EL EMPOBRECIMIENTO ESTÉTICO SE DEBE A LA SOBREPRODUCCIÓN DE ARTE CONTEMPORÁNEO
Y
LA SOBREDESTRUCCIÓN DEL TEJIDO SOCIAL SE DEBE A LAS GUERRAS EN CONTRA DEL TERRORISMO Y LOS CARTELES DE DROGA
LA SOBREPRODUCCIÓN Y LA SOBREDESTRUCCIÓN TIENEN EL PROPÓSITO DE
IMPLEMENTAR
MEDIDAS PARA ASEGURAR LA CONCENTRACIÓN DE LA RIQUEZA Y EL PODER EN LAS MANOS DE UNOS POCOS PRIVILEGIADOS
El sistema de arte contemporáneo se presenta como una herramienta neutral y positiva de integración cultural; sin embargo, al abusar de conceptos como “inclusión,” “el menor de los males,” o “libertad de expresión,” ha entrado en un viaje delirante que ha causado que se empobrezca a sí mismo.
La pobreza que destila el Artworld es intelectual y poética ya que su repertorio de variaciones formales se ha agotado. El Arte Contemporáneo, sobre todo después del Once de Septiembre, en su insaciable necesidad de racionalizar y estetizar los miedos y ansiedades colectivos azuzados por la propaganda bushista, ha llevado al arte a la bancarrota y saboteado su propio potencial crítico y visionario.
La triste historia del mundo del arte relata hoy cómo sus miembros han asumido de buena gana una actitud de auto-censura al igual que conceptualismos simplistas y formulaicos junto con un reductivismo discursivo y formal, todos ellos herramientas necesarias para poder insertarse en la red global de arte.
El arte se ha convertido en un lenguaje internacionalizado y los miembros del mundo del arte en embajadores de un sistema cultural bien intencionado que opera bajo la premisa de la inclusión y la libertad de expresión. El compromiso político y la sensibilización ética a veces se reducen a aceptar cínicamente ciertas políticas y procesos socio-económicos como “el menor de los males,” contribuyendo así a la normalización del despojo, apartheid, guerra y violencia. Esto se debe en parte al hecho de que el Artworld se encuentra subsidiado por el exceso del capital financiero invertido como herramienta de mercadeo y relaciones públicas capaz de llegarle a un público mundial: ahora los artistas entretienen a las élites corporativas eufóricas, vulgares, voraces e incultas produciendo arte que satisface sus cínicos y masoquistas gustos.
El sistema de arte contemporáneo delira ya que sus ferias y bienales continúan a prosperar sin sentido de la misma manera que el ejército de los Estados Unidos continúa su ataque y ocupación ilógicos de Irak, Afganistán, y otros lados. Mientras que el ejército de Estados Unidos sigue bombardeando gente y edificios, asesinando intelectuales y devastando culturas, las corporaciones destruyen la infraestructura de los pueblos autóctonos en nombre del “desarrollo.” Mientras tanto, el Artworld continúa a sucumbir ante la banalidad, que se ha convertido en la única manera en la que la sociedad occidental puede lidiar con esta cantidad de destrucción que no tiene precedentes. Los pensadores liberales de la cultura defienden la necesidad del arte contemporáneo ya que lo conciben como un oasis espiritual en estos tiempos violentos en los que vivimos, sin embargo, las sociedades en las que el sistema de arte contemporáneo se desarrolla pierden cuando se trata de lidiar con su pasiva participación y su silenciosa complicidad con las guerras y destrucción en curso.
La sobreproducción de arte contemporáneo superficial se ha convertido tanto en la solución como en parte del problema: el arte se usa como banda adhesiva para contener la destrucción masiva e irresponsable en otros lados, reduciéndose a actos compulsivos y convirtiéndose en vehículo de la expresión creativa del Angst occidental. ¿Cuánto tiempo seguirá operando este mecanismo de negación en nuestras sociedades?
¿Cuáles son las cuestiones políticas y morales que están en juego hoy en día en las mentes de los constituyentes del Artwold contemporáneo?
