Monday, 14 April 2008 - 3:06 PM EDT

I don't want to be a part of any "arts community" save a spontaneously self-organized one. 

If the best that Canadian "peer assessment" can produce is "From the Transit Bar" and endless carping about how more money is required for more research, more conferences, and more panel discussions, my vote would be to just shut the whole thing down. 

Monday, 14 April 2008 - 4:49 PM EDT

At issue is the question of how best to disperse 75 million government "surplus" "arts" dollars. Should museums assume their longstanding debts will be erased by government dough? Should huge corporations make philanthropic gestures assuming all along they will get  an automatic hook up with government funding for the event they are purportedly sponsoring?

 

The point of the poster - the way I read it anyway is, that there are a provincial arts council and and a municipal one too, already set up to disperse funds, (yes, via peer assessment). Between the Ontario Arts Council and The Toronto Arts Council they see way more applications for good projects, (group, individual and otherwise) than they can fund. Hence,  the maker of From the Transit Bar wants to know - why didn't these councils see some of this money? Who knows maybe this is a jackpot year. Maybe there's another 50 million lying around earmarked already.

The other question is still central. What are arts communities good for? Just to flesh it out a bit - would you mind my asking, what are the virtues of a spontaneous self - organized art community as opposed to the one that produced From the Transit Bar and the panel discussions you mention?

Monday, 14 April 2008 - 6:29 PM EDT

Well, for starters, a spontaneous self-organized art community isn't interested in replicating the language and ideological structures of the federal bureaucracies it's tied to by an umbilical cord of gold (or federal cheques).  Nor does it incur the significant costs that the Canadian artist-run center scene does in reporting to the feds: endless reports and busywork, which, by and large, detract from the time curators have available to actually spend interacting with artists...the folks the system ostensibly serves.  

I've never heard an artist or curator speak well of federal funding, eg., "Oh lucky me, I now have the resources to produce a project I previously couldn't have."  I *have* however heard lots of tales of complaint, about how, when you subtract the hourly cost of filling out grants and paperwork, and complying with a byzantine list of rules and regulations, the amount you end up receiving always seems to be not quite worth, on an objective basis, the amount of time invested in trying to obtain it.  (As opposed to funding from private sources, eg., the VIVA awards in Vancouver, whose co-founder, Doris Shadbolt, one told me matter-of-factly and very sensibly that "We don't ask where the money goes, and if [the artist] wants to spend it on a new roof, or on getting their teeth fixed, then that's perfectly OK."  (That's not a word-for-word quote, but it's probably 99% there)).

I think the current model of arts funding in Canada is totally broken, one symptom of which is the stale and boring academicism produced by the likes of CR and VF.  Giving them more money will just result in more of the same.  More conferences, more unread "think pieces," more hand-wringing, more requests for government hand-outs, more whining appeals to national identity.

Looking to government for permission (or the financial opportunity) to do something seems pretty weak to me.  Government does some things well, but involvement in aesthetics isn't one of them.

Monday, 14 April 2008 - 6:44 PM EDT

Ok, so that sums that up - what are the virtues of the spontaneous self  organizing model?

Monday, 14 April 2008 - 6:55 PM EDT

Independence, in the full sense of the word.

FREEDOM.

Monday, 14 April 2008 - 7:55 PM EDT

Yeah, freedom....Thanks CJB.
Hey everyone - there are a lot of people reading along (at least that's what the statistics say) so consider this an open thread.... don't be mum. Pipe up!

Monday, 14 April 2008 - 8:08 PM EDT

CJB,  for individual artists up until quite recently, funding was a matter of saying what you wanted to do and surviving a jury of your peers. You either got a cheque in the mail or not. Then you made your work, took a picture of it and wrote a short report. Only recently has the process become incrementally more and more opaque, beriddled with rules and regs.

