Jenny Holzer, Television Texts, 1990. © Video Data Bank Chicago.

This week New City published an essay by its arts editor Jason Foumberg on the state of art criticism amidst the rise of blogging, online websites, and other forms of interactive media titled The State of the (Visual) Art. I didn’t read this as a piece on the status of art criticism in Chicago per se, as I think some may have, but rather as about the difficulties of defining (much less practicing) this thing called ‘criticism’ at all in online, social-media driven contexts. Foumberg’s essay is part of a larger series of articles at New City that are exploring the state of criticism in the age of Yelp!,  Amazon book reviews, and other online social feedback devices. The other pieces can be found here, here, and here (this last one is about Yolp!, a Jersey Shore parody of Yelp that’s really funny). The comments that ensue are interesting, but there aren’t a lot of them and there’s not too much back-and-forth…yet. But today Christopher sent me a link to Michael S. Thomas’ blog Stagnant Vowels, in which he’s posted a response, of a sort, to the New City article, which immediately bumped Mr. Foumberg’s piece up to “hot topic” status in my mind. (Thomas’ response might itself almost qualify as a good old-fashioned Rant, and as I’ve said before, I am to rants as a moth is to a flame….Jason, in contrast, doesn’t rant: he muses.).

In his post, Mr. Thomas, who was the director of the well-respected and now defunct Dogmatic Gallery in Chicago, calls us out over here at Bad at Sports for basically being slutty opinion mongers on a par with t.v. talk show pundits. He writes:

“The flux or crisis isn’t with experts or authority per say, its in the distribution of opinion as though it were reasoned discourse. It’s in the ongoing creation of model’s for the dissemination of hyperbole without rational checks or balances. Whether it’s Glenn Beck, or Jon Stewart, or Bad at Sports these models can do much to obfuscate legitimate dialogue if not entirely cripple its formation.”

I have to assume he’s talking about our blog in particular, as the podcast’s one-on-one interview format is pretty much the antithesis of opinion journalism. But I want to know — where is all this ‘legitimate dialogue’ (emphasis on the word ‘legitimate’) that we in particular are guilty of obfuscating? Tell me where it’s happening, and I’ll gladly get the hell out of its way!

In all seriousness, though, I don’t at all disagree with Thomas on his larger point. In fact I think most of his post hits it right on the mark, particularly in his assessment that lack of editorial oversight might be precisely what makes online art criticism so problematic (I’m paraphrasing his argument, but that’s what I took away from it). Thomas finds fault with the recently launched Chicago Art Magazine for precisely these reasons, and although I shall remain neutral on the matter of his specific target, I tend to agree with many of the larger arguments he’s making. Such as this one:

“But I would argue that without editorial oversight or a progressive long term vision for growth, an endeavor such as this one is hopelessly mired. After all criticism and opinion are not the same. Amateur criticism is little more than the ALL-CAPS and bold fonts version of a comment roll, and paying said amateur is in no way a transformation of this reality. So what makes a misinformed critic not, a knowledgeable and, or an opinionated amateur? Time, energy, condensed thoughts, research, an apishly large library surrounded by lovely black and white photographs of water fowl, and other bric-a-brac? No its constancy and persistence in the pursuit of understanding and conveying the qualities that define the arcane and metaphorical reality of objects and their surroundings.”

The fact is, art writers need editors. Scratch that — ALL writers need editors. Nowadays, due to all of those economic reasons of which we’re all well aware, writing for a publication that actually employs an editor to analyze your work before it’s posted/published has become a luxury that only the luckiest of us is afforded from time to time. On a purely pragmatic level, writers need editors to ensure quality of output. We need copy-editors to fact-check us and remind us about the proper usage of its and it’s. Editors to keep us from veering into self-indulgence and unsubstantiated argumentation. And yes, editors to help keep our word count to a reasonable, readerly length. On a content level, Thomas’ argument for having a progressive long-term vision is also relevant, although he’s a little too vague on this point – does a ‘progressive long term vision’ imply some sort of overarching ideological or political stance with regards to the art in question (i.e. ‘we are pro-social practices, suspicious of art objects for sale,’ or some such?)? Some form of group-think? Or does it simply mean establishing a set of critical guidelines and standards for approaching a work of art (guidelines which would, themselves, be inherently open to critique?).

