How to Write about Contemporary Art

‘It is only shallow people who do not judge by appearances’

OSCAR WILDE, 1890⁷⁴

One reason art-writers strain to find their own ‘voice’ is that the art-world today demands that we speak in tongues, adopting multiple registers—academic for an art-history journal; gossipy on a blog; ‘objective’ for a book caption; business-like for a funding application—to suit the panoply of evaluating, explaining, descriptive, journalistic, and other text-types required. This section will delineate the tone expected for each format and share tips. A big emphasis will be on structures:

+ the what is it?/what does it mean?/so what? trio of questions addressed when looking at artworks;

+ a basic essay outline for academic and multi-artist texts;

+ the inverted-triangle news format (big opener; tapering down with details of who/what/when/where/why; ending with a ‘sting’);

+ identifying a single key idea or principle to lead your writing through an artwork, project, or artist, which can even be no-frills chronological order.

As you progress, you can relax these frameworks, or mix them—or, better still, when these practised techniques have become habit, just write. But if you’re starting out, these guiding outlines are your new best friends.

> Getting started

Whether for class submission or publication in a specialist journal, an academic paper begins with a general area of interest. At worst, this is an anemic topic assigned by your teacher. At best, this is a gripping passion that has so ferociously seized your mind, you cannot sleep. Probably, your starting point lies somewhere in the middle. Ask your tutor for book/article recommendations. Or, begin by consulting pertinent anthologies, compendia, and series, such as:

+ Harrison and Wood, Art in Theory 1900–2000: An Anthology of Changing Ideas, Oxford and Malden, M.A.: Wiley-Blackwell, 2002;

+ Krauss, Foster, Bois, Buchloh, and Joselit, Art Since 1900: Modernism, Antimodernism, Postmodernism, 2nd edn, vols 1-2, London and New York: Thames & Hudson, 2012 (includes an exhaustive bibliography by topic);

+ ‘Themes and Movements’ series: (Art and Photography, ed. David Campany, 2003; Land and Environmental Art, ed. Jeffrey Kastner, 1998; Art and Feminism, ed. Helena Reckitt and Peggy Phelan, 2001, and more), London: Phaidon Press;

+ ‘Documents of Contemporary Art’ series: (Participation, ed. Claire Bishop, 2006; Memory, ed. Ian Farr, 2012; The Studio, ed. Jens Hoffman, 2012; Painting, ed. Terry Meyer, 2011; Utopias, ed. Richard Noble, 2009, and more), Cambridge, M.A. and London: MIT/Whitechapel;

+ Routledge’s ‘Readers’: Nicholas Mirzoeff, The Visual Culture Reader, 2012 (3rd edn); Liz Wells, The Photography Reader, 2003, London and New York: Routledge.

You cannot rely solely on these overviews, and may need to seek out original full-length versions of abridged texts. All your texts cannot derive from a single anthology. Your sources must vary, and your bibliography demonstrate some effort and originality. Your institution or local library may have access to reliable, searchable online sources such as JSTOR and Questia for specialized articles.

Be smart with Google; one intelligent search leads to the next, but use only trustworthy institutional sources.

You may find an excellent online course, or an academic essay, with a thorough bibliography to begin your research. Note: You may not plagiarize existing material! Only consult the best-quality bibliographies to begin compiling your own first-draft reading list.

Read three or four essential texts on the subject; take notes. Summarize each article or chapter in a few sentences: what was the main point? Write down key information in short snippets, pertinent to your question. You need to collect evidence to substantiate your ideas later on; ‘evidence’ includes:

+ quotes from artists, critics, and key figures;

+ artworks;

+ exhibitions;

+ market data;

+ and historical facts.

Such evidence is at the service of supporting your own substantiated ideas: not just marshaled together to produce a report on the subject, like a fact-driven encyclopedia entry. Remember: a quote is evidence only of one person’s viewpoint; it may be well-informed, but is not an incontrovertible truth. (See ‘Explaining v. evaluating’ on artist’s quotes.)

Tag evidence with complete bibliography as you go along, so you’re not hunting for footnote details at the end: author, title, date, publisher/city, page number; volume and issue (for a magazine); or website address and date accessed (from a reputable Internet page). Footnotes are not just technical trivia; they show that the author takes seriously the job of substantiating ideas, and acknowledges the work of others.

Jot down any good vocabulary that you come across while reading, listing useful terms or phrases near the section where they might fit—a handy crutch when you’re at a loss for words at three o’clock in the morning, the night before submission.

After this brief but solid research, you might draw a freehand flow-chart, or timeline, or idea-map to begin making connections visually, and start clustering and prioritizing your interests in relation to your back-up evidence. You should be able to write down, in 40 words or fewer, an initial, focused area of investigation; often this is in the form of a research question. This first stab at a query may prove flawed, because it:

+ is a leading question (that suggests a predetermined answer);

+ is based on unqualified assumptions;

+ is too broad;

+ is too narrow;

+ is out-of-date;

+ cannot be researched, because no thorough and reliable information exists or can be accessed;

+ would require powers of clairvoyance.

Your research question may require rewording or refining as you progress; the longer the research time, the more modifications. A PhD inquiry might change a dozen times; a quick, three-week assignment, max once.

> The research question

You should not anticipate the answer before you start, determined to ‘prove’ an idea in your essay. This is like a detective setting out to demonstrate that the butler did it instead of asking, who killed Roger Ackroyd? The job is not to find evidence to support a predetermined conclusion but to investigate an unknown. Take a look at the following examples:

Leading question: How have powerful galleries determined the course of art history?

This assumes that powerful galleries have determined art history, which may be true but needs to be adequately demonstrated. This question excludes innumerable other factors shaping ‘the course of art history’.

Unqualified assumption: How have private collectors today gained more power and influence in the art system than the commercial galleries?

This ‘question’ is an assumption in disguise, which asserts that collectors are stronger players than the private galleries today—without qualifying this. Which collectors? In relation to which galleries? How are you measuring ‘power and influence’?

Too broad: What has been the role of commerce in art history?

How many angels fit on the head of a pin?

Impossible to research: Are powerful galleries the most important factor in an artist’s success?

Too many variables prohibit answering this one plausibly. How do you define success—financial, critical, social, personal? And how do you factor in such unquantifiables as: talent; personal relationships; fashions in the art market; curators’ picks; an influential collector’s taste—or sheer luck?

Out-of-date: Do powerful galleries play a role in the validation of new art?

Absolutely, they do. This is too self-evident nowadays to constitute an actual query.

Requires a crystal ball: How will emerging art markets affect today’s contemporary art system? No prophesies, please.

Valid research question: What is the relationship today between commercial art galleries and museums in the UK? A case study on private-gallery acquisitions made by Tate Modern, 2004–14. This question focuses on a clear period and example, whose results can be determined through studying Tate acquisitions and pertinent comments from galleries, artists, and curators, among other sources.

Once you have formulated a viable question (which will form the basis of your 100–250-word abstract, if required), pursue more directed research. Be sure to elucidate—right away, in your Introduction—why you chose your principal artists, artworks, or case studies as representative, able to answer your research question meaningfully.

Make sure your question can be adequately addressed in the time allotted. Many researchers follow the rule of thirds—devote:

+ a third of your time to research;

+ a third to planning and writing your first draft;

+ a third to polishing your draft.

Quantify the time at your disposal, then divide accordingly. Notice that a good chunk is spent revising your draft; do not underestimate the time you will need to polish and finalize. This might entail some last-minute research to corroborate specific passages in your argument—as well as sharpening up language to ensure it all achieves ‘academic tone’. Do not rush that crucial third step!

> Structure

Usually, students are fairly skilled at doing research and gathering pertinent material. Many struggle with the next steps, which distinguish valid academic research from just writing a report or pursuing a hunch:

+ focus on a precise, workable question, or corralled field of interest;

+ formulate your own argument(s), out of the evidence found;

+ select and structure all the material that you’ve dug up, based on your argument.

Here’s a basic outline for an academic essay at undergraduate or postgrad level. Make sure your reader is dead-sure what your essay is about by at least the end of paragraph two.

1 Introduce your question or topic (one or two paragraphs). Be specific!

(a) What is your argument or thesis, resulting from your research, through which you will approach your essay question or area of interest?

(b) Contextualize your topic. Clarity does not require a personality bypass but can be delivered with style, by opening, for example, with:

a description of an exemplary artwork or incident;

a well-chosen anecdote;

an over-arching quote.

2 Give background (2–4 paragraphs)

(a) History: Who else has thought/written about this? What were their main ideas?

(b) Define key terms: What definitions exist? Which will you be employing?

3 1st idea/section resulting from/building upon the above

(a) Example

(b) More examples

4 2nd idea/section resulting from/building upon the above

(a) Example

(b) More examples

5 3rd idea/section resulting from/building upon the above

(a) Example

(b) More examples

6 Final conclusion (not a reiteration of the introduction) Summarize main points and re-assert your argument in its most evolved form.

7 Bibliography and appendices: interview transcripts, charts, tables, graphs, questionnaires, maps, emails, and correspondence.

Add as many ideas as you like in the mid section. Each idea sub-section should be roughly equal in length. Most doctoral candidates repeat this pattern until they hit 80,000–100,000 words, having articulated a fairly brilliant argument which functions to hold the whole together, and constitutes the paper’s original contribution to the thinking around this topic.

Articulate an argument—or thesis, or main conclusion, or overall observation—drawn from your research, to guide you through your essay. Just piling on the broadly related information and interesting quotes you’ve come across, then dumping it all in your paper in a shapeless heap, will not make the grade. However, your thesis does not need to be a ravishing, Nobel-prize-winning theory. Just a plausible angle—like a thread running through the material, keeping your ideas together—is fine.

You must adopt your own perspective: the more original the better, it’s true, but to begin with, don’t sweat it. Keep bringing your reader back to the topic/research question and your argument or angle, perhaps at the end of every section, as a reminder of how each new reference relates to it. New points should develop your argument, adding nuances rather than just turning repetitious.

Don’t expect your reader to divine how your chosen examples fuel your idea; you must spell out the links. (See ‘How to substantiate your ideas’.) Become aware of digressive paragraphs or sections of marginal interest that are not wrapped within the main gist of your essay, and drop them. You will not use all the research you have uncovered; extract only the powerful examples which inform your exact topic and argument. Do not include all the material that you rejected in arriving at your argument, however vital that extraneous stuff was to your early thinking. Keep only what proved directly relevant—which can include a counter-argument, or examples showing that ambiguities exist, or an exception to your basic point.

New writers worry that the standard academic outline is boring or formulaic, and that it will produce an anodyne essay, but they confuse form with content. Pack the framework with compelling evidence, beguiling vocabulary, and dazzling artworks to support your staggering, jargon-free idea(s), and you will instantly triumph over its plain structure.

Some variations can include:

+ re-ordering sections somewhat;

+ offering new definitions and fascinating background throughout, not just at the start;

+ expanding upon, shifting, or even bisecting the argument;

+ introducing a counter-perspective, where the writer asks, Why might someone dispute my thesis? What might be alternative answers to my question? What are the exceptions to my general conclusion?

+ posing the central idea more as a second question than an ‘answer’, prompting new questions.

Always, each new idea is related to the previous one, and is supported by examples and evidence, building up your conclusion.

If you are struggling to organize all the material you have found (quotes, histories, examples), type a single key word, a thematic header, in front of each ‘chunk’ of information. Then hit ‘Sort’. Hey presto! All related ideas are magically clumped together, creating the informational backbone of each chapter.

Use the ‘Sort’ command to put your keyed-in research in order. For example, for a research paper on the contemporary Gothic, you might compile initial evidence into a single massive Word file, heading each piece with a one- or two-word theme (‘ruins’, ‘ghosts’, ‘haunted houses’). As research progresses, headers may grow subsections (‘ruins and 18th-century literature’; ‘ruins and modernism’); just keep track of these expanding themes to ensure consistency, then let ‘Sort’ cluster all related material together. This gives you an instant sense of which sub-topics are accruing more information, and starts the outline or flow-chart for your paper. Organize the separate sections into a sensible order, and drop any weak ones. From the pieces of evidence gathered for each sub-area, what provisional conclusion can you reach? Concentrate your energy not on mindless cutting and pasting but on analyzing your grouped information; developing brilliant ideas from the evidence; and devising intelligent transitions to join your sections coherently.

> ‘Do’s and ‘don’t’s

Don’t plagiarize, which means taking someone else’s work and attempting to pass it off as your own. Plagiarism is cheating; it reflects badly on the offender both ethically and intellectually, and is dealt with severely. Consequences can vary: resubmission; a failed grade or year; expulsion; even legal dispute. Never cut-and-paste off the Internet, unless it’s properly cited and verified. A ‘borrowed’ sentence or paragraph cleverly doctored with the occasional rewording is still plagiarism. Double-check your institution’s plagiarism policy (university guidelines often available online).⁷⁵ You may also consult websites like www.plagiarism.org if you’re uncertain about what requires footnoting, how to cite sources properly, and more.

Don’t insert quotes to do the talking for you. The job is not to pluck out juicy quotes that reaffirm your conclusions—maybe expressing them better than you can—but to analyze what is said in relation to your thesis. Don’t overquote. Unless vital to your point, include one or two citations per page, tops: you must do most of the talking. Rarely extract more than four sentences from a single citation; unless you have good reason, keep quotes brief, usually well under 50 words.

Do cite reliable sources: such as an artist’s or other qualified figure’s quotes extracted from verifiable interviews, newspapers, books, and websites. Quotes should be drawn from an expert on the subject; for example, if your essay is about national arts-funding policies in Europe, it’s OK to ask a Madrid museum director about her publicly-funded budget, but—unless she has the proven expertise—not how this compares with, say, state monies available for the arts in Italy. If she offers information outside her expertise, double-check it.

Borrowed words substantiate only what these sources think. For example, an artist’s idea about her art might authentically express what she set out to accomplish—but this hope is not necessarily communicated for you in the artworks themselves. Always contextualize quotes by asking yourself, what larger point is this quote making within my argument? Make sure your reader knows how the citation has contributed to your thinking; don’t toss in quotes and leave your reader to forge connections.

Don’t jump from a really sketchy outline to writing full-blown text. The more organized your plan, complete with plenty of precise examples relating to each new idea, the easier the task of writing. Try outlining in reverse: with your completed (or half-completed) essay in hand, describe in a single word or line the gist of each paragraph. Does your ‘reverse outline’ stand up as a logical order? Does it build an argument? If not, reorganize your paragraphs (perhaps using the ‘Sort’ command trick to group connected material together); drop unrelated sections; and add transitions or missing information still required to build your idea.

Outlining in reverse: if you’re struggling to get the hang of outlining before you write, you can reconstruct your flow-diagram after you’ve written a first draft. Professionals often work this way: partially pre-planning; then writing ‘as it comes’; and finally revising paragraphs and re-ordering them into optimal sequence afterwards.

Eliminate any repetition, waffle, and digressions from your argument. Don’t generalize; be specific.

‘Artists in the early 1990s took “site” as central to their art-making.’

All 1990s artists, in all their art? Prefer:

‘Some artists in the early 1990s took “site” as central to certain artworks, such as Mark Dion’s On Tropical Nature (1991) and Renée Green’s World Tour (1993).’

Then go on to explain how this idea can be detected in these artworks. Do use transition words to connect one paragraph to the next, words such as

moreover, in fact, on the whole, furthermore, as a result, for this reason, similarly, likewise, it follows that, by comparison, surely, yet

Don’t enlist artworks or data as illustrations for your preconceived idea. Do not decide in advance what your sources must mean in aid of your thesis, turning research into a reversed operation of confirming preconceptions. As ever, look at artworks individually, and if pertinent explain:

Q1 What is it? Dates, location, participants; a description.

Q2 What might it mean?

Q3 What might this add to your thinking, or the world at large?

Do acknowledge contradictory information or limitations in your work. Students often ask:

+ what if I find conflicting evidence: market prices, collections, institutions, or artworks that ‘misbehave’ within my nice neat thesis?

+ do I just conceal pesky contradictions?

No; almost always there is conflicting evidence. Either acknowledge exceptions upfront

‘Not all of Thomas Hirschhorn’s monuments are dedicated to well-known political figures; for example…’

or allow the ‘contradiction’ to shape your ongoing research. Admit clearly any limitations in your work:

‘This paper will not survey the entirety of 1970s performance, but focuses on two salient examples from key figures Marina Abramovic and Vito Acconci.’

You cannot simply omit out-of-whack auction prices, or curators who behave differently from your description. Acknowledge exceptions, perhaps contextualizing their rarity:

‘Unlike many earlier Venice Biennale artistic directors, Bice Curiger of the 54th edition took an unusually cross-historical approach…’

However, if exceptions outnumber your thesis examples by a margin of 3:1, your argument is seriously flawed and requires rethinking.

> Further tips

If your research paper centers on one or two essential terms treat those special words as precious treasure, to be used sparingly (for example, ‘digital imagery’; ‘collaboration’; ‘interactive museum’; ‘emerging markets’). If your reader encounters them relentlessly in every sentence, those words (and your writing) will turn meaningless and tautological. (‘Tautology’ occurs when a term is defined by itself, such as ‘collaboration is collaborative’, or ‘interactive museums interact with the visitor’. Tautology is a big no-no.) Read Nicolas Bourriaud’s landmark book Relational Aesthetics (1998; English edition 2002)⁷⁶ and notice how the author (even in translation) goes to great lengths to adopt multiple near-synonyms (‘conviviality’; ‘inter-human negotiation’; ‘audience participation’; ‘social exchange’; ‘micro-community’), developing nuances within his over-arching idea. Bourriaud limits the repetition of his magic words—‘relational aesthetics’—to keep them valuable.

Put effort into your bibliography. Here’s a secret: university lecturers set a lot of store by the quality of your bibliography, so build this up from the start. You may not have read every reference in depth; that’s OK. It must never be shorter than a page and must include plenty of challenging, pertinent books, not just Internet sources. Academics spot-check for ‘first-hand sources’: make sure you are familiar with Roland Barthes’s original Camera Lucida (1980) and not just The New Oxford Companion to Literature in French, however helpful that might be. If you quote from secondary sources, acknowledge the text’s nature as commentary; the original always take primacy.

