—The art world—
It occurred to me recently that it would help to think of the artist statement as also an art summary. The way I think about creativity, it should be as much about the art as the artist. Maybe more so. And when I think about the word statement, it sounds like it means a proclamation. Personally, I am trying to let my philosophies drive my work as a secret recipe and beyond that, keep my art "ism" viewpoints to myself. We often hear artists protest that their work should speak for itself. Even in the 21st century, I think that's the right insight.
For now, I'm going to keep using the terminology: artist statement. But for me, a good start to writing an artist statement is to think of it as an art summary. That way, I can excuse myself from thinking I need to write a manifesto about me and can focus on the work itself.
Which is where I want the viewer's focus. I would like the viewer to be able to make sense of my art piece or body of work without too much explanation. The artist statement should reinforce what viewers find in my work and validate their experience. After being affected by the art, the viewer is naturally intrigued and wants to know more about me. Why has the artist chosen this theme? What is the artist's background? Here, again, we are talking about more of a summary than a statement, and more of an afterword than an introduction.
I'm reading a book I got from the library called They Became What They Beheld by Edmund Snow Carpenter about the impact of the digital revolution on arts and culture in the sixties. In one passage, he differentiates between contemporary Western art and the art of more traditional ethnic groups. The American artist is often concerned—or said to be concerned—with self-expression, while the traditional artist is more concerned with, well, tradition. The contemporary artist's expression is often very personal, while the traditional artist starts with a communal style and differentiates him or herself with unique, albeit often subtle, variations and interpretations.
It occurs to me that this is something to keep in mind when writing an artist statement. Behind the conventional attitude of the artist statement is the contemporary, Western idea of an artist. It is a modern idea, maybe going back to the dawn of the Renaissance. In this narrative, the artist is a creative individual, often called a genius, who wrestles with angst and existential demons on the stage of the canvas. When he has left the stage, the dealer will pry lose the blood spattered floorboards and sell them to collectors who value them as signifiers of a vicarious and imaginary bohemian lifestyle of self-expression that legitimates a capitalist principal of self-interest. The artist need not win the wrestling match; evidence of the struggle is enough. And the artist statement, perhaps, doesn't need to be any clearer than the paint on the canvas to satisfy the market.
But here, we see quite obviously, I am letting my philosophies out of the bag. That's okay; this is a blog, not an artist statement. My point is that the artist statement is often highly personal, as is a lot of contemporary art, and the language that we use to name this text about our work—artist statement—reveals a bias toward individuality, if not self-absorption. Just today, I saw a painting posted on facebook that would appeal to a wide range of people, but the accompanying artist statement was incomprehensible and self-indulgent.
My personal sentiments may guide my art, but they don't need to appear in my artist statement for the reader to make sense of either my work or my artist statement. The viewer should respond to the work and the statement should jibe with the viewer's experience viewing the work. Being more of a summary than a statement, it should summarize the content, the processes, the motivation, and the aesthetic mechanisms of the work. Having made sense of the writing, the viewer is naturally intrigued and will want to go back and look closer at my paintings.
My work is not political, in the current sense of politics. My ideas guide my work, but they are not confrontational. I enjoy the work of many artists who have very different opinions. On the other hand, the artist must not hide. Faced with the possibility of being called a racist, sexist, patriarchal, othering, colonizing, appropriating, gazing, ethnocentric, ageist, anthropocentric, terracentric bastard, the artist may try to disappear and say nothing at all. It won't work. The art will always say something, whether the meaning comes from the artist or the viewer. But the art is the place to play with meaning and generate interest, not the artist statement.
I remember analyzing Hamlet in class and the others were trying to figure out Hamlet's motivations. I was utterly confused. As an artist, my only thought had ever been, "what was Shakespeare up to?" Perhaps, more accurately, what did Shakespeare's muses (Freud might say his subconscious) want? When reading my artist statement, viewers might want to know the same from me. In choosing to think of my artist statement as more of an art summary, I can still confirm my personal motivation. But these are motivations that I think the viewer should be able to see without any prompting from my words. And if there's a point of departure that doesn't remain in prominence in the final state of the series, writing about it should enhance the viewer's understanding. Otherwise, perhaps it's an anecdote better suited for a different place.
