Dear Lindsay Pollock: Basel Ain’t All Schnitzel and Cheval Blanc

POST BY KAREN ARCHEY
Karen Archey, Art Newspaper, contemporary art, art fag city, paddy johnson, lindsay pollock, barbara kruger
Barbara Kruger, Untitled (I Shop Therefore I Am), 1987

Barbara Kruger’s infamous image unironically graced the front page of The Art Newspaper’s daily ArtBasel sales report for June 12-14. One would assume the article using Kruger’s image—which skeptically investigates consumer culture—would share its critical sentiment rather than blindly glorify the private lives of collectors. The last two issues of The Art Newspaper’s Basel Edition feature Lindsay Pollock extolling celebrity appearances in a high school creative writing class-esque fashion. Our (least) favorite excerpts below:

Art Basel’s 40th edition continued to defy the worldwide financial slump yesterday, after the NetJets crowd had flitted off, leaving trails of cigar smoke, empty magnums of Cheval Blanc and throngs of prosperous European art lovers behind. Brad Pitt, Naomi Campbell, Roman Abramovich, and music producer Pharrell Williams were among the celebrities who showed up…
…The fair got off to a strong start as collectors poured into the boxy industrial convention hall promptly at 11am. A chic, mostly European crowd, wearing the latest in tans courtesy of the Venice Biennale, dashed for the stands.
…As opening day progressed, with bursts of sunshine alternating with light showers, collectors, dealers and the rest of the opening day crowd chomped veal bratwurst dipped in mustard, puffed on cigarettes and traipsed around art-jammed stands.

Can Pollock get any more sensationalistic? This brand of writing perpetuates false ideals that plague the art world, notably its obsession with monetary wealth and fame. Art Basel should be considered a mixed bag or ambivalent experience: Switzerland might be nice, but it’s no Gumdrop Mountain. Visit her Twitter feed and you’ll be barraged with “quips” about Jeff Koons, the writer’s current (and not surprising) obsession. Needless to say, AFC has yet to participate in much Cheval Blanc chugging or NetJet-jetting. We have, however, gotten caught in the rain and stayed a couple nights in a camper (van) parked down by the river (the Rhein).