Para muchos, en una época en la que se han perdido tanto inversiones monetarias como ideológicas, cuando la fe liberal que se tiene en un sistema supuestamente encarnando valores democráticos sobre la libertad de expresión se está obviamente colapsando, hay demasiado en juego. Evidentemente, el arte contemporáneo puede abrazar una postura crítica pero solamente mientras que pase por ser el antagonismo o disidencia sanos para la democracia. De esta manera, la criticalidad se ha convertido en un mito del Artworld: al reclamar ser una plataforma de inclusión de todas las voces disidentes, el Artworld se concibe a sí mismo como portavoz de la verdadera democracia. Este mito delirante ha sido socavado, entre otros, por ejemplos recientes de la represión fascista de demostraciones pacíficas en contra de las políticas del G20 en Toronto, los ataques mortales del IDF a la Flotilla de la libertad de Gaza, el asesinato de los activistas en San Juan Copala, Oaxaca, etc.
La respuesta de los intelectuales a los recientes y alarmantes eventos mundiales ha sido de negación traducida a una masa homogénea e impenetrable de terminaciones nerviosas adormecidas inundada de sentimientos de impotencia y de la necesidad ciega de sobreproducirse a morir, como si fueran hormiguitas trabajando compulsivamente en una construcción justo antes de ser inundada por una inminente tormenta de lluvia.
De nuevo, nos topamos con un presentimiento abrumador: el Artworld es un racionalizador irracional de un sistema irracional.
En México el arte contemporáneo funciona como una cortina de humo o de vapor. No es del todo inapropiado evocar aquí una imagen de Teresa Margolles, “Vaporización” (2002), -una instalación que consiste en una habitación llena del vapor de agua previamente utilizada para lavar cuerpos asesinados en una morgue en uno de los barrios más peligrosos de la ciudad de México– como una metáfora para describir el papel compensatorio del arte contemporáneo en el México de hoy: una inundación casi corpórea y seductora de los sentidos que racionaliza y al mismo tiempo se anula al opacar las realidades de la sociedad Mexicana reforzando las sensibilidades bien intencionadas de la clase privilegiada aquí y en el extranjero.
Los principios estético-políticos del arte contemporáneo están ciegamente sincronizados con el capitalismo; este hecho se hace invisible en el arte contemporáneo en sí, ya que muchos de sus preceptos son los bastiones inamovibles e incuestionables de las sociedades modernas. La inclusión relativamente reciente del arte mexicano en el panorama global ha cumplido las ilusiones de la sociedad mexicana de ser autónoma culturalmente, más allá de ser vistos como una sensibilidad estética atrasada o meras imitaciones coloniales del arte europeo. Además, el rechazo del arte contemporáneo del contenido politizado desde el Once de Septiembre, ha encontrado tierra fértil en el México neoliberal. La trivialización de contenidos vino de la mano con la privatización de la esfera cultural mexicana. La sobreestetización preferida por la elite mexicana favorece racionalizaciones poéticas y tediosas de la violencia cotidiana en este país, socavada por la normalización inconsciente de la situación neoliberal al promover la idea que la actual crisis financiera mundial es sólo parte del ciclo de creación destructiva a través del cual el capitalismo progresa, que la destrucción creativa es el motor del crecimiento económico y que el incesante reemplazo de lo viejo por lo nuevo nos trae prosperidad.
Los gestos poéticos y cínicos de los artistas se han convertido en parte del problema, ya que el Artworld se ha aclimatizado a la violencia produciendo objetos que precisamente fetichizan la violencia. Para muchos, estas expresiones son denunciaciones o hasta críticas de la brutalidad reinante, sin embargo, no son más que racionalizaciones de ciertos fenómenos promovidas por las voces que detentan el poder cultural detrás del escenario. Tal vez las abrumantes realidades socio-económicas del mundo no pueden ser comprendidas o digeridas por el Artworld en este preciso momento.
Como lo afirmó Ben Davis, el arte contemporáneo tiende a ser elitista a propósito, a jugar juegos intelectuales opacos y a poner en escena acciones políticas o espectáculos populistas que reflejan las contradicciones de la realidad económica pero a través del filtro de la posición clasemediera del mundo del arte dentro de dicha realidad, necesariamente insensible a los antagonismos sociales reales. Así, la actitud liberal clasemediera del Artworld mexicano contemporáneo encaja perfectamente con la agenda cultural de las elites financieras que manejan al mundo.