I think we also need to remember that art blogs — which are the context in which much of the ‘unsubstantiated commentary’ type of arts writing takes place — are an altogether different beast from newspapers, magazines, or art journals. From their inception blogs have always been about commentary derived from a personal standpoint (which is why Museum and institutional blogs are often so boring to read). It’s not really fair to criticize art bloggers for their lack of objectivity, or for not holding to certain journalistic or critical standards. Now, websites that self-consciously follow the model of a magazine or newspaper are a different story.

Oops. My own internal editor just told me it’s time to shut up now. Just go on over and read, and rant about (or maybe just muse on) the above-linked posts. ‘Nuff said.

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Written by Trib reporter Steve Johnson, the article was framed by this headline: “What does popularity of God Bless America sculpture say about public art in Chicago?” This, I think, was precisely the wrong boldfaced header to attach to an article about a sculpture that has been borrowed from the Sculpture Foundation and is not, in fact, meant to be a permanent part of the city’s landscape of public art. Although the Trib’s article does make passing reference to this fact, the headline seems to imply that “God Bless America” somehow holds similar status as the Picasso, Calder or Kapoor pieces do in the city’s world-class lineup of public art.

For better or worse, Steve Johnson’s story gained a degree of national attention, not as much from Chicago’s art crowd as from arts writers elsewhere in the country. On September 30th the L.A. Times’ chief art critic Christopher Knight linked to the Trib article on his Twitter feed with the comment: “Is J. Seward Johnson trying to be America’s Worst Artist?” A few days later Paddy Johnson of Art Fag City wrote a post titled “Bad Public Art Finds Audience in Chicago” containing a point-by-point takedown of Steve Johnson’s main arguments, which he set up as follows:

“Critics can wag fingers at it — and some do — but God Bless America meets some of the fundamental tests of public art. It is noticed, it is appreciated, and, in many cases, it provokes reflection on what makes an art work original.”

I drove by “God Bless America” last week. Parking is monstrous downtown so I couldn’t stop to get out and walk around it, which is too bad, since public art–like all art–needs to be experienced in situ in order to be fully understood and appreciated. Nevertheless, I can’t offer any viable counter-arguments to Knight and Paddy Johnson’s assertions that the sculpture makes for some pretty bad art. Sure, I could attempt some sort of cultural studies-style analysis of how people actually relate and respond to the sculpture in real life (a more populist form of which Steve Johnson was basically attempting in his Trib article) but my heart wouldn’t be in it. Knight’s snarky question was a valid one, and Art Fag City’s post was in keeping with its editor’s ongoing deconstructions of the more egregious myths about contemporary art and its reception–the Trib’s article, sadly, providing a prime example of just the sort of superficial arguments that so often inform those myths.

As far as I know the Trib’s Steve Johnson isn’t an art critic or an arts journalist. He’s a thoughtful and smart culture reporter who was interested in the popular reaction to a popular work of public art in his city. My beef certainly isn’t with Mr. Johnson or with the quality of the article he wrote. It’s with the fact that Johnson’s was one of the rare  “news” stories about art in Chicago that the Trib has published over the past few months. And I straight-up disagree with that particular choice of story.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, even though I’m not saying anything everyone who lives here doesn’t already know: it’s a damn shame that a city of the size and cultural prominence of Chicago does not have a national voice for its art scene, a newspaper art critic of the stature of Christopher Knight who could have written about Seward’s sculpture from a critically informed art historical viewpoint as well as the more straightforwardly populist one put forth by the Trib (or, better yet, would have chosen not to make this into a story at all, given that there’s nothing particularly timely or newsworthy about it).

This is not a city of people who know nothing about art and architecture, nor do Chicagoans evince a “fear” of the rigorous discourse that often accompanies discussion about those subjects. So why does the Trib cover art as if it its readership needs hand-holding and spoon-feeding via articles that essentially give us permission to look no further than a work of public art’s most spectacular effects?

