DOCSLIB.ORG

Art Criticism

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Art Criticism VOLUME 19, NUMBER 1 ;' ART CRITICISM Art Department State University of New York at Stony Brook Stony Brook, NY 11794-5400 The editor wishes to thank Art and Peace, The Stony Brook Founda­ tion, President Shirley Strumm Kenny, Provost Robert L. McGrath, and the Dean of The College of Arts and Sciences, James V. Staros, for their gracious support. Copyright 2004 State University of New York at Stony Brook ISSN: 0195-4148 2 Art Criticism Founding Co-Editors Lawrence Alloway DonaldB. Kuspit Editor Donald B. Kuspit Advisors lames Rubin Mel Pekarsky Managing Editor Robert R. Shane Business Editor Gediminas Gasparavicius Art Criticism is published by: Department of Art State University of New York at Stony Brook Stony Brook, NY 11794-5400 Prospective contributors are asked to send abstracts. However, if a manuscript is submitted, please include a self-addressed stamped envelope for its return. Manuscripts accepted for publication must be submitted on a PC computer disk. Please contact the managing editor for a style sheet. Subscriptions are $20 per volume (two issues) for institutions and $15 per volume for individuals in the continental United States ($20 outside the continental U.S.). Back issues are available at the rate of $10 per issue. vol. 19, no. I 3 · } 4 Art Criticism 1! Table of Contents Another ~ay Out of the Cage: An Anti-theory for Epistemology and Art in the Charles Eliot Norton Lectures of John Cage Joseph Cunningham 6 "image and word, object and idea, inside and outside": Excavating Robert Smithson's Art from under His Writings Joseph Cunningham 28 Newman's The Statiolls of the Cross: Lema Sabachthalli, A Jewish Take Matthew Baigell 52 Aesthetics of Photography: Combining the Viewer's and the Artist's Standpoints Chong Ho Yu 62 Freud -Vitruvius Dialogue Eugene Mahon 75 Approaching the Critic's Psychology through the Artist's Negative Representation of Him Donald Kuspit 93 Beat Sensibility: Verbal or Visual? Donald Kuspit 106 vol. 19, no. 1 5 Another Way Out of the Cage: an Anti-theory for Epistemology and Art in the Charles Eliot Norton Lectures of John Cage Joseph Cunningham The Charles Eliot Norton Lectures delivered by John Cage at Harvard in 1989 are among the most enigmatic of all of his writings. Written in the mesostic stylel and based on "Source Texts" ranging from quotations from Henry David Thoreau and Marshall McCluhan to selections from the New York Times and from Cage's own books, and dominated by excerpts from Ludwig Wittgenstein's writing, the Lectures, which baffled listeners at the time of their delivery, remain largely uninterpreted. The mysterious if not downright impen­ etrable mesostic form, in which they were originally delivered, demands an alternative method for examination, namely, analysis of the Source Text. These quoted sections suggest perhaps the central, if not the only, path for tracing out any meaningful interpretation of the philosophical content and signifi­ cance of Cage's Lectures. The extent to which Cage's Norton Lectures and related expressions of his philosophical viewpoint are influenced by Wittgenstein's writings on the philosophy of language, mathematics and psychology and aesthetics, is not entirely clear, despite Wittgenstein 's preeminence in the quoted material of Source Text. Because this supply of quotations is saturated with passages from many of Wittgenstein's various philosophical texts, investigation of the exact compatibility of these statements with the views presented by other quoted materials (especially those quoting McLuhan), and more importantly with various expressions of Cage's own views, provides a useful backdrop for tracing out a meaning in these dense and complex lectures. Likewise, careful analysis of the Cage's quotations from Wittgenstein's writings elucidates Cage's own philosophical views, especially with respect to topics like language, mind and art. The general affinities between the approaches of Wittgenstein and Cage seem clear enough. Cage's preoccupation with removing the ego from 6 Art Criticism the creative process and emphasis on art experience can be connected to Wittgenstein's subjugation of personal first-person mental state attributions in favor of external criteria for evidence of, for example, meaning and other intentional states. Cage's celebration of chance operations in his composi­ tional methods as well as in the performance of his pieces can be correlated to Wittgenstein's reinterpretation ofthe actual use oflanguage in terms offamily resemblance and language-games. They both reject a universally justified in­ tention-based semantics in favor of a more decentralized community-view theory of meaning and signification. They also share a more general anti-essentialist inclination: Cage in his willingness to leave so much of performance practice up to individual musicians and his commitment, in many cases, of