{ 3 comments }

Bean September 17, 2012 at 4:49 pm

For another review of Manifesta 9, check out Leigh Markopoulos’ excellent summary on Art Practical. Snip:

“In a similar way, Manifesta 9, by attempting to blur the boundaries of
art and industry, unfortunately instead raises the question of what
art or curators really have to offer as socio-political critique…

The second floor is mainly the purview of the art
historian Ades, who undertakes an investigation into the intersections
between mining and art history and presents artworks in a variety of
media. A somewhat over-scrupulous adherence to the theme renders the
overall effect one of a Google search for ‘coal + art.'”

http://www.artpractical.com/feature/a_quinquennial_and_two_biennials/

john September 24, 2012 at 2:27 am

Funny, just read the Manifesta review. It doesn’t say that non-EUR
miners are not the norm–as per your bone to pick– but it say that
blending Turkish and Belgian miners in a multi-culti way is politically
correct.

Will Brand September 24, 2012 at 10:33 am

The implication of “politically correct” is that you’ve gone out of your way to accommodate some group for no particularly good reason, or else sacrificed something for the sake of not causing offense. I don’t think the curators put prayer rugs in the show to avoid protests by Turkish coal miners, because that doesn’t make any sense. I think they put miner stuff next to other miner stuff, like they put coal-related sculpture next to coal-related drawing. Putting separate but related things in the same space isn’t being politically correct, it’s just curating.

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