Art 226 Midterm

Fritz Haeg

"Edible Estates"

Formalist

Bell, Fry, Dow

Complexity

Davis, Prigone, Varela, Holland

Who said "the art of living well and the art of dying well are one"?

Epicurus

Multicultural

McFee, Chalmers

The Art Guys

Suits with logos

Williams offers quite a bit of advice in her "getting started" section of our textbook. Explain just one piece of advice in this section that you will work on as you personally engage in research within this ART 226 class to make your research more impactful.

"Read three of four essential texts on the subject; take notes" I think if I did some more research on my own then it would help me learn more and have a greater knowledge. I usually just think it's okay to use the information I learned in class, but I know I need to work on doing outside research and utilizing the various works that have been suggested and available to me. I think this will help me both in and out of the classroom and I'll be more engaged in the work.

Why might it be important to write about art? "What can art-text 'say' that an artwork, on its own, cannot" according to Susan Sontag? What does she mean, an art-text makes an artwork more real to us?

"The aim of all commentary on art now should be to make works of art [...] more, rather than less, real to us". I think she means that we are able to understand more, it gives us more background and meaning regarding the artwork, rather than inferring on our own.

Vik Muniz

"Wasteland"

What is art to Tolstoy?

"[f]eelings ... very bad and very good, if only they infect the reader ... constitute the subject of art"

Janine Antoni

"slumber", weave nightgown

Maya Lin

(Vietnam Memorial and her River pieces) in terms of complexity theory (ants are like pins, but when you have a lot of them, they create something that acts more like an organism rather than a bunch of individual dumb things)

The examples Williams will share, illustrating good art-writing, include samples from,

historians academics curators journalists novelists bloggers

Neo-Rational

Aristotle, Adler, Ressi

Explain "critico-fiction" in your own words

A hybridized form of criticism that combines autobiography, artist's biography, criticism, and fiction

What is meant by the following statement by theorist, Boris Groys?

Art-writing provides artworks with 'protective text-clothes', if there is an unfamiliar artwork that enters the world without the protection, then people will put their own words on the artwork, because without the text, it will be dressed in words by those that are not qualified.

Gilda Williams' formula for good writing about art is

there is no formula for any kind of writing.

According to our text, there are forms of criticism that are considered "non-critical new forms" of criticism, which have joined traditional forms. Which is described as a "conventional" format of criticism?

Artist's statements

Name the British artists' collective that "returned abysmal press releases to the guilty galleries, complete with corrections and commentaries."

BANK

Queer

Butler, Foucault

Explain how Williams suggests using the "sort" command to chunk like information together so you can further analyze it to construct your essay.

Compile initial evidence into a single massive Word file, heading each piece with a one or two-word theme. As research progresses, headers may grow subsections, just keep track of these expanding themes to ensure consistency, then let 'Sort' cluster all related material together. This gives you an instant sense of which sub-topics are accruing more information, and starts the outline or flow-chart for your paper. Organize the separate sections into a sensible order, and drop any weak ones.

Tanya Aguiniga

Concepts: Border Crossing, Art/Design Paradigms, Interdisciplinarity (artist, designer, educator, activist)

Andrea Zittel

Concepts: Liberation through Limitation, Lived Practice, Working "outside the art world," What is Possible?, Embracing Ambiguity and art is largely not Problem Solving, Art/Design Paradigms

Hedonist

Epiourus, Santayana

Instrumental

Dewey

Institutional

Dickie, Danto

Explain what Williams means when she advises an art-writer to "start where the beginner's text ends."

Drop the first three paragraphs and keep only the last. Once your prolonged art-looking begins to mature, winnow down most of the preamble, and think through your own viable ideas.

What, according to Williams, is DVS?

Duplicate Verb Syndrome, like it's monstrous cousin the "yeti", unnecessarily shoves two terms together where one would suffice.

According to Williams, jargon is the oldest art-historical trick in the book.

False

Solid nouns, according to Williams, aren't able to produce full mental pictures and need abstract adjectives for support.

False

Williams suggest using carefully selected quotes to do the talking for you. She states, "The job is to pluck out juicy quotes that reaffirm your conclusions."

False

Place the steps to write a short news article, using the 'inverted triangle' structure, in the correct order.