part or all of the practice of composition to chance operations, and Wittgenstein in his assertion that (as Cage knowingly paraphrased Wittgenstein's famous formu­ lation) "the meaning of something is in its use, not in itself [essentially]," and his extreme suspicion of reductive theories claiming to get at the essences of things.2 While these resemblances between the work of the two suggest a path for looking at intertextuality between the two, the goal of this paper is to trace out, among other conceptual links, the similarities and differences in Wittgenstein's and Cage's respective pronouncements on anti-essentialist and indeed anti-theoretical stance, their respective views of knowledge and mind, and finally concepts related to the theory of art. Emphasis will be placed on the significance of their anti-theoretic stance toward epistemological, aesthetic, as well as more general philosophical issues. Finally, a framework for grasping the implications ofWittgenstein's and Cage's associated formulations regard­ ing intention, mental states and knowledge will be explored with a view to locating to their foundational status within a new concept of art. An Anti-theory There are quite a variety of ways in which connections between Cage's and Wittgenstein's similar views on language and mathematics,3 suggest a path toward a more general understanding of an anti-theoretic approach they share: Nonintention (the acceptance of silence) leading to nature; renun­ ciation of control: let sounds be sounds. Each activity is centered in itself, i.e., composition, performance, and listening are different activities. (Music is) instantaneous and unpredictable; nothing is accomplished by writing, hearing, or playing a piece of music; our ears are now in excellent condition. A need for poetry. Joyce: "Comedy is the greatest of arts because the joy of comedy is freest from desire and loathing." Affirmation of life. Purposeful pur­ poselessness. 4 vol. 19, no. 1 7 The freedom engendered by Cage's approach ("renunciation of control," "pur­ poseful purposelessness") as outlined here connects beautifully to Wittgenstein's anti-theoretic formulation; philosophical clarification of ordi­ nary language by means of another language does not add to the sense present in a word or sentence of ordinary language. And theoretical speculation about or explanation of a piece of music does not add to the sense present in a performance of it. For Cage, intention, control, composition cannot clarify sounds or silence - they cannot add to it. The principle underlying all of the solutions acts in the question that is asked. As a composer, I should give up making choices, devote myself to asking questions. Chance-determined answers'll open my mind to world around, at the same time changing my music. Self-alteration, not self-expression. Thoreau said the same thing over a hundred years ago. I want my writing to be as clear as water I can see through so that what I experienced is told without my being in any way in the way.5 ' Art is indeed" not discovery ("giving answers"), but paying attention ("open[ing] my mind to world around"). Questions are at the center of philo­ sophical inquiry and aesthetic analysis - not answers - something that is true for Cage and Wittgenstein alike. As Cage writes in the Source Text for the Norton Lectures: In philosophy it's always a matter of the application of a series of utterly simple basic principles that any child knows, and the - enormous - difficulty is only one of applying these in the confu­ sion our language creates. It's never a question ofthe latest results of experiments with exotic fish or the most recent developments in mathemati~s. But the difficulty in apply.ing the simple basic prin­ ciple shakes our confidence in the principles themselves.6 It is wrong to say that in philosophy we consider an ideal language as opposed to our ordinary one. For this makes it appear as though we thought we could improve on ordinary languages. But ordinary language is all right. Whenever we make up 'ideal lan­ guage' it is not in order to replace our ordinary by them but just to remove some trouble caused in someone's mind by thinking that he has got hold of the exact use of a common word. 7 The "latest results," or "most recent developments," cannot get us anywhere either in understanding the fundamental nature of our world or in the making of art. Nor can comparison to an "ideal." As Wittgenstein puts it 8 Art Criticism ... everything lies open to view there is nothing to explain. For what is hidden is of no interest to us.8 The philosophical clarification of ordinary language without recourse to any other language than itself cannot be a further regularization of our ordinary language. And this is interestingly connected to Cage's anti-interventionist, non-comparativist view of music and art: To sober and quiet the mind, so that it is in accord with what happens, the world around it open rather than closed ..
