{"id":15970,"date":"2021-10-26T13:57:37","date_gmt":"2021-10-26T13:57:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/artjournalstg.wpenginepowered.com\/?p=15970"},"modified":"2022-06-16T21:21:08","modified_gmt":"2022-06-16T21:21:08","slug":"a-call-to-artists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artjournal.collegeart.org\/?p=15970","title":{"rendered":"A Call to Artists"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

From <\/span><\/strong>Art Journal<\/strong><\/span><\/em> 80, no. 3 (Fall 2021)<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Only an Artist Can Tell<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Jordana Moore Saggese<\/a><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
\"a
Antwaun Sargent (@Sirsargent), \u201cthis is why you shouldn’t be out here selling your images for $100 because a major museum will \u2018acquire\u2019 your art through and stage an exhibition,\u201d<\/em> Twitter, August 25, 2020, 6:16 p.m., https:\/\/twitter.com\/Sirsargent\/status\/1298066776635383811 (screenshot by alexandre ali reza dorriz)<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Only an artist can tell, and only artists have told since we have heard of man, what it is like for anyone who gets to this planet to survive it. What it is like to die, or to have somebody die; what it is like to be glad<\/em>.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

\u2014James Baldwin, \u201cThe Artist\u2019s Struggle for Integrity,\u201d <\/em>1962<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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For those who come to it from backgrounds outside Europe (the \u201cethnics,\u201d \u201cpostcolonials,\u201d \u201cminorities,\u201d all those who have ancestry, connections or affiliations \u201celsewhere\u201d), the arena of mainstream cultural practice in the West, at least in the visual arts, is a doubly predictable space\u2014first, because it is a game space and you have to know the rules of the game, and second, because unlike any other game, such aspirants have a limited chance of success because it is predetermined they should fail.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

\u2014<\/em>Olu Oguibe, \u201c<\/em>Double Dutch and the Culture Game,\u201d <\/em>2001<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was motivated to organize this artist’s project by a series of events in summer 2020. This was a moment of profound social conflict and collective grief in the United States. The murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin on May 25 ignited a global movement; previously isolated for months due to the COVID-19 pandemic, people marched together in protest of the legacy of anti-Black violence made so clear in the murders of Ahmaud Arbery (February 23), Breonna Taylor (March 13), Floyd, and Tony McDade (May 27).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In response to this deep racial unrest, artist collectives were formed. Corporations began to issue statements supporting Black Lives Matter. As I tracked these events\u2014mostly from home and via social media\u2014I noticed that these concerns and initiatives spread to several of the arts organizations in my daily newsfeeds, as well. Large museums started to organize exhibitions that were connected to these social movements (and their heretofore egregious lack of representation in exhibition planning) and to cancel others that were suddenly viewed as troubling in this new \u201cwoke\u201d context. Some museums\u2014like the Whitney\u2014did both (see pages 8\u201313). And artists began (once again) to imagine alternatives to white supremacist violence, to challenge social structures, and to work against hierarchies that mark certain lives as unworthy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In many cases, artists are being asked to do this work so that the institutions do not have to. The latter are happy to profit off of the public\u2019s sudden interest in what Olu Oguibe has called \u201ctolerable difference\u201d\u2014that is, difference that allows the institution to maintain its superiority, difference that does not challenge its primacy. Tolerable difference, in Oguibe\u2019s words, \u201cby its presence lends credibility to the society\u2019s claims of equity and tolerance and offers proof, if it was needed, that the Empire has room and heart enough for difference.\u201d1<\/sup><\/a> Such an embrace of racial difference by institutions eager to prove their greatness has led to countless special (albeit temporary) curatorial appointments, a bevy of public programs (typically reliant on unpaid or underpaid labor), and even the acquisition of art objects under the auspices of \u201chistorical collections.\u201d The projects presented here question the formation of any special initiatives outside<\/em> of main collections and curatorial programs, and ask which of these collective actions are performative versus transformative.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I want to know: How do we prepare and protect artists (Black artists in particular) who are being called on to correct institutions\u2019 histories of white supremacy? And so I asked Edgar Arceneaux, Michael Ray Charles, alexandre ali reza dorriz, Charles Gaines, Glenn Ligon, Howardena Pindell, and Cauleen Smith for their advice. The generosity of their responses has been overwhelming, and it is my pleasure to offer them here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