Headline (and subheader): draw your reader's attention with concise, up-to-date news. The lead: front-load with an attention-grabber, perhaps a compelling anecdote that communicates what makes your story unique. Who/what/where/when/how: in clear language, follow with contextualizing detalils, quantifying and backing up your claims with attributed quotes, numerical data, and other evidence. Wind down and 'end with a sting': round off your main point(s)

Critical

Horkheimer, Habermas

Walton Ford

I can be a contemporary artist who made it in the institution who can also be a realist Research as an artist Queer theory, critical theory, ecology (makes us consider our actions) (large watercolor animals)

Respond to the following assertion from your textbook, "Your job [as an art-writer] is to steady and communicate art's basic instability using a few well-chosen ideas expressed in unclichéd and thoughful words."

I like that William's has been suggesting to use words that are short and direct. I like that you need to be able to explain the art with thoughtful words and ideas instead of blabbering on about things that are not related to the piece.

George Dickie and his philosophical approach

Institutional approach

Paragraph 1 Paragraph 2 Paragraph 3 Paragraph 4 Final Section

Introduce your question or topic Give background 1st idea/section final conclusion bibliography

What does "waffle" mean to Williams as it relates to art-writing?

It's weak text because it raises more questions than it answers

Who did the tweet like commentary?

Jerry Saltz (vampire guy)

Jan Yager

Jewelry artist, takes leaves, plants from where she lives in the ghetto and makes it beautiful

Art as Learning Quote

Josh Waitzkin

What philosophical stance? "I believe in low theory in small places.. I believe in making little thoughts.. I see to abuse, annoy... I'm chasing small projects..."

Judith Halborstone (QUEER)

What is meant by William's 'yeti' as it relates to art description for inexperienced art-writers?

Just as the yeti is impossible to pin down, and vanishes into nothing if you attempt to observe it closely, fledgling art-writers are so overcome by the task that they abandon it before even trying.

Explain what a logically ordered paragraph in art-writing entails according to Williams.

Keep to chronological order, move from the general to the specific, often introducing an overall idea, then filling it in with details and examples; prioritize information: key info goes at the end, or front-don't bury it in the middle; keep linked words, phrases, or ideas together.

Feminist

Lippard, Nochlin, Showalter

According to Williams, simile and metaphor should be used with caution. However, one is "riskier" than the other. Which is riskier?

Metaphor

Ecology

Naess, Simos

Mimetic

Plato

Expressionist

Tolstoy, Collingwood

Oliver Herring

Task Party

Duane Michals

The Return of the Prodigal Son

Tino Sehgal

The artist himself describes his works as 'constructed situations'. His materials are the human voice, language, movement, and interaction. He resists the production of physical objects

Lori Waxman Article on Parenting

aesthetic practice

Which of the following answers best explains William's 'inverted triange' structure for writing a short news article?

Top-heavy, with a summary of the main factus as the opener, then working its way down in increasing detail.

Marxist

Trotsky, Breton, Gablik

A short news article, as an art-writing, is written with little or no interpretative spin.

True

Gilda Williams suggests one of the purposes of her book, is not to dictate how you should write, but gently to point out common mishaps, and show how skilful art-writers avoid them.

True

Good art-writers, according to Williams, essentially all follow the same pattern in their writing.

True

Journalism, according to Williams, races along in the active tense, with clipped sentences that keep the subject/verb in close proximity, with few modifiers and punchy--never academic--language.

True

Stabilizing art through language risks killing what makes art worth writing about in the first place, according to Williams.

True

The rule of thirds to many researchers, according to Williams, is as follows: Devote a third of your time to research, a third to planning and writing your first draft, and a third to polishing your draft.

True

Williams may seem contradictory when simultaneously suggesting the art-writing discussion should not be more about the writer than the art, but also that art-writing is always about its writer. However, what she is really saying is in every case, an art-writer should "really know what you are writing about."

True

You should definitely share your personal opinion with your reader when writing an "evaluating" text.

True

Williams offers several "final tips" for art-writing beyond her technical tips. These include...

Turning off the Internet while writing. Revise at least two drafts. Read your text out loud. Define your audience with precision. Persuade your reader.

Ernesto Pujol

We need to be better educated in the art world and people need to take it more seriously. It requires a lot to become an artist.

Williams uses Claire Bishop's story-based account as a valuable example of an event. The three questions Bishop addresses in her story are similar to questions we have seen used in other art-writing examples. They include

What occurred? What could it have meant? What might be the greater significance of this event?

The three jobs of communicative art-writing according to our text include all but the following:

When was this work created?