La máquina de guerra y la máquina del arte han estado trabajando a todo lo que dan durante muchos años, destruyendo y sobreproduciendo sin parar, cómplices con la tarea capitalista de homogeneizar las necesidades de los consumidores al igual que las sensibilidades estéticas a escala global. ¿Porqué no declarar una moratoria de producción de arte durante un rato? Los artistas deberían de dejar de mostrar su trabajo, ralentizar y reflexionar sobre lo que está sucediendo a su alrededor; galerías y museos deberían de cerrar y las fundaciones de arte junto con los bien intencionados mecenas de arte parar todas las actividades culturales hasta que la sociedad pueda renovar la cultura por sí misma, en vez de que la cultura se les de en cuchara de plata. La elite cultural no puede seguir escondiéndose detrás de las instituciones comerciales y culturales de prestigio durante mucho tiempo. Por eso, MUACC-NILC hace un llamado a toda la producción cultural hasta el momento en el que la cultura pueda redefinirse por sí misma dentro del contexto de los cambios históricos que ha habido en nuestra sociedad, fruto de la guerra civil, de la violencia sin precedentes y del despojo masivo financiero y de recursos. Los ricos viven en México como Arundathi Roy ha descrito cómo viven en la India: Como animales encarcelados por su propia riqueza, encerrados y aislados en sus jaulas doradas, protegiéndose de la amenaza de las multitudes vulgares y desordenadas a quienes han desposeído sistemáticamente durante siglos. Esta es la causa de nuestra actual guerra civil, no las amenazas de un puñado de narcobandidos de tomar el poder en el país, sino el evidente resultado de décadas de injusticia social y ceguera manipuladora de la parte de las elites mexicanas de las cuales los artistas son ahora cómplices.
8.7.10
Contemporary Art Impoverishment: Overproduction/Overdestruction
AESTHETIC IMPOVERISHMENT IS DUE TO OVERPRODUCTION IN CONTEMPORARY ART
AND
OVERDESTRUCTION OF THE SOCIAL TISSUE IS DUE TO THE WARS ON TERRORISM AND DRUG CARTELS
OVERPRODUCTION AND OVERDESTRUCTION HAVE THE PURPOSE OF IMPLEMENTING
MORE MEASURES TO ASSURE THE CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH AND POWER IN THE HANDS OF THE PRIVILEGED FEW
The contemporary art system plays itself up as a neutral and positive cultural integration tool, however, by abusing concepts like “inclusion,” “the lesser of evils” or “freedom of expression” it has become delirious and has impoverished itself.
The contemporary Artworld reeks of intellectual and poetic poverty as its repertoire of formal variations is exhausted. Contemporary Art has bankrupted “art” in its never ending need, especially since 9/11, to rationalize and aestheticize the fears and anxieties fueled by Bushist propaganda and in the process, sabotaging its own critical and visionary potential.
The sad story about the world of contemporary art today is how its members have willingly assumed an attitude of self-censorship as well as simplistic and formulaic formal conceptualisms and reductiveness as necessary tools in order to insert themselves in the global art network.
Art has become an internationalized language and Art World members ambassadors of a well intentioned cultural system premised on inclusion and freedom of speech. Political engagement or ethical sensibilization is at times reduced to accepting cynically certain policies and socio-economic processes as “the lesser of evils,” contributing to the normalization of dispossession, apartheid, war and violence. This is partly due to the fact that the Artworld is subsidized by the excess produced by financial capital invested as a marketing and public relations tool that is capable of reaching out to a worldwide public: Artists now entertain the euphoric, voracious, vulgar and illiterate corporate elites producing art that caters to their masochistic and cynical tastes.
The contemporary art system is delusional insofar as its fairs and biennials continue thriving in the same purposeless way that the United States forces continue its illogical attacks and occupation of Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.
As the US army keeps on blowing up people and buildings, to massacre intellectuals and to devastate culture, corporations destroy native infrastructure in the name of ‘development.’ In the meantime, the Artworld continues to subside into banality; which happens to be Western society’s only way of being able to deal with such unprecedented massive destruction. Liberal cultural thinkers defend the need for contemporary art as a spiritual oasis in these violent times we live in, but the societies where the contemporary art system thrives are at a loss when it comes to coping with their passive participation and thus, silent complicity in the ongoing wars and destruction.