Never cite a press release, wiki, or other unverifiable text unless you have a valid reason (for example, to quote an example of dubious online artspeak, see the gallery press release on Elad Lassry), and have plainly divulged the potential unreliability of this source. Triple-check any information you encounter there, and stick to reputable presses and websites.

First-hand research is a big plus: for example, your own interview with the artist, auctioneer, or curator; or an independent survey. Extract (and footnote) whatever quotes from the interview or survey that contributed to your understanding of the subject, and insert the whole transcript, questionnaire, or survey results in the Appendix. Be sure always to explain each piece of quoted evidence, and show exactly how it connects to your conclusions or pushed your thinking forward.

Footnote anything not considered ‘common knowledge’: quotes, statistics, historic events—particularly any controversial points. Follow the footnote style your institution adheres to, which in the USA and UK is most likely to be ‘Chicago’, ‘MLA’, or ‘Harvard’:

+ University of Chicago Press, The Chicago Manual of Style: The Essential Guide for Writers, Editors, and Publishers, Chicago, 1906 (16th edn, Chicago and London, 2010);

+ Modern Language Association of America, MLA Style Manual and Guide to Scholarly Publishing, 1985 (3rd edn, New York, 2008);

+ Harvard Style can have minor variations, so check your institution’s guidelines. For a UK overview, see Colin Neville, The Complete Guide to Referencing and Avoiding Plagiarism, 2007 (Maidenhead: Open University Press, 2nd edn, 2010).

Sometimes institutions combine elements from each of these, or they follow the ‘Vancouver’ or ‘Oxford’ systems. If none is specified, pick one, and be consistent. If you’re really stuck, grab the most scholarly academic art-book at hand, and copy their system religiously. Footnotes are not a dumping ground to squeeze in extra information and get around stringent word counts. Stick mostly to the plain bibliographic reference. The little superscript footnote number always falls outside any punctuation.

Include the original publication date as well as the year of a recent edition. A citation such as ‘Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, 2007’ looks as if the philosopher penned those words supernaturally some two centuries after he was buried. Prefer, for example, ‘Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (1781), Penguin Modern Classics, 2007’.

Here’s how a basic outline structure translates into an examplary academic essay, that begins:

Site-specificity used to imply something grounded, bound to the laws of physics. Often playing with gravity, site-specific works used to be obstinate about ‘presence’, even if they were materially ephemeral, and adamant about immobility, even in the face of disappearance or destruction. Whether inside the white cube or out in the Nevada desert, whether architectural or landscape-oriented, site-specific art initially took the ‘site’ as an actual location, a tangible reality [1] […] Site-specific works, as they first emerged in the wake of Minimalism in the late 1960s and early 1970s [2], forced a dramatic reversal of this modernist paradigm.

Source Text 22 MIWON KWON, ‘One Place After Another: Notes on Site Specificity’, October, 1997

Kwon’s essay charts the changes in site-specific art (the term and the works) since the 1960s. Kwon never literally states her research question; I am deducing this from the essay. It is a big question—the basis for a PhD; less advanced research would probably narrow this broad question down.

1 Introduce the question or topic: How has ‘site-specific art’ changed since the 1960s?

(a) What is the argument or thesis? From her starting point [1], Kwon will show how the idea of ‘site’, as a physical place, broadened over the decades, and how this shifting definition impacts artworks themselves.

(b) Contextualize your topic with an emblematic example: In her opening section, Kwon examines two key early artists, Robert Barry (quoted in a 1969 interview) and Richard Serra, and their initial ideas about this type of art.

2 Give background: Kwon establishes the art-historical framework of modernism.

(a) History: [2] Kwon contextualizes her starting dates.

(b) Define key terms: Tracking varying definitions of ‘site’ over the past 40 years constitutes the gist of Kwon’s paper, and this task of ‘defining terms’ recurs throughout.

(c) Why should we care?: Kwon takes the compelling case of Serra’s controversial Tilted Arc (1981) public sculpture, which was locally unpopular and proposed for relocation, and quotes a passionately defensive letter the artist wrote in 1985 explaining why relocating Tilted Art would alter, if not destroy, this artwork. (The artist lost his case.)

3 1st idea/section: For early practitioners of site-specificity, the important thing was to escape or critique the ‘stark white walls’ of the gallery.

(a) Example: Artist Daniel Buren, and his desire to ‘unveil’ museum spaces and other art institutions. (page 88 in Kwon’s published essay)

(b) Another example: Artist Hans Haacke, and his understanding of ‘site’ as shifting from ‘the physical condition of the gallery (as in the artwork Condensation Cube, 1963–65) to the system of socio economic relations’. (89)

Another example: Artist Michael Asher’s contribution to the Art Institute of Chicago’s annual exhibition in 1979, in which he set out to ‘reveal the sites of exhibition [as] not at all universal or timeless.’ (89)

4 2nd idea/section: For later practitioners, ‘site’ shifts from a location in the art system to one in the wider world.

(a) Example: Artist Mark Dion’s 1991 project On Tropical Nature, set in four different sites from the Orinoco River rainforest to gallery spaces. (92–93)

(b) More examples: ‘[I]n projects by artists such as Lothar Baumgarten, Renée Green, Jimmie Durham, and Fred Wilson, the legacies of colonialism, slavery, racism and the ethnographic tradition as they impact on identity politics has emerged as an important “site” of artistic investigation.’ (93)

Another example: Art historian James Meyer’s idea of a site as (Kwon quotes) ‘a process…a temporary thing, a movement, a chain of meanings devoid of a particular focus’. (95)

Kwon continues apace, with new ideas, relevant examples, and intelligent provisional conclusions, always returning to her main argument: the definition of ‘site’ changes over time, and this informs the changing nature of ‘site-specific’ art.

5 Final idea/section: The migration of the site-specific artist across international art-projects and events coincides with planetary waves of relocated peoples and refugees.

(a) Example: A quote from postmodernist theorist David Harvey, about our changing ‘world of diminishing spatial barriers to exchange, movement and communication’ (107).

(b) Another example: The idea of ‘contemporary life as a network of unanchored flows’ (108) can recall what philosopher Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari call ‘rhyzomatic nomadism’ (109).

Note: Before introducing theorists like Deleuze and Guattari, Kwon has thoroughly grounded her reader in the materiality of the artwork and the history of her subject, applying these philosophers’ ideas to an understanding of art—not forcing the artwork to ‘obey’ their concepts.

(c) Counter-example: Kwon recognizes that, although the physical ‘site’ may have become an abstraction for artists and the high-minded, it remains a material reality for the less privileged, and quotes theorist Homi Bhabha: ‘The globe shrinks for those who own it; for the displaced of the dispossessed, the migrant or refugee, no distance is more awesome than the few feet across borders or frontiers.’ (110)

6 Final conclusion: We might consider redefining ‘site’ as the differences and relations between locations, rather than reducing sites merely to an undifferentiated series, ‘one place after another’.

The purpose here is not to produce CliffsNotes-style bookends around Kwon’s important essay; moreover, another reader may interpret this essay’s meaning differently from this proposed outline. To save space I have omitted plenty more terrific examples and insights, and all Kwon’s perfect footnotes sourcing her claims. My point is to show how a good academic does not cram in every researched example, but selectively hones in on those that enrich her own powerful, guiding observation, building idea-by-idea, example-by-example, a perspective across the material. She does not ignore a counter-argument from Homi Bhabha which might disrupt her neat argument, but allows it to broaden her thinking.

Kwon’s essay represents highly accomplished, advanced academic writing; updated and expanded, this paper eventually became the basis for an important volume, One Place After Another, published by MIT (2002).77 Even the sharpest undergrad probably cannot match Kwon’s level of research and thought here; but don’t be daunted!

+ Do solid research;

+ ask a workable essay question—don’t start with an assumption;

+ draw viable conclusions, deducted from the evidence you’ve gathered (see ‘How to substantiate your ideas’);

+ if possible, formulate your own consistent angle through which to organize a pertinent selection of examples.

Lastly, don’t forget to check submission requirements. Type up a cover sheet, usually with:

+ your name (or student number),

+ title of your paper,

+ date of submission,

+ name of your tutor or lecturer,

+ name/city of the institution.

Final checklist: proofread, and double-check unfamiliar spellings. Re-read the final draft at least twice. Unless otherwise directed, double-space; use point-size 12; insert page numbers; and keep minimum one-inch margins. Make sure paragraphs are indented. Read submission guidelines to ascertain where/when/how your assignment must be delivered. Submit on time!

> How to write a short news article

Brief, art-related news articles can appear today in everything from Elle Decoration to the Artillery (‘killer text on art’) website. The level of specialist information may vary, but all news items conventionally adopt the ‘inverted triangle’ structure—top-heavy, with a summary of the main facts as the opener, then working its way down in increasing detail.

1 Headline (and subheader): draw your reader’s attention with concise, up-to-date news.

2 The lead: front-load with an attention-grabber, perhaps a compelling anecdote that communicates what makes your story unique. Summarize enticingly the main events in first line or paragraph (max 50 words). This is the last place on earth for jargon, abstractions, or philosophical musings.

3 Who/what/where/when/how: in clear language, follow with contextualizing details, quantifying and backing up your claims with attributed quotes, numerical data, and other evidence. Avoid partial information.

4 Wind down and ‘end with a sting’: round off your main point(s).

In short, information is set in order of importance (see ‘Order information logically’). This format can be also applied to a short introduction for a longer article, or to non-journalistic texts such as the catchy website entry for a process-based artwork or an auction catalogue text.

Journalism builds from hard evidence drawn from first-hand data (interviews, eye-witness observation) and publicly available information (press releases, auction results). News articles are usually written in the third person, with little or no interpretative spin; for more opinionated journalism, see ‘How to write op-ed art journalism’.

> Basics

Keep your audience’s level of art-preparation in mind; most news articles should be comprehensible to non-specialists but of interest to the insider too. Straightforward, intelligently worded, solid information is readable in both camps. Avoid platitudes, or writing self-evident commentary off the top of your head: ‘The contemporary art-world is increasingly affected by market forces’—no kidding! Be specific and back up your statements with verified hard information, such as:

+ names of artists/galleries,

+ titles and dates of artworks,

+ sales figures,

+ visitor numbers,

+ prices,

+ costs,

+ exact times/dates,

+ dimensions,

+ distances,

+ and percentages.

Don’t bore your reader. Find a compelling story and write it up snappily, but don’t antagonize or overstate in order to falsely pump up interest levels. Journalism races along in the active tense, with clipped sentences that keep the subject/verb in close proximity, with few modifiers and punchy—never academic—language. Ensure accuracy. If necessary, seek out any missing data from authoritative and attributable sources.

The pages following extract the journalistic building-blocks (listed above) as found in two published news items. The first article contextualized protests in Brazil, and followed a longer piece about billions being spent on new ‘cultural districts’ in places as distant from each other as São Paulo, Kiev, Singapore, and Abu Dhabi; the second reported on the newly stabilized Hong Kong art market.

Artists take to the streets as Brazilians demand spending on services, not sport [1]

São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro. ‘Come to the streets!’ urged the banners held aloft during mass protests in Brazil last month. What started as a rally against a rise in bus fares flared into a nationwide show of discontent as more than a million people marched on 20 June [2] […] The demonstrators demanded that public services be given priority over the 2014 Fifa World Cup and the 2016 Olympic Games. Huge spending on the events—the cost of stadia and improvements to infrastructure ahead of the World Cup has risen to R$28bn ($12.4bn)—is taking place during an economic slowdown. Last year, the country’s growth slowed to less than 1% [3]. ‘We’re getting first-world stadiums but we don’t have first-world education and health’, says the curator Adriano Pedrosa, who took to the streets. ‘When you have a democratic country of so many sharp contrasts, the population really protests.’ [4]

Source Text 23 ‘C.B.’ (CHARLOTTE BURNS), ‘Artists take to the streets as Brazilians demand spending on services, not sport’, The Art Newspaper, Jul/Aug 2013

Hong Kong Spring Sales Reach More Solid Ground [1]

The Spring sales for Sotheby’s, in Hong Kong, which took place from 3 to 8 April, came with some reassuring news for Chinawatchers in the auction world. It exceeded expectations coming in at HK$2.18 billion against a pre-sale estimate in excess of HK$1.7 billion [2]. […] The Asian contemporary sales still seem to be struggling to match earlier higher prices, but were helped past their pre-sale estimates by You Are Not Alone by Yoshitomo Nara, which sold for over HK$41million, more than doubling its pre-sale estimate of HK$18million. Elsewhere in the contemporary Asian sales some works were left unsold (perhaps because of some ambitious estimates) [3] […] All in all, the sales sent a message of firmer ground [4].

Source Text 24 UNSIGNED, ‘Hong Kong Spring Sales Reach More Solid Ground’, Asian Art, May 2013

[1] Headline: ensure that your ‘news’ is newsworthy.

[2] The lead: a ‘hook’, which engages a reader’s interest.

[3] Who/what/where/when/how: be thorough; if pertinent, present different sides of the story. If any information is conjecture, or rumor, either drop it or make its uncertainty evident: ‘some works were left unsold (perhaps because of some ambitious estimates)’.

[4] Wind down and ‘end with a sting’: encapsulate your main point. Usually, give at least a brief introduction to named sources (‘the curator Adriano Pedrosa’), and quote their words precisely.

> How to write a short descriptive text

+ art-fair catalogue copy

+ museum labels

+ biennale guidebooks

+ art-website blurbs

+ extended captions

+ exhibition wall texts.

The proliferation of bite-size art-copy attests to what can be described as the ‘cult of brevity’ in today’s Twittering art-world whereby art must be grasped rapidly and consumed in bulk. Commissioned mini-text writers—frequently unnamed—often must:

+ balance concise, pertinent, updated facts with meaningful ideas;

+ cater to everyone from schoolchildren to seasoned experts;

+ condense a complicated multi-part artwork into just a few sentences.

Writing these short texts intelligently demands far more skill than is generally recognized, and should never be written unguided by inexperienced interns or paid by the word. Agonizing over those precise 150 words requires absolute discipline. Make no mistake: composing smart super-short texts is a disproportionately far tougher job than luxuriating in the 2,000+ words of a roomy catalogue essay.

> Basic technique

Usually, to write a very brief piece, the most common strategy is to identify one main theme or angle through which to examine the art. You cannot cover everything, so choose your focus well. It may be:

+ materials,

+ process,

+ symbolism,

+ political content,

+ the artist’s archive,

+ biography,

+ a controversy,

+ or technique.

Research the artist, look carefully, and discern the one key thread running through the text. You can employ a comparison, which might be a smart metaphor or simile. Be specific; your focus or point can be relatively minor: not ‘this artist questions all the ideologies underpinning the spectrum of 21st-century politics’. You might borrow the news-writing inverted-triangle structure (section 3.2) to fit all your information in—especially applicable in a newsy promotional blurb. Set your purple-prose radar on high alert; blinding red lights should flash if you write, ‘this ravishing artwork laments the heartbreaking puniness of all human existence’. Stay focused. Make every word count.

Consider viewing/reading conditions: art snippets might be read peering over shoulders in noisy galleries; on a tiny mobile-phone screen; or touring an exhibition, guidebook in hand. Even an ‘unsigned’ text should display some style, but err on the side of factual rather than flamboyant. Keep sentences crisp and to the point. Your text length may end up determined by the size of a Perspex label holder, usually about 150–200 words. If you are working without the help of an experienced curator, check that your texts will fit in the plastic before writing them. For large exhibitions, consider what belongs in the introductory panel—which is read by more visitors—and what goes on the wall labels. Avoid repetition.

If you write your description before the artwork arrives, double-check whatever comes out of the crate matches your words. Reproductions can be deceptive. Very occasionally, the artwork you unpack may not even be the one you were expecting (long story). You will then need to scrap your meticulously researched text and frantically rewrite.

Accuracy: all caption details must be checked, double- and triple-checked. You are writing art history; take this seriously. Is it a film, or a video? For references, look to:

+ catalogues raisonnés;

+ first-hand, fact-checked, reliable information;

+ trusted Internet resources (major museums, the artist’s own website, Grove Art online);

not any crackpot with a web address. Be careful when translating titles; there may be an official English-language translation that you need to stick to.

When faced with a particularly arduous brief, new art-writers might instantly throw up their hands in defeat. How can we sum up a two-hour film, or a three-month multi-part performance work, even a 50-year career, in just 150 words? What about artworks that are stuffed with unrelated imagery, or open-ended, or deliberately sprawling and chaotic? Isn’t reducing these hydra-headed artworks to a tame paragraph an impossible and contradictory task?

Contradictory, perhaps; impossible, no. Of course, one hopes that these mini-texts serve only to assist—rather than replace—the time readers will spend looking at the art. Here are a few special-challenge briefs (writing about a long career; a moving-image work; a highly detailed image; an open-ended or multi-part project; digital media) and a sampling of techniques that art-writers have adopted with them.

> How to write in brief about a long career

Ideally, such a text is penned by a venerable expert, steeped in 30 years’ first-hand study and observation, whose scholarship permits them to distill the very essence of an artist’s multi-decade oeuvre. Let’s say that you, in contrast, only learned to pronounce this artist’s name correctly five minutes ago. In this case, you will have to hit the library hard. Plan to read about ten or 20 times as much copy on the artist as you are asked to produce.

Here, in an extract from the Frieze Art Fair Yearbook, Martin Herbert manages to condense some 50 years’ of sculptor Richard Serra’s career into a four-sentence paragraph.

Richard Serra, born 1939, lives New York/Nova Scotia

Richard Serra is one of the most significant figures in contemporary sculpture, pivotal enough for museums and commercial galleries to have scaled their spaces with his enormous steel plates [1] in mind. Such monumental works may seem far removed from Serra’s thrown lead pieces of the 1960s [1]: throughout his career, however, he can be seen to have conducted a pioneering investigation of the properties and poetics of industrial metals [Th], particularly their physical and visual weight and occupation of space [2]. Recent projects such as Promenade (2008) [fig. 22], his row of 17-metre-high vertical plates [1] for the Grand Palais in Paris, suggest that Serra continues to push the boundaries of this exploration. Here, massiveness combines with subtle irregularities of placement which, on this scale, have grand effects on the audience [3].

