Catherine David and Irit Rogoff - “In Conversation”

Catherine David and Irit Rogoff, “In Conversation”, in Claire Doherty ed., From Studio to Situation, London: Black Dog Publishing, 2004, pp.82-89

Catherine David has worked since 2002 as director of the Witte de With Centre for Contemporary Art in Rotterdam. She’s also worked as a curator at the National Museum of Modern Art, Paris. Her exhibitions since the nineties have examined art-practice in relation to contemporary socio-political issues.

Irit Rogoff is a theorist and curator who writes on the critical, the political, and contemporary arts practices. Rogoff is a professor at Goldsmiths College, London University, in the department of Visual Cultures, which she founded in 2002.

There’s a notion of cultural specificity that runs through the text, the idea that knowledge of a culture’s history and customs is necessary to understand an artwork from that culture, or that the artwork needs to be viewed in its place of creation to successfully communicate the intensions driving the work.

An individual’s understanding of a representation will differ depending on the individual’s cultural understanding of that being represented. Irit Rogoff states that some elements of cultural experience or “rapport” effect an individual’s perception and interpretation of an artwork, “In rapport we have all kinds of conceits, we have all kinds of illusions. We have a notion of understanding. We have a notion of insight. There is a kind of empathy that is fore-grounded, there’s a notion of investigation.”[1]

Reuben Paterson‘s 2004 exhibition ‘Open for Interpretation’, deals with an understanding of interpretation. Paterson is influenced by “visual, lived and philosophical traditions of his Maori ancestors”, “‘Open to Interpretation’ is a conduit to ask where do such foundations of knowing come from?”[2] His work explores an understanding of Maori culture through the use of appropriated traditional Maori design, translated through the medium of glitter, which “suggest the assured defiance of Maori culture in the face of loss. But they also emit an air of melancholy”.[3]

Although it may be necessary to understand the cultural context of an artwork before completely understanding the intended concept projected by the work, I believe the interpretation of an artwork is always in the eye of the viewer, as argued in Roland Barthes’s ‘Death of the Author’. Thus the interpretation of an artwork’s concept is a result of any individual’s personal interpretation, culturally aware or not.

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[1] Catherine David and Irit Rogoff. “In Conversation”, in Claire Doherty

ed., From Studio to Situation, London: Black Dog Publishing, 2004, pp.86

[2] http://www.reubenpaterson.com/press/R_PATERSON_Narcissus_Press.pdf pp.1 accessed 06/05/2010

[3] http://the-artists.org/artist/paterson-reuben accessed 06/05/2010

Cuauhtemoc Medina - “Contemp(t)orary: Eleven Theses”

Cuauhtemoc Medina, “contemp(t)orary: Eleven Theses”, e-flux journal, #2, 01/2010, accessed from http://www.e-flux.com/journal/view/103.

Cuauhtémoc Medina is an art critic, curator, and historian who lives and works in Mexico City. He holds a PhD in Art History and Theory from the University of Essex, UK. Medina is a researcher at the Instituto de Investigaciones Estéticas at the National University of Mexico.

Medina asks, ‘What is contemporary art?’ and suggests a coining of contemporary art as an art movement such as Modernism, which will eventually end. He states that there are specific characteristics to an artwork which makes it contemporary, for example, one of those characteristics is that the work must “demand a double reception”[1], a reception from the general public as well as a “sophisticated theoretical recuperation”.[2]

In ‘Under the Sign of Labour’, Sabeth Buchmann attempts to define Conceptual Art by stating “Conceptual art was successful in establishing the idea that instead of being measurable only in terms of the fact of material production, the form of art’s symbolic value should be equally open to calibration using scales of social productivity.” And “art as a form of communication.”[3] Here Buchmann is suggesting that Conceptual Art is defined by the symbolic communication or the concept driving the work, rather than being an object focused art form. Although, similar to Cuauhtémoc Medina’s attempt to define Contemporary Art as a movement, the defining terms are arguable and ambiguous.