New media briefs are a piece of art-writing that can pose certain challenges. For this complex, constantly evolving type of work, suggests Williams, the short descriptive text can assist an audience by explaining exactly what they are experiencing. She suggests a modified version of 'The three jobs of communicative art-writing'. Each one of these questions should be addressed with one sentence, since this is a 'brief'. The order for this particular art-writing is as follows:

Why is it meaningful? What is it? Why might this be worth thinking about?

Discussing active verbs, Williams suggests, we should lace our text with unexpected

actions

Remembering our lecture on the partiality of knowledge being both limited and biased, Williams agrees, "All texts are partisan and never truly objective, always penned by opinionated individuals or teams, whether signed or not." She argues, however, that the methodology used to write an explaining text, includes which of the following?

an attempt to be relatively objective and draw "facts" from data sources

Old school criticism was based on connoisseurship (expert judge). Analysis of contemporary art today is thought to benefit from the following "tools" from other fields, which include all but which of the following:

an instinctive sensibility for quality in art, code-name 'taste'

Williams suggests new art-writers find it tricky to balance all but which of the following?

analysis and evaluation

Writing has become increasingly more important to what Williams calls, "the expanding art universe." Williams includes the following role(s) in this "expanding art universe?"

artists curators gallerists museum directors critics editors auctioneers publicists educators

Williams says "if you absorb only one recommendation in this book" it is...

be specific

If there is one single best reason to learn to write well about art, Williams thinks it might be,

because good art deserves it.

Williams reminds us to check the submission requirements for an academic essay, but includes all but which of the following as typical inclusions on a cover letter:

bibliography

is a living platform for storytelling according to Williams.

blogging

All of the following art-texts are usually left unsigned, with the exception of...

catalog essays

The auction catalogue blurb isn't just informative art-writing; it represents

due diligence, a legal term

According to Williams, "the backbone of academic writing and quality journalism" is achieved by providing factual or historical

evidence

In our 226 course, we will have an opportunity to practice the two basic art-writing functions, which according to Williams are:

explaining and evaluating

Williams uses the following example to illustrate a "common art-writing calamity," which could be ameliorated by which of the following?

focus more on evaluation

Williams acknowledges most of us have written a "lame art-text" but she also presents some pitfalls we should avoid. Complete the following pitfall, the art-writer "cannot trace for the reader...

how conclusions were reached."

According to our textbook, 'fear' is the root of bad writing. Writings are often inexperienced, but according to Williams, they are also terrified about all but which of the following:

incorrect forematting

what was Lucy Lippard's demographic she championed?

internationally known writer, art critic, activist and curator from the United States. Lippard was among the first writers to recognize the "dematerialization" at work in conceptual art and was an early champion of feminist art

Williams warns art-writers about the use of metaphor, but says, if you endeavor to use them,

invent your own

Williams, while arguing for clear writing, also points out that art is complex. She also warns that clearheaded writing should not be confused with...

oversimplification

"A 'borrowed sentence or paragraph cleverly doctored with the occasional rewording is still

plagiarism

Tania Bruguera

politically motivated performance artist, from Cuba, explores the relationship between art, activism, and social change, examine the social effects of political and economic power.

Williams notes the more advanced art-writing is often found in newspaper reviews and op-ed journalism. The best writers don't just write well, they...

raise the best questions and make the most pointed observations.

Sophie Calle

the Detective, which is a layered work where she hired an investigator to follow her but also asked a friend to document her and anyone that seemed to be following her

Even though we acknowledge that knowledge is partial, according to Williams, "Any paritiality [of an art-writer] must, at least, be openly disclosed." All but which of the following ethical disclosures should be included in the art-writing if they occur:

the art-writer is incredibly fond of the artist's work

Substantiation

to prove or support something; confirming that it is true or valid

According to Williams, one of the puposes of this textbook, How to Write about Contemporary Art, is as follows:

to provide some guidance to the art-writing novice--and perhaps offer the experienced writer a refresher as well.

Williams uses the example of Nicolas Bourriaud's "Relational Aesthetics" book. According to her, when you write about an essential term such as Bourriaud's new theory, you should:

use the term sparingly, adopting near synonyms to protect the word as a precious treasure.

Cayce Zavaglia

work in terms of improvisation and adaptation in relation to complexity theory (instead of painting, she embroiders)

Williams asserts "no one excels at art-writing from their ealiest attempt." She warns novice art-writers about several pitfalls. One of those pitfalls occurs when the discussion within the writing becomes all about the

writer and not the art