Monday, 14 April 2008 - 8:15 PM EDT

Also, I don't think VF would be much interested in asking government for permission to make art. I'm pretty sure her position is that people worked hard to put an arts council or two (ostensibly the voice of a broadly sketched arts community) in government. She obviously agrees with you. It's not working very well at the current moment

Monday, 14 April 2008 - 8:30 PM EDT

And so where is the arts community? What is it doing? What is it thinking? How is it aligning itself - with which sort of model?

Monday, 14 April 2008 - 8:38 PM EDT

What are all the arty peers doing? Are they quietly taking care of business? Are they busy filling out their Luminato applications? Are they joining artist run worker unions on Facebook? Are they leaving Toronto and Montreal and Vancouver and becoming LA artists? What are art communities good for? 

Monday, 14 April 2008 - 10:54 PM EDT

Hi Jen: 

"Yeah, freedom."

I hope that's not meant as snark, 'cause I'm pretty serious about it.  The notion of aesthetic freedom is too radical to take lightly.  Adorno: "When impulse can no longer find preestablished security in forms or content, productive artists are objectively compelled to experiment." (Aesthetic Theory, p. 23). He adds: "The gesture of experimentation, the name for artistic comportments that are objectively new, has endured [in the present] but now, in keeping with the transition of aesthetic interest from the communicating subject to the coherence of the object, it means something qualitatively different: that the artistic subject employs methods whose objective results cannot be forseen" (AT, p. 24, my italics). 

At the risk of repeating myself, it seems straightforward that "artistic methods whose objective results cannot be forseen" are at odds with present-day Canadian funding requirements, which require artists to outline what they're going to do, how they're going to do it, and what the result will be, and for curators to prove, definitively, how what an artist is showing will fit into some larger, pre-existing curatorial or institutional "mandate" or "model." 

This might work in the business world -- I deal with it all the time when I read annual reports as a basis for investing, or when I make financial projections for my business -- but it doesn't work at all where aesthetics is concerned.  If you already know how something is going to be realized, and what it will accomplish, there's no point in implementing it.  It'll be aesthetically DOA; there'll be no "surplus" above and beyond intent.  By and large, that's my criticism of 99% of the work made and shown in the Canadian artist-run system: it's not bad art, but merely adequate.  It does what the thesis or funding proposal said it was going to do, but no more.  "I will construct a huge paper-mache snake on the banks of Lake Okanagan to reference the Ogopogo myth and to build pride of place in the local community."  There the snake is, and there the snake sits, at least until the next rains, undoubtedly present but just kind of there, like Gertrude Stein's Oakland, cluttering up the landscape.  There's nothing really wrong with it, save its failure as an example of artistic and ideological nerve.  I'm joking, but not really.  No one in the Canadian artist-run system really asks if the work does what it purports to do: whether it's scary, or funny, or really makes viewers question racism/colonialism/WHY.  "Statements of intent" replace the work's effacacy in the world.

So-called artist-run culture attracts lots of folks who enjoy administration and bureaucracy.  Again, I see this as a fault, and I would lay it directly at the door of the founders of that culture, who in my judgement enjoyed a healthy, maybe too healthy, identification with the power structures that funded them and enabled them thrive.  Once you are part of a system that directly benefits you it is hard to speak out against that system, or to conceive of an alternative or alternatives. 

Exercises in dry academic log-rolling like the Kingston Conference are a case in point: it's like it's still 1940, and Lawren Harris is somehow still alive and babbling on about the need to create a National Art, and National Identity, and a Distinctly Canadian Criticism, and zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz....

So, to summarize: I think the federally funded "art communities" that comprise artist-run culture in Canada are ethically bankrupt.  I lay the blame on the heads of the culture's founders, who in my view were unwilling, or unable, to see how the structures they conceived could be co-opted by preexisting political and social structures.  (William Wood, an art historian I am far from on the same page with, has a very good essay on the Western Front called "'This is Free Money?'" that makes much the same point, and in a much more structured way than what I'm articulating here).  I am trying to "walk the walk" of an honest critic by, a/ not applying to the structures I despise, and, b/ creating structures (exhibition venues; publications) of my own, often in collaboration with others, that don't simply mimic preexisting "artist-run" forms. This isn't the only solution to the problem of the failure of "artist-run culture" in Canada, but it's one I've had some success with, which I hope has contributed in some small but meaningful way to the larger culture(s) I'm part of.  So yeah: freedom after all.