  1. Olu Oguibe, \u201cDouble Dutch<\/em> and the Culture Game\u201d (2000), in The Culture Game<\/em> (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2004), 35. [Google Scholar]<\/a><\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    Jordana Moore Saggese<\/strong> is the Editor-in-Chief of Art Journal<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

    Art-Org-Ask<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

    Cauleen Smith<\/a><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
    \"A
    Cauleen Smith, Covid Manifesto #6<\/em>, 2000, graphite on Post-it Note
    (artwork \u00a9 Cauleen Smith; photograph provided by the artist)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

    I do not know the origins of the extractive tradition practiced by nonprofit art organizations, by which artists are asked to donate their work to help art organizations stay liquid; but my experience of them has always felt embarrassingly burdensome and awkward. I must distinguish the annual nonprofit art orgs\u2019 auctions from other types of fundraising campaigns that erupt spontaneously as a form of mutual aid for individuals in our communities after traumas, death, or even just simple life aspirations like healthcare or travel. The \u201cart-org-ask\u201d implies a kind of quid pro quo: \u201cWe have shown your work this year, so you must break off some of that labor and give it to us so that we can do the same thing next year.\u201d Once donated, the artist\u2019s work is often discounted and can, depending upon one\u2019s standing within the commercial art market, actually do harm to the value of works we may sell through our galleries by jacking the sale price too high. Or if the discount is not low enough for auction trolls, perhaps the work does not sell at all. This is all kind of messed up. But I do donate artworks to orgs that are either run by friends or have proven themselves supportive of artists in ways that I cannot quantify but value deeply. I want my friends and community to do well and I don\u2019t mind helping. It\u2019s the system itself that is problematic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    And then there are the urgent fundraisers for political causes. These are especially tricky because the organizations generally place the artists\u2019 work into an arena in which the people buying are not necessarily art aficionados at all, but simply people able to put some money toward a good cause and who want something back in return. (Hmmm \u2026) Often there is a price cap so as not to alienate potential donors. These types of orgs will ask you to give them your five-color screenprint\/edition of 50 that you hoped to sell for $500 a pop so that they can sell it for some fast money in service of The Cause. (Ouch.) I think that there are many ways of being a good citizen and making a contribution, but this ain\u2019t one that I would encourage. I do have two suggestions. Make something that is low-cost, low-impact for the artist, but respectable at the price point the org requires. Something you would be happy to circulate freely, something one would give away to a friend or studio visitor. But it takes time to make stuff like this. We may not have time. We might only have our gorgeous, expensive prints. Another option is to just sell the work commercially and then break off a percentage to donate to your favorite causes as you can. I reckon everyone makes more money this way. Win win win win. Of course there are many ways to handle and finesse this. All I am suggesting is that we should slow down and consider the terms being offered before giving away our work to organizations that do not have the capacity, nor the desire, to protect us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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    Cauleen Smith<\/strong> was raised in Sacramento, California, and lives in Los Angeles. Drawing from structuralism, third-world cinema, and science fiction, she makes things that deploy the tactics of activism in service of ecstatic social space and contemplation. Smith enjoys container gardening, likes cats, collects vinyl records, and rocks. She is on the art program faculty at California Institute of the Arts. She holds a BA in creative arts from San Francisco State University and an MFA from the University of California, Los Angeles, School of Theater, Film, and Television.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

    Swimming against the Tide: Thoughts on Managing an Art Profession<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

    Charles Gaines<\/a><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
    \"A
    Charles Gaines, Numbers and Faces: Multi-Racial\/Ethnic Combinations Series 1: Face #7, Eduardo Soriano-Hewitt (Black\/Filipino)<\/em>, 2020, acrylic paint, acrylic sheet, and photograph, 38 x 32 x 3\u00bd in. (96.5 x 81.3 x 8.9\u2009cm)
    (artwork \u00a9 Charles Gaines; photograph provided by the artist)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

