wrong Impression

Perhaps the most frustrating thing about being an art historian is being asked, “Who is your favorite artist?” or “What is your favorite kind of art?” These questions are always difficult for me to answer honestly in less than few sentences. Perhaps because I am a talker, or because on any given day or even hour, my answer may be different. My frustration heightens with the questioner’s following claim, “Impressionism is my favorite.” Honestly, this statement just pisses me off more than anything else about being an art historian.

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Post image for Spencer Tunick, Terence Koh, Francesco Vezzoli…Does Lady Gaga Need An Art Teacher?

The age of celebrity art has dawned and no one is a better example of that high-end marriage between the haves and the haves than pop singer Lady Gaga. It has been a long time coming for the maven of the dancefloor, whose every move feels like a tribute to 1990s club kid culture. Yet, her recent collaborations with Francesco Vezzoli and Terence Koh raises the question, does she desperately need an art teacher?

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Essays

Art Beyond the Museum

by Nick Riggle on February 9, 2010

Post image for Art Beyond the Museum

Arts institutions often tell us to expect great things from their inhabitants. Take the Metropolitan Museum of Art, for (an extreme) example. As you approach it on Fifth Ave, the first thing you see is a monumental stair case leading up to huge doorways flanked by towering columns.

If you make it up the two dozen steps, past the columns, doors, and security, you enter a vast breathtaking atrium. This is your pre-launch prep station.

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Post image for Battle for the Nation: John Yau Questions Jerry Saltz’s America

In the newly released edition of the Brooklyn Rail, editor John Yau takes on New York Magazine’s art critic Jerry Saltz and his characterization of America as “big, bright, shiny, colorful, crowd-pleasing, heat-seeking, impeccably produced, polished, popular, expensive, and extroverted—while also being abrasive, creepily sexualized, fussy, twisted, and, let’s face it, ditzy.” Yau asks, “Is this ‘our America?’ Or is this Jerry Saltz shilling for Jeff Koons?”

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Post image for Rebooting Boston’s Art Inferiority Complex

Is it possible for an entire city to have an inferiority complex over its own art and artists? At times it certainly seems like Boston does. Between ignoring traveling retrospectives of local artists, devoting gallery space to art world circuit card-holders, and hemorrhaging curators, this city’s scene sometimes looks a lot like a branch office of New York: understaffed and passing on its best to the mothership.

In my previous article on Hyperallergic, I discussed Greg Cook’s view that Boston’s contemporary art scene lacks ambition and a drive to push itself further. I believe that what we need to overcome in this city is not just this inferiority complex but a specific Boston identity.

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Post image for The Collaborative Mess: Keanu Reeves & Street Art

The concept of artistic collaboration is slippery. New York Magazine’s 31st reason to love New York City in 2009 is “Because Our Street Art is Collaborative.” Maybe they don’t really understand the notion of collaboration.

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Essays

There is No Public Space

by Sarah Walko on December 15, 2009

Post image for There is No Public Space

Sarah makes small matchbook sculptures that are designed to be left in public spaces. They are intimate art works that are part of the ritual of her practice. She believes in the words of Margaret Meade, who said, “When justice is lost, we have ritual. We need more ritual in our daily lives.”

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Post image for Hyperdocumentation: Better Than the Real Thing?

This summer, I tried to go see a free David Byrne concert in Brooklyn’s Prospect Park but to no avail.

The next morning I looked up the concert online and immediately found masses of documentation … the concert had been reconstructed online so thoroughly that I didn’t really feel like I’d missed it.

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EssaysStreet

Street Artvertisements: “Hell, No!”

by Nick Riggle on October 14, 2009

Post image for Street Artvertisements: “Hell, No!”

Much contemporary art is disappointing–street art especially. Even if you manage to find a piece you really like–or, if you’re lucky, one that is really worth liking–it gets buffed, weathered beyond recognition, hyped beyond reason, or it simply disappears. And like all art, its digital web ghost doesn’t replace the real thing. It’s really gone forever. And that’s disappointing, even if you knew it would happen all along. Still, some deaths are better than others.

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EssaysMuseums

New or Same Old Museum?

by Hrag Vartanian on October 13, 2009

Post image for New or Same Old Museum?

New York-based art blogger James Wagner recently declared “New Museum Commits Suicide with Banality” after the institution on the Bowery announced that they will be exhibiting the collection of one of their mega-rich trustees, Dakis Joannou. To add insult to injury, the whole museum show will be curated by one of Joannou’s BFFs, Jeff Koons. While James is right, I would argue that there have been signs of the institution’s death wish for some time.

From day one, the new New Museum has been presenting odd shows with allusions to trendy topics that feel disconnected from its roots as a barometer of the city’s artistic culture. Remember “After Nature?” Well, I’m trying to forget. And how about the Michelle Obama portrait that was carted in for the Elizabeth Peyton show after Obama’s election victory? How delightfully chic!

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