Recently, Mel Jacobson, moderator of the CLAYART discussion group and a follower of the e.e. cummings school of typography, posted a long piece to the group which started with some of his Calligrapher friends discussing the relationship between calligraphy and art, between how they were percieved and how "artists" are being identified. He ended this with:
same thing we see in clay. not good pots, not very good 3d art. caught in the middle. the training in skill is poor, and no training in art. makes for a sorry mess. but, thank god for typeset. they can tell us all about it on the wall. paragraph after paragraph. the story of their lives. illustrated wall stories.
"anyway. it is what i am sorting out right now. i have no perfect answers. should make a good discussion for clayart. i just don't want to be embarrassed because i have skill, and years of knowledge. it seems that is what we should all strive for.
don't ever want to take away the right for anyone to do art, do three dee expression. it just always smacks me as arrogant when untrained, unskilled folks think they can do art and show it without paying dues."
Calligraphy in the United States is often interpreted as merely a craft required for the creation of fancy presentation documents. In Japan, it is an art form. The more inventive "calligraphers" such as Inoue Yuichi have always had difficulty with acceptance by the establishment, often forming new support organizations. Inoue made his living as a High School teacher.
At the most extreme, Kitaoji Rosanjin basically closed his calligraphy shop in Tokyo and eventually became on of the great potters of 20th Century Japan. The overglaze decoration Rosanjin used on some pots is the only demonstration needed for the need to develop basic skills. Rosanjin was also highly critical of the stifling, uninventive, dead-to-the-senses calligraphic establishment of his day.
Another thread in the responses is that "rules exist to be broken". There is a sense in that the greatest of artist have often (but not always) been innovators. Another sense of greatness comes when the "artist" represents the culmination of a great tradition. Beethoven was an innovator out of necessity. After a short period of study with Franz Joseph Hayden, he found that the old man no longer had anything to teach him. Still, Beethoven's first piano concerto lacks innovation. However, Beethoven's expressive needs could not be contained in the strict formality of Hayden's forms and, beginning with the 3rd Symphony, he unleashed a wave of innovation that took a generation to absorb.
The question is one of what drives innovation. Intentionally breaking the rules, satisfying our curiosity about "what would happen if..." to my mind belongs in the lab, not in our works. Those things that "work" in the lab, that lead to new ways of expression will inevitably make their way into our work. However, the marketing of art might lead one to a different conclusion. The galleries need a reason to attract buyers and, in our technology aware society, the label innovative is almost required for marketing success in contemporary art. It is not a measure of value. The overly hyped 1980's art of Julian Schnable, though not unvalued, is worth far less today than it once sold for. And, when one looks at Schnable's methods, it makes more sense that he has proved far more creative in a collaborative media, directing award winning movies, most notably "Before Night Falls".
Another theme expressed by some is the old "art is in the eye of the beholder" excuse. This brings up some very interesting problems including the extent to which the beholder's eye can be trained. Originally, Vincent van Gogh's work was considered ugly and he was almost never able to sell it into the art market of his day. Now, it is highly valued and widely acclaimed. Is this just because we have educated out eye to accept van Gogh's work as GREAT ART?
I think that we have to acknowledge that there is an art industry, critics, galleries, collectors, museums and publishers, that is always trying to tell the public what ART IS. In a culture that values developing a future more than understanding a past, this leads to projects such as the Public Broadcasting System's Art in the 21st Century. While there is much to be admired in that program, it begins with the assumption that art can be explained and explains art in terms of CONTENT. Then the categories that they use have to do with content, not media. Across two seasons (2001, 2003) they have defined are as being concerned with: place, spirituality, identity, consumption, narrative, loss & desire, time, humor.
Art in the 21st Century is a legitimate attempt to categorize and explain the products of contemporary artists to a public that needs some degree of education, a public that often fails to "get" why something so mundane is considered ART. What they totally miss is the very thing that drives many ceramic artists to work with clay, and that is the overwhelming attraction to the medium itself.
The very idea that there is enjoyment in working with clay is not something the developers of ART21 could use to justify the creation of a body of work. It does not matter much what motivation a person has, what drives them to continue working, or the content. It may be that creation is therapy. It may be a way to escape from a world that one can not control into a world where one has the chance to control MOST of what happens. What does ultimately matter is the quality of what one does. It was not the motivation of the Sikyatki potters that attracted Nampeyo and led to revival of Hopi pottery in the 20th Century. It was the quality of their work. The same can be said for Kaneshige's revival of Bizen pottery or Arakawa's revival of Mino-Seto styles in Japan.
It may also be that the perfect medium for the CONTENT of contemporary art is the critical essay.
Posted by at August 18, 2004 12:02 PM