What's the definition of a great contemporary artist? Didn't the Third Reich already tell us?
"Just keep the white collectors around the world happy by talking a lot of bullshit about minimalism! Don't you dare fucking mention Iraq! You got me, Ruscha?!" - Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld yells minimalist Venice Biennale marching orders to artist Ed Ruscha.
Surprise! Surprise! Surprise!
The Best Living Artists: An Economist's View
The art establishment says the art market is a poor way to judge artistic quality. University of Chicago economist David W. Galenson begs to differ. He's just released his list of the greatest living artists, based on the number of their works that have sold for $1 million or more at auction. He says the names on his list bear a marked similarity to those whose work appears most often in art history textbooks.
"Art scholars and critics often claim that markets for art are irrational, and that the value an artist's work brings at auction is unrelated to the real importance of that artist's work. These claims are wrong," Galenson, who studies the economics of the art world, asserts in a working paper published last month by the National Bureau of Economic Research. "The most valuable art is made by the greatest artists."
Best Sellers
Ranking of living artists by number of works sold at auction for $1 million or more*
Artist ... Number
Gerhard Richter ... 53
Jasper Johns ... 39
Cy Twombly ... 28
Jeff Koons ... 20
Lucian Freud ... 16
Robert Rauschenberg ... 14
Brice Marden ... 9
Jasper Johns ... 39
Cy Twombly ... 28
Jeff Koons ... 20
Lucian Freud ... 16
Robert Rauschenberg ... 14
Brice Marden ... 9
Ed Ruscha ... 8 (BCB editorial note: Ruscha is a covert CIA agent - read below.)
David Hockney ... 7
Ellsworth Kelly ... 6
Andrew Wyeth ... 6
Maurizio Cattelan ... 5
Chuck Close ... 5
Frank Stella ... 5
Miquel Barcel ... 4
Damien Hirst ... 4
Bruce Nauman ... 4
Georg Baselitz ... 3
Ellsworth Kelly ... 6
Andrew Wyeth ... 6
Maurizio Cattelan ... 5
Chuck Close ... 5
Frank Stella ... 5
Miquel Barcel ... 4
Damien Hirst ... 4
Bruce Nauman ... 4
Georg Baselitz ... 3
Claudio Bravo ... 3
Marlene Dumas ... 3
Sigmar Polke ... 3
Robert Ryman ... 3
Wayne Thiebaud ... 3
Fernando Botero ... 2
Louise Bourgeois ... 2
Marlene Dumas ... 3
Sigmar Polke ... 3
Robert Ryman ... 3
Wayne Thiebaud ... 3
Fernando Botero ... 2
Louise Bourgeois ... 2
Fourteen others with one work each
*As of September, 2005. Source: "Who Are the Greatest Living Artists? The View From the Auction Market" Working Paper 11644. National Bureau of Economic Research
Of course, what Gomer and the WaPo both fail to mention is that most of the artists on this list who just happen to be "great" also just happen to be white males!
Shazaam!
How ironic that this amazing secret in the world of contemporary art was shared in a WaPo section titled, "Unconventional Wisdom"!
Well, as a public service, let me provide some real unconventional wisdom for aspiring great artists:
If you're white, you're all right.
If you're brown, stick around.
If you're black, step the fuck back.
Oh, yeah, and if you're a woman...well, you'd probably be better off to just give it up and commit suicide!
And while we're on the subject of great white male artists, I couldn't help but notice that Ed Ruscha, of course, has made the list. I also couldn't help but notice that the New York Times recently informed us that two of Ruscha's CIA-sponsored paintings from the Venice Biennale have been purchased by the Whitney Museum of Covert American Art.
"They're quite radical," said Donna De Salvo, associate director for programs and curator of the permanent collection at the Whitney, "especially in the way they move beyond specifically the U.S."
I guess Ms. De Salvo gets her talking points on Ruscha from "Scooter" Libby.
I'm publishing below a version that was sent to the Washington Post in response to a review by Blake Gopnik - a review in which Gopnik, under immense pressure from the White House, refused to disclose the facts surrounding the State Department selection of Ruscha.
For the record: the Washington Post's assistant managing editor, Bob Woodward, was personally informed by me of the covert CIA agent status of artist Ed Ruscha months before this letter was submitted. With this notice I am hereby formally releasing Bob from any pledge he made to me as a confidential source.