Load more

Recommended publications
  • WORDS MADE FLESH Code, Culture, Imagination Florian Cramer
    WORDS MADE FLESH Code, Culture, Imagination Florian Cramer Me dia De s ign Re s e arch Pie t Z w art Ins titute ins titute for pos tgraduate s tudie s and re s e arch W ille m de Kooning Acade m y H oge s ch ool Rotte rdam 3 ABSTRACT: Executable code existed centuries before the invention of the computer in magic, Kabbalah, musical composition and exper- imental poetry. These practices are often neglected as a historical pretext of contemporary software culture and electronic arts. Above all, they link computations to a vast speculative imagination that en- compasses art, language, technology, philosophy and religion. These speculations in turn inscribe themselves into the technology. Since even the most simple formalism requires symbols with which it can be expressed, and symbols have cultural connotations, any code is loaded with meaning. This booklet writes a small cultural history of imaginative computation, reconstructing both the obsessive persis- tence and contradictory mutations of the phantasm that symbols turn physical, and words are made flesh. Media Design Research Piet Zwart Institute institute for postgraduate studies and research Willem de Kooning Academy Hogeschool Rotterdam http://www.pzwart.wdka.hro.nl The author wishes to thank Piet Zwart Institute Media Design Research for the fellowship on which this book was written. Editor: Matthew Fuller, additional corrections: T. Peal Typeset by Florian Cramer with LaTeX using the amsbook document class and the Bitstream Charter typeface. Front illustration: Permutation table for the pronounciation of God’s name, from Abraham Abulafia’s Or HaSeichel (The Light of the Intellect), 13th century c 2005 Florian Cramer, Piet Zwart Institute Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of any of the following licenses: (1) the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foun- dation; either version 2 of the License, or any later version.
    [Show full text]
  • EDUCATOR GUIDE Story Theme: the Grey Eminences Subject: David Ireland Discipline: Visual Art (Conceptual)
    EDUCATOR GUIDE Story Theme: The Grey Eminences Subject: David Ireland Discipline: Visual Art (Conceptual) SECTION I - OVERVIEW ......................................................................................................................2 EPISODE THEME SUBJECT CURRICULUM CONNECTIONS OBJECTIVE STORY SYNOPSIS INSTRUCTIONAL STRATEGIES INSTRUCTIONAL OBJECTIVES EQUIPMENT NEEDED MATERIALS NEEDED INTELLIGENCES ADDRESSED SECTION II – CONTENT/CONTEXT ..................................................................................................3 CONTENT OVERVIEW THE BIG PICTURE RESOURCES – TEXTS RESOURCES – WEBSITES RESOURCES – VIDEO BAY AREA FIELD TRIPS SELECTED CONCEPTUAL ARTISTS SECTION III – VOCABULARY.............................................................................................................9 SECTION IV – ENGAGING WITH SPARK ...................................................................................... 10 Artist David Ireland beside the entrance to his retrospective exhibition at the Berkeley Art Museum. Still image from SPARK story, 2004. SECTION I - OVERVIEW To learn to “read” Conceptual Artworks and EPISODE THEME understand how they communicate The Grey Eminences To help students think conceptually by looking at, talking about and making conceptual art SUBJECT To introduce students to creative ideation by David Ireland beginning instead of materials GRADE RANGES K-12 & Post-secondary EQUIPMENT NEEDED SPARK story about David Ireland on DVD or VHS CURRICULUM CONNECTIONS and related equipment Visual Art
    [Show full text]
  • Catalogue Babble Mel Bochner
    BABBEL BY MEL BOCHNER SYBARIS COLLECTION Mel Bochner (Pittsburgh, 1940) Mel Bochner is one of the most important living American conceptual artists of today. Related to Joseph Kosuth and Bruce Nauman, his work has been exhibited in prestigious museums such as the Tate Modern in London or the MoMA in New York. Bochner’s pieces fuse interests in design, written language, and art to push the boundaries of conceptual art. His interests are geometry, color, and length; his art is transgressive and experimental. In his own words: “My feeling was that there were ways of extending, or reinventing visual experience, but that it was very important that it remain visual […] The viewer should enter the idea through a visual or phenomenological experience rather than simply reading it.” New York artist Mel Bochner stands in front of his painting 'Master of the