it was only a few decades ago that the pulse of what was going on in the ‘art world’ was marked by seasonal trends in New York’s Soho - grand-slam, celebrity artists - Minimalism, Earthworks, Neo-Expressionism, Graffiti, Neo Geo - Serra, Schnabel, Salle, Kiefer, Scharf, Haring - off West Broadway, and off-off West Broadway, [Tribeca, Alphabet City, Times Square, Union Square, Noho, and Chelsea] etc.
the continuity of European Art History was revived and proliferated in New York after the art centers’ displacement during WWII - infused with new talent, discourse, media, and new money - it flourished and became not only the harbinger of intellectual and cultural change, but more importantly for America at that time, [with her predisposition for capitalism and grandiosity] - it became the repository for an over-productive liberal arts educational system that continued to lower standards for its’ own survival, and became a barometer for real estate development speculators interested in high-yield revitalization of America’s urban blight ... just follow the art ...
the Art Center flourished and reproduced itself faster than a super virus; migrating and adapting to every nuance of its host’s environment with the eventual result being ‘pluralism’ - a terminal diagnosis describing the entropy of unfocused, and unprincipled over-indulgence resulting in banal gentrification of a tradition of ideals in the Arts - grass-roots art meccas popped up everywhere under the guise of co-ops and 501 C3’s, providing culturing for everyone - and soon it became difficult to determine where the center was and what was the prevailing urgency ...
or as Yeats describes; “things fall apart; the centre can not hold”...
until of course, the advent of the personal computer; which coagulated narcissism in the form of worldwide entanglements that provided immediate gratifications and de-personalized socialization - and then, personal domains based on branding and misinformation rather than substance ...
soon, everyone was an artist or celebrity of some sort ...
the next ‘big thing’ could be found anywhere - everywhere, and the only necessary validation was repetition, sales, and exposure comparable to the numbers advertised on fast food marquis’
and what would once require the squandering of trust funds, inheritances, and government entitlement programs for involvement in the ‘art centers’, could now be accomplished with pre-packaged, media savvy, product development and placement for global consumption or targeted audiences ...
but wait a minute, there seem to be more ‘artists’ [and lawyers] now, than ever existed in the history of the world - at least by art historical records - could it be that we’re actually living in an unprecedented period of world-wide cultural enlightenment or did we miscalculate every brick layers genius and significance in the building of the pyramids ...
woops, back up to pre-pluralism - and the art dealing ‘authorities’ with their newly acquired art history - or even law degrees, who were able to fast-track careers with v.i.p. perks to an unsuspecting, and previously disenfranchised pool of investors with all the finesse and expertise of junk-bond brokers - and let us not to forget the attractive young interns of upwardly mobile fortune 500 companies who made off with client and mailing lists to lay the foundations for their own house of cards with newly graduated Ivy League artists who probably attended some of the same frat parties as the soon-to-be president, G.W.Bush ...
ahhh - these are the days that Andy Warhol dreamed of while marketing his career change from Madison Avenue advertiser to Main Street’s resurrection of art savior to all - the transfiguration from Bergdorf & Goodman to Walmart ... from Da Vinci and the ideals he propagated to Jeff Koons’ inflatables ...
theses are the good old days, but you have to wonder - where have all the 'real artists' gone, the art, the music - could the continuity of centuries of tradition and ideals become so diluted by manufactured inventions in fifty years that we’ve stopped looking for art, or are we still too dependent on where Madison Avenue directs our attention ...
it’s so un-cool to not tolerate banality - or search for the good in it ...
i think this is about to become a series of off-the-cuff entries that addresses some distresses amid the arts ...
p.s. I wrote this after reading a short article on Dr. Albert Barnes, inventor and art collector from PA - years ago i met one of his associates who told me about one of his 'art quest' trips to Paris before WWII ...
he visited Giacometti's studio and discussed some of the work being produced by other artists, who seemed to be impressed with a fellow name Soutine - but no one knew how to find him - eventually, after days of inquiry Dr. Barnes located the artist and purchased some of his paintings - the artist packed the paintings, took the profits, bought a fur coat for his girlfriend, and took a cab to Provence ... the rest is history ...