    The artist has the least agency in the power grid made up of artists, writers, curators, museum boards, gallerists, and collectors. The exceptions are artists who have exceptional careers. But agency is not intrinsic to any one of these groups, it is acquired collaboratively. The power grid of the market is unstable because it is based on works of art, which are complicated objects. Also, the interests and missions of its members are quite diverse, yet paradoxically unified by the idea that its purpose is to secure the best examples of works of art. Part of the art world is a market, essentially capitalist, which creates a space of winners and losers. However, the artist is in a unique place because what they make are not just simple commodities. More broadly, the art world is both an instrumental space of labor (which serves galleries) and an experimental space where knowledge can be produced (which serves museums and history). In view of this, in engaging the art world the young artist can protect herself by privileging ideas over markets. This is not to say that the artist does not operate in a market, it is to say that it is a market that should be governed by those ethics that privilege the production of ideas. For example, the artist can make pragmatic market decisions such as ensuring that their production is protected by contracts. At the same time, she should never decide to be in a show solely because it might be a good career decision, if doing so would require compromise. In each case the artist is privileging the aesthetic and conceptual domains of the work of art over market value.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Artists of color and women still face additional constraints on their ability to succeed. For example, there is heightened interest in diversity by the mainstream art world, which has increased the career opportunities of artists of color. However, just as in the world at large, where there is a growing middle and upper class of people of color, this growth does not extend broadly to the general population of people of color. A typical white family has ten times the net worth of a Black family. In the art world white people are still overrepresented, as the opportunities to succeed do not go very deep in the population of artists of color. White supremacy continues in the upper echelon of institutions to actively resist power sharing. This is why institutions such as museums continue to mishandle racial conflicts. People of color have not for the most part been elevated to decision-making positions, which leaves them out of any process designed to resolve the conflict. I am not suggesting that if our institutions were truly diversified that racial conflict would not exist. I am saying that the solutions would be different; diversifying the boards all the way to the top decision-makers would neutralize white supremacy and make institutions more competent in resolving not only racial conflict but in finding ways to be more fully representative of the culture at large.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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    Charles Gaines<\/strong> lives and works in Los Angeles, where he is a member of the CalArts School of Art faculty. He has been the subject of numerous exhibitions in the United States and internationally, and his work is in prominent public collections including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Gaines\u2019s work was presented at the Venice Biennale in 2007 and 2015.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

    NEW FINANCIAL ARCHITECTURES FOR CREATIVE COMMUNITIES (NFACC) aka STRUCTURES TO MAINTAIN YOUR JOY!<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

    Edgar Arceneaux<\/a><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
    \"a
    Edgar Arceneaux, Zora Arceneaux Holding Her Vice President Kamala Harris Blue Pineapple Upside Down Cake<\/em>, Studio Edgar Arceneaux, 2021 (artwork \u00a9 Zora Arceneaux; photograph provided by Edgar Arceneaux)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

    Born in 1972, Los Angeles\u2013based artist, director, writer, and organizer Edgar Arceneaux<\/strong> received a BFA from the ArtCenter College of Design and an MFA from the California Institute of the Arts. Arceneaux constructs drawings, installations, and video and film works as complex arrangements of association that examine adjacencies and points of contact between implausible relations. He directed his first play at the Performa biennial in New York in 2015 and was awarded the Malcolm McLaren Award. Arceneaux received the prestigious Mike Kelley Foundation Award in 2019 and the COLA Individual Artist Fellowship in 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    He has participated in the Rauschenberg Residency, Captiva Island, Florida; Artpace San Antonio; Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture; Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, Alberta; and Fachhochschule Aachen, Germany. Solo exhibitions have been presented at the MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge, Massachusetts; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; Studio Museum in Harlem, New York; and Museum f\u00fcr Gegenwartskunst, Basel, Switzerland. His work is in major museum collections at the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Museum of Modern Art, New York; Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh; Museum Ludwig, Cologne; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; and Los Angeles County Museum of Art. He is an associate professor of art for Roski School of Art and Design at the University of Southern California.<\/p>\n\n\n\n