Chicago needs at least one real art journalist with a national platform to represent this city to the rest of the country, if not the world (and by “art” here I mean fine art, not theater, dance, music, etc.  if that’s not already obvious). Clearly, other arts writers across the country are still paying attention to the Trib’s art coverage and looking specifically (and exclusively) to that paper for news and insight into Chicago’s art scene and its art public. The problem is that the Trib is relying on reporters who have no in-depth art backgrounds to cover art news in this city–no dog in the fight, as it were–and frankly I find the effects of this to be somewhat humiliating.

Chicago needs a high-profile newspaper writer who is both a critic of and an advocate for the city’s art; not a booster but a person who will draw attention to bad decisions and art world folly while at the same time placing new developments within a larger cultural and historical context. Chicago’s art bloggers simply aren’t able to bear that responsibility, not because of a lack of talent but from a serious lack of time, money and resources. My advice to the Trib: get freelancer Lori Waxman on staff and make her a reporter or something–I don’t fucking care, but Chicago needs to cultivate its own Chrisopher Knight some way or another. Until we do, we risk letting writers from other cities steer the discourse on Chicago art. We owe it to ourselves not to let that continue.

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**Image credit: Shannon Keller, Knitter. Keller’s work is currently on view at Show Cave in L.A. (via The World’s Best Ever).

*CAA Study finds over-reliance on part-time faculty in American higher education.

*New York Times looks at how artists are adjusting to economic hardship.

*Edward Winkleman asks his readers why the view that art is ‘unmasculine’ still persists?

*Chicago artist and illustrator Lauren Nassef’s “A Drawing a Day” still going strong.

*Joanne Mattera bites back after receiving a cease and desist letter warning her not to write about vanity galleries (a.k.a. ‘pay to show’ schemes).

*The architecture of ‘evil lairs’ at BLDGBLOG (via C-Monster). Makes me long for the days I still had time to play videogames.

*Chicagoist’s report on the Society for News Design’s conference and discussions about what’s happening in the Chicago journalism scene. Very interesting write-up here, including follow-up comments.

*”The practice of art gets the criticism it deserves”–Great piece on how the internet is changing critics and art criticism by John Haber.

*Another good read on the above topic: “Arts Writing and ‘The New Thing’” at Peripheral Vision. (Meg has also twittered numerous of-the-moment links on the topic of arts journalism this past week, make sure to check those out too).

That’s all for now. I’m off to see Several Silences at The Renaissance Society.

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Although I didn’t attend the opening, I rushed out to see the exhibition the day after, as I am sort of a geek when it comes to things like art criticism and the general issue of cultural writing, and I’d been looking forward to this show ever since I heard about it a few months ago.  Further fueling my excitement was the fact that Chicago art people can get really fired up around questions of criticism, validation, aesthetic judgment, issues of power and how one goes about garnering cultural capital, and that interest, coupled with the no-bullshit, straight-shooting style of discourse I have also observed both conversationally and occasionally in print led me to anticipate something deliciously juicy—maybe even bloody—from this exhibition. Something raw, not cooked.

Suffice it to say what I actually encountered in the gallery was disappointing. I saw a very conventional-looking exhibition of art objects, all of which were accompanied by the standard wall labels that, save for Conrad Bakker’s, contained no explanatory text or any other critical framing devices other than object information. Clearly the organizers were at some pains to keep things kosher: to let the artists have their space, and the critics theirs, and then put the mix-it-up-part yet someplace else.  Aesthetically and pretty much on every other level however the works themselves don’t play well together -  it’s not that they clash, they just don’t speak or, as the case may be, ‘respond’ to one another in any way. I gather they’re not supposed to, as the show wasn’t curated along thematic or formal lines but instead according to the idiosyncratic selection process of each participating critic.

Indeed, the catalogue’s introduction posits the role of the art critic as central to this exhibition, and describes the show’s purpose as investigating “the critical process itself, by opening up the crucial ways that critics engage with artists’ work….The essays are not meant to be typical reviews, but rather self-reflexive expositions of the writing process and on the art that inspires them.” In this way “Response” is structured in a layered fashion, with the first layer of encounter (for viewers, anyway) being the work on display in the gallery itself, the second layer the exhibition catalogue, where criticality, writing, and aesthetic judgment are allowed to re-assert themselves, and the third layer taking place off stage, so to speak, and re-presented online via a series of recorded conversations that are available on the I Space website (and I think on cd as well).

