What Extreme Conceptual Art Tells Us About Inequality and Value

LaBossiere's exploration of art as concept reveals disquieting implications. If art (not just extreme conceptual art, but all art) gains its value to some degree from the value of its creator, then one must wonder what sort of inequality exists in the valuation of art. Would, for example, a Big Al Carter piece sell for more if Big Al had not been black and unrepresented by a gallery? Or, would it sell for less? When artists become petit-celebrities of a sort, does their art increase in value? Should it, particularly if the quality (however measured) has not? And, perhaps more importantly, how do our cultural biases play into the determination of value for pieces of art labeled "tribal" or "folk" art?

Click to read more ...

Twenty-Somethings, It's Time to Buy Art

Twenty-somethings, it's time. It's time to roll up that poster of Muhammad Ali and that silk screen canvas print of the Eiffel Tower. It's time to rest something lasting on those blank white apartment walls. It's time to buy original art.

Click to read more ...

The Art of Fear: Makode Linde's 'Painful Cake'

Now, imagine viewing these images (just like most of the world has this past week) without knowing the artist’s intent, without knowing the context for the event, without knowing why this mostly-white audience is laughing hysterically at this grotesque portrayal of black womanhood. If you care about humanity and racial justice, your response is probably immediate and swift. Your response is coated in fear. We know racism exists, we think we see it here, we fear we see it here. Is this the real image? Or, is this a mere representation of the real image?

Click to read more ...

There's One Like You on Every Block: Wyclef's Words for Trayvon Martin

When I think about music, I think of passion. When I think about passion, I think of emotion. When I think about emotion, I think of love, hate, fear, joy, sadness, resilience, and a great many others. But most of all, I think of universality. The best songs, in my opinion, tell a story. They take us on a journey of love, of hate, of hurt, of forgiveness. They remind us that we are not alone. The specificity of a story often breeds the universality of the emotions it conjures.

Click to read more ...

Interview: Sean Lotman, Photographer and Writer

There is something inherently enduring about Sean Lotman’s work. Lotman is that nowadays-rare photographer who despite the trend toward digital photography still shoots using an old-school analog camera. His choice affects the look and feel of his work and it affects the way he approaches his work’s creation. Lotman does not hold on to analog photography for sentiment – or even aesthetics – alone; rather, he sees an analog camera as integral to his method. For Lotman, art-making is “risky,” it is something that requires skill as well as luck and a willingness to be in the moment. Analog enables such immediacy, such intimacy between the creator and the creation. “Art is the greatest clue to the self,” Lotman tells us, “It draws from talent, experience, and the subconscious.”

Click to read more ...

Editors' Note: The Studio Museum in Harlem, this Spring

The Studio Museum in Harlem has several exciting exhibitions this spring.

Click to read more ...