{"id":363,"date":"2009-03-26T17:50:39","date_gmt":"2009-03-27T00:50:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp\/2009\/03\/the_hits_keep_coming\/"},"modified":"2009-03-26T17:50:39","modified_gmt":"2009-03-27T00:50:39","slug":"the_hits_keep_coming","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/2009\/03\/the_hits_keep_coming.html","title":{"rendered":"Artists who are punching bags – the hits keep coming"},"content":{"rendered":"

Julian Schnabel<\/a> is one of those artists whom critics feel obligated to disdain personally. The list changes, but once artists are on it, they’ll be pricked by kicks for some time to come. <\/p>\n

Even sanest man in art criticism – Richard Lacayo<\/a> – goes mildly nutty at the mention of Schnabel’s name. Here’s Lacayo’s drive-by Schnabel hit in a discussion of Guest of Cindy Sherman<\/a> by Paul H-O:<\/p>\n

Paul comes off as a somewhat goofy but implacable guy who has a way of
\ngetting his foot in the door and a sense of humor about himself. He’s
\nnot afraid to show us footage of artworld blowhard Julian Schnabel —
\nwho (no surprise) does not have a sense of humor about himself —
\ntelling Paul that his tv show is “a sort of masturbatory exercise in
\nstupidity.” (Careful Julian, that’s a pretty good description of your
\nentire career as a painter.)<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Really? His entire career?<\/p>\n

Another must-kick artist is Dale Chihuly<\/a>. He could make mountains dance, and critics would turn away in disgust. The most recent addition to the critical no-fly zone is Shepard Fairey<\/a>. Damion Hayes of the street art blog To Fear It Is To Know It<\/a> is obsessed with disrespecting Fairey. How bad is it? Hayes backs AP over Fairey. That’s a disgrace. Today, again<\/a>.  (A rational view of the case here<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

Artists do not poison waterways, start wars or send the economy into free fall. Rigorous criticism is essential, but personal insults degrade the critic who tosses them off. <\/p>\n

I started reading Thomas Albright in the SF Chronicle in college. He later wrote a book<\/a> about Bay Area art. It’s good but not great. Albright was master of the 10-to-15-inch review in a newspaper. In that small space, he did it all: close attention to the work in question and a sweeping sense of context paired with decisive judgment, all in his confident, smart, no bullshit style. <\/p>\n

He died in his late 40s in 1984. At his funeral, someone said that Albright’s attacks were formidable but never personal. In his reviews, Albright called no one names, not even the SF art dealers who once bought space on a billboard to say, “Fire Tom Albright.” I believe they included an exclamation point.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Julian Schnabel is one of those artists whom critics feel obligated to disdain personally. The list changes, but once artists are on it, they’ll be pricked by kicks for some time to come. Even sanest man in art criticism – Richard Lacayo – goes mildly nutty at the mention of Schnabel’s name. Here’s Lacayo’s drive-by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-363","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/363","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=363"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/363\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}