Tuesday, 15 April 2008 - 12:37 AM EDT

Tuesday, 15 April 2008 - 11:49 AM EDT

Re: I hope that's not meant as snark, 'cause I'm pretty serious about it. 

No need to look for snark. There is none. I, myself am quite serious about my independence and freedom. One quibble I have with your take is on this point:

I've never heard an artist or curator speak well of federal funding, eg., "Oh lucky me, I now have the resources to produce a project I previously couldn't have."  I *have* however heard lots of tales of complaint, about how, when you subtract the hourly cost of filling out grants and paperwork, and complying with a byzantine list of rules and regulations, the amount you end up receiving always seems to be not quite worth, on an objective basis, the amount of time invested in trying to obtain it.

I have heard artists and curators speak well of funding. I can't say I'm an overly funded artist. I've made many more things on my own steam than anybody elses but with what I've received, I've made great work. I don't know any artists who assume they will be funded. Everybody I know works and has the calloused feet and hands to prove it.

Other than that, I see the pratfalls very much as you call them.

Re:  "artistic methods whose objective results cannot be forseen" are at odds with present-day Canadian funding requirements, which require artists to outline what they're going to do, how they're going to do it, and what the result will be, and for curators to prove, definitively, how what an artist is showing will fit into some larger, pre-existing curatorial or institutional "mandate" or "model."

Check. Agreed, though as I said above, these requirements and the language in which they are couched have gotten out of control, mainly in the last few years. Incrementally, actually insidiously, grants for artistic experimentation became grants for artistic practice and professional key moments. 

Re: This might work in the business world -- I deal with it all the time when I read annual reports as a basis for investing, or when I make financial projections for my business -- but it doesn't work at all where aesthetics is concerned.  If you already know how something is going to be realized, and what it will accomplish, there's no point in implementing it.  It'll be aesthetically DOA; there'll be no "surplus" above and beyond intent.  By and large, that's my criticism of 99% of the work made and shown in the Canadian artist-run system: it's not bad art, but merely adequate.  It does what the thesis or funding proposal said it was going to do, but no more.  "I will construct a huge paper-mache snake on the banks of Lake Okanagan to reference the Ogopogo myth and to build pride of place in the local community."  There the snake is, and there the snake sits, at least until the next rains, undoubtedly present but just kind of there, like Gertrude Stein's Oakland, cluttering up the landscape.  There's nothing really wrong with it, save its failure as an example of artistic and ideological nerve.  I'm joking, but not really.  No one in the Canadian artist-run system really asks if the work does what it purports to do: whether it's scary, or funny, or really makes viewers question racism/colonialism/WHY.  "Statements of intent" replace the work's effacacy in the world.

Check. Especially that last bit which strikes me as a problem a spontaeously self organized arts community could take on - something it could be good for.

Re:

So-called artist-run culture attracts lots of folks who enjoy administration and bureaucracy.  Again, I see this as a fault, and I would lay it directly at the door of the founders of that culture, who in my judgement enjoyed a healthy, maybe too healthy, identification with the power structures that funded them and enabled them thrive.  Once you are part of a system that directly benefits you it is hard to speak out against that system, or to conceive of an alternative or alternatives.

and:

I lay the blame on the heads of the culture's founders, who in my view were unwilling, or unable, to see how the structures they conceived could be co-opted by preexisting political and social structures.  

Check. But I'm not sure who could have foreseen the way things have played out (even if Adorno seems precient). VF and CR have spoken out against what they perceive as a misallocation of a whack of cash. Ultimately, I don't blame them for doing that.

Hello LM.