Universe (2010)' at the Whitechapel Gallery PA/independent.co.uk Crazy, 2019 Monotype with collage, engraving and reliefs on hand-painted Twinrocker paper 127 x 165 cm Silence, 2019 Babble, 2019 Monotype with collage, engraving and reliefs Monotype with collage, engraving and reliefs on hand-painted Twinrocker paper on hand-painted Twinrocker paper 81 x 52 cm 160 x 120 cm Bozo, 2019 Monotype with collage, engraving and reliefs on hand-painted Twinrocker paper 109 x 119 cm Chuckle, 2016 Monotype with collage, engraving and reliefs on hand-painted Twinrocker paper 45 x 76 cm n/a Top Dog, 2019 Eradicate, 2019 Monotype with collage, engraving and reliefs Monotype with collage, engraving and reliefs on hand-painted Twinrocker paper on hand-painted Twinrocker paper 160 x 90 cm 81 x 52 cm Blah, Blah, Blah, 2019 Monotype with collage, engraving and reliefs on hand-painted Twinrocker paper 125 x 183 cm HA, HA, HA, 2019 Monotype with collage, engraving and reliefs on hand-painted Twinrocker paper 51 x 57 cm Fool, 2019 Monotype with collage, engraving and reliefs on hand-painted Twinrocker paper 127 x 167 cm SYBARISCOLLECTION.COM [email protected] +1 (832) 530 3996 +55 (55) 8435 4487 Ig Fb SybarisCollection.
    [Show full text]
  • PDF SVA Handbook 2020–21
    2020/2021 SVA Handbook SVA • 2020 / 2021 20 /21 SVA Handbook CONTENTS President’s Letter 2 The College 3 Academic Information 9 Student Information 23 Faculty Information 44 General Information 55 Standards, Procedures, Policies and Regulations 69 SVA Essentials 93 2020–2021 Academic Calendar 113 Index 119 SVA.EDU 1 THE SVA HANDBOOK provides faculty, students and administrative staff with information about the College, its administration, services and processes. In addition, the Handbook contains policies mandated by federal and state regulations, which all faculty, students and administrative staff need be aware of. In this regard, I would especially like to call your attention to the sections on attendance (pages 12 and 46), the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) (page 85), Student Disruptive and Concerning Behavior (page 74), Title IX procedures (page 84) and the SVA policy on alcohol and drugs (page 70). We look forward to the 2020–2021 academic year. Our students, this year from 45 states, one U.S. territory and 49 countries, will once again pursue their studies with the focused guidance of our renowned professional faculty. DAVID RHODES President August 2020 2 SVA HANDBOOK THE COLLEGE Board of Directors 4 Accreditation 4 SVA Mission Statement 4 SVA Core Values 4 History of SVA 5 Academic Freedom 6 First Amendment Rights 6 SVA Student Profile 7 SVA.EDU 3 BOARD OF DIRECTORS The Interior Design program leading to the Brian Palmer Bachelor of Fine Arts in Interior Design is ac- Joseph F. Patterson credited by the Council for Interior Design Anthony P. Rhodes Accreditation (accredit-id.org), 206 Grand- David Rhodes ville Avenue, Suite 350, Grand Rapids, MI Lawrence Rodman 49503-4014.
    [Show full text]
  • Claes-Göran Holmberg
    fLaMMan claes-Göran holmberg Precursors swedish avant-garde groups were very late in founding their own magazines. in france and Germany, little magazines had been pub- lished continuously from the romantic era onwards. a magazine was an ideal platform for the consolidation of a new movement in its formative phase. it was a collective thrust at the heart of the enemy: the older generation, the academies, the traditionalists. By showing a united front (through programmatic declarations, manifestos, es- says etc.) you assured the public that you were to be reckoned with. almost every new artist group or current has tried to create a mag- azine to define and promote itself. the first swedish little magazine to embrace the symbolist and decadent movements of fin-de-siècle europe was Med pensel och penna (With paintbrush and pen, 1904-1905), published in Uppsala by the society of “Les quatres diables”, a group of young poets and students engaged in aestheticism and Baudelaire adulation. Mem- bers were the poet and student in slavic languages sigurd agrell (1881-1937), the student and later professor of art history harald Brising (1881-1918), the student of philosophy and later professor of psychology John Landquist (1881-1974), and the author sven Lidman (1882-1960); the poet sigfrid siwertz (1882-1970) also joined the group later. the magazine did not leave any great impact on swedish literature but it helped to spread the Jugend style of illu- stration, the contemporary love-hate relationship with the city and the celebration of the intoxicating powers of beauty and deca- dence.
