Cargo Culture, Reheated
Or, You’ll Get What You’re Given And Like It, Bitches™.
For readers with an interest in really bad art and its coercive public funding, this post and subsequent discussion over at Artblog, which some of you may have missed, offers quite a lot to chew on. Because I’m vain and shallow, I’ll quote myself:
The political uniformity and extraordinary conceits of our own publicly-funded arts establishment have entertained us many, many times. As when the writer Hanif Kureishi told Guardian readers that culture, as represented by him, is “a form of dissent,” while the paper’s theatre critic Michael Billington claimed that a reduction of taxpayer subsidy for loss-making plays is nothing less than “suppression” of that “dissent.” Likewise, when the playwright Jonathan Holmes claimed that he and his peers are “speaking truth to power” – I kid you not – and insisted, based on nothing, that “the sole genuine reason for cuts is censorship of some form” and “the only governments to systematically attack the arts have been the ones that also attacked democracy.”
You see, the suggestion that artists might consider earning a living, rather than leeching at the taxpayer’s teat, is apparently indistinguishable from fascist brutality and the end of civilisation. Though when the status quo in London’s dramatic circles is overwhelmingly leftwing, and when publicly subsidised art and theatre tend to favour parties that favour further public subsidy for art and theatre, what “dissent” actually means is somewhat unclear. And reluctant taxpayers please take note: Despite all the years of providing hand-outs, you’re now the oppressor.
The whole thing, as they say.
Why would most people bother? There are other pleasures out there in which the conventions are preserved and celebrated.
Quite. I’m sure I must have said this before, but I no longer bother visiting my local galleries. It’s just not something I would think of doing on a free afternoon, not for pleasure. The repeated disappointment and wasting of my time has successfully repelled me. I’d rather go to the cinema, or look at furniture, or phones.
[…] or look at furniture, or phones.
Or cars. Probably not entirely coincidental that at the same time as “art” has gone down the rabbit hole well-heeled collectors have turned to other items to satisfy their aesthetic sensibilities. The fact that fine art museums are putting on exhibitions that concentrate on these artifacts (The art of the motorcycle at the Guggenheim a number of years back being maybe the first one) shows that they are becoming aware of this change in their audience.
I think that there is still a lot of artists out there, but they are now working in industrial design. It is not a coincidence that the country that nurtured the likes of Botticelli and da Vinci and Raphael and Mantegna and Canaletto also allowed for the development of Zagato and Vignale and Michelotti and Gandini and the like. They were what I would call real artists, meaning individuals who had a grounding in craft and the aesthetic vision to transform this craft into something that patrons are willing to pay for. Whereas the people who now pass themselves off as artists are people with no discernible talent who in an earlier time (i.e. before state funding of the arts) would have had to find other lines of work. And if what we see in these pages is any indication, they might have been happier if they had been forced to earn an honest living.
Presume y’all have seen this?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/02/art-world-is-hotbed-of-corruption-collector-claims/
Somewhat akin to something I tell my wife, unmade beds don’t exactly unmake themselves for large sums of money.
the art world [is] also now used for “money laundering”
Interesting, that. Would of course explain why aesthetic considerations (and ability, for that matter) are irrelevant.
It’s minor stuff in the grand scheme of crony capitalism, but the major dealers and collectors maintain their status through networks that ultimately incriminate contemporary museums operating on ostensible behalf of the public interest.
on ostensible behalf of the public interest
Ha! The public interest is an externality, as the economists say. Pretty much everything that is funded by the public fisc is an insider’s game, with the public interest serving as window-dressing for connected parties to enrich themselves. Public universities that serve as jobs programs for otherwise unemployable liberal arts or social studies majors and that churn out more of the same without any concern about what would actually serve the nation whose taxpayers they fleece. Public schools that keep inner-city kids ignorant and unable to read while making sure that the teachers can’t get fired for even the most egregious offences. A Veterans’ Administration that lets sick veterans die while waiting for care, but that awards its staff bonuses for a job well done. An entire welfare apparatus whose sole purpose seems to be to employ bureaucrats to stick their hands into the pockets of taxpayers and redistribute a tiny portion of the loot without any lasting effect on the poverty rate. And then of course, as you mention, the crony capitalists: Solyndra, Tesla, Google, and on and on ad nauseam.
The public interest. What a quaint notion.
RE: where artists with technical talent end up in clown world – concept art & movies: a surfeit of technical talent churning out space marine design #314567 and sexy dark elf #43921 for the continued gratification of aging manchildren everywhere.