28 July 2006

Body Worlds

Went to see Body Worlds last Saturday night at 3 a.m. with R. As usual, we waited until the last possible minute, so that's the only ticket we could get -- but it was really fun, and there was such a novelty in going to the museum at that time of night. And it was still crazy crowded. Long lines, in spite of the timed tickets. But pretty well worth the wait.


It's pretty crazy. It's shocking how quickly seeing people that have essentially been turned into plasticized meat & splayed out becomes normative. It really was pretty cool, and fascinating from both a scientific and aesthetic perspective.

The most interesting thing for me, however, is the controversy surrounding it in Germany, where Dr. Gunther Von Hagens first developed and displayed this technology as artwork. People were outraged, and there were rumors (don't know if they were ever substantiated) that the bodies were bought from the Chinese Gov't., which was killing prisoners. I believe he still isn't able to display them in Germany. But the key thing in the controversy was that they were considered art, and the good Dr. presented himself as both scientist and sculptor.

In the U.S., there has been little controversy, and the show has sold out to blockbuster crowds, and I suspect in large part because it has been marketed purely as science (although in the exhibit they are presented as art, in a sense, because they have nameplates with the year on them just as in an art museum). There were even enormous billboards with the human meat sculptures displayed large on busy streets, and no one freaked or even complained.

If it was presented at the art museum, I believe people would have a difficult time with it -- art is seen as more "frivolous" than science, even though just as much (and often the same things) is learned through it. People forget about the early anitomical studies -- for example, Pietro del Cortona's early renaissance dissection drawings were some of the earliest diagrams of the human body on the inside.

It's interesting, sometimes, how the lack of general knowledge about art history can collide with social taboos.

18 July 2006

regarding art snobbery...

Now, I am one to always come down on the side of contemporary art and intellectualism, and I abhor the ongoing attacks from pop culture in the form of mockery, but even so...

Last weekend at the public lecture for the Site Santa Fe Biennial, it's curator, Klaus Ottman, actually uttered these words (emphasis mine, to capture his inflection): "...but the theme is that there is no theme!" (Now, repeat that to yourself in a german accent and excited tone, to get the effect.)

I nearly blew milk out my nose, and I wasn't even drinking any. Could he have said anything more pretentious, more cliched, than that? It was like the Spinal Tap of artspeak, it sounded like it could have been on the Simpson's, or in Daniel Clowes Art School Confidential. It sounded ridiculous.

This is why, I thought to myself, this is why they mock us. We just walk right into it. If I can't take it seriously, who the hell does? It's those times when I almost...just a tiny bit...get Kuspit. But then he hasn't appealed to me since he juried an awful show here. The only one I've consistently agreed with is Dave Hickey, who seems to leave the bullshit & artspeak at the door, very refreshing.

As to the rest of the biennial? A snooze. It left me cold, only Carsten Nicolai's work managed to move me. There are only 13 artists, each of whom has their own room, so in contrast to previous biennials it seemed stingy & sparse, & left one feeling a bit cheated. Considering the lengths to which previous curators have gone -- off-site installations, live performance (that you don't have to pay $20 for), even modifying the outside of the building, Ottman's approach seemed a tad lazy and uninspired -- although others have been kind enough to call it "conservative". No one I spoke to that weekend seemed too impressed. I have been a Catherine Opie fan, but her work relied so heavily on context that it ultimately failed, in my eyes. The painting was awful, and I used to be a huge Jennifer Bartlett fan but felt her new work lacked the same aesthetic pull. And I had looked forward to Wolfgang Laib's work, but it somehow felt just like a minimilist exercise in spatial composition, unlike when he uses natural materials.

Ottman did say one thing that was good, but after everything else he said it seemed disingenuous: "I want this show to be about the artists and not the curator". I believe he tries, and perhaps even means well, but his own pompousness got in the way.