At its worst, contemporary curation is both morally prescriptive and superficial. It can be painful and detract from the art. Great curation can, on the other hand, transform art and objects. Thanks for the article!
As an artist I am encouraged to have an 'elevator pitch'. But on the rare occasions I get access to someone with influence (eg an art society president, a critic), I enter a spiral of self-consciousness, seeing their eyes glaze over within a few seconds, as though they've pigeon holed me already. Or if they've seen a couple of my pieces, they seem to decide what it's about, and don't stay long enough to pick up the thread of the body of work. This would be fair enough if there was no substance in my work, but engaged, intelligent followers reflect convincingly that they see it. Some curators go to great lengths to understand, and to take the blurb from the artist's words. But it's rarely unadulterated when it makes it to the catalogue, especially if it's been run through AI. I usually read exhibition blurb if it's factual, but walk away when it swerves into interpretation. I do find it's interesting to hear perspectives, outrage, excitement about contemporary and historic work in, say a critical essay. For me that includes applying a contemporary moral lens to historic work.
Thanks for your thoughts, Gail. I agree with what you say completely, though I also find it frustrating that so much contemporary criticism seems to circle around the same interpretative positions. The speed at which artists are pigeonholed, often before a body of work has been properly encountered, feels at odds with the slower, more attentive looking that art actually requires. I value critical writing when it allows for disagreement, surprise, or even discomfort, and I’d love to see more diversity of opinion and risk-taking in how both contemporary and historical work is discussed.
Returning reader. I read The Seven Pillars as an English language teacher working in the northern Hijaz of Saudi Arabia. A student reported his family heritage entailing encounters with Lawrence, both spy and freedom fighter we doubled. I wonder if this indicates the problematic knot that undermines the either/or in presenting historical contexts with works. That which invites personal and historical group dynamics of learning.
I like Faith Ringold is it, in a lecture on the subject of cultural appropriation, presenting a performance of Aretha Franklin singing/covering Adele's Rolling in the Deep, in this regard.
Yes, two interesting examples of how layered reinterpretations complicate ownership, authorship, and meaning. History is never resolved, it's always negotiated between text, memory, and context. Thanks for this, Jonathan, excellent food for thought.
You articulate with real elegance something many artists recognise instinctively, even if it remains baffling to everyone else. That gap was one of the reasons I started my Substack. I wanted to open up a conversation about what artists actually do and think, and, in a small way, to reclaim a discussion about what art is uniquely capable of. It seems to me that much of the confusion comes from a distrust of art’s mystery, and a corresponding urge to instrumentalise it: to make it political in order to grant it an obvious social function.
Thanks Matthew. I absolutely recognise that instinctive gap you describe so clearly. I agree that there’s a real discomfort now with art’s mystery (totally the right word), and there's a rush to make it useful or legible in narrowly defined ways. But what art does best is resist that flattening, to think and feel in forms that don’t resolve neatly. Opening up space for that conversation feels necessary.
Oh, I'm glad you found that, i clicked on the link but couldn't find any text. I can't honestly remember Lawrence's story, but someone living with nomads in the desert is hardly a white guy appropriating native dress for a photo shoot (I'm sure he was actually a rank imperialist but you know what I mean...)
Exactly. Lawrence fought alongside the Arabs against the Ottoman Empire in WWI, and was presented with the robes as a gift by the Arab ruler Emir Faisal. His involvement led him to become a key advocate of an independent Arab state as the Western powers carved up the Middle East. Faisal encouraged Lawrence to adopt the clothing of an Arab 'sherif', and Lawrence did so out of comfort but also so that the tribesmen would behave towards him as though he were one of their leaders. There is an account of it in his 1926 autobiography. My point about all of this is that the historical context is complicated and nuanced, even down to how we might interpret his account and his memories in his later autobiography. None of that gets mentioned. Instead what we get is a trigger warning for people who might take anachronistic offence.
It’s really quite ridiculous. Trying to show that you're aware of colonial and class oppression becomes almost a new form of imperialism in itself! Another case of the importance of understanding context...