    [Show full text]
  • Conceptual Art: a Critical Anthology
    Conceptual Art: A Critical Anthology Alexander Alberro Blake Stimson, Editors The MIT Press conceptual art conceptual art: a critical anthology edited by alexander alberro and blake stimson the MIT press • cambridge, massachusetts • london, england ᭧1999 Massachusetts Institute of Technology All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means (including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval)without permission in writing from the publisher. This book was set in Adobe Garamond and Trade Gothic by Graphic Composition, Inc. and was printed and bound in the United States of America. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Conceptual art : a critical anthology / edited by Alexander Alberro and Blake Stimson. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-262-01173-5 (hc : alk. paper) 1. Conceptual art. I. Alberro, Alexander. II. Stimson, Blake. N6494.C63C597 1999 700—dc21 98-52388 CIP contents ILLUSTRATIONS xii PREFACE xiv Alexander Alberro, Reconsidering Conceptual Art, 1966–1977 xvi Blake Stimson, The Promise of Conceptual Art xxxviii I 1966–1967 Eduardo Costa, Rau´ l Escari, Roberto Jacoby, A Media Art (Manifesto) 2 Christine Kozlov, Compositions for Audio Structures 6 He´lio Oiticica, Position and Program 8 Sol LeWitt, Paragraphs on Conceptual Art 12 Sigmund Bode, Excerpt from Placement as Language (1928) 18 Mel Bochner, The Serial Attitude 22 Daniel Buren, Olivier Mosset, Michel Parmentier, Niele Toroni, Statement 28 Michel Claura, Buren, Mosset, Toroni or Anybody 30 Michael Baldwin, Remarks on Air-Conditioning: An Extravaganza of Blandness 32 Adrian Piper, A Defense of the “Conceptual” Process in Art 36 He´lio Oiticica, General Scheme of the New Objectivity 40 II 1968 Lucy R.
    [Show full text]
  • 2016–2018 Exhibition Calendar Current As of November 2016
    2016–2018 Exhibition Calendar Current as of November 2016. Information is subject to change. For a listing of all exhibitions and installations, please visit www.lacma.org The Serial Impulse at Toba Khedoori John McLaughlin Paintings: Total Abstraction Renaissance and Reformation: Gemini G.E.L. German Art in the Age of Dürer and Cranach UPCOMING EXHIBITIONS Moholy-Nagy: Future Present February 12–June 18, 2017 The first comprehensive retrospective of the work of László Moholy-Nagy (1895–1946) in the United States in nearly 50 years, this long overdue presentation reveals a utopian artist who believed that art could work hand-in-hand with technology for the betterment of humanity. Moholy-Nagy: Future Present examines the career of this pioneering painter, photographer, sculptor, and filmmaker as well as graphic, exhibition, and stage designer, who was also an influential teacher at the Bauhaus, a prolific writer, and later the founder of Chicago’s Institute of Design. The exhibition includes more than 250 works in all media from public and private collections across Europe and the United States, some of which have never before been shown publicly in the U.S. Also on display is a large-scale installation, Room of the Present, a contemporary construction of an exhibition space originally conceived by Moholy-Nagy in 1930. Though never realized during his lifetime, the Room of the Present illustrates Moholy’s belief in the power of images and various means by which to disseminate them—a highly relevant paradigm in today’s constantly shifting and evolving technological world. Curators: Carol S. Eliel, Modern Art, LACMA; Karole P.B.
