critical

Monday, 7 Jan 2019 - 21st Jan Asynchronous Seminar (drawn from issues raised in Krzysztof‘s lecture) - CW

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Asynchronous Seminar (drawn from issues raised in Krzysztof‘s lecture) - CW
When Monday, 7 Jan 2019 Description Via LMS, written contributions over two weeks

On Thursday, 17 January 2019 05:17:35 UTC+4, Jo Nichols wrote:
Is it the artist not the art that drives its value? If we look to the Vermeer fake this certainly is true. The gate keepers of the art world, the institutions and the gallery owners certainly seem to hold the power as they can set the price, push the sale, hype the artist. Therefor if one chooses to work out side of such institutions the struggle for financial success is much grater and artists are not necessarily good business people able to push their own works worth. The artists however who make the artwork hold the top trump cards as the institutions would have no currency to trade without them. 

My first response on seminar was to Jo's point (see above quote): To reply to Jo's point, regarding whether it is the artist, not the art that drives its value, I would agree with this and take it a step further. The art market works to trends as do almost all markets. This leads to gallerists, curators and institutions seeking artwork made by a particular group of artists who are in favour at the time. Does this lead us to a point where the work isn't as important as an artist might like to think it is, but rather their gender, race, biography, struggles etc speak more to the consumer than the work itself does? Would the work still be in favour if it was produced by an artist coming to the art market with a more 'privileged' backstory? 

Second response purely to lecture: Does removing oneself from the art world simply bring about isolation and loss of confidence or does it feed integrity? - I've recently discussed this question with a group of artists in the studio I am a member of. We discussed the aspect of visibility, and what would it mean to be invisible, how could we become invisible and let the artwork speak for itself? There is an element of creating 'dead art' by removing oneself from the art world. If work is not seen than can it be classed as professional work or merely an act to pass the time? Does the work itself have more integrity if the bias surrounding artist biographies is removed? If all artworks could be viewed in neutrality would it lead to purer/truer readings, literally allowing the work to speak for itself? - hide quoted text -

Elaine's response to me: interesting question Katie, I guess for me it depends on your audience. I think bios, statements etc can be helpful in giving the audience some kind of ‘in’ into the work, I remember in college for our degree show our department advocated for no statement, title, name but audience were frequently asking some kind of information on the works. I also remember writing a paper on anonymous artists where I found that anonymous artists were really playing the same game only without a name re publicity,  even inviting press to talk and write about the work. 

My third response, this time to Elaine: I agree Elaine, regarding the anonymous artists, we all have to play the same game regarding publicity and getting work out there. The one thing is that an anonymous artist really has to make sure the work speaks for itself if they don't have the additional resource of biography for insight. On the other hand, it may allow them to comment on issues that they may otherwise be criticised for if their identity was in the public, ie: white artists commenting on race relations, or male artists commenting on feminism. In these situations, the strength may be in the fact that the artist is an unknown and that work is viewed for its narrative. If the artist's identity was exposed they may be criticised for coming from a place of privilege or domination regardless of whether their work had a strong and positive impact. - show quoted text -

Mozhdeh response to me and Elaine: @Katie, ‘Yes’ a good art speak but as you and Elaine mentioned publicity is important in the contemporary world of art, it seems in the art today 'the artist is a part and it's not a part' of its work of art. 
Although the intention of being an anonymous artist has some interesting aspects and differences for some artists and the curiosity of being an unnamed artist maybe grab attention, the success of that is still conditional and very much depend on 'anonymous publicity'! @Elaine as Elaine points out. 
In the other hand I think the form of art play the main role in this matter, as for some art forms it not possible to be unknown, as the artist is the main element in the existence of artwork, and also the artist location and geographical, cultural ability, knowledge, and understanding of art and this concept is something to be considered!!
Talking about the geographical matters and possibilities bring to my mind this question ‘who is the anonymous artist? the artist who chosen to be behind her/his work of art or who has been forced to be a kind of 'muted artist' under regional, political, cultural, race, gender, identity etc. sensitivity and or pressure of its surroundings!! How much these issues effects on artist activities and or limited the ways and choices for the artist and or being an artist?