The Turner Bequest section is absolutly incredible! I've always been facinated by how artists' hidden work reveals their true creative process, and Turner's 37,000 pieces are a treasure trove. The digitization project makes it accessible to everyone, which is exactly what art history needs right now.
You are in the present, interacting with it by revisiting history I find. It’s pretty easy to find Marlowe Moss stylish now after having been “educated” by exhibitions specifically telling us to look at Claude Cahun as a gender fluid same sex loving person. An exhibition, a work of art is always telling us something. What it can’t do is simply confirm what you know, it can’t be propaganda. But what would poke our societal limits now as Moss or Cahun did to their peers then? What around us is begging for our attention despite the discourse? Because history can also flatten our outlook if we’re looking for what has been validated. I mean, considering collections now, Jeff Koons has made it. Does it mean he is a great artist? For some yes, and for others no. That’s the juice of it! A student of mine just did an MFA thesis on magic, witches and the occult, which would have never been accepted even 10 years ago as a subject. However, as you say very well, flattening is terrifying and it is happening a lot in museum texts. I still remember the Tate show about conceptual art-my heart sank. The texts and the curation almost managed to kill the love some of us still have for it.
Yes because one thing is certain, art always goes beyond historic determination and is mysterious and iridescent. Over-determinating curation cannot replace the necessary space one needs to make for the artist’s values and convictions.
I agree with the spirit of what you’re saying. You’re right that we’re always in the present when we look back, and that history can just as easily become a comfort blanket if we only engage with what’s already been validated. The Moss/Cahun point is true: part of their charge then was precisely that they unsettled the terms of the moment, whereas now we risk smoothing them into something stylish, even reassuring.
I love your question about what might be poking at our limits now, beyond the sanctioned discourse — what’s being overlooked, or feels awkward, or doesn’t yet have the language or institutional permission to be understood. That’s where things usually get interesting, and also where institutions tend to be least brave. And yes, exhibitions always tell us something, but the moment they slip into confirmation or moral packaging, they stop being art and start behaving like messaging.
Your Koons example is great. Canonisation doesn’t equal greatness, it just tells us what systems are rewarded at a given moment. And the MFA thesis on magic and the occult is such a good reminder that shifts do happen, often quietly, at the edges, before they’re named or absorbed. I’m with you entirely on the flattening of conceptual art through over-determined curation. When the framing does all the work, the art barely gets a chance to breathe.
So enjoyed considering your point of view, Victoria. You would think that with all the "uncertainty, disagreement, and unresolved tension" happening around the world that the art being seen would align in depth to what is actually happening - even if it's from a personal daily experience. I hear the same curatorial dialogue over and over again and truthfully it seems to be doing more harm than good especially when you think about the cancellation of new work that is going unseen. Thanks for writing your thoughts and giving me the space to consider what is happening within our art institutions. It 's truly sad.
I agree, Sadie. It’s striking how often the art (and especially the language around it) feels flattened into the same familiar script. That repetition can dull rather than sharpen our ability to really see what’s being made. And yes, the quieter tragedy is all the work that never gets the chance to be encountered at all — not because it lacks depth, but because it doesn’t quite fit the narrative.
Thanks Victoria ! Have you ever thought about why institutions have focused so long on a similar narrative? I can think it's acceptable, the issues are important but in life their are multiple stories to be told - plus the herd mentality is at play. It's an important topic to consider especially if you engage with Art. My mind is spinning!
I think all that you have suggested contributes, plus more. Another aspect could be about risk management? Institutions are under huge pressure to justify themselves morally, politically, and economically, so they gravitate toward narratives that feel defensible, particularly amongst a particular political constituency. Important issues, yes, but not given the space to breathe or allowed any complexity, contradiction or ambiguity.
This really lands for me. I don’t want *less* context, I want better context, especially for artists and stories that haven’t historically been seen or taken seriously. That framing can be crucial. But when interpretation starts doing all the thinking for us, it flattens the work instead of opening it up. Some of the art I love most lives in contradiction, ambiguity, and tension. I miss being trusted to look, sit with discomfort, and make meaning myself instead of being handed the takeaway upfront.