Source Text 25 MARTIN HERBERT, ‘Richard Serra’, Frieze Art Fair Yearbook, 2008–9

fig. 22 RICHARD SERRA, Promenade, 2008

Herbert informs us of the artist’s status (‘one of the most significant figures in contemporary sculpture’), which for once is justifiable, and substantiates that hefty claim: ‘museums and commercial galleries […] have scaled their spaces with [him] in mind’. He then fulfills the three-part job of communicative art-writing (see ‘The three jobs of communicative art-writing’). Do not underrate the skill required to single out the right idea, and make it stick.

Theme: ‘A pioneering investigation of the properties and poetics of industrial metals.’ [Th]

Q1 What is it?

A A concise description of the heavy late work is set in contrast with earlier, lighter examples [1].

Q2 What might it mean?

A Serra’s weighty materials draw attention to two basic attributes of sculpture. [2]

Q3 So what?

A Herbert’s reiteration of the impressive scale of Serra’s sculptures returns neatly to his opener, about museums scaling their spaces around the artist’s often gigantic art, and might connect to the viewer’s own experience of this mammoth artwork [3].

If you’re stuck finding a workable theme to guide you through a big-name long-career artist, you can always ‘cheat’: recycle a key idea summarized by the artist’s associated big-name long-career critic, as found in your initial research. Convey the artist’s stature within art history (Who is he or she?) without lapsing into hagiography. Get to the crux of what makes the artist important, then back it up with choice examples from varying stages in the career.

> How to write in brief about moving-image art

Inexperienced art-writers ponder how to squeeze a whole film into a short text, plus offer a modicum of analysis. Again, discover a guiding idea that runs through the art, then back it up with a couple of succinctly described examples: whether two separate artworks, or a pair of key moments or images extracted from a single work.

Andrew Dadson, born 1980, lives Vancouver

Andrew Dadson is a mischievous neighbor [Th]. In his series of deviant acts [Th], which he documents in photographs [1], he has literally and figuratively jumped his neighbors’ fences [2]. The two-channel looped video Roof Gap (2005, [fig. 23]) records him leaping from roof to roof [1] around his neighbors’ houses. Following a dispute, Dadson performed and documented Neighbour’s Trailer (2003), in which the artist gradually moved his neighbor’s parked trailer inch by inch closer to his house [1] every night. In a similarly anarchic ongoing series Dadson turns objects of suburban division, such as fences or lawns, into black monochrome paintings using black paint. These irreverent ‘Land art’ works attempt to reclaim the increasingly privatized suburban landscape by breaching its staid boundaries [3].

Source Text 26 CHRISTY LANGE, ‘Andrew Dadson’, Frieze Art Fair Yearbook, 2008–9

fig. 23 ANDREW DADSON, Roof Gap, 2005

Theme: The artist’s identity as a ‘mischievous neighbor’ engaged in ‘deviant acts’ [Th].

Q1 What is it?

A Photographs, as well as two moving-image works, are briefly described [1].

Q2 What might it mean?

A The artist ‘literally and figuratively jump[s] his neighbors’ fences’ [2].

Q3 So what?

A Lange sets Dadson’s work both in the context of art history (Land art) and as a social commentary about the powerful public/private boundaries that define suburbia [3].

Lange uses storytelling to encapsulate Dadson’s two time-based works, turning each performance piece into a one-line tale to get across her main theme: the artist-as-mischievous-neighbor. She employs a wealth of concrete nouns (‘fences’; ‘roof’; ‘houses’; ‘trailer’; ‘inch’) and active verbs (‘jumped’; ‘leaping’; ‘breached’) to help readers picture Dadson’s ‘deviant’ suburban mischief. Don’t attempt a blow-by-blow summary; encapsulate the thrust of the action, then explain why it might matter.

fig. 24 AYA TAKANO, On the Way to Revolution, 2007

> How to write in brief about a highly detailed artwork

Multiple unfamiliar figures and objects drift across Aya Takano’s artworks; here’s how Vivian Rehberg gets to grips with the Japanese artist’s floating comicbook fantasyland—while suggesting where it may be heading.

Aya Takano, born 1976, lives Japan

A member of the Kaikai Kiki corporation, founded by Takashi Murakami, Aya Takano is known for her liquescent drawn and painted images [1] influenced by popular culture [Th], and the post-Manga Superflat aesthetic. Built out of pale washes and colors [1], her fantasy worlds [2] are populated by lean girls with budding breasts and juice-tinted lips, who frequently cavort with animals or other lovely-looking youths in imaginary lands or cityscapes. On the Way to Revolution (2007, [fig. 24]) is typical of her approach: a massive horizontal painting [1] of bright chaos where doe-eyed figures rush and tumble toward the foreground streaming planets, stars, helium balloons, fashion accessories, and creatures both real and imaginary [2]. After all, what else should you pack for a trip to Utopia? [3]

Source Text 27 VIVIAN REHBERG, ‘Aya Takano’, Frieze Art Fair Yearbook, 2008–9

For the London art-fair crowd reading this text, Rehberg helpfully sets Takano in relation to the noted Japanese Superflat artist with whom her audience may be familiar; then she sets up her theme and addresses the three tasks of communicative art-writing.

Theme: ‘images influenced by popular culture’ [Th].

Q1 What is it?

A ‘liquescent drawn and painted images…built out of pale washes and colors’; ‘a massive horizontal painting’ [1].

Q2 What might it mean?

A Takano’s ‘fantasy worlds’ are ‘both real and imaginary’ [2].

Q3 So what?

A The writer imagines that Takano’s assortment of goodies could provide the necessities ‘for a trip to Utopia’ [3].

Notice all the concrete nouns with which Rehberg shows how stuffed Tayano’s canvases are with the flotsam and jetsam of Japanese popular culture: ‘girls’, ‘breasts’, ‘lips’, ‘animals’, ‘youths’, ‘cityscapes’, ‘planets’, ‘stars’, ‘balloons’. Concise description is further achieved through wonderfully picture-forming adjectives (‘juice-tinted’, ‘doe-eyed’) and active verbs (‘rush and tumble’). Abstract nouns are limited, and arrive mostly at the end, when we’ve got a handle on the art: ‘chaos’, ‘Utopia’.

> How to write in brief about an open-ended artwork

How can an art-writer encapsulate an artwork that sets out to be limitless, or unpredictable, without betraying the unconfined nature of the art? These writers, Mark Alice Durant and Jane D. Marsching, do not flatten out the maddening heterogeneity of this sprawling sound/Internet/installation artwork, but offer a sampling of the erratic sources one might encounter there.

fig. 25 MARIA MIRANDA AND NORIE NEUMARK (OUT-OF-SYNC), Museum of Rumour, 2003

Out-of-Sync, a collaboration between Australian artists Maria Miranda and Norie Neumark, has been producing radioworks, websites and installation for over ten years. Their fictive investigations of the murky border regions include ‘anomalies, rumor, difference, Gertrude Stein, ducks, everyday life, trees and frogs, Jules Verne, volcanoes, Jorge Luis Borges [1]—through a variety of “scientific” approaches, from rumourology to emotionography to data collecting’ [2]. Museum of Rumour [3] [fig. 25] is both an Internet work and a site-specific installation, originally installed in 2003, [in which] [p]erfectly reasonable scientific claims are set against random and marginal visions.

Source Text 28 MARK ALICE DURANT AND JANE D. MARSCHING, ‘Out-of-Sync’, in Blur of the Otherworldly, 2006

Durant and Marsching do not attempt to define all the esoteria (‘emotionography’) tossed into Out-of-Sync’s work but hint at the variety of unrelated sources [1] and methods [2] that you might encounter there. The writers borrow a list-like quote from the artists to show the unpredictability of their references, and suggest how, for Out-of-Sync, these mirror the random content of a rumor or some pseudo-sciences. The focus on one specific work, Museum of Rumour [3], and visually loaded details (‘ducks’, ‘volcanoes’) gives the reader a good general impression of this artwork as a multi-media grab-bag that combines science, literature, film, religion, and more.

> How to write in brief about a multi-part project

Increasingly, 21st-century artists are engaging in complex artworks that unfold over time, involve multiple partners and media, and extend well beyond the gallery walls. In this brief text for the dOCUMENTA (13) exhibition catalogue, which presents artist Seth Price’s year-long project spanning art and fashion, occasional art-writer Izzy Tuason wisely chose to address its two principal elements—clothing and sculpture—by presenting their uniting themes:

A piece of clothing is similar to an envelope [1]: both are cut from a flat template, folded, and secured shut. Each is an empty package, awaiting content and subsequent travel [2].

In 2011, Seth Price designed a group of clothing in collaboration with New York fashion designer Tim Hamilton. Based on military tailoring, the collection of lightweight garments includes a bomber jacket, flight suit, and trench coat, among other items. Outer shells are raw canvas, a fabric with traditional military and artistic uses. The interior lining is printed with security patterns taken from the inside of business envelopes; such patterns typically feature a repeating bank logo or abstraction […]

Meanwhile, Price prepared a second group of works for dOCUMENTA (13)’s exhibition space at Kassel Hauptbahnhof. Developed in parallel to the clothing line, these huge, wall-mounted business envelopes are fabricated from the same materials—canvas shells, logo-patterned liners, pockets, zippers, arms and legs—and within the fashion industry [3], using Hamilton’s professional network of seamstresses, pattern-makers, and factories. In the sculptures however, the ratios between the ideas are skewed differently: more ripped-open envelope than garment, they are hardly wearable. Here the human form is tacked on awkwardly, limbs dangling as from animal pelts. […]

At dOCUMENTA (13) the two groups of work are juxtaposed, one in the exhibition halls, the other available for sale to the public […] [4].

Source Text 29 IZZY TUASON, ‘Seth Price’, The Guidebook, dOCUMENTA (13), 2012

The writer explains key differences between Price’s two ‘products’, clothing and sculpture (one is wearable while the other is not, for example), but connects them for the reader in multiple ways:

[1] both are inspired by envelope design;

[2] both share a common theme: the empty package;

[3] both are made of canvas and produced by garment workers;

[4] both are ‘available’ at the exhibition, whether on sale (clothing) or on display (sculpture).

The information has been organized chronologically, working from a general theme (the ‘empty package’) to the specific details of each intervention. Solid nouns keep the description concise:

+ ‘bomber jacket, flight suit, and trench coat’

+ ‘business envelopes’

+ ‘liners, pockets, zippers, arms and legs’

+ ‘seamstresses, pattern-makers, and factories’

+ ‘animal pelts’

This writer successfully avoids a few art-writing traps. He does not attempt a potted history of the art/fashion crossover; neither does he attempt to survey this artist’s entire, varied career but follows one well-identified theme, chronology, and logical order to describe succinctly this complex artwork.

> How to write in brief about new media art

With new-media art, writing succinctly and labelling accurately have only got harder. Artist and researcher Jon Ippolito has demonstrated how, for computer-based installations and video multicasts, even compiling basic caption information—author, date, medium—can pose a minefield of uncertainty.78 Digital art is often produced by a shifting cast of collaborators, and varies in format (technologies, dimensions) when relocated from, say, the artist’s website to an online art magazine, or public display in a gallery or festival.

The following public-collection website entry regarding one version of a live web-feed work, Decorative Newsfeeds, has been modified from artists Thomson & Craighead’s own description of their project.⁷⁹

Decorative Newsfeeds (2004) presents up-to-the-minute headline news from around the world as a series of pleasant animations, allowing viewers to keep informed while contemplating a kind of readymade sculpture or automatic drawing [1]. Each breaking news item is taken live from the BBC website [2] and presented on-screen according to a simple set of rules, and although the many trajectories these news headlines follow were drawn by the artists and then stored in a database, the way in which they interact with each other is determined by the execution of the computer program. Decorative Newsfeeds is an attempt to articulate the rather complex relationship we all have with rolling news and how such simultaneous reportage on world events impinges on our own lives [3].

Source Text 30 UNSIGNED, ‘Decorative Newsfeeds’, Thomson & Craighead, 2004, British Council Collection website

For this complex, constantly evolving new-media work, the short descriptive text assists visitors by explaining exactly what they are looking at. Each of the three sentences assumes one task, albeit inverting the order of what I’ve called ‘The three jobs of communicative art-writing’ (see ‘The three jobs of communicative art-writing’), and answering a question:

Q2 Why is this meaningful?

A Decorative Newsfeeds, as well as being an artwork, presents newsfeed, ‘allowing viewers to keep informed while contemplating a kind of sculpture’ [1].

Q1 What is it?

A ‘News item[s] taken live from the BBC website’ that interact with a computer program [2].

Q3 Why might this be worth thinking about?

A The work is ‘an attempt to articulate [how] world events impinge[ ] on our own lives’ [3].

Website entries for digital art often require constant updating; a new media artwork ‘must keep moving to survive’—like a shark, as Ippolito puts it.⁸⁰ Dates are especially slippery; an ongoing digital work begun in 2004 but subsequently revised can be dated ‘2004’, ‘2004–ongoing’, ‘2004/2014’, or more. If possible, seek first-hand information directly from the artist or their authorized website.

> Notes on exhibition wall labels

Viewers spend an average of ten seconds reading a museum label;⁸¹ a writer will put in hours of research to extract the right ten-second text. Attentive observers like artist Meleko Mokgosi in Modern Art: The Root of African Savages (2013, a heavily annotated museum label riddled with her handwritten commentary), can expose the many assumptions therein.

Avoid the Sesame Street-level content of this label, which Burlington magazine spotted accompanying a Braque still-life in a Glasgow museum:

If Georges Braque was struggling with a complex painting, he would often paint still lifes to clear his mind. The bowl of fruit in his studio also provided a handy snack!⁸²

You don’t want contemporary-art skeptics to declare that, not only could their three-year-old create better art, she could compose more illuminating text to go with it. Only research raises your label above such infantilizing trivia. Your label may also need to let visitors know what they can or cannot do; whether they are invited to:

+ touch the artwork,

+ operate the handle,

+ move the mouse,

+ take a sheet;

or, as in the case of this label photographed at MuMOK, Vienna in 2012, ignore the artist’s original commands (Franz West self-contradicting museum label, fig. 26).

fig. 26 Franz West self-contradicting museum label, MuMOK, Vienna. Photo Catherine Wood

> On the house: following house style

If you are asked to write for an established museum or collection (or publisher), they will have a ‘house style’ that ensures consistency across all their texts. Get a copy, and obey it to the letter. Is it circa, c. or c.? If you need a reliable example, look up a favorite professional website (say, the Art Gallery of Ontario, or San Francisco MoMA—there are hundreds) and follow their system. Check (or decide, and stick to) policy for every detail, and be consistent. For captions, often the order is: artist; title; date; medium; dimensions; collection. Additional information can include: photographer; provenance or acquisition history; collection reference numbers. Unless otherwise specified, for wall labels choose a 14-point font size or larger, always sans serif, to ensure legibility.

> How to write a press release

Truly, the saga of the contemporary art press release deserves a chapter unto itself. In most other sectors, this modest sheet of A4 serves merely to:

+ inform the industry, an editor, or a reporter of a newsworthy item, usually bearing a banner-line header for instant communication, in the hope of media coverage;

+ provide journalists with the bare-bones, plain language from which to pen a news item;

+ offer full contact info details (‘for further information, please contact’); a decent copyright-free picture, and a pertinent quote or two. Job done.

The press release is structured as a no-frills ‘inverted triangle’ (see section 3.2): an infomercial that prioritizes news in order of importance. Once upon a time, art-world exhibition press releases were likewise fairly normal, useful one-pagers where a journalist would find straightforward information.

Here are the key elements extracted from two relatively sober examples (by art-world standards): one announcing the recipient of a notable art prize, ‘Stan Douglas wins the 2013 Scotiabank Photography Award’; the second about a private gallery solo exhibition, artist Harun Farocki on view at Raven Row, London, 2009.

Scotiabank is thrilled to announce that Vancouver’s Stan Douglas has been named winner of the third annual Scotiabank Photography Award [1] […] The prestigious prize provides the winner with $50,000 in cash, a primary Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival exhibition in 2014 and book to be published worldwide by international art publisher Steidl [2].

‘Stan Douglas has helped define and enrich the Canadian art and photography landscape with his outstanding artwork,’ said Edward Burtynksy, Chair of the Scotiabank Photography Award jury and co-founder of the Award. [3] […] Based in Vancouver, Stan Douglas has created films, photographs, and installations that reexamine particular locations or past events [4]. […]

Stan Douglas was selected from a group of three finalists, which included Angela Grauerholz and Robert Walker, by a jury of some of photography’s most respected experts: William Ewing, Director of Curatorial Projects, Thames & Hudson […]; Karen Love, Independent Curator and Writer, Director of Foundation and Government Grants, Vancouver Art Gallery; Ann Thomas, Curator, Photographs Collection, National Gallery of Canada [5].

Source Text 31 UNSIGNED, ‘Stan Douglas wins the 2013 Scotiabank Photography Award’, 2013, Scotiabank website

[Raven Row announces] the first UK exhibition of the two-screen and multi-screen works of revered German filmmaker Harun Farocki [1]. […] The survey comprises nine video installations from his first two-screen project Interface in 1995 to Immersion, 2009, about the use of virtual reality in the treatment of traumatized US soldiers following the occupation of Iraq [2].

Since the sixties, Farocki (born in 1944, living in Berlin) has reinvented what can be described as the film essay. […] In the mid-nineties, Farocki began making films for two, and occasionally more, screens [4]. […]

The exhibition is curated by Alex Sainsbury. It is linked to ‘Harun Farocki. 22 Films 1968–2009’, a season of Farocki’s single-screen films and events at Tate Modern, 13 November–6 December 2009, curated by Stuart Comer, Antje Ehmann and the Otolith Group [5].

