As a part of its effort to generate additional interest for its sleek new home, set to open later this year, the New Museum in New York City has created a series of Hot Button! panel discussions all held at The Great Hall at Cooper Union. Last night was the second in the series, entitled "Location, Location, Location! Is Provincial a Bad Word?" Students, art professionals, curators such as Massimiliano Gioni as well as critic Jerry Saltz sat in the historic auditorium to listen to the panellists' thoughts on provincialism as a concept and how it relates to contemporary artistic practices.
Moderator Richard Flood, chief curator of The New Museum, told the assembly that "we're not here to build a jungle gym." Instead of attempting to come to conclusions, the discussion was intended to be a journey that may land us in the place we started, but subtly change the way we look at our current place in the world.
Saskia Bos was the first to speak. The Dutch curator is currently Dean of the School of Art at The Cooper Union, and has curated such international projects as The Venice Biennale and the 2nd Berlin Biennial. The construct put to us by Bos was based on her belief that if being original exists it is a choice on behalf of the artist. Since the advent of technology such as the Internet, Bos argued, there is no reason to be outside of "the action" unless one wants to be. Artists who choose to live in places other than artistic centers do so for various reasons: perhaps for a "purer" or less artistic--in the sense of the concentrations of art and art-related people and ideas--environment. Some find that their concentration on the work is helped by being away from the "market and gossip-oriented cities." Or possibly the affordability of studio space outside of urban centers makes for better artistic negotiations with one's muse. Bos spoke of the curator's history of "bridging" these worlds and the need to bring in artists to a biennale, for example, in order to widen the perspectives of both the audience the artists themselves. Others on the panel went on to agree with Ms. Bos as she pointed out the irony that "if you don't ever leave New York City you run the risk of becoming provincial."
Nicolai Ouroussoff, architecture critic for The New York Times told us that when he hears the word "provincialism" he thinks only of Paris in the age of Neoclassicism. Provincialism, Ouroussoff declares, "Is not an issue in this country, except for New Yorkers...who still believe in the idea of a cultural center or magnet." He goes on to make a compelling case that New York is more or less a completed experiment, and that most architects now work on the periphery as opposed to city centers. New talent is not encouraged, especially as young artists and architects can no longer afford Manhattan and a concrete mass such as the World Trade Center now "represents our paranoia" rather than our ingenuity. The critic related an anecdote about riding through NYC in a cab with Dutch Architect Rem Koolhaas. As they passed Times' Square, which now displays the franchises built on conformist attitudes that we used to associate with the suburbs, Koolhaas whispered to Ouroussoff, "New York is dead. This is the right time to go."
Next Teddy Cruz, the articulate and passionate Guatemalan-born architect, spoke on the global border between San Diego, California and Tijuana, Mexico--the busiest border in the world. In his fascinating exploration of two cultures from an architectural point of view, Cruz's presentation drew an imaginary line across a globe that took as its initial arc the border between these two cities and projected the future migrations and living trends. The economic poverty in Tijuana has given rise to creative solutions such as imported bungalows being placed on top of existing homes, and old tires transformed into clever and effective retaining walls. Conversely, Cruz argues that the border walls have turned San Diego into the world's largest gated community.
The art star of the evening, Julie Mehretu, was eloquent and charming as always. As a rare treat she showed slides of her body of work throughout the past decade, and discussed her process for an appreciative crowd. To embark on one of her complicated and unique drawings, Mehretu often takes an individual mark from an earlier work and assigns it characteristics which will work in the system of the new drawing. "I try to create a specific arena for narrative to take place," the artist says. Indeed, her architecture-based scenes often depict stadiums, high rises, and monuments and moments of migration, evacuation or conflict. All exist at some point when "history, time and space become fused." The result is an exquisite screen that enables us to experience a fresh architectural and visceral language. "Beauty," Mehretu declares, "in breakdown."
Roger Buergel, curator and Artistic Director of Documenta 12, was the final speaker of the evening. He amused some by announcing that he was discarding his notes and would speak about what he had heard from the other panelists. Buergel is a fierce intellectual who speaks in arching and complex theoretical questions such as "What is an exhibition?" and "Can art negotiate the relationship between subjectivity and the world?" For those who were able to concentrate on his heavily accented but flawless English, Buergel's insights were rewarding. He closed with an admonition to the powers-that-be at the New Museum, publicly expressing his wish that the institution "has the discipline to think of itself as established, but also to keep itself open to redo itself." We shall see.
The next Hot Button! Panel, "The 'IT' Factor: What Makes Something Hot?" will be held on 28 March.
Doug McClemont
New Yorker Doug McClemont is the former Editor-in-Chief of the gay porn rag HONCHO. He is writing about his recent adventures as a mortician.
For more information on the New Museum's Hot Button! panel discussions click here.
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