Also I loved learning about Marlow Moss - thank you!
Yes, yes, yes! You've nailed it Sally Jane -- better context, not less, feels like exactly the point: context as a way in, not a set of conclusions. That sense of being trusted as a viewer really matters. To sit with ambiguity, contradiction, even discomfort, and let meaning emerge slowly rather than being handed the 'correct' (whose correct??) interpretation at the door. So much of the art that stays with me lives in that unresolved space. Did you click on the link to my previous article about an artwork I saw at Artes Mundi back in 2023. I needed a bit more factual context, but the film was incredible even without any, and it made me do a whole load more research on the artist and the geographical area after I'd seen in. It's one of the artworks I've seen in recent years that has imprinted itself most in my memory.
And I’m especially happy Marlow Moss resonated — she’s one of those figures whose story expands the conversation rather than tidying it up. I love her style too. I feel like I would have dressed like her in the interwar years!
I read your other article too, yes and… this feels like the perfect example of why the answer isn’t less context or more context, but better context. The work can hit you first in the body and senses, and then the story deepens it, especially when it’s a place or community most of us would never otherwise encounter.
And heck yes I've always wanted to try wearing a suit!
Thank you for putting into voice that which many have felt. I am a professional artist and art teacher who has sold work very well over the years. I have lived and painted in the now, absorbing some of what is happening around me, experimenting, while staying true to my art soul. I will continue on my path until those quiet loud brushes slip from these fingers.
Thanks for this Andrew, you put it beautifully. There’s something reassuring in hearing from someone who has lived inside the work for so long, staying porous to the present while still faithful to that inner compass. That idea of the 'art soul' feels exactly right: not fixed, not defensive, just quietly persistent. And that last line… it says everything. Making, experimenting, responding, right up until the brushes fall silent — that feels like the truest measure of an artistic life.
From an artist's point of view, I have been feeling this lately. In the studio I am currently enjoying process and experimentation, while trying to focus on hope and joy. It getting me through atm... My work draws on art history and philosophical ideas but I am tired of having to explain myself.
YES, Sue! That pull back toward process, experimentation, and even just making as a way through feels completely understandable, especially right now. Hope and joy aren’t evasions; they’re sustenance, and historically they’ve always been legitimate, even radical, artistic positions.
And the exhaustion around explanation? That makes total sense too. Art history is full of artists who trusted the work to do its own thinking, without footnotes or moral scaffolding attached. Drawing on philosophy or history doesn’t mean you owe anyone a seminar afterwards. I think the most generous thing an artwork can do is leave space — for ambiguity, for feeling, for the viewer to meet it on their own terms.
I absolutely completely agree about how you feel drawn to art from the past as opposed to a lot of what is being created today. I agree, much of it is thin, over-explained and morally "correct". Not that I am advocating immoral art. However, as you also point out - the whole point of art is freedom, and as Immanuel Kant already said: we need artists who create in freedom and viewers who can view the work in freedom.
I explained this to a friend the other day. If I make a work of art, and I am really passionate about the environment, and I take an organic piece of linen canvas, I paint on it with organic paints, and I paint it with big letters "GREEN" written across it - the blurb next to it explains all this to the viewer, then THAT is not art! It is one-dimensional (art is always open to more than one interpretation) and I am abusing the freedom of the viewer, because I am making the viewer think about the environment. If, on the other hand, I paint a beautiful garden, then I may also be passionate about the environment, but it is open to more than one interpretation.
This is why, in my practice, I spent 10 years studying art philosophy: what makes a work of art a work of art. And of course artists from the past were well aware of this kind of thinking - Kandinsky and the Blue Rider movement wrote about where art was going BEFORE they actually made any work in the "new" manner - though art was also never about creating "new" things, but building on what was already good to elevate it to yet another, higher, plane.