But the problem is that that there is no actual ‘criticism’ per se and not much self-reflexivity happening anywhere in the exhibition—not in the catalogue, and not really in the online conversations either.  Really, the only thing that makes this show different from any other is that the so-called “responsive” material has been discursively incorporated into the ‘exhibition proper’ –but there isn’t any alchemy happening within that exhibition space with the potential to create new models of understanding or thought-provoking bits of exchange.

In order to assume the role of curators, the critics abandoned their role as critics, instead of—and this is where I thought it could have gone differently—figuring out a way, as uncomfortable though it surely would have been, to simultaneously inhabit both roles. It’s not like I wanted venomous exchange—that’s just as bad as being overly solicitous. But what if, instead of choosing artists whose work they admired, some of the critics had selected an artist whose work has in their opinion been uneven over the years, or about whom they’ve written critically in the past but have subsequently revised their opinion, or maybe even an artist whose work they’ve always avoided writing about because, embarrassed though they may be to admit it, they’ve never really ‘gotten it’ and so could never bring themselves to write about it?

To me, that would be really interesting, that would be sexy. I was expecting something sloppier, but this is all so darn polite. To be sure, there are a few revelatory moments. I liked how in the essay artist Adelheid Mers admits that she envies “quick witted historians and philosophers” and that her own work—“slow and clumsy”– is made in an effort to make sense of concepts that initially befuddle her.  Alicia Eler’s opening statement: “I never meant to be an art critic,” hints at a reluctance to embrace the role both professionally and personally, as if there is something slightly humiliating about admitting your identity as this schlumpy homely person that’s called an art critic as opposed to an artist, who is by definition a hottie. Lane Relyea’s rundown of Artforum’s descent into little more than punditry is illuminating, but there’s nothing personally revealing about it. How does he feel about the role that he himself plays in all this, as an educator, a critic himself, and a writer for that magazine? Relyea remains conspicuously silent on this point, preferring instead to swathe his words in the comfortably familiar rhetoric of the academician-as-critic.

My own words here may come off as snarky, but truly, I speak from love. I think art criticism is a dying form, hell, it’s probably already dead, Saltz and Roberta Smith notwithstanding. Professional art critics are the auto workers of the culture industry, as a friend of mine put it over a beer last weekend: outdated, irrelevant, and almost certainly on their way out. I’m not happy about this, and I surely do hope that criticism morphs into something new and exciting and, most importantly, equally valid and as relevant as it once was, a long time ago, as it tries uneasily to find a place in online discourse. But I still kinda think ‘the art of criticism’ is going down in flames. And if that’s the case, why not go down in style? This was supposed to be the critics’ moment in the limelight – why not loosen up a little—or maybe a lot? Use the “I” word more often? Embarrass yourself with your enthusiasms, confused lusts, and occasional flights of fancy, even if it means feeling a twinge of regret the next day (and also maybe a little thrill of relief)? An exhibition like this is your chance to get shitfaced at the office party and cry on the janitor’s shoulder, spill red wine on your pinstripe suit–hell, fuck your boss in the supply closet, nobody really cares what you do anyway.

Everyone’s so afraid of offending each other, and I don’t blame them. Chicago, I gather, has a small and friendly art scene where everyone knows everyone. Maybe that’s the problem with criticism in this city—no one really wants to do it right because what do you say to that person when you inevitably run into them at an opening the following week? It’s an argument for remaining friendless if there ever was one.

A panel discussion on this exhibition will take place at Art Chicago a week from today, Monday May 4th, 1-2:30 pm at the Merchandise Mart Conference Center. In spite of myself, I can’t wait to see it.

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I just read (via Meg’s Twitter– I’ve been away from my computer for almost a full day, so this is fresh news to me) that the Chicago Tribune laid off its sole art critic, Alan Artner (sources: Time Out Chicago; Chicago Reader blog). Wow. I don’t know Mr. Artner personally but I am really sorry to hear about this. He seems to have been widely respected — a few detractors, of course, but my sense is that he did his job very well and has made a major contribution to art coverage in this city during his decades at the Tribune.