17/10/2017 - Task 2 - FFF - FRAME - Thoughts - GENRE

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GENRE

What genres do I fit in to? Gender, race, age, nationality, occupation, likes, dislikes, stereotypes.

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Are stereotypes genres?

how does genre affect how your work is read? Identity politics, inherited genres, uncontrolled genres, unsolicited genres, sub-genres, locations genres, political genres.

Where do I sit?

What’s my genre? Is that the same as context? Or more flexible/solid? Does one inform the other? Should it?

How do our genres affect how we read others?

How much does taste/preference impact on genre reading?

Can you claim a genre that not yours for the taking? Does that depend on the genres classifications, i.e. some you can, some you can’t, some you shouldn’t?

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17/10/2017 - Task 2 - FFF - FRAME - Thoughts - TEXT

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TEXT

How I talk about my work affects how the gallery discusses it, which affects how it is read and discussed by audience & critics.

If I use text within my work, the words have the meanings dictated by the dictionary... who wrote the dictionary? - See Urban Dictionary for new words/slang - expression of roots - childhood of mum and Nan using Cockney Rhyming Slang, everyday speech - dialect as a class signifier. Can I redefine words - misinterpretation as work - such as dictation - see previous post. 

Gallery tend to exploit novelty – newness, & exaggerate the sensations, experiences, dramatizing, emphasizing. use of language is unique to gallery - institution uses different  - not wot worry about this - only for exhibitions?

critics question the work, dependent on publication they may be more provocative or simply highlight key terms from press release. Try to be objective, mostly subjective, bias. Is all writing bias? Is all art bias? does it matter? YES - RELATES TO CLASS AND CATEGORISING< LEAVING OUT< EXCLUDING ELEMENTS OF SOCIETY

- so how do I include text within my work so it allows the work to be read with clarity – how does this relate to genre, story telling? Is it in danger of becoming a ‘branding’ exercise?

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Previous work including text - a lot of my older work had written messages embedded within in them, hidden under the layers of paint.

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14/10/2017 - Flânuse - Can I be defined as one? A city story

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Identify as Interdisciplinary producer – ‘the creative’ is a myth – romanticized

W, Benjamin – author as producer -consume/produce – important to produce

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discourse, here, of there & from here.

Cultural production as a form of belonging – investing

Marxist as form of control - Orientalism - colonial idea

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Genre theory – rhetoric in ancient Greece, drama prose etc

Becomes more elaborate & representative of social, political, economic structures

Genre theory the director recedes – its about the mood, type of story etc.

Aspects of affect – genre creates mood. Affects emotion

Film, books, food – agreed upon set of variables need in understanding genre.

Looking at genre as layers- relevant to life in GCC: horror of being an immigrant, psychological thriller, veneers of genres laterally, social relationships – fantastical, shared cultural understanding/ assumptions

Use genre to create a lens to see place – use to speak back to outsider – inside to outside

Disinterested gaze – are you allowed to be disengaged?

Enclaves- marina, jlt, malls – malls as public space –

The bridge linking the metro to the mall... no need to step outside, no need to breathe the hot air, so hot it feels like your lungs are burning. building the habit of staying inside, when its cooler, no need to step in to the chilly wind.

The bridge linking the metro to the mall... no need to step outside, no need to breathe the hot air, so hot it feels like your lungs are burning. building the habit of staying inside, when its cooler, no need to step in to the chilly wind.

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Flâneur – a man who saunters around observing society.

Flânuse – female flânuer - Women’s bodies in context of loafing, can women loaf? Or a changed body – how things are read.

‘the keen-eyed stroller who chronicles the minutiae of city life’ – The guardian, Lauren Elkin, July 2016

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Hybrid of Flânuer – to encompass driving – speed, wrapped up in genres, class – grammar of dialogue between master planner and constructors. Using the metro...