Artists used to be highly intelligent beings with a well-rounded education - including philosophy. Which of course influenced how they worked.
I like working with the criteria as originally written down by Kant - here an excerpt from my presentation on why we need art:
It is very difficult to say what a work of art is. To help us define what makes a work of art a work of art we need criteria.
These point us towards freedom.
They are NOT rules, but open and free. Not a dogma. They are there to help, after all, its no use if you have a car, but don’t know how to drive.
If we remain in the purely subjective (and art is subjective) we remain alone in our opinion (I like/don’t like it). This leads to loneliness.
Looking at art is a process of communication with the self (my subjective response) and communication with others.
Questioning: do I like what I am looking at (the subjective response, communication with myself, learn about myself)
Questioning with a tool for discussing the artwork that goes beyond the purely subjective (criteria). This tool needs to point the way to freedom, it is not a set of rules but open to interpretation.
Discussion/Questioning of thoughts and interpretations of the work with others using criteria as a framework/tool
=>JUDGEMENT: by applying criteria and discussion. This judgement is no longer arbitrary, but universal, based on criteria.
Judgement is subjective, but not entirely personal, striving for a universal judgement grounded in individual feeling.
Without criteria to give us a framework for making a judgement we remain not only lonely, but cannot make a judgement that stands up to discussion with others. We need to move from the subjective experience into the universal experience.
Criteria point to the goal of freedom, they protect freedom, and are not rules, but aids to perception.
Criteria give us a basis for discussion and decision making - in communication with others in peace and freedom.
I primarily use the Criteria for Aesthetics in Art as written down by Immanuel Kant.
It is generally easier to say what is not a work of art and start from there.
Hi Sibylle, thank you so much for taking the time to write this — it’s such a generous, thoughtful response and it really moves the conversation forward. I love your example of the 'GREEN' canvas versus the painted garden; it gets right to the heart of the difference between work+curator that tells us what to think and work that leaves space for thinking.
Your point about freedom, for both the artist and the viewer, really resonates, as does the way you describe Kant’s criteria not as rules but as tools that help us see, talk, and think together rather than in isolation. This all adds real depth and clarity to the discussion and gives me a lot to keep thinking about.
That’s an important question because otherwise I feel that I’m just in the discourse. I clicked on the linked article but I would like to know what the experience is in the museum. The website says: “This is a historical work of art which reflects the attitudes and viewpoints of the time in which it was made. Whilst these may differ from today's attitudes, this image is an important historical document.” This can be interpreted in many ways. With the current anti-Islamophobia and the interventionism of the UK at the time, it almost seems to quieten locals who might be upset to see a white man who may have adhered to Muslim culture and religion. Or it can also be seen as defending the work from “wokeness” saying that “it is an important work of art”.
In my opinion it's unnecessary to have it there at all because it focuses attention just on this subject. Let's have some historical context instead. Or if that's not possible, nothing at all: let the viewers be intrigued and find out more for themselves.
I would need to check in the gallery as I haven’t been since Jan 2025. There was an interesting corrective article on the historical context in The Telegraph this week.
Thank you so much for your succinct summary of SHAME ENDS HERE Victoria... It is absolutely as much about listening as it is about revealing the data and the underlying stories behind, and beyond, the statistics.
I want men and naysayers to come in, to stimulate conversion, and get closer to understanding why society is in this situation. Too often discussions around this topic only address the already-in-the-know.
A printed booklet with the projects supporting data and framework is available at the show and can be emailed on request.
It's already prompted really worthwhile conversations, from the public map-marking event onwards...the double whammy of visceral art and data is quite powerful.
I'm looking forward to channeling this experience back into my stonecarving after this foray...
At its worst, contemporary curation is both morally prescriptive and superficial. It can be painful and detract from the art. Great curation can, on the other hand, transform art and objects. Thanks for the article!
Agree 100%!