Tuesday, 15 April 2008 - 11:50 AM EDT

prescient dammitt

Tuesday, 15 April 2008 - 1:25 PM EDT

Hey everyone:

That very good William Wood essay I cited above turns out to be available at the following link, and pretty germaine to the discussion:

http://www.ccca.ca/c/writing/w/wood/wood001t.html 

Jen, thanks for your thoughts, & work-inflicted scars.  

"Art is modern art through mimesis of the hardened and alienated; only thereby, and not by the refusal of a mute reality, does art become eloquent; this is why art no longer tolerates the innocuous."  (Adorno, AT, p.21).

Tuesday, 15 April 2008 - 4:16 PM EDT

Interesting read, CJB. The money quote?

"In politics this scheme would be called oligarchic."

I do seem to recall a seminar class lead by a  former director of the Front. He regaled us with tales of building a whisky still with CC money. Was that stuff true or personal mythology? 

Thursday, 17 April 2008 - 3:51 PM EDT

BTW:

I have this feeling CJB and I have had this conversation once before...There is a strange corollary to this discussion going on here. I make a HUGE distinction between the view expressed by  Marnie Soupcoff who has no real interest, let alone personal investment in the arts and that of CJB which is informed, proactive and completely invested.

Thursday, 17 April 2008 - 5:31 PM EDT

You do fight the good fight. 

 b/t/w VOCA's software automatically created an email link when I typed in j@simpleposie's  (Hey so does yours!) I was alarmed that I may have turned your address into a spam magnet until I noticed that the address ain't going anywhere with an apostrophe or without a .com at the end.

Thursday, 17 April 2008 - 6:03 PM EDT

No worries LM. These conversations really give me pause.

Thursday, 24 April 2008 - 1:48 PM EDT

The character Newboy, an old poet, in Sam Delaney's crazy great book Dhalgren, says, "I wonder sometimes if the purpose of the art community isn't to provide a concerned social matrix which simultaneously assures that no member, regardless of honors or approbation, has the slightest idea of the worth of his own work." 

Thursday, 24 April 2008 - 1:55 PM EDT

Had to go look up approbation.

Thursday, 24 April 2008 - 1:58 PM EDT

This must be round 25 of this conversation for us Sally, what are you thinking about it these days?

Thursday, 24 April 2008 - 2:06 PM EDT

This is a good thread. Sorry to chime in so late, I've been distracted with that horrid flu that's going around. CJB, I agree with some of what you say, and disagree (surprise!) with some of it too. Like L.M., I completely agree that the structure that demands an artist predetermine their project is antithetical to the artistic process. Somewhat similar to the weird construct in MFA programs of self-consciously applying theory to your own work.

On the other hand, I am a curator who was able to produce a show, pay artist fees slightly above par, and tour the exhibition because the director of the host institution and I wrote a couple of successful grants. And we were darn happy about it. While I agree that the peer review system is pretty impenetrable to certain types of work, it's not quite as tight as all that. I know lots of artists who aren't part of any policy clique who've occasionally benefitted, and I know it's a useful resource to have out there. Also, better a jury of peers than a jury of bureaucrats!

I agree with Clive Robertson that the arm's length aspect of art's funding, which is only mandated in the arts councils (and Canada Council represents 5% of federal arts funding), is key to avoiding a kind of nationalistic, state-sponsored art.

But I sure agree there are lots of problems. My biggest concern with artist-run centres, having been involved with them in various capacities for many years, is labour ethics. The inherited DIY ideology demands that employees work much longer hours than they are paid for. DIY passion emerges naturally when you are doing your own project, but you can't force someone to feel it when they are doing administration for someone else. The pressure is sometimes explicit and sometimes implicit, but it is always there. Staff are also expected to carry a skill set that is super-human in scope. Due to the haphazard and volatile power dynamics that arise when artists try to take on management positions on boards, the staff also bear the brunt of the blame if/when things go wrong. I think artist-run centres do good work and ensure that we get to see emerging artists who are doing something other than collector-friendly drawing and painting and photo, but I am increasingly angry that the system self-perpetuates without doing anything about the fact that exploitation of staff has become systemic. This mess is the legacy of self-organising arts communities. Unfortunately, it'll take more organising to fix it, and that's a darn unpleasant prospect. Like CJB, I don't WANT to be part of a self-righteous angry collective, I just want to get on with my own work.

