Questionnaire on the Contemporary

October 130 (Fall 2009)

Until perhaps a decade ago the field of contemporary art asn!t formally recogni"ed ithin the discipline of art history# $or% in this area as often dismissed as &mere 'ournalism or criticism( relati)e to hat as seen as the more serious scholarship that too% place around earlier historical periods# *his situation has changed in recent years( +ut it remains the case that contemporary art history has a )e,ed relationship to the discipline as a hole# -n fact( the )ery idea of contemporary art history ould seem to +e an o,ymoron# .o can something &contemporary +e treated ith the gra)ity and scholarly detachment of a safely historical o+'ect/ -nstead of a gradual accretion of reasoned 'udgments o)er time( the dialogue around contemporary art is synchronic( contradictory and lateral# *he pro+lem of the contemporary is rooted in a tension that emerged hen art history as first formali"ed as a discipline# *he generation of historians that helped esta+lish the field in the mid0nineteenth century found itself confronted +y a )ast range of ne and unfamiliar artifacts that ere

circulating throughout 1urope as a result of colonial e,pansion into 2frica( 2sia and the 2mericas( as ell as early archaeological e,ca)ations in -taly and 3reece# .istorians and philosophers such as 4ohann .erder( and later 5arl 6chnaase( raised the 7uestion of ho contemporary )ie ers could transcend the

differences that e,isted +et een themsel)es and )ery different cultures hose

or%s of art they admired8cultures hose shared meanings ere inaccessi+le to them due to distances of time or space# 2s 6chnaase rote in 193:( ;-f artistic form depends upon religion( ho forms/; (1) .o can e Christians # # # accept anti7ue heathen

can e ha)e a &con)ersation ith a culture if e no can longer

understand( or sympathi"e ith( its sym+olic )oca+ulary or +elief systems/ 2nd ho can these mysterious and ine,plica+le o+'ects +e made semantically

accessi+le to contemporary 1uropean )ie ers/ *he discourse of art history emerges in part in response to this 7uestion# <ne of its founding premises as the concept of a 7uasi0transcendent formal intelligence( manifested in idely disparate or%s( and operating ith relati)e independence from specific cultural or historical conte,ts# *he autonomy of aesthetic form( e)ident in $=lfflin!s famous analysis of the e)olution of the >oman triumphal arch( as necessary to pro)ide art history ith an identity separate from that of con)entional history# 2t the same time it introduced a significant tension around 7uestions of reception and conte,t# -n Rethinking Art History ?onald @re"iosi has descri+ed the relati)ely unde)eloped status of reception as a category of art historical analysis# &Ay and large( he argues( &the )ie er has +een seen # # # as a passi)e reader or consumer of images # # # *his logo centric paradigm is gi)en a characteristic slant or tra'ectory so as to pri)ilege the ma%er or artist as an essentially acti)e( originary force( in complementary contrast to the essentially passi)e consumer or reader of or%s# -t in)ol)es no great leap of the imagination to see that the paradigm simultaneously ser)e as a )alidating apparatus to pri)ilege the role or function of the historian or critic as a

legitimate and un)ested di)iner of intentionality on +ehalf of lay +eholders# (2) 3i)en this conte,t( - thin% there are t o important distinctions to +e made a+out the treatment of contemporary art +y the discipline of art history# First( the artist is generally still ali)e to dispute or challenge the historian!s assessment( and can claim some counter)ailing authority# *his is particularly rele)ant gi)en the increasing fre7uency ith hich artists also function as critics and theorists in

their o n right# 2nd second( the contemporary )ie er is also a)aila+le as a resource for the analysis of reception at a le)el of pro,imity and detail that is seldom accessi+le to historians of earlier periods# Aoth of these factors implicitly challenge the hermeneutic monopoly that the historian typically en'oys# 2s a result( contemporary art history poses something of a threat to traditional art historical discourseB the threat of unregulated and multiple claims of interpretational authority# Coreo)er( +oth of these factors tend to undermine the perception that the discipline of art history is defined +y a capacity for critical detachment or a more o+'ecti)e( less interested( relationship to it!s o+'ect of study# >eception is precisely something e can address as historians of the contemporary# Dot in order to reco)er the &real or originary meaning of a gi)en or%( +ut +ecause there is a mode of e,perience that occurs at the site of reception that is significant and orthy of analysis# *he relati)ely unde)eloped status of reception theory in art history is particularly e)ident in research associated ith contemporary art practice# *his is due in part to the tendency in much recent scholarship to simply import generic reception models ta%en from

the traditions of poststructuralist literary and critical theory into the analysis of contemporary )isual art# *he result has +een the emergence of a 7uasi0canonical +ody of art theory centered on the notion of the art or% as a su+)ersi)e te,t that see%s to desta+ili"e or other ise disrupt the )ie er!s preconceptions# &*e,tual practices lend themsel)es to an a,iomatic form of criticism in hich the or% instantiates certain propositions a+out the )ie er!s e,perience that necessarily remain untested (e,cept through the surrogate consciousness of the critic)# 2s ith any theoretical system it can +e deployed ith greater or lesser le)els of

sophistication# -n it!s more programmatic form the comple,ities and contradictions of +oth theory and practice are elided and practice ser)es merely to illustrate or )erify certain a priori theoretical insights# *his discourse is entirely appropriate for the analysis of art practices that operate ithin a te,tual register (the or% of art as an e)ent( o+'ect or image fa+ricated +y the artist +eforehand and set in place +efore the )ie er)# .ere the artist!s )ision is enacted for( or against( the )ie er through a form of unilateral modeling (the artist!s mode of perception stands as the telos to ards hich the )ie er aspires( or +y hich they are guided)# *he )ie er!s feed+ac%( as such( is seldom a significant factor and e)en their presence +efore the or% is understood only hypothetically# -t is less effecti)e( ho e)er( hen applied to dialogical or participatory practices that mo+ili"e )ery different forms of inter0 su+'ecti)e affect( identification( and agency# .ere the process of reception is generati)e in ays that are distinct from o+'ect0+ased practices# >ather than transmitting a pre0e,isting content( e,pression ta%es place through an unfolding

process among an ensem+le of colla+orati)e agents# *he locus of creati)e production is displaced from the le)el of independent ideation on the part of the artist to an indeterminate( collecti)ely authored e,change among multiple interlocutors# - +elie)e that one of the most promising areas for ne research in

the field of contemporary art in)ol)es the de)elopment of more nuanced and detailed models of the processes of reception mo+ili"ed in such practices# 3rant 5ester Uni)ersity of California( 6an ?iego 1# Cichael @odro( The Critical Historians of Art (De @ress( 1993( p#1# .a)enB Eale Uni)ersity

2# ?onald @re"iosi( Rethinking Art History: Meditations on a Coy Science (De .a)enB Eale Uni)ersity @ress( 1999( p#:F#