Overproduction of banal contemporary art has become the solution as well as part of the problem: Art is the band-aid for reckless and massive destruction elsewhere, a compulsive activity and the vehicle of creative expression of Western angst. How long will this denial mechanism keep on thriving in our societies?
What political and moral questions are in play now in the minds of contemporary Artworld constituents?
A lot might be at stake for many, at a time of the loss of their monetary and ideological investments, when their whole-hearted liberal faith in a system supposedly incarnating democratic values about the freedom of expression is obviously collapsing. Evidently, a critical stand can be embraced by contemporary art, but only insofar as it passes as the antagonism that is inherent to a healthy democracy. This is how criticality has become an Artworld myth: in its claim to be a platform for the inclusion of all dissident voices, the Artworld conceives itself as the spokesperson of true democracy. This delirious myth is undermined by recent examples of the fascistic repression of pacific demonstrators against the policies of the G20 in Toronto, the IDF mortal attacks on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla, the murder of activists in San Juan Copala, Oaxaca, etc.
The intellectuals’ response to recent alarming facts and events in the world has been denial translated into one homogenous impenetrable mass of numbed nerve endings all feeling the same impotence and blind need to overproduce themselves to death like busy little ants working compulsively at an interminable construction site just before it is about to be inundated by an impending rain storm.
Again, we are faced with the overwhelming sensation that the Artworld is an irrational rationalizer of an irrational system.
In Mexico contemporary art functions as a smoke shield or a steam shield. It is not inappropriate to evoke an image by Teresa Margolles, Vaporización (2002), – an installation that consists of a room full of steaming water that had been previously used to wash the bodies of murdered people at a morgue in one of Mexico City’s most dangerous neighborhoods – as metaphor to describe the compensatory role of contemporary art in Mexico today: A seductive quasi corporeal inundation of the senses which rationalizes and at the same time nullifies itself by clouding the realities of Mexican society reinforcing the well intentioned liberal sensibilities of the privileged class here and abroad.
The aesthetico-political principles of contemporary art are blindly in sync with capitalism; this fact is rendered invisible by contemporary art itself because many of its precepts are the immovable and unquestionable bastions of modern societies. The fairly recent inclusion of contemporary Mexican art in the global panorama has fulfilled liberal Mexican society’s expectations of cultural autonomy beyond being seen as backward or a mere colonial imitation of European art. Moreover, contemporary art’s disavowal of politicized content since 9/11, has found fecund ground in neo-liberal Mexico. The trivialization of content came hand in hand with the privatization of the Mexican cultural sphere. The over-aesthetization preferred by the Mexican elite favors tedious poetic rationalizations of the daily violence lived daily in this country, underscored by the unconscious normalization of the Neoliberal situation by promoting the idea that the current worldwide financial crisis is just part of the normal cycle of creative destruction through which capitalism progresses, that creative destruction is the engine of economic growth, and that the ceaseless replacement of the old with the new brings prosperity.
Artists’ poetic and cynical gestures have become part of the problem, as the Artworld has acclimatized itself to the present climate of violence by producing objects that precisely fetishize violence. Many understand these works as denunciations or even as critiques of the reigning brutality, however, they are convenient rationalizations of phenomena promoted by the voices holding the cultural power behind the scenes. Perhaps the overwhelming socio-economic realities of the world cannot be apprehended or digested by the Artworld at this precise moment.
As Ben Davis pointed out, contemporary art tends to be purposefully elitist, to play opaque intellectual games, and to stage political action or populist spectacles that reflect the contradictions of economic reality but through the filter of the Artworld’s middle class position within such reality, necessarily oblivious to real social antagonisms. This is how the liberal, middle class attitude of the contemporary Mexican Artworld fits in perfectly with the cultural agenda of the corporate and financial ruling elites worldwide.