    [Show full text]
  • NGA | 2017 Annual Report
    N A TIO NAL G ALL E R Y O F A R T 2017 ANNUAL REPORT ART & EDUCATION W. Russell G. Byers Jr. Board of Trustees COMMITTEE Buffy Cafritz (as of September 30, 2017) Frederick W. Beinecke Calvin Cafritz Chairman Leo A. Daly III Earl A. Powell III Louisa Duemling Mitchell P. Rales Aaron Fleischman Sharon P. Rockefeller Juliet C. Folger David M. Rubenstein Marina Kellen French Andrew M. Saul Whitney Ganz Sarah M. Gewirz FINANCE COMMITTEE Lenore Greenberg Mitchell P. Rales Rose Ellen Greene Chairman Andrew S. Gundlach Steven T. Mnuchin Secretary of the Treasury Jane M. Hamilton Richard C. Hedreen Frederick W. Beinecke Sharon P. Rockefeller Frederick W. Beinecke Sharon P. Rockefeller Helen Lee Henderson Chairman President David M. Rubenstein Kasper Andrew M. Saul Mark J. Kington Kyle J. Krause David W. Laughlin AUDIT COMMITTEE Reid V. MacDonald Andrew M. Saul Chairman Jacqueline B. Mars Frederick W. Beinecke Robert B. Menschel Mitchell P. Rales Constance J. Milstein Sharon P. Rockefeller John G. Pappajohn Sally Engelhard Pingree David M. Rubenstein Mitchell P. Rales David M. Rubenstein Tony Podesta William A. Prezant TRUSTEES EMERITI Diana C. Prince Julian Ganz, Jr. Robert M. Rosenthal Alexander M. Laughlin Hilary Geary Ross David O. Maxwell Roger W. Sant Victoria P. Sant B. Francis Saul II John Wilmerding Thomas A. Saunders III Fern M. Schad EXECUTIVE OFFICERS Leonard L. Silverstein Frederick W. Beinecke Albert H. Small President Andrew M. Saul John G. Roberts Jr. Michelle Smith Chief Justice of the Earl A. Powell III United States Director Benjamin F. Stapleton III Franklin Kelly Luther M.
    [Show full text]
  • Combination Unlock: SM
    Combination unLock: SM Unlock bingos from COMMON 2 & 3-LETTER COMBOS. 7s/8s starting, containing, ending (if any). Plurals / conjugations not listed separately. compiled by Jacob Cohen, Asheville Scrabble Club 7s start SM- SMACKED ACDEKMS SMACK, to strike sharply [v] SMACKER ACEKMRS one that smacks (to strike sharply) [n -S] SMALLER AELLMRS SMALL, of limited size or quantity [adj] SMALTOS ALMOSST SMALTO, colored glass used in mosaics [n] SMARAGD AADGMRS emerald (green gem) [n -S] SMARMED ADEMMRS SMARM, to use excessive flattery to obtain favors [v] SMARTED ADEMRST SMART, to cause sharp, stinging pain [v] SMARTEN AEMNRST to improve in appearance [v -ED, -ING, -S] SMARTER AEMRRST SMART, characterized by mental acuity [adj] SMARTIE AEIMRST smarty (obnoxiously conceited person) [n -S] SMARTLY ALMRSTY in smart (characterized by mental acuity) manner [adv] SMASHED ADEHMSS SMASH, to shatter violently [v] SMASHER AEHMRSS one that smashes (to shatter violently) [n -S] SMASHES AEHMSSS SMASH, to shatter violently [v] SMASHUP AHMPSSU collision of motor vehicles [n -S] SMATTER AEMRSTT to speak with little knowledge [v -ED, ING, -S] SMEARED ADEEMRS SMEAR, to spread with sticky, greasy, or dirty substance [v] SMEARER AEEMRRS one that smears (to spread with sticky, greasy, or dirty substance) [n -S] SMECTIC CCEIMST pertaining to phase of liquid crystal [adj] SMEDDUM DDEMMSU ground malt powder [n -S] SMEEKED DEEEKMS SMEEK, to smoke (to emit smoke (gaseous product of burning materials)) [v] SMEGMAS AEGMMSS SMEGMA, sebum (fatty matter secreted by certain
    [Show full text]
  • William Blake, Electric Thinking, Holism, and the New Art: Blake Helps the Toronto School Unlock the Seals to the Great Code; Or Reconnecting R
    Vol 1 No 2 (Autumn 2020) Online: jps.library.utoronto.ca/index.php/nexj Visit our WebBlog: newexplorations.net William Blake, Electric Thinking, Holism, and The New Art: Blake Helps the Toronto School Unlock the Seals to the Great Code; or Reconnecting R. Bruce Elder—Professor Emeritus Ryerson University—[email protected] In his last public lecture on Blake, presented in 1987 in London, England, Northrop Frye situated the poet’s formidable achievement in the context of Western mythology: To have turned a metaphorical cosmos eighteen centuries old upside down in a few poems, and provided the basis for a structure that practically every major thinker for the next century would build on, was one of the most colossal imaginative feats in the history of human culture. The only drawback, of course, was that no one knew Blake had done it: in fact Blake hardly realized he had done it either. For some fifty years, Frye devoted significant efforts to discerning the deep structure of Blake’s universe and the underlying forces that give rise to it. In Anatomy of Criticism, he generalized the approach he developed while studying Blake: he decided to investigate literature as an “order of words” with an assumed coherence and set out to crack the great code the gives rise to its recurrent patterns. The investigation of patterns in literature (or in art history) is what Frye believes the critical method to be: one identifies basic elements and notes patterns in their reoccurrence, reorganization, transformation, and interaction. Marshall McLuhan, Frye’s colleague in the Department of English at the University of Toronto, also believed that the study of media is a search of patterns.
