For many people the current “Art” system is beginning to not work, and it’s not just in Santa Fe. Often it’s not working for the patron, who can be overwhelmed with mediocre production work that lacks both virtuosity and authenticity. And often now it’s not working for galleries. They are going out of business right and left due to clients’ diminished disposable income or increased apprehension about their own financial safety. And for many galleries their own increased operating overhead has become simply too much to bear.
And I hear now that often the current system is not working for the artist. Artists are too often asked to respond to particular niche, to produce a related and consistent body of work so there is time to build and market a reputation. This so that the market can respond. The market pushes the gallery to build a product identity instead of a process identity. In reality the artist must grow and change somehow or the work eventually founders. It might be a change in direction, a change in content, or even change in disciplines. But a living thing is either growing and changing, or it’s dying.
And perhaps content is too often driven by the markets’ idea of fashion. Thumb through the last five issues of Art Forum and then thumb through five issues from 10 years ago and you get the idea. The marketing people are telling us what colors are going to be “in” this year and too many of us fall for it.
So what’s up?
Well, my observation is that there are several things going on. Everything, not just art, is becoming too com-modified. Water, and Christmas, are in the same boat. Perhaps this is a function of a capitalist society where advertising drives values more than intrinsics. Perhaps art is fundamentally and uniquely at odds with this kind of valuing.
Or perhaps it’s a function of being told by arts institutions for decades now that everyone is an artist. And while this may be true technically, certainly not everyone is a good artist, or even a real artist. But we do wake up now and find an over-abundance of work, art-work, curatorial-work, and collected-work that is simply weak. It is far too often done by people who have had a great deal of encouragement but have not yet brought together the marriage of passion and virtuosity necessary to be “good”, they have not invested in the very discipled effort required to speak fluently and beautifully in the language they’ve chosen. And not enough people can tell the difference.
So perhaps some of this perceived failure of the art-system rests with the system and some with the three participating parties, not enough of whom have paid the genuine dues required for participation.
How do you see it?
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The problem is language. The word “art” is insufficient in its lexical value. We tend to attribute any neat thing made by man that has esthetic concerns above all else as art. The real value of “art” lies in the idea. It is best when it documents human thought. The current system is not set up to sell documentations of thought. It is set up to sell decoration. And because the source of money for artist is tied to this system, it becomes impossible to alter. Unless we as artist learn to expect less from our art. We need to let art incubate itself in a situation that is less demanding of it. Everyone involved needs to learn to expect less from art and adjust accordingly. My first exhibited pieces hang in your gallery today. I spent 3 dollars to make a piece that is beautiful as is, unframed, laying on a surface. In order to conform my piece to the expected terms the system requires, I had to spend 150 dollars on a frame. Now the piece, which I would glady accept 20 dollars from, is priced at 400. As a ‘star-up’ artist, I find this subject fascinating and in need of a new direction. Thank you for bringing it up.
so – which side are you on?
The headline in the initial entry implies there is to be a discussion re: the Santa Fe Art System. I don’t believe that Santa Fe is comparable to the rest of the country’s or the world’s art systems, if they can be called systems at all, so I’m inclined to dispense with that notion up front.
I do want to weigh in on the general discussion, however. If the art market is failing and galleries along with it, that is nothing new.
The same happened in the 1990s. I attended a symposium at the Park Avenue Armory in NYC where several internationally respected ADAA member dealers admitted, after pinpoint prodding from me, to their role in the art market’s crash. They had begun to knowingly represent artists whose work was second-rate, then through promo and guile created markets for this work. Here possibly, and abroad certainly, art became collateral for other buying. Then both the investment and real estate markets went into decline. The weak art, in owners’ efforts to recoup $$$, was put up for sale in secondary markets, often major auction houses, but could not find buyers.
Confidence was undermined across the board. These dealers went into damage control mode, but countless wonderful artists who had played no part in this folly, were tainted nonetheless.
Doesn’t this scenario have a familiar ring? Unfortunately, people have short memories, one generation passes and a fresh one comes up, relying again on the “expertise” of others.
I think the references to fashion and marketing are right on, and so “American.” Planned obsolescence, a feature applied to refrigerators or cars, seems to apply to art nowadays. It must be new, trendy, a sign of upward mobility. That the artist —more accurately, perhaps, the artist’s prerogative for creative exploration— may get high-jacked in the process doesn’t seem to be an issue.
I think the last few years have taught all of us how systems can be corrupted. The essential ingredient is participants not trusting their own good judgment and feeling they must rely on others to make sound choices. Must a dealer follow “fashion” ? Must an artist be told what to create? Must a buyer be told what is good art?
It’s unclear who/what the writer means by “arts institutions.” Museums? Schools? Leagues? I don’t buy the assertion of “being told by arts institutions for decades now that everyone is an artist. … And not enough people can tell the difference.” I’ve found neither to be true. Further, who has taken, or been handed, the power to make these determinations?
The art market is commodity based. Speaking as an artist it is very difficult to conform to the needs of a gallery owner. they are at odds. Galleries need or want products they can sell and they yearn for consistancy from their artists so they have a solid body of work. i find the best dealer, and it sounds like you do this, allow their artists to grow and develop their search without expecting repeat after repeat form their artists. Finding the gallery that has the right aesthetic for one’s work, and the customer base, along with allowing for creative development is the golden ticket. The customers look for guidance from a gallery and can be educated in understanding the need for artists to grow and change.