Source Text 32 UNSIGNED, ‘Harun Farocki. Against What? Against Whom?’, 2009, Raven Row website

[1] A one-line header, or short paragraph, with the main announcement;

[2] information about the immediate event or exhibition (up to four lines)—what is the award; which works are on view;

[3] a pertinent (jargonless) quote;

[4] essential background on the artist (up to four lines);

[5] a short final paragraph with the fine print.

In addition, include the gallery’s details: address, opening hours, website/email, phone number; name of press contact. (Separately), send a directly relevant, good-quality picture (minimum resolution 300dpi), available for usage, with all caption info: artist, title, date, medium, dimensions, venue, name of photographer.

If you follow the above basic model, first take an oath to obey the section, Do not ‘explain’ a dense, abstract idea with another dense, abstract idea. And if, despite your efforts, when you’ve finished writing the press release you are somehow too ashamed or otherwise reluctant to show the artist your text about her own show, that is a bad sign. Rewrite it, keeping the words simple but smart.

> Practical tips

Choose the right photograph. A picture is worth a thousand blurbs. You want a clean and highly legible image, usually of a recent work: the press always want super-current—or, even better, tomorrow’s—news. To judge how well a photograph will print in a newspaper, photocopy it in black-and-white: if the photo dies in a sea of gray, pick another where the image stands out, with starkly contrasting darks and lights. (This trick works even if the image will be published in color or on the web.)

Presentation and clarity are paramount. For print-outs, prefer double-if-not-triple-spaced, breathable press releases from which the journalist can extract the essential information effortlessly. An art-critic will glance over the press release and absorb the headline artist/gallery/exhibition, or scan for key facts. Be sure always to include any really basic background info: materials; process, or how the work was made; perhaps how the artist arrived at this idea—hard information, rather than conceptual jibber-jabber. A pertinent artist’s, curator’s, or critic’s statement (always missing; why?) might throw some light on what’s going on. Fabulously comprehensive gallery or artist websites, with every scrap of criticism, interviews, artist’s statements, catalogue texts, and images of artworks, provide any critic with all the research she will ever need. Facilitating tactics like these help attract coverage.

Hooking the press

No member of the press is ever going to open your email and promptly drop everything to rush and see the ‘first-ever exhibition in Antwerp of this exciting new-media artist, born 1973 in Wysall’. For mainstream press interest, you will need a newsworthy, eye-catching, general-audience hook. Perhaps your exhibition showpieces a human skull, covered in 8,601 diamonds, with a 52.4 carat pink diamond on its forehead and carrying a £50 million price tag? Or, all proceeds go to Amnesty International; or the artist worked with disadvantaged kids—that sort of thing? At the very least, to gain broad (non-specialist) coverage your exhibition must be connected to a book-launch, new film, or major exhibition; or it must include outrageously rare or valuable work.

Having a genuine art-critic review your show is a subtler endeavor. Art-critics receive daily many dozen gallery press releases, the majority of which they delete unread and in bulk. In general, their review choices are independently made, and drawn from regular rounds of the galleries; occasional leads from trusted colleagues; artist studio visits; art-world buzz; some online research. Artists—when they’re not plugging their own shows—can be reliably counted upon for valuable go-see recommendations. If you want the critics to beat a path to your gallery, here’s my advice: make friends with as many art-critics as you can, put on the best exhibitions that you are able, then do whatever it takes to get them through the door (see FAQ, ‘How to write an exhibition review for a magazine or blog’)

There is no law stating you must produce a single, one-size-fits-all press pack. Consider tailoring the content and quantity of press materials to suit the needs of your target media.

Make your news super-easy to insert, as is. Galleries expect magazine staff writers to do all the hard work of transforming the impenetrable prose and partial information in their press release into publishable news. No hyperbolic praise seemingly written for and by the artist’s mother (‘the world’s greatest living sculptor’); no artspeak lunacy; no missing information (who-what-where-when-how-why, all present and accounted for), with a punchy headline and media-friendly quotes, plus a copyright-free, exclusive, fully captioned, high-res photograph.

> Fifty Shades of Press Release

Oddly, as contemporary art gets hotter, the gallery press release seems only to grow more daft. This curious sheet of A4 persists as our dottiest institution: a law unto itself. Ghostwritten by interns; burdened with the contradictory task of both clarifying and mythologizing the art on view; religiously ignored by the press, ‘gallery press release’ is an accepted misnomer. Yet some day, when these are all professionally compiled by PR firms staffed solely by Ivy-league communications grads, we might miss those nutty print-outs, all typos and non-sequiturs and run-on sentences. The gallery press release is art-writing’s favorite problem-child.

Perhaps the press release serves to compensate for the dearth of actual coverage, and fulfills mostly ritualistic functions (see the Introduction); at least somebody wrote something if a press release exists. Some have embraced the special weirdness of this document and invented variations based on the paradox of the ‘signed press release’, likely to leave gallery-goers visibly more—rather than less—mystified. That is their point. The press-release-as-mini-exhibition-catalogue can take the form of:

+ an extended artist’s, curator’s, or critic’s statement: such as artist Christopher Williams writing on his own show, David Zwirner Gallery, New York, Jan—Feb 2011;⁸³ critic Mike Sperlinger writing on sculptor Michael Dean, Herald Street Gallery, London, May 2013;⁸⁴

+ commentary from another artist: such as artist Francesco Pedraglio, for Marie Lund at Croy Nielsen Gallery, Berlin, Sept—Oct 2012;85

+ creative writing: such as J. Nagy, on Loretta Fahrenholz at Halle Für Kunst Lüneburg, May 2013;⁸⁶

+ innovative graphics/stand-alone artwork: such as Charles Mayton at Balice Hertling, Paris, Dec 2012;⁸⁷

+ a collection of ‘parables’ loosely related to the show’s theme: such as A.E. Benenson, for Torrance Shipman Gallery, Brooklyn, New York, Mar–May 2013.⁸⁸

Curator Tom Morton’s revised press release/interview for his ‘Mom & Dad Show’ at Cubitt Gallery, London (February 2007; the exhibited artists are the curator’s parents) revealed all the ‘track changes’ and behind-the-scenes commentary, to help us grasp what an intensely fraught print-out this is.⁸⁹

These alternatives testify to just how off-the-leash the gallery press release has become, and can be among the best things in the show. Generally speaking, these variations imply a confident and knowing author behind them, well-versed in art-world conventions and able to spin off them. If you attempt these options or invent your own, be sure that all involved—artist, gallery—are OK with your novelties. Galleries sometimes have two press releases: one playing it straight, supposedly geared at the press, and a second ‘alternative’ variation—just like the project space adjacent to the traditional museum.

> How to write a short promotional piece

A short promotional text, for a museum brochure or website for example, is a mini-press release, crossed with a mini-news item. Sometimes who/what/where/when details are piled up near the header, to free the text for a basic descriptive understanding of the exhibition or artist’s work.

Robin Rhode: The Call of Walls, 17 May 2013—15 Sep 2013. National Gallery of Victoria International, 180 St Kilda Road [1]

Robin Rhode is a South-African artist based in Berlin who works in photography, animation, drawing and performance [2]. ‘The Call of Walls’ is an exhibition of new works [fig. 27] that derive inspiration from the streets and politics of his hometown Johannesburg [3]. Rhode’s witty, engaging and poetic works make reference to hip-hop and graffiti art; to the histories of modernism; and to the act of creative expression itself.

A special exhibition for youth and families will accompany Rhode’s photographs and animations [4]. This unique project extends the artist’s interest in wall drawing and encourages participants to come together to draw and color in an interactive installation [4] of large-scale paste-ups.

Source Text 33 UNSIGNED, ‘Robin Rhode: The Call of Walls’, 2013, National Gallery of Victoria website

fig. 27 ROBIN RHODE, Almanac, 2012–13

This modest 100-word text does not attempt, say, a full-scale analysis of post-apartheid South Africa or a debate on the status of street-art, but sticks to the simple job of explaining:

[1] Who/what/when/where: ‘Robin Rhode: The Call of Walls, 17 May 2013—15 Sep 2013, National Gallery of Victoria International’;

[2] Media (what kind of work?): ‘photography, animation, drawing and performance’;

[3] Key idea: ‘the streets and politics of his hometown Johannesburg’;

[4] What to expect on your visit: you will see ‘photographs and animations’; also, ‘participants [are encouraged] to come together to draw and color in an interactive installation’.

The idea is to entice viewers in straightforward language, hinting at what’s on show and suggesting why a visit is worth their while. You want to convince the art habitué she shouldn’t miss it, but to avoid alienating potential first-time visitors.

> How to write an auction catalogue entry

The auction catalogue blurb is, usually, a classic piece of ‘unsigned’ art-writing. It pulls together dependable technical and numerical details (dimensions; materials; provenance; and more) and authoritative art-historical information to present artworks in their most attractive light for a potential buyer. In sum, such a text aims to establish worth. In terms of this book’s division between art-writing’s two main tasks—‘explaining’ and ‘evaluating’ art—the auction entry is plainly a paradox (see ‘Explaining v. evaluating’). While clearly in the business of selling and attributing value to artworks (literally, a price), the style and content of auction-house texts revolve around ‘straight’, research-based, art-historical explanation:

+ how and when the work was made, exhibited, and received;

+ its place within art history, the broader historical context, and the artist’s own life and career.

With rare exception, the auction house participates solely in the artwork’s secondary market, i.e. the acquisition and sale of work that has been owned previously. The catalogue entries on these works are usually written in-house by trained art historians—auction staff writers, researchers, and experts, possibly with the input of others including the Head of Sales. Their length varies immensely, from

+ lengthy technical information (always impeccably compiled) with no added verbiage;

+ longish caption;

+ medium-sized article;

+ to book-length investment

in proportion to the work’s significance and expected return. Their content may further benefit from the expertise of

+ outside art-historians;

+ artist’s estates;

+ the representative gallery;

+ and, potentially, the artist herself.

The auction catalogue is rarely where new art-historical research will surface. Fanatical accuracy and transparency of sources is imperative. The auction catalogue blurb isn’t just informative art-writing; it represents due diligence, a legal term.

Due diligence: ‘appropriate, sufficient, or proper care and attention, esp. as exercised to avoid committing an offence; a comprehensive appraisal undertaken by or on behalf of a prospective buyer’—OED.

Research must be flawless, with evidence drawn from

+ first-hand expertise of knowledgeable insiders;

+ the catalogue raisonné (if one exists)—the official, comprehensive publication listing of every work (or type of work) by one artist, meticulously compiled;

+ noted publications from a museum, university press, or a recognized dealer in this artist’s career;

+ or the artist’s own verifiable words.

It might be described as a compilation of ‘unassailable’ evidence—if dripping with superlatives. The auction catalogue’s factual data (technical details such as materials and dimensions; exhibition history; literature; sourced quotes from artists or critics) qualify as the firmest historical information, even for academic work, and are carefully ascertained through uncompromising, verifiable research. Forget anything that smacks of theory, academic jargon, or free-flowing commentary that might declare your own personal, interpretative response. However, the auction blurb should not read as a dry encyclopedia listing or academic treatise, but must be fairly lively and engaging, using (attributed) quotes and anecdotes about the artwork’s making, display, or former owner.

All of these, however discreetly, are at the service of confirming the cluster of values—whether commercial, art-historical, intellectual, or symbolic—centering on an artwork. This is a minefield: how do artworks accrue value? A flourishing sub-genre of research exists, devoted to the big art-story rocking the 21st century: the expanding cosmos of art/money relations.90 For art-market expert Noah Horowitz, author of Art of the Deal: Contemporary Art in a Global Financial Market (2011), the basis for art’s value divides into three: economic, critical, and symbolic.⁹¹

+ economic: what were the achieved prices?

+ critical: what makes this artwork unique (within art history, the artist’s oeuvre, the history of the medium)?

+ symbolic: what is the artwork’s social cachet?

The first, economic value, is suggested in the catalogue by market experts, appearing in the estimate bracket. Much auction essay content seems to focus on the second, critical value. The last one, symbolic value, is also key to the accompanying text, but is swayed by what Horowitz calls ‘softer variables’.92 Whatever finally seals the deal when it comes to the symbolic value acquired in contemporary art-buying—the art represents an indispensable addition to an ongoing collection, public or private; or convinces as a sound investment; or 100% resolves an empty stairwell; or just makes the owner happy and proud—is anybody’s guess. Symbolic value may accrue through curious stories or details surrounding the artwork’s making or its subsequent history that might pique the buyer’s interest. Soundly researched, the auction catalogue essay must strike the balance: neither dry art-historical essay nor aggressive sales pitch.

The auction blurb tends to open with a kind of ‘lead’, or an enticing opening sentence or paragraph. Auction catalogue layouts today can resemble glossy magazines, sometimes displaying full-page bleeds and easy-to-read pull-quotes propping up a big sale. Ideally, the auction catalogue entry is a jargon-free, expertly informed, enthusiastic, readable piece of art-writing.

This example is extracted from an entry for a major painting from the French Modern master Jean Dubuffet, La Fille au Peigne (1950), on sale at Christie’s, New York, in 2008:

La Fille au Peigne is one of the very first paintings that Jean Dubuffet created for his Corps de Dames series. This series, which he worked on from April of 1950 to February of 1951, is widely acknowledged as the most important body of work in Dubuffet’s entire career [1]. The Corps de Dames series consists of only thirty-six works [2], each dedicated to a monumental female nude, many of which now belong to prominent international museum collections, including the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C., the Centre Pompidou in Paris, the National Gallery in Berlin, and the Museum of Modern Art in New York [3]. Through the Corps de Dames, Dubuffet effectively challenged not only traditional conventions of female beauty, but also defied all customary aesthetic principles of painting itself [4]. Dubuffet’s dramatic upending of art-historical tradition, which would have wide repercussions in the history of post-war art, is exemplified in the inventive handling of both paint and figure in La Fille au Peigne.

Nothing in the history of art quite prepares one for the sight of Dubuffet’s La Fille au Peigne. In the catalogue for his retrospective [5] at the Museum of Modern Art in 1962, Peter Selz declared the Corps de Dames as being ‘surely among the most aggressively shocking works known to the history of painting […]’ (P. Selz, Dubuffet, New York, 1962, p. 48) […] Although it has some affinities,93 such as the corpulent Venus of Willendorf [6], it goes beyond a mere primitivizing depiction.

Source Text 34 UNSIGNED, ‘Jean Dubuffet (1901–1985), La Fille au Peigne, (1950)’, Christie’s Postwar and Contemporary Art Evening Sale, 2008, New York

This entry, with its traces of mid-20th-century formal art-talk (‘inventive handling of both paint and figure’; ‘primitivizing depiction’), brings to mind the old-time connoisseur, a figure once closely associated with the big-money art trade. Its hint of plummy speech might still sound classy and reassuring to some buyers. Auction catalogue prose is never over-specialized or polemic. Unlike a museum label potentially geared at school-trippers, auction-text is strictly for grown-ups. Readers are treated flatteringly, as if they are all comfortably conversant in art matters.

Notice how the text establishes economic, critical, and symbolic values for this ‘monumental female nude’, which:

[1] holds a special place in the artist’s life or career, for example the artwork is representative of the artist’s most recognized style; dates from the period of the artist’s finest work; or is a successful example from one body of the artist’s oeuvre. The artwork’s historical significance can be bolstered with relevant archive imagery, such as a preparatory sketch; a photograph of the artwork hanging in the artist’s studio or an early exhibition; or the artist’s source material, such as an inspirational personal photograph;

[2] is rare, for example is recognized as ‘among the finest’ of a period; or belongs to a limited series; or is just rarely available to buy;

[3] belongs or belonged to a noteworthy collection, public or private. This pedigree is called ‘good provenance’, and is listed within the extensive caption information;

[4] is part of ‘the literature’. The writer(s) will research instances in which significant critics and historians have mentioned the work in major catalogues, books from the university presses, and specialist periodicals of note. Was the artwork illustrated?

[5] has a significant place within art history. Beyond ‘rare’, we might dare whisper ‘masterpiece’: an outmoded term and virtually taboo in any other contemporary art-writing context, it is reserved for a sale’s real showstoppers.

[6] can be compared with another artwork by the same artist, a predecessor, or peer—because it bears some resemblance, or shared the same concerns. In addition to the Venus of Willendorf, later in this entry La Fille au Peigne is compared to Willem de Kooning’s Women dating from the same period. Other illustrations include female nudes by Degas and Picasso.

All quotes are meticulously sourced within the text (not footnoted). Further in this two-page essay, among other things, we find:

+ a definition of ‘Art Brut’ (‘Raw Art’), the specialist term associated with Dubuffet;

+ relevant information about the artist’s interests (he was keen on the art of children, for example);

+ artist’s quotes, such as, ‘It pleased me […] to juxtapose brutally in these female bodies the very general and the very particular […]’;

+ an aside about the textured paint, possibly mixed with sand and applied with a trowel, not a brush—likening the surface to a kind of ‘rugged’, earthy terrain;

+ a final quote by the noted critic Michel Tapié, who around the time of this artwork wrote that Dubuffet’s art is ‘profoundly human’.

Attributes of value are gracefully presented in an auction catalogue text: the writer is not just pounding out reasons to buy this artwork. The skill of the job is to intuit the elements about the art, found in careful research, that maximize believably the work’s economic–critical–symbolic value.

> The ‘art-world’s native tongue’?

At its best, the auction catalogue entry sets the standard for accessible and concise scholarship. Perusing these catalogues, one gets the impression that the older the artwork, the more dignified the text. At its worst, this sales pitch can occupy a rung barely a notch above the low-grade gallery press release.

Simultaneously self-portrait, biomorphic composite and minimal totem, Nature Study from 1984 consummately summates Louise Bourgeois’ negotiation of sexual politics via an extraordinarily loaded and often surreal host of visual referents. Elegant and luxuriant in appearance, the delicately swollen bronze pillar and polished gold appendage integrates a serene Brancusian aesthetic with an ambiguous articulation of phallic potency and female fertility.94

‘Consummately summates’? ‘Elegant and luxuriant in appearance’? What next, ‘fine Corinthian leather’? Most auction catalogue entries are fairly respectable; but the weaker examples can read like over-enthusiastic BA assignments, if professionally fact-checked and proofread.