As an artist I am encouraged to have an 'elevator pitch'. But on the rare occasions I get access to someone with influence (eg an art society president, a critic), I enter a spiral of self-consciousness, seeing their eyes glaze over within a few seconds, as though they've pigeon holed me already. Or if they've seen a couple of my pieces, they seem to decide what it's about, and don't stay long enough to pick up the thread of the body of work. This would be fair enough if there was no substance in my work, but engaged, intelligent followers reflect convincingly that they see it. Some curators go to great lengths to understand, and to take the blurb from the artist's words. But it's rarely unadulterated when it makes it to the catalogue, especially if it's been run through AI. I usually read exhibition blurb if it's factual, but walk away when it swerves into interpretation. I do find it's interesting to hear perspectives, outrage, excitement about contemporary and historic work in, say a critical essay. For me that includes applying a contemporary moral lens to historic work.
Thanks for your thoughts, Gail. I agree with what you say completely, though I also find it frustrating that so much contemporary criticism seems to circle around the same interpretative positions. The speed at which artists are pigeonholed, often before a body of work has been properly encountered, feels at odds with the slower, more attentive looking that art actually requires. I value critical writing when it allows for disagreement, surprise, or even discomfort, and I’d love to see more diversity of opinion and risk-taking in how both contemporary and historical work is discussed.
Thank you Victoria, 100% agree. Very much enjoying my introduction to substack, for content like yours.
Ah that's so lovely to hear, thanks Gail. What kind of art do you make? Do you have a website I can look at?
Thank you too Victoria - www.gailreidartist.com hopefully laid out for easy digging!
Returning reader. I read The Seven Pillars as an English language teacher working in the northern Hijaz of Saudi Arabia. A student reported his family heritage entailing encounters with Lawrence, both spy and freedom fighter we doubled. I wonder if this indicates the problematic knot that undermines the either/or in presenting historical contexts with works. That which invites personal and historical group dynamics of learning.
I like Faith Ringold is it, in a lecture on the subject of cultural appropriation, presenting a performance of Aretha Franklin singing/covering Adele's Rolling in the Deep, in this regard.
Thanks!
Yes, two interesting examples of how layered reinterpretations complicate ownership, authorship, and meaning. History is never resolved, it's always negotiated between text, memory, and context. Thanks for this, Jonathan, excellent food for thought.
You articulate with real elegance something many artists recognise instinctively, even if it remains baffling to everyone else. That gap was one of the reasons I started my Substack. I wanted to open up a conversation about what artists actually do and think, and, in a small way, to reclaim a discussion about what art is uniquely capable of. It seems to me that much of the confusion comes from a distrust of art’s mystery, and a corresponding urge to instrumentalise it: to make it political in order to grant it an obvious social function.
Thanks Matthew. I absolutely recognise that instinctive gap you describe so clearly. I agree that there’s a real discomfort now with art’s mystery (totally the right word), and there's a rush to make it useful or legible in narrowly defined ways. But what art does best is resist that flattening, to think and feel in forms that don’t resolve neatly. Opening up space for that conversation feels necessary.
Oh, I'm glad you found that, i clicked on the link but couldn't find any text. I can't honestly remember Lawrence's story, but someone living with nomads in the desert is hardly a white guy appropriating native dress for a photo shoot (I'm sure he was actually a rank imperialist but you know what I mean...)
Exactly. Lawrence fought alongside the Arabs against the Ottoman Empire in WWI, and was presented with the robes as a gift by the Arab ruler Emir Faisal. His involvement led him to become a key advocate of an independent Arab state as the Western powers carved up the Middle East. Faisal encouraged Lawrence to adopt the clothing of an Arab 'sherif', and Lawrence did so out of comfort but also so that the tribesmen would behave towards him as though he were one of their leaders. There is an account of it in his 1926 autobiography. My point about all of this is that the historical context is complicated and nuanced, even down to how we might interpret his account and his memories in his later autobiography. None of that gets mentioned. Instead what we get is a trigger warning for people who might take anachronistic offence.
It’s really quite ridiculous. Trying to show that you're aware of colonial and class oppression becomes almost a new form of imperialism in itself! Another case of the importance of understanding context...