“CODE RED ALERT: The U.S. Department of State Officially Approves Artist Ed Ruscha for International Exhibition at the Venice Biennale”
Apparently, the CIA and Department of Homeland Security cleared Blake Gopnik’s article, “Fading Glory”, for recent publication in the Washington Post. We can only assume that such a high level national security clearance was indeed authorized, considering the glaring lack of proper background, combined with the misleading misstatement of fact in the article, that avoids any mention whatsoever of the convoluted and suspect selection process sanctioned by the U.S. Department of State that resulted in the selection of minimalist artist Ed Ruscha to be the official U.S. representative at the 2005 Venice Biennale.
When upper management in the U.S. Department of State meets behind closed doors, it’s normally for the purpose of developing the spin of day to continue to advance the war theory of weapons of mass destruction; but when the little known Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs appoints high ranking curators and museum directors to meet behind closed doors, their postmodern art job is to emerge with an American artist weapon of mass appeal (Ed Ruscha) to participate in the 2005 Venice Biennale.
The U.S. Department of State controlled process for deciding the participating American artist for the 2005 Venice Biennale was a screw-up that only a government agency that believes in “nation building” could conceive. A federal law, the Fulbright-Hays Act, mandates that the U.S. Department of State provide oversight of American participation in a handful of prestigious international artistic and cultural events, including the Venice Biennale. Until recently, the process of selecting an artist was orchestrated by the Fund for US Artists at Overseas Exhibitions. In the past the National Endowment for the Arts would convene a panel of insider art professionals who were tasked with reviewing curatorial proposals submitted in response to an open call for submissions. The Pew Charitable Trusts and the Rockefeller Funds kicked in the money to support chosen project, with a little boot offered by the U.S. Department of State.
But the public/private partnership collapsed in late 2003 when, due to the private funders citing a realignment of funding priorities, pulled out. The U.S. Department of State, once again caught off guard because of bad CIA intel, didn’t know what was happening or what to do. Thus, their undemocratic solution: Have a select group of non-controversial pro-American art priests go into a closed door session and select a non-controversial pro-American pop artist whose minimalist work is subject to open-ended conversations that will never touch on any issues regarding America’s arrogant attitude as exemplified by its foreign policy – and with specifically no references whatsoever to its “War on Terrorism”. And to further assure that the message of the artist stays comfortably within U.S. Department of State approved guidelines regarding the content of curatorial messages, the selected artist, Ed Ruscha, was allowed to choose his own curator (Linda Norden, associate curator of contemporary art at Harvard’s Fogg Art Museum), a Venice Biennale first
Needless to say that this whitewashed arrangement will not result in a controversial installation by Ruscha in which he digitally photographs performance actors/artists playing the role military interrogators flushing the Koran down a toilet while others dressed as American soldiers wail on Muslim captives – no, we’ll be safely treated to innocent and non-provocative words and phrases painted on canvasses like, WHO ME? or ART = MONEY = FAME or SWEET, and other deep stuff like that that wears a bullet proof critical vest - the Minimalist postmodern relativist art fanatics love Ruscha and naturally they’re not about to criticize his government sanctioned appearance in Venice; the worst we’ll hear and read is “he was a safe choice”.
Safe indeed. Safe is what you’ll always get when your government gets in the business of proffering art to the world; and safer still is what you must get when dangerous times compel quiet acquiescence to the party line.
Our government’s position during this so-called “War on Terrorism” is that we all just shut up, sit down and do what we’re told to do. Our government has made it easy for us to know when to comply by issuing its daily Homeland Security Codes in Minimalist colors and words RED = SEVERE, ORANGE = HIGH, YELLOW = ELEVATED, BLUE = GUARDED and GREEN = LOW.
It comes as no surprise that the U.S. Department of State has enthusiastically endorsed a minimalist word artist like Ed Ruscha as the official American artist to represent the United States of America at the 2005 Venice Biennale. Maybe the man behind the curtain in our government will lower the national security alert lever to GREEN so as to encourage all of us compliant Americans to trip over to Italy this summer to see what profound words of encouragement that Ruscha has painted for our cultural edification and amusement.
Or more likely, once again we’ll find ourselves this summer being urged to stay inside because of the mandatory Code Red Alert – and perhaps that’s not a bad thing because anytime your government issues an official imprimatur on a specific artist from a particular school of art, red flags ought to be going up everywhere…especially among art critics who write for nationally and internationally distributed newspapers.