The war machinery and the art machinery have been working full blast for many years now, unrelentless in their overproductive destruction insofar as they are complicit with capitalism’s task of homogenizing consumer needs and aesthetic sensibilities at the global scale. Why not an art production moratorium for a while? Artists should stop showing their work, slow down and reflect upon what is happening around them; galleries and museums must close down, and art foundations and well intentioned art patrons should bring all cultural activities to a halt, until society is able to renew culture by itself, as opposed to being fed culture. The cultural elite cannot continue hiding behind institutional, commercial and cultural venues of pseudo prestige for much longer. MUACC-NILC calls for a stop to all cultural production until culture can again redefine itself within the context of the historical changes brought to our society by the current civil war, unprecedented violence and massive financial and resource dispossession. The rich live in Mexico like Arundathi Roy describes how they live in India: Like animals incarcerated by their own wealth, locked and barred in their gilded cages, protecting themselves from the threat of the vulgar and unruly multitudes whom they have systematically dispossessed over centuries. This is the cause of the current civil war, not the few narco bandits threatening to take over the country, the evident result of decades of social injustice and manipulative blindness on the part of the Mexican elites to which artists are now complicit.
AND
OVERDESTRUCTION OF THE SOCIAL TISSUE IS DUE TO THE WARS ON TERRORISM AND DRUG CARTELS
OVERPRODUCTION AND OVERDESTRUCTION HAVE THE PURPOSE OF IMPLEMENTING
MORE MEASURES TO ASSURE THE CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH AND POWER IN THE HANDS OF THE PRIVILEGED FEW
The contemporary art system plays itself up as a neutral and positive cultural integration tool, however, by abusing concepts like “inclusion,” “the lesser of evils” or “freedom of expression” it has become delirious and has impoverished itself.
The contemporary Artworld reeks of intellectual and poetic poverty as its repertoire of formal variations is exhausted. Contemporary Art has bankrupted “art” in its never ending need, especially since 9/11, to rationalize and aestheticize the fears and anxieties fueled by Bushist propaganda and in the process, sabotaging its own critical and visionary potential.
The sad story about the world of contemporary art today is how its members have willingly assumed an attitude of self-censorship as well as simplistic and formulaic formal conceptualisms and reductiveness as necessary tools in order to insert themselves in the global art network.
Art has become an internationalized language and Art World members ambassadors of a well intentioned cultural system premised on inclusion and freedom of speech. Political engagement or ethical sensibilization is at times reduced to accepting cynically certain policies and socio-economic processes as “the lesser of evils,” contributing to the normalization of dispossession, apartheid, war and violence. This is partly due to the fact that the Artworld is subsidized by the excess produced by financial capital invested as a marketing and public relations tool that is capable of reaching out to a worldwide public: Artists now entertain the euphoric, voracious, vulgar and illiterate corporate elites producing art that caters to their masochistic and cynical tastes.
The contemporary art system is delusional insofar as its fairs and biennials continue thriving in the same purposeless way that the United States forces continue its illogical attacks and occupation of Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.
As the US army keeps on blowing up people and buildings, to massacre intellectuals and to devastate culture, corporations destroy native infrastructure in the name of ‘development.’ In the meantime, the Artworld continues to subside into banality; which happens to be Western society’s only way of being able to deal with such unprecedented massive destruction. Liberal cultural thinkers defend the need for contemporary art as a spiritual oasis in these violent times we live in, but the societies where the contemporary art system thrives are at a loss when it comes to coping with their passive participation and thus, silent complicity in the ongoing wars and destruction.
Overproduction of banal contemporary art has become the solution as well as part of the problem: Art is the band-aid for reckless and massive destruction elsewhere, a compulsive activity and the vehicle of creative expression of Western angst. How long will this denial mechanism keep on thriving in our societies?
What political and moral questions are in play now in the minds of contemporary Artworld constituents?
A lot might be at stake for many, at a time of the loss of their monetary and ideological investments, when their whole-hearted liberal faith in a system supposedly incarnating democratic values about the freedom of expression is obviously collapsing. Evidently, a critical stand can be embraced by contemporary art, but only insofar as it passes as the antagonism that is inherent to a healthy democracy. This is how criticality has become an Artworld myth: in its claim to be a platform for the inclusion of all dissident voices, the Artworld conceives itself as the spokesperson of true democracy. This delirious myth is undermined by recent examples of the fascistic repression of pacific demonstrators against the policies of the G20 in Toronto, the IDF mortal attacks on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla, the murder of activists in San Juan Copala, Oaxaca, etc.