When I moved to Chicago last year I was really surprised at the lack of, let’s call it “mainstream press” art criticism in Chicago, including at the Tribune. I don’t think a major city daily should have only one art critic on staff like the Trib did (look at the L.A.Times–at least for now, they have chief art critic Christopher Knight plus David Pagel and several other longstanding freelance art critics who’ve made names for themselves over the years), but at least they had someone.  I was shocked that the Chicago Reader, this supposedly nationally recognized alternative weekly, doesn’t do regular art reviews and only occasionally covers the business end of what’s happening in art here. And relieved to discover New City‘s extensive coverage of Chicago art – that thin little weekly entertainment rag does a hell of a lot for the art scene in this city, no? But I’m blown away to learn that the city’s most prominent newspaper critic has been cut. We all know the Trib is bankrupt (and whither the Trib goes, so too the LA Times?). But this decision has symbolic ramifications too.

Since I’m new to Chicago, with not a lot of personal history with the art scene behind me to fully contextualize this news (or to allow me to feel cynical about it, frankly), I’d like to hear your thoughts and comments on this development.  How will the absence of regular, critical art coverage in the city’s major daily paper impact Chicago’s visual arts community (if at all)? Are there outlets in this city big enough to absorb someone with Artner’s experience and talents, or will he be forced to go elsewhere?

This is indeed sad news for the visual arts in Chicago; especially as we are gearing up for the Version and Art Chicago/Artropolis events taking place here over the next few weeks, when more eyes than usual will be upon us. Just not any from the Tribune.

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Read more about it directly from The Pulizer Prize website and also at the New York Times.

Updated: whoops, rushing to get this post out pronto and misspelled Cotter’s last name! My bad!

Update #2: My snark about paltry prize money aside, this is a big deal for Cotter and for newspaper art critics in general. As the L.A. Times’ art critic Christopher Knight points out, Cotter is the first art critic to win a Pulitzer in 35 years, “since the late Emily Genauer of Newsday won in 1974.” So bravo to Cotter. Newspaper art criticism may well be in its death throes, but at least not before one of the best of them has received this kind of recognition.

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To me, writing about art is a lot like writing a love letter. I’m sure many of you are snorting with derision at that statement, but I don’t care; I really mean it. Why else would those of us who still bother to write about art keep doing it, if not for the sheer stupid pleasure of using exorbitant language to capture that which words can never adequately convey?

That’s why I’m kind of aghast at the rise of Twitter and Facebook as a growing forum for art criticism these days. Now, I totally get the social aspects and benefits of these applications, and to the way they provide increased and enriched  opportunities for argument and back-talk, along with a gossipy sort of zing to art discourse in general, I say right on. But I mourn the passage of long-form art criticism (can we please just call it art writing? The term ‘criticism’ always feels much too, well, critical to me). The blogosphere still allows people to write about an artwork or a show at some length, but even that is changing: some bloggers who’ve held their fingers to the wind for far longer than I are noting (in decidedly hopeful tones, I should add) the drastic streamlining of  the blog form, or even, as Deanna Isaacs surmised a few weeks ago in the Reader, the death of text itself.

Art, like any object of affection, deserves extravagant prose devoted to it, damn the word count. Even work that may not be all that great is worthy of elaboration in my book. Do we really want Peter Schjeldahl and the museum curators to be the only ones given the space and opportunity to write about art at length? Personally, I think that would be a fucking shame.

That being said, I’m not against Twittering art reviews at Bad At Sports–I  think we should try it. I’m well aware that blogs are not the place to try and resuscitate long-form criticism, and I’m continually fascinated with the different ways people use words to grapple with art. The — what is it — 140 words? — that Twitter allows can provide a good exercise in summing up a work of art or an exhibition concisely and with, as the genre seems to require, just the right amount of deadpan irony. I myself possess none of the pith required to Twitter well, but I genuinely look forward to seeing what those who have a knack for it will do with this emerging form.

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