Auction catalogues: the fine print

An expert (not the writer/researcher) may furnish or confirm portions of the detailed technical information required. You must check exact guidelines for your company or publication (which may require more, less, or different information), but published auction data might run like this:

Artist(s)’s name(s); dates of birth (and death);

Title—Triple-check this; is the Basquiat drawing called Furious Man or The Furious Man?

Signature—Give any inscriptions on the reverse or anywhere else on or around, the work; this information is furnished by an expert;

Detailed list of materials—Highly detailed and informed: never ‘mixed media’ but, for example, ‘cast silicon, bronze, and polyurethane paint’, or ‘oilstick, acrylic, and ink on paper’;

Dimensions—In cm and in., usually measured to the first decimal point (cm), and 1/8 inch;

Date executed (year or years)—Usually, disclose any discrepancies or variations here; this requires research;

Edition—If applicable, including artist’s proofs, unique variants and more;

A price estimate—The presale lower and upper estimate, established by auction house experts, in currency (£, Ä, $, ¥, and more, as required). The seller(s)’s reserve price (usually somewhere above the presale low) is conspicuously never published. Calculating or anticipating these figures accurately is usually well outside the writer’s responsibilities.

Provenance and acquisition history—Where has this work been since it left the artist’s studio, up to the current owner? Requires research and expertise.

Exhibition history—Can include all viewings, public or private;

Specific bibliography, or ‘literature’—Head for the library; find reputable references (such as exhibition catalogues) that ideally specify this artwork. Was this artwork illustrated, in color or black-and-white?

The open secret is that auction catalogues are consulted mostly because they supply some very special information: an artwork’s provenance, exhibition history, and—a drumroll, please—the all-important estimated price-bracket. This revelation is so singularly exciting that, frankly, little else on the page can compete. Auction catalogues represent a rare public airing of art prices, however approximate; few real players read past that opening gambit. Even the most meticulously researched, perfectly worded essay will fade to gray when printed beneath a jaw-dropping 6-, 7-, or 8-digit figure.

Here is little-known writer Alice Gregory, whose states that her day job shortly out of college was to pen auction catalogue copy, describing her understanding of the requirements:

The essay copy is mostly a formality, but it plays a role in the auction house’s overall marketing strategy. The more text given to an individual piece, the more the house seems to value it. I sprinkled about twenty adjectives (‘fey’, ‘gestural’, ‘restrained’) amid a small repertory of active verbs (‘explore’, ‘trace’, ‘question’). I inserted the phrases ‘negative space’, ‘balanced composition’, and ‘challenges the viewer’ [1] every so often. X’s lyrical abstraction and visual vocabulary [1]—which is marked by dogged muscularity [1] and a singular preoccupation with the formal qualities of light [1]—ushered in some of the most important art to hit the post-war market in decades. I described impasto—paint thickly applied to a canvas, often with a palette knife—almost pornographically and joked with friends on Gchat that I was being paid to write pulp. Pulp was exactly what I was writing. It was embarrassingly easy, and might have been the only truly dishonest part of the […] enterprise. In most ways, the auction house is unshackled from intellectual pretense by its pure attention to the marketplace. Through its catalogue copy (and for a time, through me), it makes one small concession to the art-world’s native tongue.

Source Text 35 ALICE GREGORY, ‘On the Market’, n+1 Magazine, 2012

Actually, this is pretty good art-journalism. Its mix of insider knowledge and confidential chattiness characterizes one promising strain of Y-generation art-writing. It is disheartening to learn that Ms Gregory felt her auction-house work hinged on disguising her obvious knack for language. Notice how Gregory’s words tally with many suggestions in Section Two, ‘The Practice’: her deliberately ‘bad’ art-writing is a pile-up of vague abstract concepts [1] (see ‘Do not ‘explain’ a dense, abstract idea with another dense, abstract idea’). Her good-quality ‘real’ writing favors solid nouns and well-chosen verbs (in bold; see ‘Load your text with solid nouns’ and ‘Gorge on the wildest variety of strong, active verbs’). ‘The art-world’s native tongue’ does not need to be crummy writing.

Happily, there are exceptions to Gregory’s account. Christie’s publication Andy Warhol’s Green Car Crash (Green Burning Car I), produced for its May 2007 sale in New York, for example, which includes a short piece by the legendary collector/curator/museum director Walter Hopps, a well-researched essay by Robert Brown, and rare archive photos and texts—while confirming Gregory’s volumes of copy: volumes of cash ratio, at 100+ pages—can sit comfortably on any shelf of serious Warhol literature.⁹⁵ The freshman level of some auction catalogue content is jarring, because auction specialists are among the most clued-up in the business. No one knows more about market behaviors, or so many artworks’ technical nitty-gritty and tangled genealogies, than the top brass at the big auction houses. These pros could write compelling sales-copy in their sleep—plus spice it up with some serious gossip, if that were permissible.

> How to write an exhibition review for a magazine or blog

First, go and see plenty of exhibitions. Your city may have a printed or online local gallery guide listing where to go. Most private-gallery exhibitions are free, while public-museum entry fees vary. Check for byzantine opening times, and attend as many

+ gallery shows,

+ openings,

+ performances,

+ art parties,

+ pop-up events,

+ book launches,

+ and art fairs

as you can squeeze your way into. Scour active art neighborhoods, but discover unexplored shows too. Unless you’re writing about online art, the web cannot replace face time with the art and the gallery people. Be adventurous. Have a ball.

Choose an exhibition that sticks with you. Unless your tutor or editor selects the show (in which case, see it and respond honestly) choose art that makes an impression on you, good or bad. When you’ve targeted the right exhibition, spend time there. Look closely; take notes, describe the art to yourself. For a video, installation, or any complex artwork, jot down memorable phrases and images while looking (at the whole thing, of course: start to finish). You will need these details later, as examples in your text. Exit the gallery feeling you know the art. While it’s fresh in your mind, write any ideas or phrases that come to mind (although many will come later, as you write).

Here’s a tip: first consider reviewing an artist of your generation—maybe even of your culture and outlook. If you want to sound like you know what you’re talking about, then know what you’re talking about. Truth is, most art-writers write best about artists roughly their same age, give or take a decade.

Unless you’ve accomplished heaps of pioneering research on a veteran artist and possess a valid new approach (this entails years of work), you will struggle to add convincingly to what’s been said, especially in just 500 words. Be realistic: don’t pitch an Eva Hesse review to Artforum; they’ve got Briony Fer, who’s been writing exquisitely on the late artist for years. Revised perspectives and new ideas are welcome, but beware of coming across as under-qualified, rather than inventive. If you’re young, remember that many art mags are searching for hot new art reviewed by hot new critics anyway.

Never, ever assume your reader has seen the exhibition; in fact, assume your audience has never come within a mile of the gallery, or has ever heard of the artist(s)—unless it’s a bonafide superstar. Be sure always to explain selectively what the art is before extrapolating meaning:

+ what is the art made of?

+ how big is it?

+ how long does it last?

+ what’s in the picture?

+ what did the artist do?

Given that you cannot describe every last material property of what’s on show, however, you might well ask, ‘How do I choose which attributes, or which works or moments of the exhibition exactly, I should describe?’

To answer this, take inventory of the specific points in the art that seem to hold meaning: which of those details, or artistic decisions, contributed to your thinking—or argument, or perspective—on the work? Always introduce one strong idea of your own into your review; you will not find this in the press release or the curator’s statement: only by looking for yourself. Think of one good way in to the work. Inexperienced reviewers ricochet from one interpretation to the next. First paragraph: it’s about gender. Second: it’s about national identity. Third: U-turn: it’s about the history of photography. Follow one idea through—which of your brilliant angles is the most promising, the most comprehensive to understanding the whole show? To quantify: in 500–800 words, one good idea is plenty. Over a thousand, you may need to stretch your imagination. Under 500, one opinionated, punchy concept is your only hope for making an ounce of sense.

Warning: do not distort your interpretation of the work to vent some madcap thesis. Your idea should genuinely emerge from looking—closely, with curiosity and generosity. Further warning: your idea should be thoughtful, and fairly original. If your conclusion is that—lo!—the viewer activates and completes the work, recall that Duchamp said so in 1957, and that is one tired horse. If your ‘idea’ rehearses comatose notions about ‘blurring boundaries’ or ‘challenging preconceptions’, you must work harder. Admit that such ‘ideas’ are dead-on-arrival. A good idea is risky; take a risk.

Seasoned art-writers often form their guiding idea while writing, in an exploratory way; upon its discovery, they polish their main point as they revise. A novice may need actively to discipline their review. Spell out your umbrella concept in a maximum of 25 words and tape it to your laptop. It may be a one-word theme or principle. But remember: your idea, or observation, does not function to straightjacket the artworks, only to help shape the review’s content. Do not to force the art to comply with your interpretation; just observe where you find—or complicate, perhaps even contradict—that theme in the art. The idea may change or grow as you write; that’s OK. If you set off writing and stumble upon a better thesis, or your first idea isn’t working, you may need to trash that attempt and have another crack at it.

Even some very experimental online review writing, such as Hilton Als’s evocative response to the exhibition ‘Subliming Vessel: The Drawings of Matthew Barney’ at the Morgan Library & Museum in New York, revolves around one theme: masculinity, and the ways Matthew Barney’s show stirs up Als’s memories of his father. This is how he begins:

Let me tell you something about Daddy. He was very handsome, a lady killer who buried two partners while he lived in his own isolation. You could not reach him except by telephone; he was inviolate, the chief citizen in his own word-filled world. Daddy didn’t like to share. He had a room in his mother’s house, but he preferred his children visit him in a cinema, a restaurant, any place that helped him preserve the sanctity of his own skin and fears.

Source Text 36 HILTON ALS, ‘Daddy’, 2013

From there Als weaves his intensely private reflections around his recent experience of Barney’s exhibition, which spans—among all the arcana gathered there—such testosterone-driven subjects as weight-lifting, Houdini, and Norman Mailer. The writer gracefully intertwines three strands: his childhood, the art, and his own reckoning about ‘exhausted masculinity’. Even such unique and personally risky art-reviewing as Als’s can be seen as held together by an over-arching idea—masculinity—cohering the whole.

Your shining idea will determine:

+ how to order the material,

+ what to cut,

+ where to pay special attention,

+ which artworks and details to include.

It will shape your descriptions: what exactly in the art provoked your stupendous idea? Your guiding thought will come to your aid especially when discussing:

a moving-image work—

How much of my text is spent just telling the on-screen story?

a group show—

Which artworks and artists do I concentrate on; which can I omit?

Questions such as those—and others raised by inexperienced reviewers—

+ Do I need to include the artist’s biography?

+ How many artworks should I talk about?

+ Should I quote the artist?

+ How much description, and how much analysis?

—can be answered by asking: does this information fan the principal fiery idea behind your review? If not, drop it.

If you’re stuck for an idea, try writing a few pre-idea, stream-of-consciousness pages. Keep only the valuable bits where your theme gains momentum. And, if after thinking hard absolutely no idea hatches in your mind: how about switching exhibition? The trouble might be your lack of imagination—or, this uninspiring show draws a blank. This ‘art’ may not be worth pondering. Either discuss this art vacuum intelligently, or find another show—one that sets your imagination on fire.

In Jan Verwoert’s review of Neo Rauch (David Zwirner Gallery, New York, October 2004), he calls into question the painter’s relationship to his emphatically Germanic subject matter. Verwoert acknowledges the paintings’ perfect craftsmanship, and recognizes their supposed ‘ironic distance’ from uneasy moments of German history, but suspects that Rauch’s virtuoso—but uncritical—paintings only fuel a Teutonic stereotype. In these segments, notice how the critic ‘joins the dots’ in his interpretation, and substantiates his observations in the artworks themselves (see ‘Follow your thinking’).

Supportive interpreters of Neo Rauch’s work have argued that, by re-staging and emptying out the heroic iconography of Socialist Realism in his paintings, Rauch commemorates the death of the ill-fated state-socialist Utopia [Th] of the German Democratic Republic. […] Lösung (Solution, 2005 [fig. 28]), for instance, shows a small country house around which figures in period costume from different centuries perform grotesque acts [1]. There is a soldier dressed in a late 18th-century uniform leisurely executing a man in football gear from the 1950s. […] Admittedly, the scene is absurd; still, the sombre expressions of its cast and the pathos…are what anyone would think of as typically German [2]. […] Rauch is too much of a virtuoso to seriously question the power of his paintings and dare mess up their perfection. […] His paintings remain what they are: mythical celebrations of a confused sense of Germanic identity lacking any kind of critical sensibility [3].

Source Text 37 JAN VERWOERT, ‘Neo Rauch at David Zwirner Gallery’, frieze, 2005

Verwoert presents his single idea, then follows it through the text, answering the questions posed by a classic art-writing structure (see ‘The three jobs of communicative art-writing’):

Theme: ‘Supportive interpreters of Neo Rauch’s work have argued that…Rauch commemorates the death of the ill-fated state-socialist Utopia’ [Th].

Q1 What does the art look like; where can you see this idea? [1]

Q2 What might it mean? [2]

Q3 Why might this matter? [3]

In the full text, Verwoert provides plenty more evidence to drive home his argument. He never loses sight of his main concept—this artist is out of touch with the reality of contemporary Germany, playing into a worn myth rather than commenting upon it—and Verwoert’s chosen details are united by that conclusion. The critic does not attempt to cover every painting, nor does he veer off into non-sequiturs (say bringing up Clement Greenberg’s painting dogma, out of the blue).

fig. 28 NEO RAUCH, Lösung, 2005

Not everyone was as harsh about Rauch’s ‘Renegaten’ exhibition. Artforum reviewer Nico Israel, who also plucked out Lösung, thought the opposite: this painting demonstrates the artist’s ‘pervasive sense of disgust’ for his subject matter.96 In the Village Voice, Jerry Saltz shared Verwoert’s reservations, but on different terms: ‘Rauch’s are lifeless, sexless phantoms of a painted world. Although several of these paintings are stunning, I think they could be hard to live with.’⁹⁷

As a reviewer, your singular focus is not purported as the only valid perspective, rather it condenses the gist of your considered opinion, as observed in the art, binding your review together.

> FAQ

1 How do I get published? Can I just send in my review?

Generally, newspapers have staff critics, and will only hire writers with a demonstrable track record (see ‘How to write a review for a newspaper’). For magazines or online journals, check whether or not your desired publication has a policy regarding unsolicited material; if they do, follow their guidelines, and submit a stunningly smart review. Otherwise, there is good news and bad. The good news is, all magazines—art or otherwise—are permanently on the look-out for writers. The bad news is, their ideal is super-literate, outrageously informed, original, talented, witty, charming, and fits in with their magazine. The basic art-writing tips elsewhere in this book will help with some of the first six; here let’s concentrate on that last requirement: delivering what your magazine wants.

If you hanker after a specific publication, look at and read it closely. Put on your thinking cap, and understand exactly what the title publishes. Examine the length and tone of your chosen magazine, and ensure that your writing literally ‘fits’.

+ Art Asia Pacific, frieze, and Art Monthly are middleweights, 800–1000 words apiece;

+ Art in America reviews are a brusque 450 words (approximately) and mostly descriptive;

+ Art News varies; choose S, M, or L sizes: 300, 400, or 500 words, depending on ‘importance’ (usually the editor’s call). Same for Modern Painters: 450 words, 300, or a two-line, 75-word quickie;

+ Artillery’s are about 500–800 words and informal;

+ Bidoun or Texte zur Kunst reviews are the heavyweights, weighing in at up to 1,500 words, tightly written and knowledgeable;

+ BlouinArtinfo’s pithy one-line reviews are the Little League players, and showcase fast-paced art-writing talent;

+ Burlington—established 1903—is the duchess of the UK art-world. Many reviewers probably hold a PhD on the work of their chosen artist, so don’t pitch your hilarious, experimental review there. As with the academic art journals, submit here only if you have proven authority on your subject;

+ Cabinet is a terrific read but scarcely mentions the ‘A’ word (Art);

+ Flash Art or Art Review we’ll call the flyweights: about 500 words and breezy;

+ Mousse’s are shorter still, coming in at about 300 words, devoutly jargon-free and newsy;

+ Parkett and October do not seem to publish reviews at all;

+ Third Text is the industry super-heavyweight, with reviews up to 3,000 words (including footnotes, a rarity for reviews): academic in tone and profoundly researched;

+ TimeOut reviews can be lengthy, complete with a mini artist’s interview, or almost caption-like in brevity, but always journalistic and youthful.

Be sure to double-check the info listed above; formats change. Besides, there are plenty of others.98 Conspicuously missing are most online magazines; word-count those for yourself. Tired of them all? Start your own!

If writing for an art magazine, observe their review section. Notice how curiously similar their formats are, conventionally comprised of around three to seven paragraphs. The first paragraph(s) might introduce the guiding theme or principle. The middle section addresses What is this art?, bringing in examples that sustain the main idea. Ideally, the last section gets around to the question, so what? (see ‘The three jobs of communicative art-writing’).

Do not dismiss this neat little model. As you gain experience, by all means venture into bold uncharted review structures. The expert writer can scramble the basic order, maybe spend a paragraph digressing. His or her guiding idea is probably more sophisticated than a newbie’s, and may only begin to cohere while writing, rather than following a pre-planned outline, and take full shape in the final draft. But for now, embrace this tidy formula, and dance with it. Fill the standard handful of paragraphs with a single strong idea, your brainy observations and spectacular vocabulary, and your reviews will soon hold water.

2 Do I show my review to the artist/gallerist/curator before publication?

The official answer is no. Publication is the first time your text reaches anyone but the editor. Everything you need to know should be right there, in the exhibition.

In practice, however, if you like meeting artists, review-writing is a handy excuse for a studio visit. Especially if publishing the first-ever text about an artist, you might talk to the artist(s)—not for approval, but to ensure you’re getting the facts right about materials or process. Early texts establish the groundwork about artists, and factual errors can dog them for years. (Note: Artists can make things up, forget their history, or change their story. That’s OK.)