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Authors of city are not natives

Walking is a class ‘thing’

Is it intentionally hybrid – municipality memory, pedestrian areas, DXB, AD, SHJ – remaining places of congregation

Intimacy not relating to emotional – affected

How people know cities – Michel De Certeu – how to inhabit the walking

The ‘peopling’ of the city is how to know the city –

Urbanism – intersections / meeting points

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Each city has a different affect

Layers of city are displaced – moved through the areas – each area has its own genre –

Simultaneous genres – where the sidewalk ends the genre ends – difficult to walk from one to another – the legal act of walking – divided city – penetration only possible with vehicle

Intimacy allows for dwelling, - phenomenology – does the city allow for intimacy because of the lack of dwelling?

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Could it be seen as diminutive to utilize collective and simple genres to categorize and classify elements or themes of life, which is usually deemed as complex? Is it that we find it complex as individuals but as a collective life is generic? We’re birthed, grow, reproduce, and die; in between we have a collection of experiences in an order that is somewhat common. To classify it in to broad, subversive genres is dualistic in action: collating and rejecting information, group and ungroup persons and the removal of individualism of persons while delving in to the minutiae of an individuals’ story.

To recollect the so-called ‘untold stories’ of the impermanent residents here, is a genre that has been explored by anthropologists, biasedly by the media, and favorably by the government; or the heavily curated and contrasting accounts of the socialites and ‘influencers’ of social media. These genres of narrative manipulate and play to the existing desires of mass consumers of media. Increasingly issues in and of physical space are highlighted in a virtual space via a network society, the sense of reality becoming divertissement, the tuning in to the genres of others lives to tune out our own.

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Heredity genres

Genres dictating how work is read

Expat – being ‘from here’ but not ‘of here’

Space in common – the male

Struggle in geography – disconnect

consumption of space per person

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Genre as superstructure over the city –

Being conscious that our position is never fixed and can change

Many different positions – partial posterity

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Performance of identity – genre of literature on identity politics becoming a genre

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Marxist theory of control through genre – is the 'city' constructed in a fashion to create control – provide choices and then struck within them – used a s control

Censorship a- bypassing –

Moving through space that isn’t designed to be moved through

The inviting pristine grass on the untouchable intersection

The inviting pristine grass on the untouchable intersection

Multicultural poly-amory

City a story – genre becomes productive – woody Allen feel

Genre allows for calibrated sense of expression

Read it backwards –

Pick a genre, such as rom com, horror , then make a film about labour or race

Genre as capitalist market – working against the niche markets

Self hood as genre - A system of beliefs, suspension of belief - Looming cloud of authenticity – if we remove genre – there is not something else? - If there is a state/time from which genre can be removed – impossible?

Establishing a genre from a ‘test’ one

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Genre is constructed and fluid – genre or subgenre

Conceptualize genre as forces or gathering

Semiotics – semantics

  • classifications

  • effectives

  • to create, interpretation and culture larger and feeds into genre

being aware of own genre –

genre as metaphor – expressing what is not expressible, ghost stories – if souls exist, do they maintain closure because of repatriation, why are there few gulf ghost stories

accessing uneasy topics

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is trauma resisted here? Everything is asking you to be happy.

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27/09/2017 - How does text generate meaning for/in art?

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Addressing the politics and other issues

an artist & their context

A Generative series - the idea is to create interventions that will have an impact on practice

Sketchbooks

Sketchbooks

Slow learning – slow to find yourself

Leap of Faith – decoding and unraveling - reassess how I frame critique of own work.

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Thinking strategically - endgame – enrich work

how meaning is produced around artworks. Understand how artist can control the meaning they create around their works.

Artist – documents etc

Who is speaking? – What are they saying?

How do we confront meaning? – categorisation

critical, social theory

How will it help formation of critique?

  • observing how we observe –O, Ward –

  • controlling nuances in my text to control/stage stories

  • how to place in a wider context

side note, audit – alserkal – exhibitions – male/female – nationality – group shows – residences

‘local’ art and global critique - How local art is perceived globally, what is local? How are they out of contrast as nationality?

how do we make sense when there is no distance? does artwork need distance from its narrative? can I discuss something I am distant from? Or do I need to be apart of it - links to Langlands and bell/Emin and the depth of research and personal narrative.

Studio & Cube – the relationship between when art is made and art is created – Brian O’Dougherty - Less in to biographical dialogue

website: http://tashkeel.org/workshops/critical-dialogues-1

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