💯
The Turner Bequest section is absolutly incredible! I've always been facinated by how artists' hidden work reveals their true creative process, and Turner's 37,000 pieces are a treasure trove. The digitization project makes it accessible to everyone, which is exactly what art history needs right now.
100%
You are in the present, interacting with it by revisiting history I find. It’s pretty easy to find Marlowe Moss stylish now after having been “educated” by exhibitions specifically telling us to look at Claude Cahun as a gender fluid same sex loving person. An exhibition, a work of art is always telling us something. What it can’t do is simply confirm what you know, it can’t be propaganda. But what would poke our societal limits now as Moss or Cahun did to their peers then? What around us is begging for our attention despite the discourse? Because history can also flatten our outlook if we’re looking for what has been validated. I mean, considering collections now, Jeff Koons has made it. Does it mean he is a great artist? For some yes, and for others no. That’s the juice of it! A student of mine just did an MFA thesis on magic, witches and the occult, which would have never been accepted even 10 years ago as a subject. However, as you say very well, flattening is terrifying and it is happening a lot in museum texts. I still remember the Tate show about conceptual art-my heart sank. The texts and the curation almost managed to kill the love some of us still have for it.
Yes because one thing is certain, art always goes beyond historic determination and is mysterious and iridescent. Over-determinating curation cannot replace the necessary space one needs to make for the artist’s values and convictions.
I agree with the spirit of what you’re saying. You’re right that we’re always in the present when we look back, and that history can just as easily become a comfort blanket if we only engage with what’s already been validated. The Moss/Cahun point is true: part of their charge then was precisely that they unsettled the terms of the moment, whereas now we risk smoothing them into something stylish, even reassuring.
I love your question about what might be poking at our limits now, beyond the sanctioned discourse — what’s being overlooked, or feels awkward, or doesn’t yet have the language or institutional permission to be understood. That’s where things usually get interesting, and also where institutions tend to be least brave. And yes, exhibitions always tell us something, but the moment they slip into confirmation or moral packaging, they stop being art and start behaving like messaging.
Your Koons example is great. Canonisation doesn’t equal greatness, it just tells us what systems are rewarded at a given moment. And the MFA thesis on magic and the occult is such a good reminder that shifts do happen, often quietly, at the edges, before they’re named or absorbed. I’m with you entirely on the flattening of conceptual art through over-determined curation. When the framing does all the work, the art barely gets a chance to breathe.
So enjoyed considering your point of view, Victoria. You would think that with all the "uncertainty, disagreement, and unresolved tension" happening around the world that the art being seen would align in depth to what is actually happening - even if it's from a personal daily experience. I hear the same curatorial dialogue over and over again and truthfully it seems to be doing more harm than good especially when you think about the cancellation of new work that is going unseen. Thanks for writing your thoughts and giving me the space to consider what is happening within our art institutions. It 's truly sad.
I agree, Sadie. It’s striking how often the art (and especially the language around it) feels flattened into the same familiar script. That repetition can dull rather than sharpen our ability to really see what’s being made. And yes, the quieter tragedy is all the work that never gets the chance to be encountered at all — not because it lacks depth, but because it doesn’t quite fit the narrative.
Thanks Victoria ! Have you ever thought about why institutions have focused so long on a similar narrative? I can think it's acceptable, the issues are important but in life their are multiple stories to be told - plus the herd mentality is at play. It's an important topic to consider especially if you engage with Art. My mind is spinning!
I think all that you have suggested contributes, plus more. Another aspect could be about risk management? Institutions are under huge pressure to justify themselves morally, politically, and economically, so they gravitate toward narratives that feel defensible, particularly amongst a particular political constituency. Important issues, yes, but not given the space to breathe or allowed any complexity, contradiction or ambiguity.
Yes, you are so right about the issues - it's a good thing to bring complexity into our art institutions. Thanks for answering, Victoria.