Medina’s notion that the term ‘Contemporary Art’ will eventually define a genre seems understandable when regarding the earlier movement of Modernism, which referred to modern art at the time. But I think Contemporary Art will always refer to the art world at present. Medina’s statement that contemporary art must “demand a double reception”[4], a reception from the general public as well as a “sophisticated theoretical recuperation”[5], seems to contradict ‘Contemporary Art’ as a movement, the constantly changing nature of culture, which contemporary art responds to, ‘the general culture and sophisticated culture’, will enforce an ever changing definition of contemporary art and as a result, the term ‘Contemporary Art’ will continue to refer to art created in the present time.

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[1] Cuauhtemoc Medina, “contemp(t)orary: Eleven Theses”, e-flux journal, #2, 01/2010, accessed from http://www.e-flux.com/journal/view/103, 17/2/2010. Page 2.

[2] Cuauhtemoc Medina, “contemp(t)orary: Eleven Theses”, e-flux journal, #2, 01/2010, accessed from http://www.e-flux.com/journal/view/103, 17/2/2010. Page 2.

[3] Sabeth Buchmann “Under the Sign of Labor”. Page 179

[4] Cuauhtemoc Medina, “contemp(t)orary: Eleven Theses”, e-flux journal, #2, 01/2010, accessed from http://www.e-flux.com/journal/view/103, 17/2/2010. Page 2.

[5] Cuauhtemoc Medina, “contemp(t)orary: Eleven Theses”, e-flux journal, #2, 01/2010, accessed from http://www.e-flux.com/journal/view/103, 17/2/2010. Page 2.

Craig Garrett on Thomas Hirschhorn

Craig Garrett, “Thomas Hirschhorn: Philosophical Battery”. Flash Art no. 238, 2004: pg. 90-93

Written by Craig Garrett, the managing editor of Flash Art Magazine and art critic.

Thomas Hirschhorn is a Swiss artist known for his artworks that consist of constructing extremely saturated installations using common materials that he uses to offer a specific message, in and outside of galleries. He received the Marcel Duchamp prize in 2000/2001 and the Joseph Beuys prize in 2004.

Thomas Hirschhorn works within a territory where philosophy informs his artistic practice, his work is based on the notion that philosophy is art and that his work is the affirmation of philosophy as art, and not as an educative device. “I share with Marcus Steinweg (philosopher) the idea that philosophy is art.”[1] Hirschhorn accumulates and appropriates a mass amount of material that he feels acts as affirmation of philosophy as art, effectively communicating his adoration of philosophy as art.

James Turrell’s practice relates to Hirschhorn’s incorporation of philosophy, Turrell’s work “Third Breath” 2005 draws an influence from philosophy and cultural understandings of light. Light is projected from the sky into a darkened room, the phenomena of the outside world becomes the subject of Turrell’s work, making the viewer aware of the connection between the sky and the earth, the way which light moves, the subject of Turrell’s work is the Philosophy of light. “Light as the radiant power of the mind and the fluid of illumination. Romanticism idealised light as a metaphor for the infinite and for visionary power”[2]

Hirschhorn states that he wants to work as a fan in order to speak through his work. I understand his perspective as a practicing artist that is a fan of philosophy with an ambition to communicate and share this through his work. However I don’t see the need to act as a fan to be able to initiate a conversation of philosophy between the work and the audience members. I think that Hirschhorn’s work successfully acts as a means of initiating a conversation between the audience members without necessarily communicate his stance as a fan, rather than an artist dealing with philosophic issues. The work doesn’t just act as a representation of the artist’s adoration for philosophy alone.

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[1] Craig Garrett, “Thomas Hirschhorn: Philosophical Battery”. Flash Art no. 238, 2004: pg. 92

[2] James Turrell. Geometry of Light. Herausgegeben von. Essay by Ursula Sinnreich Page 21