Increase your chances of publication

Include a high-res image (minimum 300 dpi), with full caption (artist, title, year, materials, photographer, gallery; you may need copyright clearance). Prefer a never-before-published recent work, ideally dated the current year—one you talk about in your review.

Proofread assiduously. Check exact titles of artworks, and spell the artist’s name right, consistently—umlauts (…), accents (ă, é, ”), cedillas (ç), hyphens, and all diacritical marks. Don’t forget to sign your name; this omission reveals that you are still frightened to consider yourself an opinionated author. Take courage!

If you do not live in a long-established, world art center, do not despair. If you see a notable exhibition elsewhere don’t hesitate to write it up, get a picture, and send it in. Good, out-of-the-way information about unusual artists and galleries can be priceless for an art magazine. They’ve got plenty of people covering London, New York, Los Angeles, and Berlin. Be selective, but know that you may have better odds getting published if you’re in Glasgow, Dehli, Melbourne, or Johannesburg. Cover your own patch.

If you choose to repeat what the artist says about the art (not indispensable), then quote directly. Unless you really suspect an artist is churning out deplorably vapid ‘art’, be sensitive, and remember that this is someone’s life’s work you’re handling. Try to be in sync with whatever you’re writing about—even if you’re condemning the stuff. You are contributing to a lasting body of written knowledge that will come to surround this art; take the job seriously.

3 Is it OK to write a negative review?

Of course. Whether you respond positively or negatively, substantiate your ideas with the ‘proof’ on view (see ‘How to substantiate your ideas’). This discipline is especially crucial for a really stinging review: is this art demonstrably bigoted and phoney, infuriating you for good reason? Or did you wake up in a foul mood, hungover from a bad date? The Verwoert example above (Source Text 37) is a first-class example of a well-argued unfavorable review.

You are not the spokesperson for the exhibition. Your job is to write a thoughtful review. The artist or the curator does not have the last word. Read the artist’s statement, or converse with the gallery owner, but remember that you are at liberty to doubt every pearly word of their claims about the art. If these insiders do trigger a worthwhile idea, you do not need to repeat their comments verbatim (if you do, however, you should attribute them in quotes). Reviews virtually never include footnotes.

4 How much biographical information should I include?

Never list the stack of biennials, exhibitions, and museums the galleries pile up at the bottom of a press release. Usually, a compact description (‘the New York-born, Berlin-based sculptor’) is plenty, but even this summary can feel plodding if inconsequential to the rest. If biography is central to your idea, selectively include pertinent career info—but do not play amateur sleuth, ‘revealing’ the artist’s alleged personality flaws as ‘expressed’ in the art and confirmed in your exposé. Generally speaking, concentrate on the art, not the artist.

5 Should I assume the reader has seen the show?

Assume the reader is an agoraphobe who has not left his bedroom since 1998. Always tell us, succinctly and intelligently, what’s on view. Of course you must have seen the show, in person, to review it!

6 Who picks the exhibition for review, the critic or the magazine?

Usually, the critic. Editors will trust you with this responsibility if you

+ know your local scene well;

+ will choose worthwhile artists/exhibitions/events;

+ will avoid—or at least disclose beforehand—any conflicts of interest (see ‘Artist/dealer/curator/critic/blogger/‘Kunstworker’/journalist/historian’).

7 Don’t art magazines just publish reviews from their advertisers?

Total myth. Artforum, Art in America, Flash Art, Art Monthly, TimeOut, Parkett, Tate Etc.—any reputable magazine—will never

+ nudge you in the direction of (or away from) a gallery to reward their advertisers;

+ doctor your text to reflect a gallery’s advertising profile.

Art press/art gallery intricacies may be far more subtle than this, but having written for all those, I promise: I have never sensed any alleged review/advertising cabal. Editors will just remind you when your deadline is looming, then straighten out any wonky syntax. I suspect some inexperienced critics do worry about popularity, and self-censor their texts out of fear (see ‘Fear is the root of bad writing’), which may account for the paucity of negative reviews these days. Confident critics, however, speak their minds. Pitch exhibitions for review solely because you think they merit coverage (good or bad), and because you have something to say.

8 How many artworks should I cover?

In 500 words, between two and four works, ensuring you give a fairly comprehensive overview. If the exhibition consists of twelve drawings, a website and a film, you must at least acknowledge the many media—even if you lavish your attention on the fabulous film at the back and barely respond to the rest.

9 Can I write in the first-person, and use ‘I’?

This is frowned upon, and usually gets knocked back into the customary third person. Musings about ‘my really amazing day looking at art’ are strictly kid stuff and will be instantly binned. However, blogging has opened up an idiosyncratic, first-person style for which ‘I’-speak is almost mandatory.

> How to write a review for a newspaper

I know: an art-critic for a serious newspaper is unlikely to be reading this ‘how-to’ book. A good newspaper review reflects an expertise that can’t be gleaned from these pages. Combining opinionated and informed art-criticism with the who/what/where/when/why of news-reportage, a newspaper review is expected both to add stimulating new perspectives for the art-devotee and yet be completely accessible to the first-time reader. Even tougher, newspaper copy is frequently penned at breakneck speed in the wee hours of the morning, to meet killer daily deadlines.

The newspaper reviewer’s ethical reputation must be spotless. Reviewers risk excommunication if they don’t play fair, and must cover their patch broadly—which means plenty of exhibitions they may barely like, while covering possibly a few centuries of art-history. And they write:

+ Obits: ‘Franz West, Influential Sculptor, Dies at 65’

+ General art news: ‘Google Art Project Expands’

+ Op-ed reports: ‘Critic’s Notebook: Lessons in Looking’⁹⁹

and must never tire of the gallery, art-fair, and social rounds. To boot, they must convey a unique personality, an ongoing perspective, a dependable art-voice to which readers can return day after day. This makes good-quality newspaper art-writing sound heroic; maybe it is.

In the following example, Roberta Smith—who’s been writing for the New York Times for 20 years 100—went somewhat out on a limb covering little-known 86-year-old painter Lois Dodd, whose work was on view a good distance from art-hub Manhattan, at the Portland Museum of Art, Maine. Perhaps many readers (like me) had never heard of Dodd at the outset; by the end of Smith’s piece, they have acquired:

+ a strong impression of Lois Dodd’s art over a 60-year career;

+ an understanding of what the exhibition did well, and how it could have been improved;

+ a healthy sense of where this painter fits in art history.

Above all, Smith’s review encourages her readers to see Dodd’s painted sheds, apple trees, and lawns for themselves. For these reasons, Smith’s words add ‘something more and better’, as Peter Schjeldahl recommended good art-criticism should do.¹⁰¹

The following extracts are from Smith’s opening paragraphs, plus the final line. Notice the different and shifting kinds of information the newspaper critic must simultaneously deliver: news about the event; biographical info about this unfamiliar artist; description, interpretation, and evaluation—of both the paintings and the exhibition on review.

Lois Dodd paints with an insistent, sometimes daring economy. She has spent some 60 years making images of her immediate surroundings, and each painting seems to go emphatically as far as she thinks it should and no further [Th]. No frills attached.

‘Lois Dodd: Catching the Light’, the modest retrospective of Ms. Dodd’s work at the Portland Museum of Art here is populated by paintings of landscapes, interiors and river views; of flowers, garden sheds and lawns; of compact clapboard houses and barns, by the light of the moon or sun […][1].

This list may sound conventional, even pedestrian, but the paintings hold your attention. […] Behind their veneer of homey familiarity, these paintings are tough and unruly. Their main attitude seems to be a blithe, independent-spirited ‘Take it or leave it.’ [2]

So far the art establishment has mostly left it. Ms. Dodd is 86, and this is her first museum retrospective. It is being staged some distance from the New York art-world, on whose edges she has quietly lived and worked for decades. […]

[A] painter who looks carefully and trusts herself can never paint the same thing the same way twice [3].

Source Text 38 ROBERTA SMITH, ‘The Colors and Joys of the Quotidian’, New York Times, 2013

First paragraph: interpretation/news, or theme—what is an initial idea or ‘way in’ to this art? [Th]; second: news/description, packed with solid nouns, to address what is it? [1]; third: interpretation/description, or what might this mean? [2]. Smith explains who the artist is, and why this news—about the first museum retrospective of this octogenarian artist, overlooked in New York—matters. She ends with a broad statement on how Dodd’s work informed her understanding of what good painters do, answering the final question, so what? [3] (see ‘The three jobs of communicative art-writing’).

Before reaching that concluding observation, Smith weighs in with an anecdote from painter Alex Katz; close analysis of individual works, like Apple Tree and Shed (2007; fig. 29); plus art-historical contextualization, for example in relation to Minimalist Donald Judd and abstract painter Ellsworth Kelly. This is all accomplished without losing either the plot or the reader, in the informed and generous style for which this world-class critic is known.

fig. 29 LOIS DODD, Apple Tree and Shed, 2007

> How to write a book review

The ideal book review is written by an expert who knows even more about that subject than the author of the reviewed book—probably an unreasonable level of expertise to expect from a student or other newcomer. If you don’t know much about the subject of the book that you’re reviewing, you probably need to research further before you start.

A review is not a summary, but an analysis. Like an exhibition review, a brief book review can benefit from the critic forming a single, overall perspective or response, which is then supported by evidence (quotes, examples, and passages) extracted from the book. Every piece of analysis should return to the content: where exactly did you find the evidence to support your points?

Most book reviews begin with a short overview, briefly outlining (or hinting at) the main point being made, the assessment. You may introduce relevant information from other publications on the same subject, or your own verifiable knowledge, to support your evaluation, positive or negative. Generally, reviewers identify both the book’s weak-points and strengths. Unless you absolutely do not encounter the slightest flaw—or merit—from cover to cover, some equanimity regarding quality is usually expected. Even if you detest the book, ask yourself what the author did well, and vice versa.

When assessing a book for review, you should be looking at:

+ topicality: or importance of the content;

+ argument: clear and persuasive; or contradictory and difficult to follow;

+ enjoyability: the quality of the writing or the imagery;

+ originality: evidence of original (or regurgitated) thinking and research;

+ thoroughness: accuracy; or factual errors, inconsistencies, or discrepancies;

+ attributions: citations and quotations; or assumptions that are ungrounded, highly disputable, or unacknowledged;

+ examples: the author’s fabulous choices; or missing, overfamiliar, and/or outdated data;

+ presentation: layout and design (usually outside the author’s remit).

Sarah Thornton’s page-turner Seven Days in the Art World (2008)102 was greeted mostly by a wave of favorable press, which applauded the book’s engaging writing and vivid depiction of the mysteries of the art industry. In contrast, taking a more critical tack, Art Monthly’s Sally O’Reilly compared Thornton’s breathless week, jetting across the art-world, with the book-critic’s own typical day in the industry’s lower-income bracket (see ‘When still in doubt, make a comparison’):

The art-world in which Sarah Thornton has spent seven days is one that I recognize but do not inhabit myself. It is an art-world of money, power and reputations; it is not one of drudgery, blagging and scraping by [Th]. […] Thornton has selected the upper, moneyed echelons for her investigation and, to judge by the list of interviewees at the back of her book, has been rigorous in connecting with many of the big players. […] She is also admirably direct with her interviewees […] and asks Marc Jacobs what he thinks of [Takashi] Murakami referring to his design for a Louis Vuitton bag as ‘my urinal’ [1]. […]

There may be a few players that sip Bellinis by the Cipriani pool, but this is far from the experience of the majority […] To take Murakami as the subject of the studio visit chapter is rather like offering Turkish delight as a typical foodstuff [2]. […]

As a form of writing, the ethnographic tilt of Seven Days is incredibly interesting, with its fusion of autobiography, anthropological documentary and Sunday supplement exposé [3]. When Thornton introduces a person, she describes what they look like and intersperses their reported speech with descriptions such as ‘She took a bite of her sandwich and tilted her head’. […]

Source Text 39 SALLY O’REILLY, ‘Review: Seven Days in the Art World’, Art Monthly, 2008

O’Reilly is a long-time art-world member, qualified to compare her experiences with those portrayed in Thornton’s book and offer an alternative. The ‘Turkish delight’ simile is terrific: sticky stuff meant to be irresistible but, for some, cloying and indigestible [2]. It also suggests an exoticizing and touristic approach, which matches O’Reilly’s over-arching opinion: Thornton’s is a partial view, fuelling a glittering stereotype of art-world life that is unfamiliar—if not undesirable—to many [Th]. Along the way, however, O’Reilly is not indifferent to Seven Days’s strong points—Thornton has been both ‘rigorous’ and ‘direct’ with her research [1], and the critic is fascinated by the hybridized writing style of the book [3].

The reader may not agree with the reviewer’s conclusions, but O’Reilly substantiates every point regarding what she identifies as the book’s weaknesses and strengths with an example or a quote. While The Sunday Times lauded Seven Days as ‘the best book yet about the modern-art boom’,103 in contrast O’Reilly concluded that Thornton’s book was a ‘missed opportunity’ to counter the common perception of contemporary art as ‘a plaything of the rich’.Whatever your response, trace exactly the passages or ideas that show where your opinion was formed; while reading, underline or signal for yourself key examples or quotes, and bring these to bear to support your brilliant conclusions.

> How to write op-ed art journalism

‘Op-ed’ (traditionally, printed opposite the editorial page, and written by someone not on staff) art journalism differs from a simple news article by virtue of its frankly opinionated slant. Today’s open-mike culture of blogs, Facebook and Twitter accounts provides the perfect 21st-century vehicle for instantaneous, personal views about art—and everything else. However, even strongly biased good commentary is based on persuasive evidence:

+ first-hand accounts,

+ statistical research,

+ knowledgeable observation,

+ and incisive analysis.

Maybe it’s because websites like TripAdvisor and Yelp have redefined ‘review’ as a no-holds-barred platform for complaining about anything from fleabag hotels to disappointing cocktails, online art-writing too can seethe with raw accounts of art-viewing, expressed in a gloves-off critical language almost unheard of in the days of solely paper press.¹⁰⁴ Combining

+ art-criticism,

+ gossip,

+ market highlights,

+ diary-writing,

+ statistical research,

+ personal revelation,

+ snippets of informal interviews,

+ and eye-witness reportage,

op-ed content is still only as good as its writer’s knowledge, insider access to the contemporary art players, and talent for well-worded commentary.

A top op-ed critic/journalist—on paper or online—can transform even a short 140-word news item into a smart piece of art-critical/historical reflection:

Haim Steinbach, Hessel Museum of Art and CCS Galleries at Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY, June 22–December 20, curated by Tom Eccles and Johanna Burton Travels to Kunsthalle Zürich, spring 2014

Conspicuous in his absence from the generation-defining [2] 1986 exhibition that catapulted Ashley Bickerton, Peter Halley, Jeff Koons, and Meyer Vaisman (forever after known as the Sonnabend Four) into the blue-chip empyrean, fifth wheel Haim Steinbach [2] went from white-hot to ‘underrecognized’ in the hiccup of a SoHo season. Twenty-seven years on, this bolt-from-the-blue survey, tracking the artist’s career from his grid-based paintings of the 1970s to today’s large-scale installations [1], means to lay that epithet to rest. Surely the artist’s signature Formica shelves displaying tidy rows of period-perfect product [1] rank among the indelible tokens of their time [2]. I, for one, cannot think of another artist whose output I would be greedier to assess with fresh eyes [3].

Source Text 40 JACK BANKOWSKY, ‘Previews: Haim Steinbach’, Artforum, May 2013

All the tiresome who/what/where/when’s are stacked in the header, leaving former Artforum editor Bankowsky enough space not only to inform about Steinbach’s upcoming retrospective, but succinctly tell us:

Q1 What the art is, and who the artist is [1]?

Q2 What it might mean [2]?

Q3 Why we might care now [3]?

The plugged-in art-critic/journalist is perhaps the most valued conduit to art-industry news, ideally combining the accessibility of journalism with criticism’s acute perceptions about art. Jargon-free, the op-ed news story is relayed in a conversational tone that inspires readers’ confidence in their privileged informer.

Here is Ben Davis, reporting as the 2012 New York Frieze art fair opened in its swish new tent:

The giant Frieze Tent [1] looks smart; the sweeping venue is filled with natural light (even in the relative gloom of a gray afternoon) and pleasant to navigate, despite its immensity; and the roster of exhibitors feels well-chosen [2]. The crowd is lively and Manhattan’s millionaires seem to be in a buying mood [3]. The space even feels relatively laid back for such a high-stakes affair. Heck, even the bathrooms look great.

Source Text 41 BEN DAVIS, ‘Frieze New York Ices the Competition with its First Edition on Randall’s Island’, BlouinArtinfo, 2012

This opener may sound breezy and off-the-cuff, but consider how much hard information Davis gets across effortlessly:

[1] the Frieze art fair is big—maybe even growing—in its flash new venue;

[2] the ‘right’ galleries are in attendance;

[3] moneyed New Yorkers seem to be visiting in droves, and the place is buzzing with trade.

Moreover, as Davis reports, the architecture is a pleasure: bright even on an overcast day, and furnished with impressive bathrooms—the whole suggesting not only understated luxury but the organizer’s attention to detail. Here is Davis again, as the fair came to its close:

Racing around Frieze’s big tent, I had a sort of epiphany, the equivalent of the moment when you realize that the outline of the vase is actually two faces looking at each other. [1] I suddenly had the very strong sense that the art, the supposed point of all this, was the excuse for the event itself, rather than the other way around. Background and foreground switched places […]

Embedded in the environment of the art fair or the art opening, the objects on view realize their status as ‘conversation pieces’ [2], as excuses for a very specific social interaction. In the future, we may remember this epoch of art as being, above all, about the production of some very clever theme parties.

Source Text 42 BEN DAVIS, ‘Speculations on the Production of Social Space in Contemporary Art, with Reference to Art Fairs’, BlouinArtinfo, 2012

The writer updates the old-fashioned, novelty-art reversal [1] to a macro-scale, applying this figure/ground inversion to the current art-world: in the chat-a-thon that is the art fair, artworks end up as serviceable conversation-starters and party backdrops [2].

