Dave Hickey introducing himself to his students:<\/p>\n
I’m happy you’re all here. This is my e-mail, in case you have any questions, because I am paid by the university and I want to be a good employee. Personally, I don’t give a fuck.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Hickey didn’t write it, he said to his students in a class at the University of Nevada Las Vegas titled, LA Noir<\/i>. We know this because student Simon Horning in the 2009 class took notes and published them<\/a> with disclaimers:<\/p>\n
Many sentences were reconstructed from fragments and memory. I did not use a recorder…This piece, therefore, is what I heard and not necessarily what Dave Hickey said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
I hope Horning got an A. As he remembered Hickey telling the class:<\/p>\n
Get excited about telling a story. Make up the fucking material. When
\nJohn Ashbery was asked how he wrote so much, he said, ‘It’s like
\ntelevision. There’s always something on.’<\/p><\/blockquote>\nHickey is the great tap-dancing art critic of our time. He can link any X to any Y and produce the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. I remember the specific thrill of reading his connection between Caravaggio’s The Incredulity of St.Thomas<\/i><\/a> and Robert Mapplethorpe’s Lou<\/i>, who is sticking a finger in his penis, in The Invisible Dragon: Four Essays on Beauty<\/i><\/a>. (Individual essay online here<\/a>.)<\/p>\n
Hickey no longer teaches art because, as he told Sarah Thornton who quoted him in her book, Seven Days in the Art World<\/i><\/a>, he doubts the value of the process.<\/p>\n
My one rule is that I do not do group crits. They are social
\noccasions that reinforce the norm. They impose a standardized discourse.
\nThey privilege unfinished, incompetent art…
\nIf you’re not sick, don’t call the doctor…I don’t care about an artist’s intentions. I care if the work looks
\nlike it might have some consequences.
\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\nHe moved over to the English department, where he hopes to do less damage but still be paid. Below, to give the flavor, a few quotes from <\/i>the text. (<\/i>Thanks to Nathan Lippens for the recommendation.)<\/p>\n
On aging:<\/p>\n
I haven’t had to look presentable for twenty years.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
On non-rugged individualism:<\/p>\n
I’m the one who stands on his own two feet, having no other available
\nfeet.<\/p><\/blockquote>\nReading the Bible:<\/p>\n
In the West, high art and popular art can be divided from each other like the Bible can be divided into Ecclesiastes and Proverbs. The Proverbs tell you to be a good person, not to do drugs, be home before ten o’clock, and don’t listen to Jane’s Addiction at four in the morning. The prophetic books like Ecclesiastes are about death, violence, and protecting Israel, and this creates prophetic cultures that produce high art. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Understanding LA:<\/p>\n
Los Angeles is a city of bubbles. You have body-builder bubbles, nudist bubbles, surfer bubbles, rich bubbles, poor bubbles. So, how do you write a novel about a city with all of these bubbles? Until Raymond Chandler came along and created the private eye, you really couldn’t. The private eye can move from one bubble to another and tie them together. He’s there to take you to all the places you can’t go.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
This stuff is not morally redemptive. I mean, Keith Richards is not morally redemptive. <\/p>\n
LA is a city of secrets. LA noir is kind of about privacy
\nbecause the private eyes are opposed to public eyes like the cops and
\nthe press. The classic image of the genre is a room with the blinds
\nclosed. This is important because of the decay of privacy we have had
\nsince these books were written.<\/p>\nDetective
\nnovels are designed to deal with people in stores. <\/p>\nIf you lived in LA, you know it’s a new
\nworld every day. <\/p><\/blockquote>\nReferring to Auden’s The Dyer’s Hand<\/i><\/a>:<\/p>\n
Auden compares British noir novels with American noir and says that in the British novels, there is a snake in the garden, whereas in the American novels there is a presumption of the general corruption of everyone and everything. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Know your enemy:<\/p>\n
I drive to think. I’ll drive out to Red Rock. Then I’ll drive to the
\nMormon church to remind me of who the enemy is. Sorry, Mormons, but it
\ndoes look like America’s going to end the same way as Rome. A bunch of
\ncrazy Christians are going to ruin it. \n<\/p><\/blockquote>\nMore on know-your-enemy:<\/p>\n