    [Show full text]
  • Marianne Stockebrand Respect Nature Was of the Highest Order
    This talk was first given in the German original in Septem- ber 2011 at the Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich, then in its English translation in Marfa on May 12, 2012, and is here pub- lished in a slightly edited version. To speak of “The Whole Judd” is of course an incredible decla- ration and one that can only be justified as a headline. Never- theless, I intend to move beyond the stereotype of the “artist of boxes” in order to outline a more complex figure. Donald Judd was highly productive, and in many diferent areas. He started out as a painter, moved on to three-dimen- sional objects, made prints throughout his life, drew prolifi- cally, wrote exhibition reviews and essays, practiced architec- ture (although he didn’t call himself an architect because he didn’t have a license) and renovated first his own building in New York and subsequently his residence in Marfa, Texas, and finally founded a museum—the Chinati Foundation—also in Marfa. In addition to the completed architectural projects there are a large number of unrealized ones that exist only in the form of sketches and plans. He designed furniture, which he considered part of his architecture. The first pieces were made purely for personal use because nothing suitable was available for purchase in West Texas; later the range of designs was expanded to include tableware, textiles, jewelry, and so on. Finally, Judd also ranched, and in this capacity served as a guardian of the landscape. He purchased large parcels of land not far from Marfa and kept only a small number of cattle because the land had been overgrazed and needed to rest.
    [Show full text]
  • 1 Life Between Two Panels Soviet Nonconformism in the Cold War Era
    Life Between Two Panels Soviet Nonconformism in the Cold War Era DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By Clinton J. Buhler, M.A. Graduate Program in History of Art * * * * * The Ohio State University 2013 Dissertation Committee: Dr. Myroslava M. Mudrak, Advisor Dr. Kris Paulsen Dr. Jessie Labov Dr. Aron Vinegar 1 Copyright by Clinton J. Buhler 2013 2 Abstract Beneath the façade of total conformity in the Soviet Union, a dynamic underground community of artists and intellectuals worked in forced isolation. Rejecting the mandates of state-sanctioned Socialist Realist art, these dissident artists pursued diverse creative directions in their private practice. When they attempted to display their work publicly in 1974, the carefully crafted façade of Soviet society cracked, and the West became aware of a politically subversive undercurrent in Soviet cultural life. Responding to the international condemnation of the censorship, Soviet officials allowed and encouraged the emigration of the nonconformist artists to the West. This dissertation analyzes the foundation and growth of the nonconformist artistic movement in the Soviet Union, focusing on a key group of artists who reached artistic maturity in the Brezhnev era and began forging connections in the West. The first two chapters of the dissertation center on works that were, by and large, produced before emigration to the West. In particular, I explore the growing awareness of artists like Oleg Vassiliev of their native artistic heritage, especially the work of Russian avant-garde artists like Kazimir Malevich. I look at how Vassiliev, in a search for an alternative form of expression to the mandated form of art, took up the legacy of nineteenth-century Realism, avant-garde abstraction, and Socialist Realism.
    [Show full text]