The intellectuals’ response to recent alarming facts and events in the world has been denial translated into one homogenous impenetrable mass of numbed nerve endings all feeling the same impotence and blind need to overproduce themselves to death like busy little ants working compulsively at an interminable construction site just before it is about to be inundated by an impending rain storm.
Again, we are faced with the overwhelming sensation that the Artworld is an irrational rationalizer of an irrational system.
In Mexico contemporary art functions as a smoke shield or a steam shield. It is not inappropriate to evoke an image by Teresa Margolles, Vaporización (2002), – an installation that consists of a room full of steaming water that had been previously used to wash the bodies of murdered people at a morgue in one of Mexico City’s most dangerous neighborhoods – as metaphor to describe the compensatory role of contemporary art in Mexico today: A seductive quasi corporeal inundation of the senses which rationalizes and at the same time nullifies itself by clouding the realities of Mexican society reinforcing the well intentioned liberal sensibilities of the privileged class here and abroad.
The aesthetico-political principles of contemporary art are blindly in sync with capitalism; this fact is rendered invisible by contemporary art itself because many of its precepts are the immovable and unquestionable bastions of modern societies. The fairly recent inclusion of contemporary Mexican art in the global panorama has fulfilled liberal Mexican society’s expectations of cultural autonomy beyond being seen as backward or a mere colonial imitation of European art. Moreover, contemporary art’s disavowal of politicized content since 9/11, has found fecund ground in neo-liberal Mexico. The trivialization of content came hand in hand with the privatization of the Mexican cultural sphere. The over-aesthetization preferred by the Mexican elite favors tedious poetic rationalizations of the daily violence lived daily in this country, underscored by the unconscious normalization of the Neoliberal situation by promoting the idea that the current worldwide financial crisis is just part of the normal cycle of creative destruction through which capitalism progresses, that creative destruction is the engine of economic growth, and that the ceaseless replacement of the old with the new brings prosperity.
Artists’ poetic and cynical gestures have become part of the problem, as the Artworld has acclimatized itself to the present climate of violence by producing objects that precisely fetishize violence. Many understand these works as denunciations or even as critiques of the reigning brutality, however, they are convenient rationalizations of phenomena promoted by the voices holding the cultural power behind the scenes. Perhaps the overwhelming socio-economic realities of the world cannot be apprehended or digested by the Artworld at this precise moment.
As Ben Davis pointed out, contemporary art tends to be purposefully elitist, to play opaque intellectual games, and to stage political action or populist spectacles that reflect the contradictions of economic reality but through the filter of the Artworld’s middle class position within such reality, necessarily oblivious to real social antagonisms. This is how the liberal, middle class attitude of the contemporary Mexican Artworld fits in perfectly with the cultural agenda of the corporate and financial ruling elites worldwide.
The war machinery and the art machinery have been working full blast for many years now, unrelentless in their overproductive destruction insofar as they are complicit with capitalism’s task of homogenizing consumer needs and aesthetic sensibilities at the global scale. Why not an art production moratorium for a while? Artists should stop showing their work, slow down and reflect upon what is happening around them; galleries and museums must close down, and art foundations and well intentioned art patrons should bring all cultural activities to a halt, until society is able to renew culture by itself, as opposed to being fed culture. The cultural elite cannot continue hiding behind institutional, commercial and cultural venues of pseudo prestige for much longer. MUACC-NILC calls for a stop to all cultural production until culture can again redefine itself within the context of the historical changes brought to our society by the current civil war, unprecedented violence and massive financial and resource dispossession. The rich live in Mexico like Arundathi Roy describes how they live in India: Like animals incarcerated by their own wealth, locked and barred in their gilded cages, protecting themselves from the threat of the vulgar and unruly multitudes whom they have systematically dispossessed over centuries. This is the cause of the current civil war, not the few narco bandits threatening to take over the country, the evident result of decades of social injustice and manipulative blindness on the part of the Mexican elites to which artists are now complicit.
7.7.10
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