Much ado about nothing

Some good things come in small packages but in this case the quantity reflects the quality. Readers would be well advised to look at Herbert Gans, Peter Swirski, Lawrence Levine, and Noel Carroll for illuminating books about contemporary art.

Toil and trouble?

Strictly speaking this small text did not offer a very short introduction to contemporary art. What this small text does offer is - some - introduction to contemporary art - and - Julian Stallabrass' view on the economic and political nature of contemporary art, the necessary "evils" of its relationship to fashion and money, and current trends in the art world. The blurb on the inside cover of the text is more accurate: "What is contemporary about contemporary art? What effect do politics and big business have on art? And who really runs the art world? ...an exploration of the global art scene".

This is a well written and referenced work with biting but not bitter insights that struck this reader as more of a polemic investigation rather than an investigation into the nature of contemporary art. Once that agenda is understood, the reader is drawn to gaze through Stallabrass' intense eyeglass into the art world system as it stands presently, with contemporary art examined almost as a trumpeted diversity of the globalized art world may conceal other, newer uniformities." (p49)

Stallabrass discusses contemporary art and makes some key observations about how artists address consumerism, mass production, and commodification in chapter three "Consuming culture".

"Yet generally in the 1990s consumerist spectacle - suitably spun for art-world-taste - prevailed over critical thinking about the interrelationship between production and consumption." (p69).

its main use - is being sullied matter are indulged in; success generally comes swiftly, or not at all." (p134/5)

What would extend this discussion would be to look into what makes this tense relationship between those with the money to fund art and those that create it today any different to the time of the Medici. Is it simply that the idealism and rhetoric in notions of globalisation (whether economic or artistic) really does not address the power relationships between those with the advantage and those without and what happens when that power imbalance is overlooked (and a colonising or homogenising effect occurs)? Is it that the wave of mass culture and production (in material and intangible) form is really going to put notions of exclusive and rarity to test in the art world, and if so, is that necessarily going to diminish or transform art (in Western terms)? If that is the case, is there reason to revisit ideas of the power (and freedom) to challenge (as art has in the past) and the value and potency of that?

Stallabrass' text highlights the cosiness (and attendant sacrifices of expression) and the dangers (tiredness and impotency) of too close an alignment with two of society's more powerful estates. This text is not exactly controversial in its criticism, but it is definitely thought-provoking in its insights and the issues its raises.

Young artists beware!

This is an excellent little book! Not much of an introduction as it assumes quite a lot of previous knowledge of the field; but an eye-opening Marxist analysis of the mechanics and machinations of the art world and of its myriad connections with the larger economic and political structures within which it thrives or dies.

For example the paragraph that should be carved on the lintels of all art schools doors: "...the overall nature of the arts economy is generally disavowed informed about their prospects for success, are prone to taking risks, are poor but come from wealthy backgrounds... and tend to subsidize their art-making out of other earnings. These features... cause the art world to be permanently over-crowded, making the poverty of artists a structural feature."

Stallabrass discusses how the multi-cultural fashion in the arts serves (apart from a few third-world artists) the ideological campaign of the Neo-Liberal economy and the multi-national corporations. He touches on how academe creates one kind of artist while the market creates another. Both types are adapted to their niches in the economic structure and neither enjoys the freedom artists are generally assumed to gain in exchange for their frustration and poverty.

A fascinating and eye-opening read.