The Bullshit Artists | The New York Observer
This piece on bullshitting in the art world is hilarious and dead on: “Perhaps the issue is that the threshold for what qualifies as an idea in the art world is just too low.” Don’t miss the closing. It’s killer.
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I know it’s fish-in-a-barrel fun to bust on nonsensical art jargon spewers, but absolutely none of the actual quotes in that article get even close to being hard to understand.
Opaque language and sloppy thinking are not the same thing.
I know it’s fish-in-a-barrel fun to bust on nonsensical art jargon spewers, but absolutely none of the actual quotes in that article get even close to being hard to understand.
Opaque language and sloppy thinking are not the same thing.
The quotes in the article weren’t supposed to be hard to understand! Unless you’re talking about the quotes from the Whitney catalog and Gormley’s Times interview, which area not “hard to understand” but abstract to the point of meaninglessness.
The quotes in the article weren’t supposed to be hard to understand! Unless you’re talking about the quotes from the Whitney catalog and Gormley’s Times interview, which area not “hard to understand” but abstract to the point of meaninglessness.
In fairness, I think the link description might lead one to think that it’s about art speak as opposed to a piece that’s calling bullshit on the art world.
In fairness, I think the link description might lead one to think that it’s about art speak as opposed to a piece that’s calling bullshit on the art world.
uh-uh, the article itself doesn’t get around to defining bullshit–or giving an actual example of it–until the Gormley quote.
Far be it for me to defend Gormley, who even Carol Vogel flags as a “smooth talker.” But as tasty as Leon’s line about a low threshold is, I can’t see how it’s possible to judge Gormley’s statement without lining it up against the artwork itself. In which case, it seems to do what he says. If the piece itself is glib–by literally tricking people into looking, wondering, and then realizing it’s not a naked jumper, just a bunch of statues–then the problem is the work, not the bullshit, and not the low bar.
But the entire article until that point is Rob Storr and Mas Gioni talking about people throwing out intellectual theories and philosophical jargon without thinking or knowing what they’re saying. It’s Storr’s [uncredited] lament from Frieze a couple of months ago, that everyone gets practice and praxis mixed up. OR it’s a work by Barbara Kruger, an artist who trafficks in BS and cliche, who refuses to play along.
It still all seems like apples and oranges to me.
uh-uh, the article itself doesn’t get around to defining bullshit–or giving an actual example of it–until the Gormley quote.
Far be it for me to defend Gormley, who even Carol Vogel flags as a “smooth talker.” But as tasty as Leon’s line about a low threshold is, I can’t see how it’s possible to judge Gormley’s statement without lining it up against the artwork itself. In which case, it seems to do what he says. If the piece itself is glib–by literally tricking people into looking, wondering, and then realizing it’s not a naked jumper, just a bunch of statues–then the problem is the work, not the bullshit, and not the low bar.
But the entire article until that point is Rob Storr and Mas Gioni talking about people throwing out intellectual theories and philosophical jargon without thinking or knowing what they’re saying. It’s Storr’s [uncredited] lament from Frieze a couple of months ago, that everyone gets practice and praxis mixed up. OR it’s a work by Barbara Kruger, an artist who trafficks in BS and cliche, who refuses to play along.
It still all seems like apples and oranges to me.
I still don’t understand the issue here. Is it that you think Neyfakh’s bullshit net is too large? I really don’t see a problem with producing a survey of the various kinds of bullshit in the art world.
It’s Barbara Kruger unwillingness to discuss her intent, it’s people who come up with smart ideas that don’t mean anything, it’s ideas and art speak that are utterly meaningless.
I suppose I see your point visa vi Gormley’s work, but I can’t help but think it’s a little nit picky. It’s okay to highlight meaningless art speak without the work if the point is to highlight meaningless art speak. Even if the work was brilliant, “questioning both the status of art and the nature of our built environment” qualifies as bullshit.
I still don’t understand the issue here. Is it that you think Neyfakh’s bullshit net is too large? I really don’t see a problem with producing a survey of the various kinds of bullshit in the art world.
It’s Barbara Kruger unwillingness to discuss her intent, it’s people who come up with smart ideas that don’t mean anything, it’s ideas and art speak that are utterly meaningless.
I suppose I see your point visa vi Gormley’s work, but I can’t help but think it’s a little nit picky. It’s okay to highlight meaningless art speak without the work if the point is to highlight meaningless art speak. Even if the work was brilliant, “questioning both the status of art and the nature of our built environment” qualifies as bullshit.
I’m sure I’m nit picky, but I don’t think this is a survey; it’s two unrelated things.
1. What artists say to reporters.
Kruger makes art about an artist spewing bullshit while being interviewed by a journalist, and gallerygoers all laugh at it. Surprisingly, the artist refuses to speak with a journalist about her artwork.
Gormley’s quote was delivered to/through Carol Vogel, who called the artist out as a “smooth talker,” NYT-speak for bullshit artist.
2. What non-curators and non-academics say to curators and academics.
Here, Storr is in a different league altogether. And he’s already addressed this very topic [clueless misuse of theoretical language] in print.
And I like Gioni and think his comments are apt as far as they go, but I would bet this entire bullshit story could have been written using quotes from his critical/theoretical underpinnings of the Urs Fischer show. [Or have we already forgotten “he treats reality as if it were software”?]
But who’s to blame there? Do we all want to sound like Dave Hickey? I was blown away by Andrea Fraser’s dismantling of Buchloh’s interpretation of Michael Asher, but if I try to recap it, I guarantee I will sound like the art world’s most hapless bullshitter.
So it boils down to the difference between NYT/NYO and Artforum/October. This surprises who, exactly?
I’m sure I’m nit picky, but I don’t think this is a survey; it’s two unrelated things.
1. What artists say to reporters.
Kruger makes art about an artist spewing bullshit while being interviewed by a journalist, and gallerygoers all laugh at it. Surprisingly, the artist refuses to speak with a journalist about her artwork.
Gormley’s quote was delivered to/through Carol Vogel, who called the artist out as a “smooth talker,” NYT-speak for bullshit artist.
2. What non-curators and non-academics say to curators and academics.
Here, Storr is in a different league altogether. And he’s already addressed this very topic [clueless misuse of theoretical language] in print.
And I like Gioni and think his comments are apt as far as they go, but I would bet this entire bullshit story could have been written using quotes from his critical/theoretical underpinnings of the Urs Fischer show. [Or have we already forgotten “he treats reality as if it were software”?]
But who’s to blame there? Do we all want to sound like Dave Hickey? I was blown away by Andrea Fraser’s dismantling of Buchloh’s interpretation of Michael Asher, but if I try to recap it, I guarantee I will sound like the art world’s most hapless bullshitter.
So it boils down to the difference between NYT/NYO and Artforum/October. This surprises who, exactly?
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