features
A response from Keith Seward
To the "newly appointed conceptualart.org critic" who wrote "Rush -- The Net Art Gold Rush" --
Someone pointed me to your article at http://www.conceptualart.org/features/rush/index.html, in which you discuss at length a piece I wrote for Parkett called "Frankenstein in Paradise." I really have no bone to pick with your analysis, though I would like just to respond to two small points in your text.
First, you write:
"...The art moved, but the conversation didn«t, and we are left with the unanswered question of 'why are we reading this argument in response to that artist?' It is a forty-year-old idea repeated to test its validity in a contemporary context. This is sadly not a reflection on Jeff Koons«s art, since the article doesn«t quote a single word from the artist or one of over a dozen people from his studio. It is a reflection of what is considered important in a contemporary assessment of art."
Although "Frankenstein in Paradise" did not quote a single word from the artist or his assistants, it was not written until after I had visited the studio several times to view work in progress. These visits included one particularly involved discussion with Koons -- upwards of several hours, if I recall correctly -- in which the artist described at length his intentions in creating the works in the "Celebration" series.
Leaving aside the old debate about the validity of relying on artistic intent as the "meaning" of a work, I would just like to point out that I consciously modeled "Frankenstein in Paradise" on concepts described to me by Koons himself in the course of this conversation. Certainly I expanded on these concepts, understood or misunderstood them in my own way, but at the same time I did feel as though the essence of the text came directly from the artist himself. If I did not quote Koons directly, it was purely for stylistic reasons (also, since the piece was not intended to be an interview, I had not taped my conversations with Koons and thus did not want to misquote him).
In short, although "Frankenstein in Paradise" did not quote Koons, it drew on my interactions with him, and in this regard I considered the text highly empirical. (I mention this not to "refute" your arguments, but simply to underscore that, in this regard, my text may not have been as "typical" as you make it out to be. It was not written in an ivory tower.)
Second, you write:
"The Koons review in Parkett is relevant for one final reason: Keith Seward is among a new breed of well-paid art theorists and critics in the publishing world of art (magazines, anthologies, etc.). He is a graphic designer and interactive CD producer. It is particularly interesting to view how the world of commercial interactivity with the computer is cultivated by the art-world to play an active role in the public«s perception of future of artistic development. It is in the Net Artist«s best interest to examine their opinions, what influences their writing, and what resources they cite to support their claims of what is and is not to be understood as important in contemporary art -- specifically, in the future of Net Art."
When I first got involved in writing for-hire art criticism, an old hand at it said to me: "What in the world would you want to do this for? You have a trust fund or something?" Personally I did not have a trust fund, and in the five years or so in which I actively published art criticism, I don't think I ever met a well-paid critic. It's possible I wasn't running in the right circles, but by and large it's a thankless job unless you care enough about it to get your rewards from non-monetary sources.
In short, although Parkett is among the better-paying art magazines, I would hardly say that I was "well-paid" as an art critic -- and if there is a class of "well-paid" art critics outside the few people who work for national publications such as Time or the NY Times, it never included me.
On the other hand, the "particularly interesting" thing about the nexus between art, money, and computers, is that one can earn more in a week as a computer programmer or graphic designer than an art critic can make in a good year. But the money here, by and large, flows back down to the art world not in the form of dilettante critics but in the form of dot-com millionaires buying art.
Also, I've often wondered how much of a drain this imposes on the art world -- how many would-be artists have turned into computer professionals simply because of the money. You can't go anywhere in Silicon Alley without meeting someone whose "real thing" is to be in a band, or to exhibit at a gallery, or whatever. There is a new hybrid type out there, or perhaps two hybrid types. There are really talented computer professionals who abandon art to become well-paid designers, and there are artists who tend to dabble in technology (usually unsuccessfully, in my opinion, since technology requires expertise and is thus difficult for the mere dabbler).
Finally, on a personal note I might mention that, whatever type of hybrid I may myself be, I have been straddling this fence between art and technology for almost ten years now. At the same time as I was writing about art, mostly painting and sculpture, I was simultaneously working as an artist in a new medium, producing a highly acclaimed series of CD-ROMs called BLAM!. And the company I founded last year, Supervert 32C Inc., still rides this seesaw -- if you haven't already, you may want to check out its web site at http://www.supervert.com. The Koons text is reproduced there in its entirety, so you may want to link your own text to it.
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Keith Seward Supervert: http://www.supervert.com