This really lands for me. I don’t want *less* context, I want better context, especially for artists and stories that haven’t historically been seen or taken seriously. That framing can be crucial. But when interpretation starts doing all the thinking for us, it flattens the work instead of opening it up. Some of the art I love most lives in contradiction, ambiguity, and tension. I miss being trusted to look, sit with discomfort, and make meaning myself instead of being handed the takeaway upfront.
Also I loved learning about Marlow Moss - thank you!
Yes, yes, yes! You've nailed it Sally Jane -- better context, not less, feels like exactly the point: context as a way in, not a set of conclusions. That sense of being trusted as a viewer really matters. To sit with ambiguity, contradiction, even discomfort, and let meaning emerge slowly rather than being handed the 'correct' (whose correct??) interpretation at the door. So much of the art that stays with me lives in that unresolved space. Did you click on the link to my previous article about an artwork I saw at Artes Mundi back in 2023. I needed a bit more factual context, but the film was incredible even without any, and it made me do a whole load more research on the artist and the geographical area after I'd seen in. It's one of the artworks I've seen in recent years that has imprinted itself most in my memory.
And I’m especially happy Marlow Moss resonated — she’s one of those figures whose story expands the conversation rather than tidying it up. I love her style too. I feel like I would have dressed like her in the interwar years!
I read your other article too, yes and… this feels like the perfect example of why the answer isn’t less context or more context, but better context. The work can hit you first in the body and senses, and then the story deepens it, especially when it’s a place or community most of us would never otherwise encounter.
And heck yes I've always wanted to try wearing a suit!
Thank you for putting into voice that which many have felt. I am a professional artist and art teacher who has sold work very well over the years. I have lived and painted in the now, absorbing some of what is happening around me, experimenting, while staying true to my art soul. I will continue on my path until those quiet loud brushes slip from these fingers.
Thanks for this Andrew, you put it beautifully. There’s something reassuring in hearing from someone who has lived inside the work for so long, staying porous to the present while still faithful to that inner compass. That idea of the 'art soul' feels exactly right: not fixed, not defensive, just quietly persistent. And that last line… it says everything. Making, experimenting, responding, right up until the brushes fall silent — that feels like the truest measure of an artistic life.
Digital hugs heading in your direction!
From an artist's point of view, I have been feeling this lately. In the studio I am currently enjoying process and experimentation, while trying to focus on hope and joy. It getting me through atm... My work draws on art history and philosophical ideas but I am tired of having to explain myself.
YES, Sue! That pull back toward process, experimentation, and even just making as a way through feels completely understandable, especially right now. Hope and joy aren’t evasions; they’re sustenance, and historically they’ve always been legitimate, even radical, artistic positions.
And the exhaustion around explanation? That makes total sense too. Art history is full of artists who trusted the work to do its own thinking, without footnotes or moral scaffolding attached. Drawing on philosophy or history doesn’t mean you owe anyone a seminar afterwards. I think the most generous thing an artwork can do is leave space — for ambiguity, for feeling, for the viewer to meet it on their own terms.
well said! love it :-)
Dear Victoria,
I absolutely completely agree about how you feel drawn to art from the past as opposed to a lot of what is being created today. I agree, much of it is thin, over-explained and morally "correct". Not that I am advocating immoral art. However, as you also point out - the whole point of art is freedom, and as Immanuel Kant already said: we need artists who create in freedom and viewers who can view the work in freedom.
I explained this to a friend the other day. If I make a work of art, and I am really passionate about the environment, and I take an organic piece of linen canvas, I paint on it with organic paints, and I paint it with big letters "GREEN" written across it - the blurb next to it explains all this to the viewer, then THAT is not art! It is one-dimensional (art is always open to more than one interpretation) and I am abusing the freedom of the viewer, because I am making the viewer think about the environment. If, on the other hand, I paint a beautiful garden, then I may also be passionate about the environment, but it is open to more than one interpretation.
This is why, in my practice, I spent 10 years studying art philosophy: what makes a work of art a work of art. And of course artists from the past were well aware of this kind of thinking - Kandinsky and the Blue Rider movement wrote about where art was going BEFORE they actually made any work in the "new" manner - though art was also never about creating "new" things, but building on what was already good to elevate it to yet another, higher, plane.
