Customer Reviews

Modern Art in the Common Culture

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This book consists of a collection of eleven essays on modern art in the common culture. Chapters touch on Warhol, the New York School, Hank Herron, Artforum, pastoralism in recent art, and comparable subjects.

On page 185, Crow refers to the increasing "tendency of critics to assert their prerogatives by cultivating a forbiddingly difficult language." Crow himself is a learned critic of modern art and its relations to the common culture. However, his book unfortunately is an exemplar of the depressingly difficult language he mentioned above. For example, on page 78 he writes of artists "asserting a condition of non-difference between high art and the general economy of sign production, art being increasingly distinguished as an extraordinary and privileged marker by the actual behavior of that economy."

If coping with this type of writing comes readily to you, there are several worthwhile insights that can be gleaned from the book. For this reader, however, the game was not worth the candle, and try as I might, after ten chapters, I could not bring myself to finish the eleventh and concluding chapter. Caveat emptor.

Is contemporary art dead? Amidst the onslaught of all the -isms and in a life-world in which art and life seem so removed: is art dead today?

Crow doesn't think so and he offers a selection of observations of specific artistic practices that illuminate the vitality of art in our culture today: yes, it still speaks and it still responds. There is still hope.

There is a great reading of Warhol's "Disasters" in its social and historical context. You might just take another look at a Warhol after reading this piece. And against Peter Burger's declaration that the avant-garde is dead, Crow responds that engaged avant-garde practices still exist, if not flourish today: Bleuker and Matta Clark, to name a few. As an art historian of 18th century France, Crow proves to be a deft observer and critic of contemporary art practices.

Beautiful picture plates alongside brilliantly written essays. This is art criticism and art history at its best. What is criticism? The best, I think, are the ones that appreciate and demonstrate value without the pretenses and the cliches. This book is such an effort.

I personally hate modernist art theory with a passion *BUT* since there is a need to navigate this terrain, Thomas Crow's book provides an excellent overview. He cuts through the BS and explains how we got to where we are in the art world - including why art criticism seems less and less interested in any actual art. Or being understood by the general public. Difficult reading nonetheless.