Davis is witty while offering intelligent reflection on the shape-shifting mechanisms of the art system. And let’s face it: weak art-writing is depressing not only for its dense language and unfathomable logic: it is also unrelentingly humorless. If you can bring a smile to readers’ lips and still get your facts straight, then—in op-ed journalism, not academic or institutional writing, which demands ‘serious’—please do so. Remember ‘the baker’s family who have just won the big lottery prize’: a phrase that manages to turn Goya’s line-up of aristocrats into a curtain-call for a theatrical comedy about, well, an 18th-century baker winning the big-prize sweepstakes. Even 160 years later the phrase is still pretty funny, still packing its punch.

> Who’s doing the talking?

The eternal mark of a true art-critic is the insistent return, again and again, to the artwork, and art-making itself. The extract from the second of Davis’s texts reprinted above (Source Text 42) is just the opening ‘hook’ and final ‘sting’; in between he offers a mini round-up of other art events round town (Marina Abramovic at MoMA; Carsten Höller’s funfair slides at the New Museum), all reconnected to his chicken-and-egg question: which comes first, the art object, or the social interaction it generates? Unfailingly, I believe, the true art-critic’s eye will drift toward the art. In contrast, a journalist with only the faintest curiosity about art—basically a tourist on a brief stopover in the art-world—is perpetually distracted, turning his attention to anything but art. The giant price tag; the glamorous gallerist; the collector’s gorgeous beachfront home: the non-art journalist will sooner devote a paragraph to relaying verbatim what an artist ordered for lunch rather than mystify his reader with the art, a subject he has no idea how to talk about (see ‘The first time you write about art’).

As we’ve seen, the gist of Sally O’Reilly’s response to Sarah Thornton’s Seven Days in the Art World (see ‘How to write a book review’) is not that the book is badly observed or unappealingly written, but that the author seems to tunnel her vision only on the starriest edges of the art-universe, and fails to recognize innumerable other planets: countless regional scenes; bloggers and small publishers; academics outside Goldsmiths in London or CalArts in Los Angeles; small-scale project spaces and art-dealers; and the millions of non-celebrity artists dependent on their day-jobs to get by. At times these satellites collide, but much of the time they occupy separate galaxies. Good art-critics have a sense of most (if not all) these sub-sets. Many are (or go on to become) lifelong art devotees; instinctively, they write for the like-minded.

The non-specialist journalist probably has a relationship with art more like that of economist Don Thompson, who spent the equivalent of a gap year investigating the big-money, auction-going tip of the art-world to pen the popular The $12 Million Stuffed Shark.105 Compare the passage from Thompson’s book immediately below with an Art in America op-ed from art veteran Dave Hickey that follows.

What do you hope to acquire when you bid at a prestigious evening auction at Sotheby’s? A bundle of things: a painting of course, but also, you hope, a new dimension to how people see you […]

The motivation that drives the consumer to bid at a branded auction house, or to purchase from a branded dealer, or to prefer art that has been certified by having a show at a branded museum, is the same as that which drives the purchase of other luxury consumer goods [1]. Women purchase a Louis Vuitton handbag for all the things it may say about them. The handbag is easily recognized by others, distinguished by its brown color, gold leather trim and snowflake design. […] Men buy an Audemars Piguet watch with its four inset dials and lizard-skin band even though their friends may not recognize the brand name, and will not ask. But experience and intuition tells them it is an expensive brand, and they see the wearer as a person of wealth and independent taste. The same message is delivered by a Warhol silkscreen on the wall or a Brancusi sculpture in the entrance hall [2].

Source Text 43 DON THOMPSON, The $12 Million Stuffed Shark, 2008

If you look at artworks as I do, against a field of all the artworks you’ve ever seen [1], this intricate flutter of precedents makes for a bigger and more memorable experience […] [T]hree decades of art theory and art history have destroyed our understanding of art practice. So, let me remind you that the practices of law, medicine and art are dedicated to maintaining and renewing our ideas of justice, safety and happiness [2]. To perform these tasks, they each hold a full field of precedents at the ready to cope with the unprecedented present. Everything is always available, because you never know what antique legal decision, herb or icon you will need right now […] As practical precedents, works of art are orphans, ready to be adopted, nurtured and groomed to the needs of any astonishing new circumstance.

Source Text 44 DAVE HICKEY, ‘Orphans’, Art in America, 2009

Notice how the economist sets art against a backdrop of luxury consumer goods; the art-critic, against his wide knowledge of other artworks [1]. Hickey suggests that art—like the disciplines of law and medicine—aspires to high ideals that are offered to the world at large; in Thompson’s text, in the eyes of a collector at least, ‘branded’ art can at most communicate the wealth-status of a luxury watch, in the privacy of one’s well-appointed foyer [2]. Writers from another discipline often conduct attentive research on the art industry in relation to their background and—like the most devoted art-critics—can be effective in tailoring their message to what interests their readers. These audiences, however, can belong to vastly diverging tribes.

If you ask members of the Anglo-Saxon art-world to name their favorite art-writer, from my experience many will intone ‘Dave Hickey’ without missing a beat.¹⁰⁶ (An academic is more likely to say T.J. Clark. Neville Wakefield [US] and the late Stuart Morgan [UK] come up a lot too.) A former art-dealer who’s followed the art scene since practically the Ashkan School,107 Hickey is informed, witty, outspoken, and always keeps in mind the Big Picture: art is for everyone and can make life better, that’s why we bother. His art-resumé is as long as the Mississippi: retired Professor of Practice at The University of New Mexico; former executive director of Art in America magazine; a curator of SITE Santa Fe, 2001–2; indefatigable art-writer and -lecturer.¹⁰⁸ Don Thompson is a reputable economist and Senior Scholar and Nabisco Brands Professor of Marketing emeritus at the Schulich School of Business, York University, Toronto.¹⁰⁹ When reading journalism, bear in mind your author’s field of expertise. One might reasonably question, for example, whether art-critic Dave Hickey would provide the most reliable opinion regarding, say, optimal branding strategies for the cookie industry—even if he’d spent a whole year assiduously researching the light-snack world.

It is likely that an increasing number of non-art specialists (or semi-specialists) will tackle contemporary art—perhaps because open-access art-writing platforms abound online; or perhaps because, despite the growing fascination for contemporary art, specialist art-texts can lean toward the deadly dull. The art-writing gates are growing wider, which may prove beneficial for art-criticism. Dedicated art-critics will have to compete with a new batch of art-commentators who not only will introduce new perspectives but may be capable, enjoyable writers. The best combination, however, will remain the formidable art-writer able both to write well and apply real knowledge about art—that is, what you aim to be.

> How to write a catalogue essay or magazine article

It is worth repeating that you should begin by viewing the art at length in the flesh, then looking some more; reading; and using YouTube, UbuWeb, and Google to find everything online (of worth—the artist’s gallery or own website as well as reputable magazines [see Resources] are often the most reliable sources).

> A long-form text on one artist

Choose an artist with whose work you really connect. Take notes. Write down the bibliography or credible web address behind the material you’ve gathered: you may need to double-check sources later. If you are not already in contact, speaking to the artist directly—if possible—is always a big plus, and may be indispensable. But do not stalk artists with requests! Unless he or she is a pal, only attempt contact (through their website or gallery) when you have absorbed all you can about the art, and have formulated some informed questions (not: Can you tell me about your art?). Know your subject, and ask precise questions; maybe arrange a studio visit or interview.

Remember the three principal questions an art-writer might pose when looking at art (see ‘The three jobs of communicative art-writing’):

Q1 What does the artwork look like? What is it made of?

Q2 What might this mean?

Q3 How might this be meaningful to the world at large?

This is not a box-ticking operation; just keep these questions in mind as you prepare, write, and edit. Are you

+ substantiating your points with examples?

+ spelling out the logic of your thinking?

+ explaining what the work is before expanding on what it may mean?

+ looking at the art, work by work?

Content

Assuming you answered ‘yes’ to the above questions, writing well about one artist (or group) relies on

+ possessing a personal affinity with the art, and some ideas to share;

+ looking, reading, researching all you can;

+ finding the right structure or organizational principle that fits the artist(s), your thinking, and the allotted word length.

For a single-artist catalogue essay or magazine article, you typically have between 1,000 and 4,000 words to play with. Unless you choose to zoom in on a certain period, series or individual artwork, you will probably cover: key artworks (and some lesser-known examples); all the media; and the principal ideas or themes. For an exhibition-specific catalogue or feature, refer principally to the artworks on view. In addition, you might discuss significant moments in the artist’s career, such as:

+ a life-changing trip;

+ personal upheaval (a life-event the artist has spoken about openly—not a private revelation);

+ a turning-point exhibition or artwork (subject matter or series);

+ an encounter with an important person or collaborator(s);

+ a change of environment: teaching post; working environment; studio space;

+ any new beginning: new media; technology; city.

and perhaps include artist’s statements and key critical commentary on the art. As you do your preliminary research, make a list of these essentials. As with an academic essay, begin by outlining your ideas; this might take the form of a flow-chart or timeline, or other graphic system to organize the information on paper. Choose which examples or points to include, then find their rightful place in your essay. Gauge your audience’s level of expertise: art-specialized, or more mainstream?

Often the purpose of a single-artist essay is to give even a first-time reader a solid overview; your words should contribute to the body of writing that will accumulate around her or him. Imagine that yours is the only text on this artist or body of work: how best to cover it all? If your essay will join others in a multi-authored monographic (one-artist) catalogue, be sure fellow-writers are not covering the same ground.

Structure

Many text-structures delineated below are not suited for academic assignments (see ‘How to write an academic essay’), but a catalogue essay or magazine article usually entitles you to more freedom. The list-like biography should get stacked somewhere at the back, and not clutter your clean prose.

Chronological. The most common organizing principle—since at least Giorgio Vasari (1511–1574), arguably the first-ever Western art historian—chronology has the advantage of ensuring a comprehensive logical thread through a life and career. This should not, however, reduce the art to a linear evolution from A (early attempts) to B (first mature triumphs) to C (the masterwork). Some art-writers instinctively recoil at chronology, terrified it will read like an earnest book report: ‘Pablo Picasso was born in Málaga, Spain, in 1881. As a boy…’. However, if suffused with marvelous insights, brilliant vocabulary, and lucid description, this structure can prove surprisingly elastic, accommodating your own insights, and producing an exquisite text.

In this opener on the late Polish sculptor Alina Szapocznikow, curator Adam Szymczyk begins his chronologically arranged article with his first powerful encounter with the art [1], which acts as a kind of Proustian madeleine110 prompting Szymczyk to unravel the art and life of this under-recognized artist [2]. The critic uses this singular, emblematic work, Journey, to introduce readers to what initially intrigued him—imbalance; ghostliness; weight; scale [3]—about the art:

fig. 30 ALINA SZAPOCZNIKOW, Le Voyage [Journey], 1967

It was the mid 1980s, a bleak, depressed era in post-martial-law Poland, when I first saw Alina Szapocznikow’s 1967 sculpture Le Voyage (Journey) [1] [fig. 30] at Muzeum Sztuki in Lodz. Strolling pretty much alone through the museum’s galleries, I came upon it suddenly: a slender waxy-white nude that seemed to recline in the air. Perched on a tiny metal plinth and leaning back at a steep angle, improbably balanced between standing and falling, it denied gravity with the ease of a specter [3]. Rounded pads of blue-green polyester covered the figure’s eyes like the lenses of oversize sunglasses, conveying hippie-era modishness but also evoking blindness, a state of perceptual impairment […]. [E]manating a sense of lightness, it also seemed strangely aglow, half opaque but translucent enough to absorb and reflect the ambient light. It was an unforgettable apparition [2], the more so because of its oddly quiet presence, which set it apart from other pieces by Polish and international artists displayed nearby.

Source Text 45 ADAM SZYMCZYK, ‘Touching from a Distance: on the Art of Alina Szapocznikow’, Artforum, 2011

This single, small sculpture plainly stopped Szymczyk in his tracks; the writer’s account of this arresting work displays impressive powers of observation, and might induce a reader to learn more about this curious figurative art. Following this opener, the writer follows rough chronological sequence to trace those initial insights—and new ones that emerge—throughout Szapocznikow’s career, covering a good sampling of this artist’s sculpture and photographs from her student days in Prague to her Paris sojourn during the 1960s when she made Journey, to Szapocznikow’s early death in 1972.

Thematic. An essay may have subdivisions feeding into a principal theme, or splinter into multiple themes.

Curator Iwona Blazwick’s extended text on Cornelia Parker identifies clusters of themes—‘The Found Object’; ‘Performance’; ‘Abstraction’; ‘Knowledge’; ‘Power Structures’—in order to navigate through the British sculptor’s art:

The found object is distinct from the readymade in that it is, for the most part, unique [1]. Duchamp’s paradigmatic readymade—the mass-produced urinal—was never plumbed in or pissed into. […] By contrast, the found object, as it appears in the assemblages of Robert Rauschenberg or the accumulations of Tony Cragg or the transmutations of Cornelia Parker [2], is singular by virtue of having accrued a history […] it is second hand […]

‘The established language and connotations around an object give it the potential to “mean something else”,’ Parker has said. ‘I’m interested in taking them and trying to push them […] as far as they might go.’ [3]

Thirty Pieces of Silver (1988–89 [fig. 31]) is a sculpture that, like Richard Serra’s Throwing Lead (1969) [2], first took form as a documented action. Parker arranged hundreds of silver artefacts on a path in the countryside. She then hired a magnificent machine redolent of the nineteenth century—a steamroller—to trundle slowly over them all, squashing them flat […] these found objects were then suspended from metal wires so that they floated in thirty pools, like ghosts, above the ground [4].

Source Text 46 IWONA BLAZWICK, ‘The Found Object’, in Cornelia Parker, 2013

fig. 31 CORNELIA PARKER, Thirty Pieces of Silver, 1988–89

Notice how Blazwick elegantly draws in essential information—a definition of ‘found object’ [1]; art-historical precedents both near and far [2]; an artist’s statement [3]—before embarking on a detailed description and her own interpretation of Thirty Pieces of Silver: ¹¹¹ these suspended collections of shiny objects look like supernatural, airborne puddles [4] as readers can verify looking at a nearby image of the work.

Beware: artists’ careers will rarely slavishly obey your convenient thematic categories! Some artworks will impertinently straddle themes, or refuse to play along with your neat structure, and may require special accommodation.

Posing a question. An opening question might guide the way into an artist’s work. The skill lies in framing the right query, then organizing artworks in terms of possible answers—or the new questions they generate.

Alex Farquharson begins his essay on performance artist Carey Young by asking:

So, what will be required in the future? Answer: ‘sole creators…defined by ideas’, ‘disruptive innovation’ and ‘a shift from…tangibles to intangibles’. These phrases aren’t lifted from an award ceremony speech by the curator of an international Biennale, but from an article in Fast Company, a leading business magazine. [1] […] Never before has the lexicon of contemporary art and leading-edge business, with their mutual emphases on discovery, creativity, and innovation, sounded so alike.

[In the performance work I am a Revolutionary, artist] Carey Young, dressed in a smart business suit, paces back and forth in a slick office space. […] Young is alone in the room with a tall middle-aged man, also smartly dressed, who is in the process of offering her instruction—coaxing her, giving praise and supporting her efforts with constructive advice. ‘I am a revolutionary’, Young exclaims for the n’th time, weary but determined to better her delivery. Again but with different emphasis” ‘I…am a revolutionary.’ […]

[W]hy are these four words causing her so much trouble? Is it because, as an artist, she can’t quite bring herself to believe in either the avant-garde or political utopia, if that is her message? Or, as an executive, does she doubt that she is indeed a radical leader, a visionary?

Source Text 47 ALEX FARQUHARSON, ‘The Avant Garde, Again’, in Carey Young, Incorporated, 2002

The critic’s recurring questioning suits the open-ended nature of Young’s art, which tests today’s fuzzy boundaries between art and business. Managerial lingo and artspeak sound more and more alike [1], and this overlap, it so happens, is just what Young’s art is all about. In the future, will anyone tell them apart? Farquharson concludes that, for now, they remain in ‘parallel worlds’ but—as Young’s work seems to ask—is the art/business distinction destined to collapse?

Embedding the artwork against the backdrop of life events. Unless you’re writing a biography, usually concentrate on the vicissitudes in the art’s trajectory, not the artist’s personal life. This technique is regularly applied to certain artists’ life/work stories, such as Louise Bourgeois’s, but increasingly this life-equals-art tactic feels overdetermining, and should be adopted with caution.

A–Z format. Also used, for example, in Louise Bourgeois’s Tate Modern catalogue (2007)—as if mirroring the ‘encyclopedic’ nature of this artist’s complicated life/art story. This dictionary style requires plenty of imagination: you will struggle with ‘X’. If you take this A–Z route, first insert each of your main points under the right letter, then have fun with filling in the rest.

Numerical lists. Bruce Hainley’s survey essay for a monograph on artist Tom Friedman, ‘Self-portrait as Untitled (without Armature)’,112 is an idiosyncratic combination of chronology and themes, ordered numerically, weaving Friedman’s art through digressive soliloquies on topics veering from Martha Stewart to ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’. Written in a confessional tone and with some single-line ‘chapters’ (‘Tom Friedman’s studio has no windows’), Hainley’s unconventional joy-ride is highly accomplished and suits Friedman’s confounding art. This unorthodox structural system can be difficult for the inexperienced to pull off without the text dissolving into a self-indulgent mess. However, if you have the self-discipline to ensure all key material finds its rightful place, and the artwork at hand somehow suits a numbering system, then you might try this structure on for size.

A work of fiction or poetry around the artist. The sky’s the limit on this one.

In painter Karin Davie’s catalogue for the Albright-Knox Museum, Lynne Tillman pens a tale about flying in response to an image of the painter levitating, and begins:

Davie shows me a photograph she shot of herself levitating… Why not fly away, defy gravity, why not believe in a world beyond, one we can’t know?