http://seanmorrisseycarroll.blogspot.com b.s.
ha ha ha give ‘em hell.
http://seanmorrisseycarroll.blogspot.com b.s.
ha ha ha give ‘em hell.
http://www.wwiiggss.com wwiiggss
Well, the camper van is your experience and Cheval Blanc is hers. Street cred points for both of you!
From this end, yours and hers are both interesting, valid point of views and you have to assume readers are smart enough to discern information for themselves.
http://www.wwiiggss.com wwiiggss
Well, the camper van is your experience and Cheval Blanc is hers. Street cred points for both of you!
From this end, yours and hers are both interesting, valid point of views and you have to assume readers are smart enough to discern information for themselves.
Art Fag City
@wwiiggss No. Street cred points are not allotted to both of us. It’s one thing to report on collector culture it’s quite another to present a sycophantic glamorization of that scene. It’s an inaccurate report, and we’re calling Pollock out for it. And it’s a questionably challenged journalistic practice to hope that readers who haven’t been here or don’t know anything about the scene will be able to “discern” these falsehoods. We’re all better off without this kind of crap permeating the art world.
Art Fag City
@wwiiggss No. Street cred points are not allotted to both of us. It’s one thing to report on collector culture it’s quite another to present a sycophantic glamorization of that scene. It’s an inaccurate report, and we’re calling Pollock out for it. And it’s a questionably challenged journalistic practice to hope that readers who haven’t been here or don’t know anything about the scene will be able to “discern” these falsehoods. We’re all better off without this kind of crap permeating the art world.
http://www.artfagcity.com Karen Archey
Can I get reality points instead of street cred points?
http://www.artfagcity.com Karen Archey
Can I get reality points instead of street cred points?
Allison
What is exactly is inaccurate about it? I can’t say I’m in Basel but her description sounds fairly plausible. Sure, Pollock’s mood-setting details tend to be gratuitous but I would hesitate to suggest they weren’t necessarily true. You haven’t really described a Basel that could not be the same as hers. Posting incendiary comments about her reporting without clear evidence to give weight to your claims makes you sounds a little… disgruntled?
Allison
What is exactly is inaccurate about it? I can’t say I’m in Basel but her description sounds fairly plausible. Sure, Pollock’s mood-setting details tend to be gratuitous but I would hesitate to suggest they weren’t necessarily true. You haven’t really described a Basel that could not be the same as hers. Posting incendiary comments about her reporting without clear evidence to give weight to your claims makes you sounds a little… disgruntled?
Art Fag City
@Allison You’re right to point out that not all of it is untrue, though it is quite misleading. “Chic” collectors “wearing the latest tans from the Biennale” may have attended the fair but most buyers did not fit that description. No trails of cigar smoke were left anywhere, (though you can smoke inside Volta). I’d really like to see this kind of writing retired.
Art Fag City
@Allison You’re right to point out that not all of it is untrue, though it is quite misleading. “Chic” collectors “wearing the latest tans from the Biennale” may have attended the fair but most buyers did not fit that description. No trails of cigar smoke were left anywhere, (though you can smoke inside Volta). I’d really like to see this kind of writing retired.
chad
Kick Ass AFC. Perhaps if Pollock and company spent more time looking at the art and not gawking at celebrities and trying to get into parties they would be able to formulate a critical assessment of the work instead of pandering to the celebrity culture club. But hey, I guess one writes about what one knows, but I for one don’t want to read that nonsense.
chad
Kick Ass AFC. Perhaps if Pollock and company spent more time looking at the art and not gawking at celebrities and trying to get into parties they would be able to formulate a critical assessment of the work instead of pandering to the celebrity culture club. But hey, I guess one writes about what one knows, but I for one don’t want to read that nonsense.
Art Fag City
@chad Pollock is a reporter so her beat really isn’t responding to the art. That’s fine, but as Karen’s title suggests, Basel ain’t all Schnitzel and Cheval Blanc
Art Fag City
@chad Pollock is a reporter so her beat really isn’t responding to the art. That’s fine, but as Karen’s title suggests, Basel ain’t all Schnitzel and Cheval Blanc
Art Fag City
@chad Pollock is a reporter so her beat really isn’t responding to the art. That’s fine, but as Karen’s title suggests, Basel ain’t all Schnitzel and Cheval Blanc
http://davidmcbride.net David
Pollock is likely targeting a different audience, for whom her kind of writing is the cat’s meow, and as such quite accurate. These are the ills of the art fairs. AFC’s audience is clearly different, and the event gets represented differently here.
I’ve always kind of wondered about reporting on art fairs at all, as the audience of art fairs generally matches Pollock’s audience more than AFC’s. It has seemed weird to me that they have been treated similarly to exhibitions (although I recognize there are different approaches to art fairs, some perceived more like exhibitions.) They seem to be a product of the ‘boom’. So, maybe Basel ain’t all Schnitzel and Cheval Blanc, but it kind of is, since if it weren’t it probably wouldn’t exist.
http://davidmcbride.net David
Pollock is likely targeting a different audience, for whom her kind of writing is the cat’s meow, and as such quite accurate. These are the ills of the art fairs. AFC’s audience is clearly different, and the event gets represented differently here.
I’ve always kind of wondered about reporting on art fairs at all, as the audience of art fairs generally matches Pollock’s audience more than AFC’s. It has seemed weird to me that they have been treated similarly to exhibitions (although I recognize there are different approaches to art fairs, some perceived more like exhibitions.) They seem to be a product of the ‘boom’. So, maybe Basel ain’t all Schnitzel and Cheval Blanc, but it kind of is, since if it weren’t it probably wouldn’t exist.
http://www.northcoastcampers.com.au/ Campers Sunshine Coast
lol