Artists used to be highly intelligent beings with a well-rounded education - including philosophy. Which of course influenced how they worked.
I like working with the criteria as originally written down by Kant - here an excerpt from my presentation on why we need art:
It is very difficult to say what a work of art is. To help us define what makes a work of art a work of art we need criteria.
These point us towards freedom.
They are NOT rules, but open and free. Not a dogma. They are there to help, after all, its no use if you have a car, but don’t know how to drive.
If we remain in the purely subjective (and art is subjective) we remain alone in our opinion (I like/don’t like it). This leads to loneliness.
Looking at art is a process of communication with the self (my subjective response) and communication with others.
Questioning: do I like what I am looking at (the subjective response, communication with myself, learn about myself)
Questioning with a tool for discussing the artwork that goes beyond the purely subjective (criteria). This tool needs to point the way to freedom, it is not a set of rules but open to interpretation.
Discussion/Questioning of thoughts and interpretations of the work with others using criteria as a framework/tool
=>JUDGEMENT: by applying criteria and discussion. This judgement is no longer arbitrary, but universal, based on criteria.
Judgement is subjective, but not entirely personal, striving for a universal judgement grounded in individual feeling.
Without criteria to give us a framework for making a judgement we remain not only lonely, but cannot make a judgement that stands up to discussion with others. We need to move from the subjective experience into the universal experience.
Criteria point to the goal of freedom, they protect freedom, and are not rules, but aids to perception.
Criteria give us a basis for discussion and decision making - in communication with others in peace and freedom.
I primarily use the Criteria for Aesthetics in Art as written down by Immanuel Kant.
It is generally easier to say what is not a work of art and start from there.
Hi Sibylle, thank you so much for taking the time to write this — it’s such a generous, thoughtful response and it really moves the conversation forward. I love your example of the 'GREEN' canvas versus the painted garden; it gets right to the heart of the difference between work+curator that tells us what to think and work that leaves space for thinking.
Your point about freedom, for both the artist and the viewer, really resonates, as does the way you describe Kant’s criteria not as rules but as tools that help us see, talk, and think together rather than in isolation. This all adds real depth and clarity to the discussion and gives me a lot to keep thinking about.
Absolutely essential.. thank you
Thanks Zelga!
What does the trigger warning with the Lawrence drawing say?
That’s an important question because otherwise I feel that I’m just in the discourse. I clicked on the linked article but I would like to know what the experience is in the museum. The website says: “This is a historical work of art which reflects the attitudes and viewpoints of the time in which it was made. Whilst these may differ from today's attitudes, this image is an important historical document.” This can be interpreted in many ways. With the current anti-Islamophobia and the interventionism of the UK at the time, it almost seems to quieten locals who might be upset to see a white man who may have adhered to Muslim culture and religion. Or it can also be seen as defending the work from “wokeness” saying that “it is an important work of art”.
In my opinion it's unnecessary to have it there at all because it focuses attention just on this subject. Let's have some historical context instead. Or if that's not possible, nothing at all: let the viewers be intrigued and find out more for themselves.
Online it’s this: https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw03809/TE-Lawrence
I would need to check in the gallery as I haven’t been since Jan 2025. There was an interesting corrective article on the historical context in The Telegraph this week.
Thank you so much for your succinct summary of SHAME ENDS HERE Victoria... It is absolutely as much about listening as it is about revealing the data and the underlying stories behind, and beyond, the statistics.
I want men and naysayers to come in, to stimulate conversion, and get closer to understanding why society is in this situation. Too often discussions around this topic only address the already-in-the-know.
A printed booklet with the projects supporting data and framework is available at the show and can be emailed on request.
It’s a very necessary project Lucy and I hope you manage to break through the silent wall with this
It's already prompted really worthwhile conversations, from the public map-marking event onwards...the double whammy of visceral art and data is quite powerful.
I'm looking forward to channeling this experience back into my stonecarving after this foray...