Apparently, the CIA and Department of Homeland Security cleared Blake Gopnik’s article, “Fading Glory”, for recent publication in the Washington Post. We can only assume that such a high level national security clearance was indeed authorized, considering the glaring lack of proper background, combined with the misleading misstatement of fact in the article, that avoids any mention whatsoever of the convoluted and suspect selection process sanctioned by the U.S. Department of State that resulted in the selection of minimalist artist Ed Ruscha to be the official U.S. representative at the 2005 Venice Biennale.
When upper management in the U.S. Department of State meets behind closed doors, it’s normally for the purpose of developing the spin of day to continue to advance the war theory of weapons of mass destruction; but when the little known Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs appoints high ranking curators and museum directors to meet behind closed doors, their postmodern art job is to emerge with an American artist weapon of mass appeal (Ed Ruscha) to participate in the 2005 Venice Biennale.
The U.S. Department of State controlled process for deciding the participating American artist for the 2005 Venice Biennale was a screw-up that only a government agency that believes in “nation building” could conceive. A federal law, the Fulbright-Hays Act, mandates that the U.S. Department of State provide oversight of American participation in a handful of prestigious international artistic and cultural events, including the Venice Biennale. Until recently, the process of selecting an artist was orchestrated by the Fund for US Artists at Overseas Exhibitions. In the past the National Endowment for the Arts would convene a panel of insider art professionals who were tasked with reviewing curatorial proposals submitted in response to an open call for submissions. The Pew Charitable Trusts and the Rockefeller Funds kicked in the money to support chosen project, with a little boot offered by the U.S. Department of State.
But the public/private partnership collapsed in late 2003 when, due to the private funders citing a realignment of funding priorities, pulled out. The U.S. Department of State, once again caught off guard because of bad CIA intel, didn’t know what was happening or what to do. Thus, their undemocratic solution: Have a select group of non-controversial pro-American art priests go into a closed door session and select a non-controversial pro-American pop artist whose minimalist work is subject to open-ended conversations that will never touch on any issues regarding America’s arrogant attitude as exemplified by its foreign policy – and with specifically no references whatsoever to its “War on Terrorism”. And to further assure that the message of the artist stays comfortably within U.S. Department of State approved guidelines regarding the content of curatorial messages, the selected artist, Ed Ruscha, was allowed to choose his own curator (Linda Norden, associate curator of contemporary art at Harvard’s Fogg Art Museum), a Venice Biennale first
Needless to say that this whitewashed arrangement will not result in a controversial installation by Ruscha in which he digitally photographs performance actors/artists playing the role military interrogators flushing the Koran down a toilet while others dressed as American soldiers wail on Muslim captives – no, we’ll be safely treated to innocent and non-provocative words and phrases painted on canvasses like, WHO ME? or ART = MONEY = FAME or SWEET, and other deep stuff like that that wears a bullet proof critical vest - the Minimalist postmodern relativist art fanatics love Ruscha and naturally they’re not about to criticize his government sanctioned appearance in Venice; the worst we’ll hear and read is “he was a safe choice”.
Safe indeed. Safe is what you’ll always get when your government gets in the business of proffering art to the world; and safer still is what you must get when dangerous times compel quiet acquiescence to the party line.
Our government’s position during this so-called “War on Terrorism” is that we all just shut up, sit down and do what we’re told to do. Our government has made it easy for us to know when to comply by issuing its daily Homeland Security Codes in Minimalist colors and words RED = SEVERE, ORANGE = HIGH, YELLOW = ELEVATED, BLUE = GUARDED and GREEN = LOW.
It comes as no surprise that the U.S. Department of State has enthusiastically endorsed a minimalist word artist like Ed Ruscha as the official American artist to represent the United States of America at the 2005 Venice Biennale. Maybe the man behind the curtain in our government will lower the national security alert lever to GREEN so as to encourage all of us compliant Americans to trip over to Italy this summer to see what profound words of encouragement that Ruscha has painted for our cultural edification and amusement.
Or more likely, once again we’ll find ourselves this summer being urged to stay inside because of the mandatory Code Red Alert – and perhaps that’s not a bad thing because anytime your government issues an official imprimatur on a specific artist from a particular school of art, red flags ought to be going up everywhere…especially among art critics who write for nationally and internationally distributed newspapers.
posted by The Right Reverend James W. Bailey at 10:45 AM
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