Viveros-Faune and the Village Voice's ethics problem

In the final part of this week's Q&A with Village Voice art critic Christian Viveros-Faune, I asked Viveros-Faune how it was that he worked as an organizer and co-director of two commercial art fairs (Volta in NYC, Next in Chicago) at the same time he was the Village Voice's art critic. One of the fairs, Next, is owned by Merchandise Mart, the a major player in American art fairs and the owner of NYC's The Armory Show. The arrangement puts a Village Voice art critic in bed with a major art market player. "Why isn't that the most basic kind of conflict-of-interest?" I asked.

Viveros-Faune's answers are in the post below this one, or here.

This is a textbook case of an unethical conflict-of-interest. Would Roger Ebert work for a film distributor? What if the LA Times' theater critic decided what plays are shown at Geffen Playhouse and was financially reliant upon the success of those plays? What if NYT art critic Grace Glueck sat on the board of an art museum? (Oh, wait...)

By virtue of being a Village Voice's art critic -- a job previously held by major figures such as Peter Schjeldahl and Jerry Saltz -- every other week Viveros-Faune holds either the third- or fourth-most-prominent position in the NYC art-critical landscape. Just like Saltz before him, Viveros-Faune is in a position to impact critical thought, to move the market, to decide what artists and what galleries make it -- and which don't. Viveros-Faune also has the opportunity to use his Voice presence as a way to review -- even promote -- artists and galleries he has selected for inclusion in the art fairs in which he is involved. (Conversely, if a gallery isn't interested in participating in a Viveros-Faune fair, he could punish them by refusing to review their shows.) Both fairs have big-dollar sponsors, and Viveros-Faune is listed as Next's contact for sponsorship. Would a critic negatively review artists owned by one of his sponsors? Or would he be extra-likely to consider artists owned by a sponsoring private management group? The possibility of impropriety, the exact sort of thing ethics are supposed to prevent, is acute. That is flat wrong.

Because conflicts-of-interest strike at the very heart of the integrity of journalism, newspapers and other news organizations are typically extra-careful about avoiding them. Nothing is more devastating to a newspaper than the revelation that it employs someone who may be using the newspaper as a front for that individual's private interests.

So have Viveros-Faune's commercial interests impacted his Voice columns? First: The whole point of ethics is to ensure that this question isn't even asked. But because Viveros-Faune and the Voice have so flouted journalistic norms, we must. When it comes to what he has chosen not to write, we'll never know. That's troubling. According to Volta's website, the exhibitor lineup for that fair, of which Viveros-Faune is a co-director, will not be released until February. There is also no available lineup for exhibitors of the Next fair, which Viveros-Faune co-organizes.

The Voice, of all papers, might be expected to be extra-careful. Sixteen months ago the paper emptied its arts staff, replacing many experienced veterans in the process. You'd think that the new leadership, notably editor Tony Ortega, would be extra-vigilant to make sure nothing like this happened. (A source tells MAN that Village Voice Media has no in-house ethical handbook or guidelines that its writers must follow.) Yesterday I emailed Ortega for comment. He did not reply. In a subsequent email to the paper's spokesperson, I again asked to talk with Ortega. He didn't reply to that request either. Yesterday morning VV arts and culture editor Brian Parks sent me this email:

Critics in the arts sometimes also have other involvement in their fields. Whether in the fine arts or elsewhere, we regularly review our critics' activities with them, and are confident that they will not abuse their critical role for personal gain elsewhere in their field. I have discussed your concerns with Christian, and I am convinced that he has avoided such a conflict of interest, keeping his curatorial efforts and critical writings distinctly separate.

Parks did not return a phone message seeking clarification of the final sentence of his email: The issue at question is not "curatorial efforts" (at, say, a college art gallery or some such place), but Viveros-Faune's management/organizing role in two commercial art fairs. (In our Q&A Viveros-Faune used the same defense, indicating a bizarre inability to differentiate between effectively choosing commercial galleries for a commercial endeavor, and being a curator.)

"I think that you can sort of wear a lot of hats in the art world," Viveros-Faune said. Yes, if you're existing solely within the art world, you can do that. But by writing for the Voice, Viveros-Faune works both in the art world and in the journalism world. That means he must be held to journalistic standards. Viveros-Faune's indication that he should be able to disregard ethical standards because he needs to make money is particularly galling.

On a personal note, this is uncomfortable for me. I've done dozens of Q&As on MAN with all sorts of art world figures, people such as Getty CEO James Wood, critic Jerry Saltz, Gugg curator Nancy Spector, ex-Walker director Kathy Halbreich and artist and New Yorker photographer Robert Polidori. I hope the history of this site indicates that I don't do ambushes and that I don't do gotcha-journalism.

So I want to explain how this all came out: On Monday, impressed with a recent Lawrence Weiner review, I asked Viveros-Faune to come on MAN and he agreed. That night, while researching and preparing for the Q&A I discovered the hiding-in-clear-sight conflicts-of-interest discussed here. When Viveros-Faune and I did our Q&A on Tuesday, my last few questions were about this topic. I expected him to say that he was in the process of separating himself from his commercial interests, or some such thing. He didn't:

What should happen next is pretty clear: Viveros-Faune should immediately withdraw -- both in terms of involvement and any financial interest -- from the two commercial art fairs he organizes, and the Village Voice should explain to its readers how it published his work in the face of such obvious conflicts. If Viveros-Faune won't do that, the Voice has only one option: It should stop publishing him.