Page 18 - Studio International - January 1972

Varieties of attention today is not commercial in this competition such as we have, when many strong
There is much to be said for a system of healthy
But much of the art that commands most
industrial obvious sense, since its products are enormous opposing commitments can fight and flourish.
Alternative systems of selection are paternalistic
in scale, or auto-destructive, or are given away
experience free, or are held to exist only in some noosphere or worse. But we should be clear that many
self-styled radicals who detest the art-dealers are
of concepts. The market becomes thin and
Technology and art 32 tight, or disappears completely. Economic embracing career-paths quite as industrialized,
analysis should now focus not only on the in a different idiom, as are those of obvious
physical commodities, if any, that are still businessmen-artists.
traded in, but also on the career patterns of One artist, writer and editor in London
artists and their promoters. whom I respect, believes that artists should try
A similar analysis has been undertaken of the to maintain their integrity by accepting
career patterns of scientists in books such as poverty. He has little in the way of material
Jerome Ravetz's recently published 'Scientific property but is very generous with his intel-
Knowledge and its Social Problems' (O.U.P.). lectual property. His ascetic path is surely
Ravetz describes a scientific research pro- virtuous, its disadvantage being that it constrains
gramme resulting in publication as a kind of his range of options excessively. For those who
investment which if successful brings its reject this path, for one reason or another, there
owner specific rewards ranging from citations are possibly other ways to avoid being part of
in other scientists' papers (where a coded the industrializing process.
etiquette is observed) to grants, research con- Most intelligent art critics are going through
tracts, academic appointments and professional a period of acute self-questioning (as are many
honours. The scientific paper is accepted by a artists too): this is testified by the recent
learned journal on the decision of the editor writings of men as different as Charles
advised by referees who form part of the quality Harrison, Jack Burnham and Jean Clay. Less
control system of science. Though the scientific penetrating writers are content to resort to
paper is not a saleable or negotiable product, eclectic journalism, scholarly catalogues, or the
`The lot of the art critic today is not a happy one being too specialized to earn literary royalties, investigation of museum and gallery politics.
... Is he journalist or aesthetician, prophet or it acquires a property-value for its owner which For me one of the most promising approaches
public-relations man, interpreter of tradition or might even be assessed in financial terms on has been, and still is, the rapprochement between
adventurous iconoclast, fabricator of taste or some actuarial basis. In our industrialized art and science, a process which resists at least
follower of fashion ?' So writes a reviewer in society, according to Ravetz, science becomes some of the industrializing tendencies of art and
the TLS (26 November). industrialized and its practitioners fall into the science alike, in that it challenges professional
The principle of 'assertion of process' is now roles of entrepreneurs, contractors and demarcations, trespasses on intellectual property
widely followed in art and is sometimes even salesmen. and demystifies brand images. Unfortunately
adduced as if this alone justified the artist's Many artists are industrialized in a straight- the quality of discourse in this no-man's-land
activity. But what of the process of writing forward way as producers of saleable com- is poor as yet. One journal that should be doing
about art ? Both the handful of serious critics modities. But others are industrialized in the something to improve it is Frank Malina's
and the larger guild of art reviewers and weaker but interesting sense suggested by Leonardo, published by Pergamon Press, but
journalists are accustomed to playing the role of Ravetz in his study of scientific careers : they its editorial policy is undiscriminating to say
disinterested observers, part of the 'quality are marketing their names, filing ideas like the least. Having no wish to corner the valuable
control' system regulating the release of art to patent applications in art magazines, contracting space that Studio International can spare for
the public consciousness. Since this is the last with galleries and arts councils, tendering for the subject, I am glad to leave it free for
of a regular series of monthly articles on art grants or jobs. Yet there is no quality control others. q
and technology that I have written for this system in art nearly as respected as that where-
journal, no apology need be made for some by expert referees assess a new scientific theory. Counter-Technology
reflections on the role of the art commentator. Movements and opinions in art have The 'Counter-Technology' branch of the
He is often no more disinterested than is the proliferated too much. counter-culture is articulated in such American
man of discriminating mien who announces on Here the role of the critic-promoter- publications as Radical Software (mainly for
television that on balance, or according to the organizer-curator-linkman is of special `video freaks') and Whole Earth Catalog.
latest research, such-and-such a brand is importance. Such people are often more Aquarius Project (P.O. Box 4013, Berkeley,
preferable. Critics and reviewers are of course verbally articulate than are artists. Their California 94704) is interested in the possibility
part of the marketing department of the art economic ties with the art they are involved of 'automated communes' using surplus hard-
industry as much as they are part of its quality with do not have to be based on an art-market ware and the technical skills of drop-outs.
control department. This would be a banal to be intimate. Prestige, commissions, invita- `Communes which are unafraid to adapt the
point to make about the kind of art that is tions, jobs, follow from the successful handling whole range of modern technology to their
bought and sold in private galleries, where of their 'accounts'. The quality of their address- needs might serve as an advance scouting and
notoriously a single man can act as critic, as books, and their presence in other people's, experimental groping process, exploring the
private collector and as consultant to dealers or constitute professional property which is possibilities of the re-formation and re-
museums or other private collectors. There are sometimes jealously guarded. deployment of the physical plant of society, of
commonly-heard allegations about specific I see nothing particularly wrong in all this. decentralization and de-urbanization, resulting
individual careers which would be a worthwhile People are standing up for what they believe in in knowledge which will be crucial to a society
subject for serious research, since some major and doing their best to further the interest of undergoing a radical social revolution, such as
artists' reputations are involved. Allegations those whose work they admire as well as their the U.S. may be within the next decade or so.'
about the corruption of art criticism form part own interest. What are the alternatives ? To judge from their policy statement this
of the standard radical attack on the capitalist Society must find some way of selecting out its project is worth following. q
art world. most creative people, if it is not to stagnate. JONATHAN BENTHALL

8