I went to the panel that Clive hosted (and Vera spoke at) a couple of weeks ago at the Gladstone because I share concerns about the governments' heavy investments in the architectural expansion of flagship institutions, the prevailing Creative Cities nightmare that means a lame-o festival like Luminato is granted roughly the same amount of government money as the TAC's entire annual budget,  and the censorship threat of Bill C-10. But I found the panel alienating and confusing. There were a lot of assumptions being made, particularly about the sanctity of artist-run culture, and the clubbish atmosphere felt impenetrable. While lip service was paid to reaching out across generations, the actual young people in the room who spoke up were treated with a general attitude of "if you'd seen what I've seen, young whippersnapper, you'd change your tune." In particular, one young man raised concerns about the role of culture in a context of global warming, which went over like a lead balloon. Artists aren't supposed to give a shit about the end of the world, I guess.

I do, however, recommend Clive's recent book, Policy Matters. It's historical and factual and highly critical of government policy, and it's a great research tool if you do care about arm's length funding. One thing you can say about Clive and Vera is that they aren't scared to rock the boat.

And I think the idea that private funding offers freedom is a bit disigenuous. Anybody notice, for example, that Matthew Teitelbaum's position is now sponsored? His official title is, Matthew Teitelbaum, Michael and Sonja Koerner Director and CEO. Or, look at the Luminato program. One of the events is an evening hosted by the Walrus, where you get to meet Nicholas Campbell and listen to novelists who've written noir thingies about their cities. And it costs $150 ($25 less if you are a subscriber). That's not programming, that's a fundraising event for Walrus. How come it's part of Luminato? Because the Creative Cities/Cultural Capital economic model of justifying investment in culture is only interested in art as bait for private sponsorship.

And, for individual artists, self-marketing is just as unlikely to provide income, and just as deadly to the process of artmaking, as writing grant applications. Like William Wood said, there's no such thing as free money!

okay...I'm sorry that was way too long. 

Thursday, 24 April 2008 - 2:14 PM EDT

I had that flu a couple of weeks ago. It was deadly. But I think my vitamin regime  is kicking in now and I'm on the mend. Hope you feel better soon!

Thursday, 24 April 2008 - 2:22 PM EDT

Great points BTW:

I loved the inspire carlito blog from last year's Luminato. The secret silk society was my favourite entry - so bogus it was almost great. 

Thursday, 24 April 2008 - 2:57 PM EDT

Or How 'bout this post from the same "blog" with the tag line, "The offering to women that this artist contributes seems simple because, we are worth it!"? 

Thursday, 24 April 2008 - 5:29 PM EDT

wow. I somehow missed that whole Carlito thing. I spent most of this afternoon convinced it was a hoax. I'm staggered and, yeah, I sort of love it. Bring back the sexy-French-art-geniuses-who-love-women of yore! And isn't it great that he's sponsored by L'Oreal and we were invited to go down and get make-up tips from the sponsors while we watched him work?

Dig this quote about Carlito from the globe: "Although harnessed to the scaffold, he's managed to move across it horizontally with the nimbleness of a dancer, often choreographing the rhythm of his brush strokes to the music programmed on his iPod (Maria Callas, Underworld, Moroccan music, 'sacred chants from India with electronic beats')."

Its all so sex-in-the-city.  A perfect scheme to reel in us creative class chicks. "Urban Art! it's sooo...dirty, and there's poverty, which makes me sad, but it's kind of sexy too, you know?"

Thursday, 24 April 2008 - 6:52 PM EDT

Barf.