Source Text 48 LYNNE TILLMAN, ‘Portrait of a Young Painter Levitating’, in Karin Davie: Selected Works, 2006

The free-form story that follows suits Davie’s gravity-less abstract paintings, and complements Barry Schwabsky’s earlier straight catalogue text in the same volume (which revolves around the contrast between the artist’s ‘floating’, curvy brushstrokes and her sturdy rectilinear ones). Schwabsky’s comprehensive, work-by-work foundation, systematically covering a range of this artist’s work, allows later texts like Tillman’s the freedom to explore uncharted territory.

> An article or essay on a group of artists or a concept

A long-form non-academic text for publication—in a book (exhibition catalogue, thematic overview), or magazine—about a group of artists, historical period, medium, or an idea can usually omit footnotes and the wordiness of a scholarly paper, but generally proceeds along similar structural lines (see ‘How to write an academic essay’).

1 Introduce the group, question, process, or set of interests, maybe with a story or an example.

2 Give background

(a) History: Who else has thought/written about this?

(b) Define key terms

3 1st Artist or idea

(a) Example (artworks, quotes from the artist, critics, philosophers or more)

(b) More examples

4 2nd Artist or idea

(a) Example

(b) More examples

5 3rd Artist or idea…

6 Conclusion

7 Bibliography and appendices (for a catalogue).

Safely outside the confines of academic protocol, that one-size-fits-all pattern can be tailored to suit any shape, by: reordering or dropping sections; allowing unequal lengths for idea-sections, which can range from just a sentence to novella length; or straying a little to drag in, for example, your penchant for Heavy Metal—assuming this eventually circles back to your main point(s), and you keep the flow. As ever, don’t be afraid to acknowledge counter-arguments; consider alternative perspectives; and entertain further questions. No essay perfectly adheres to the standard outline, but this basic structure underlies many thematic or multi-artist texts.

In the following specialist art-magazine article, art-critic T.J. Demos examines recent artworks by a range of artists whose work rethinks the natural environment in the 21st century. For Demos, it seems, these artists foreground the way economics now shape our relationship to nature, and show up not only the perverse ‘natural’ conditions that result, but the potential dangers of money-driven ecological policies. These extracts are from the opening two paragraphs:

The night sky may never have looked as disturbingly different as it did in Black Shoals Stock Market Planetarium (2001/2004 [fig. 32]), for which the London-based artists Lise Autogena and Joshua Portway projected an array of otherworldly constellations onto a planetarium-style dome [1]. Each astral body corresponds not to nature but to a publicly traded company, as a computer program translates the real-time financial activity of the world’s stock exchanges into glimmering stars […] Stars flash brightly whenever the stock is traded, gathering into clusters or dispersing according to market momentum […] When there’s a market downturn, they experience famine and die out, overcome by the darkness.

But this extraordinary ecosystem is also, pointedly, devoid of natural life…[The] Black-Scholes option-pricing formula, published in 1973 [2a] […] set the course for the trading of financial derivatives on an unprecedented scale […] Black Shoals Stock Market Planetarium reduces complex calculations of this kind to the level of a video game’s seductive logic [2b] […] Black Shoals’s creatures are nothing but a purified expression of self-entrepreneurship—approximating what Michel Foucault, in his later writings on bio-politics, called Homo economicus [2c] […] The piece is not just a means of visualizing data but an existential model for predatory life under advanced capitalism, within a zone where nothing else—not bodies, social life, religion, or aesthetics—matters.

Source Text 49 T.J. DEMOS, ‘Art After Nature: on the Post-Natural Condition’, Artforum, 2012

fig. 32 LISE AUTOGENA AND JOSHUA PORTWAY, Black Shoals Stock Market Planetarium, 2012

How does Demos set the stage for the rest of his article and his ideas to unfold?

1 Introduction: Describes an emblematic artwork in his opening paragraph, Portway and Autogena’s Black Shoals Stock Market Planetarium.

2 Gives background

(a) History: The Black-Scholes option-pricing formula from 1973;

(b) How does the artwork connect to the world at large? Both at the level of a video game and revealing the vulnerability of life exposed to purely economic rationality;

In the rest of the approximately 4,000-word article, Demos goes on to outline his thematic ideas, supporting each with examples, partially summarized below.

3 1st idea: Legislation to curb climate control such as the Kyoto protocol effectively amounts to ‘the selling of the “right” to pollute’, and ‘each passing year sets a world record for the emission of greenhouse gases’.

(a) Example: Amy Balkan, Public Smog, 2004–, in which the artist sets up a ‘clean-air “park” in the atmosphere’ based on emission credits that the artist has purchased.

4 2nd idea: Art and ecology are increasingly making an appearance in contemporary art. ‘[A] growing number of exhibitions, catalogue and critical texts are dedicated to the topic of art and the environment’.

(a) Example: ‘the 2007 Sharjah Biennial, titled “Still Life: Art, Ecology and the Politics of Change”.’

(b) Example: Tue Greenfort, Exceeding 2 Degrees, 2007. ‘The artist also raised the temperature of the entire museum by two degrees Celsius—the interval set as a plausible but now seemingly unreachable goal in the fight against global warming’.

5 3rd idea: These 21st-century artists contrast with ‘1970s pioneers of eco-art [who] tended to posit nature as a separate realm of purity needing protection’.

(a) Examples (historic): Artists Joseph Beuys, Agnes Denes, Peter Fend, Hans Haacke, Helen Mayer Harrison and Newton Harrison.

(b) Example: Indian scientist and environmental activist Vandana Shiva, who has defined ‘the corporate control of life’ by means of ‘biotechnology and intellectual property law.’

Example: artists’ group Critical Art Ensemble project such as Free Range Grain (with Beatriz da Costa and Shyh-shiun Shyu, 2003–4), ‘a mobile laboratory-cum-performance piece […] where visitors bring in store-bought groceries for CAE to test for genetically modified ingredients’.

6 Final conclusion: ‘For many artists who have put [environmental crisis and economic decisions] at the core of their practice, it’s perfectly justifiable to claim […] they are occupying “the most crucial terrain of ideological struggle in our time”.’

Demos probably did not plot out his article exactly as I am surmising; often, experienced art-writers structure material intuitively, as they go along. And Demos’s piece is considerably more nuanced, with additional detail and analysis. My point isn’t to slice this rich essay into bite-size chunks, but to show how even complex and forward-thinking texts are based around a standard structure, sequenced information, and substantiated ideas. The material is ordered less rigidly than an academic essay:

+ a background history of 1970s’ art arrives, where it is needed, midway through the essay (5a);

+ some sections are longer, composed of multiple examples; others only one.

The basic structure of such an article can be flexible, and—adjusting for whatever modifications suit your topic—serves to:

+ organize the valuable material you have collected;

+ arrive at original, substantiated conclusions;

+ suggest why this is important to think about now.

The merit of Demos’s essay is not its sound structure but the critic’s ability to identify a worthwhile topic, gather compelling evidence—

+ current artists,

+ earlier artists,

+ exhibitions,

+ cultural and scientific theories,

+ economic policies and tools

—and persuasively interpret their implications. Demos is also good, I think, at describing complicated artworks succinctly, without narrowing their interpretation.

> How do I get my essay published?

Books are usually commissioned by a publisher’s in-house editor. Art books, especially monographs, will be initiated in consultation with the artist and possibly their gallery, who will choose from the pool of well-known art-writers. However well-received your third-year paper (or even PhD dissertation) was, commissioning editors will rarely invite a very green author to pen their monographs—a publishing investment whose success relies on both the artist’s and the author’s worth and reputation. (They might give you a chance on a smaller project to pen short explanatory intros, captions and blurbs—assuming you write clearly and check your facts meticulously.) If you are convinced that you have an irresistible book idea with a real readership, you can try pitching your idea, in a very brief email, to the appropriate commissioning editor. This is, however, a long shot. If you really crave a published book, you might consider self-publishing/-distributing, or contacting the small independent presses—where much exciting new publishing occurs today. 113

Your chances for publication improve with the quick-turnaround magazines. The advice for getting your essay published by a magazine is much as for a review (see the longer FAQs in ‘How to write an exhibition review for a magazine or blog’). Follow, if available, a magazine’s ‘unsolicited material’ submission policy. You might pitch (again, in a concise email) exciting article-ideas to the editor; or, if you’re feeling even luckier, submit your flawlessly polished final text, then cross your fingers. You have far better odds of getting published when writing about an amazing artist who has never, or hardly ever, been covered. You might trawl gallery and museum websites for forthcoming exhibitions, and—if you have something to say about them—pitch articles to magazines in sync with the upcoming art calendar, well in advance. Remember, the aim of the press is to satisfy readers with up-to-the-minute information.

Along with your immaculately proofread article, include a list of four or five images plus a couple of alternatives you’d like as accompanying illustrations (usually recent artworks you talk about). Give contact details for the artists’ galleries, from whom you or the magazine will obtain photographs and information regarding permissions to use them.

As always, choose a magazine that suits the tone and length of your writing. Get out your calculator, and work out an approximate word-count for your chosen magazine’s articles. Don’t attach a 15,000-word MA thesis to a covering letter, then expect the editorial team to whittle it down to their standard 2,500. Make publishing your article easy: send perfect, newsworthy, trimmed, finished, highly original, and enchantingly written prose.

Never promise an artist or gallery—or yourself—that your article will get published without 100% confirmation from the editors. Remember: a text rejected from one magazine might be cherished by another, so keep trying. Believe in your writing.

> The multi-artist catalogue

Like the press release, the multi-artist catalogue genre has functioned as an art-world cauldron for bubbling up new format possibilities. The standard group-exhibition catalogue framework—

+ an umbrella essay;

+ a sprinkling of images showing exhibited artworks;

+ relevant comparative pictures;

+ an introduction to each artist

—has felt a little stale since at least 1968, when the late Seth Siegelaub created the Xerox Book: a low-cost exhibition-in a-book with specially commissioned projects by seven artists.114 In practice, probably no actual group-exhibition catalogue has ever followed the generic structure to the letter; intuitively, art-writers and curators bend this framework to suit their needs. It can seem grossly formulaic; vary its components however you please, then fill it with engrossing ideas, inspiring artworks and splendid design to overcome tedium in an instant. A basic introductory text can be supplemented by less predictable essay-formats, images, reprinted texts (ensuring you have secured necessary permissions) and more, brightening up the remainder of your publication.

In curator Polly Staple’s introductory text to the group exhibition ‘Dispersion’ (ICA, 2008–9), she encapsulates what first motivated her to bring these artists together (i.e., ‘all of the artists in the exhibition share a preoccupation with appropriating and intercepting images’) before introducing each one. This exercise does not lapse into a neat scheme to justify how each artist ‘fits’ within the curator’s interests, but how each problematizes her questions on his or her own terms, often opening new tributaries of thought.

The curator also suggests some commonalities across subsets of artists (‘Eichhorn, Lloyd, Steyerl and Olesen all reveal the archive to be totally non-objective’) and mentions earlier relevant examples such as video-pioneer Joan Jonas. Toward the conclusion, Staple furthers her observations in relation to the artists’ contributions, also benefiting from the writings of architectural theorist Kazys Varnelis.

Staple’s solid opening essay, covering the exhibition’s premise regarding ‘distributed media’, frees up the rest of the catalogue to explore more uncharted ground in individual texts for the participating artists, each handled differently, including:

+ a set of ‘20 Questions’ to artist Anne Collier from artist–critic–curator Matthew Higgs;

+ an artist’s statement titled ‘Two Girls One Cup’ from Mark Leckey;

+ an interpretative text by critic Jan Verwoert on Hilary Lloyd’s videowork;

+ an extract from Epistemology of the Closet (1990) by the late Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, on behalf of artist Henrik Olesen;

alongside three other artist-specific texts. Following all these, a final, separate set of reprinted essays (collectively titled ‘Contextual material’) includes pertinent extracts by thinkers including philosopher Giorgio Agamben and academic Jacqueline Rose.

The exhibition catalogue Dispersion becomes a ‘stand-alone’ publication: a book whose longevity extends beyond the exhibition dates, becoming far more than a mere souvenir for gallery visitors. Acquiring a longer shelf-life, the Dispersion publication is conceived also to serve anyone subsequently seeking general material about the artists and topic covered. Staple’s clear-headed introduction not only elucidates her curatorial premise, but acts as a foreword to a ‘stand-alone’ book.

> Variations on a theme

If you’re looking for alternative formats, begin by scouring your local museum, gallery, or specialist art bookshop for original alternatives:

+ the text-free image leaflet;

+ the catalogue-in-a-box;

+ the –zine;

+ the flexi-catalogue held by ringbinder, its contents rearranged at will.

Copy, elaborate, or invent your own format to the spirit of your project—but beware: bookshops usually resist stocking off-beat book-formats. These are a few pre-digital options; online catalogues appeal as the updateable, cheaper, quicker, flexible, and instantly distributed alternative. However, the printed catalogue maintains the allure of permanence and, from my experience, artists (and many others) still prefer paper to screen. 115

The anthology

The catalogue can be transformed into a collection of related texts examining an idea; for example The Potosi Principle: How Can We Sing the Song of the Lord in an Alien Land? (2010) ¹¹⁶ contains almost no art-related texts (a list of artists and works is at the back), but intensely researched papers about the exhibition’s theme: the entangled history of money and art since colonial times.

The rule here: in your group exhibition text or catalogue, either cover all the artists, or none. I recommend treating all the artists in your exhibition/text relatively equally; omissions are a sure-fire way to make an enemy for life.

Cover all your artists, or none. Plucking favorites while ignoring others is not only grossly unfair but will de facto produce inaccurate documentation of the exhibition. This is considered bad practice unless intrinsic to the exhibition idea itself or otherwise justifiable, and presented beforehand. For example, in Polly Staple’s ICA publication Dispersion, discussed above, artist Seth Price’s well-known illustrated essay ‘Dispersion’ (2002)117 —which gave rise to the show’s title—was understandably privileged.

The thesis

A curator may pen an academic-style paper—built on art-historical or theoretical grounds—which exists alongside the exhibition without necessarily spelling out the direct correlation with each artwork. Jon Thompson’s essay for his group exhibition ‘Gravity and Grace: The Changing Condition of Sculpture 1965–1975’ (1993, the title borrowed from philosopher Simone Weil) delineates the thesis behind his London Hayward Gallery group exhibition: the course of sculpture across the 1960s and 1970s is not as America-centric as some later historians have claimed. The text systematically argues this thesis but eschews any systematic artist-by-artist, work-by-work correspondence.

The graphics/image/text fusion

The catalogue can be an artwork in its own right, released from either ‘explaining’ or, literally, ‘documenting’ the exhibition. For the blind man in the dark room looking for the black cat that isn’t there (2009)¹¹⁸ confounds all expectations and is a feast of vintage imagery (Harpo Marx, Denis Diderot, Charlie Chaplin) alongside immense pull-quotes (‘Artists don’t solve problems, they invent new ones’—Bruce Nauman¹¹⁹) and short texts ranging in subject from the travels of Charles Darwin to Albert Einstein’s ‘special relativity’.

The multi-part catalogue

If you’ve got the budget, there might be good reason to split the catalogue into parts, with distinct sections for:

+ artists’ statements;

+ curator’s statements;

+ other commentary, or reprinted texts (get permission to reproduce these!);

+ images (ditto: get permission);

+ artist-by-artist info.

Exhibition publications can vary in size from the stapled brochure to a hefty tome. The multi-part catalogue accommodates the many kinds of material that accumulate around an exhibition, and acknowledges that some visitors require only a basic guide, while aficionados might enjoy spending the next year poring over the ideas behind it, for example, dOCUMENTA (13)’s biblically titled The Book of Books (2012), a 768-page leviathan with 101 essays on anything from hypnosis to witch-hunting. The weightiest of the catalogues published for this massive exhibition, The Book of Books was part of a trio that included an artist-by-artist soft-cover The Guidebook; and an archive-like The Logbook, which collected the correspondence, emails, conference notes and interviews that document the show’s lengthy preparation.120

The ‘unconventional’ text

Assuming you have no outside obligations, enjoy your freedom and consider penning:

+ a piece of fiction or poetry;

+ a list-like collection of extraneous observations;

+ an A–Z or ‘index’ of loosely affiliated topics;

+ an elaboration on your penchant for Heavy Metal;

+ ad infinitum.

You should feel liberated by all these innovations, but be aware that they might clash with the requirements of those you are working with.

Surely, ‘How to write an artist’s statement’ is an oxymoron. The artist’s statement is billed as unfettered self-expression, as resistant to formulae as art itself. Some—penned by the likes of Adrian Piper or Robert Smithson—endure among the most exhilarating contemporary art-writings ever, bar none. And yet, searching the phrase ‘My art explores…’ will return literally millions of Google hits. Tongue-tied artists can access an online ‘instant artist statement’ generator, which will produce a ‘unique’ paragraph of sadly recognizable art-filler, along the lines of:

My work explores the relationship between {gender politics; military–industrial complex; universality of myth/the body} and {copycat violence; postmodern discourse; unwanted gifts; skateboard ethics}. With influences as diverse as {Derrida; Caravaggio; Kiergegaard} and {Miles Davis; Buckminster Fuller; John Lennon}, new {variations; combinations; synergies} are {synthesized; generated; distilled} from both {orderly and random dialogues; explicit and implicit layers; mundane and transcendent dialogues}.121

My assumption is that you, in contrast, would like to set aside such templates and produce an inspiring text, which

+ attracts interest in your work from gallerists, collectors, awarding bodies, admissions officers, university boards; other artists, and more;

+ reflects your art and true interests believably back to you;

+ assists you in your thinking as you continue making art;

+ will not make you cringe and twitch to read it, but sounds like an accurate picture of what you do.

In the pursuit of producing a worthwhile artist’s statement, let’s examine the hazards of the job. If you can dodge the perils listed below, and apply a few tips from Section Two (‘The Practice—How to Write About Contemporary Art’), your statement will be off to a flying start.

> The ten most common pitfalls (and how to avoid them)

1 They all sound alike

Before setting off on ‘My art explores…’, take inventory of the countless other options available (or invent your own). You might begin by reading notable artist’s statements—not to copy, or become intimidated, but to identify a tone or slant which appeals. Have a look at Stiles and Selz’s Theories and Documents of Contemporary Art: A Sourcebook of Artists’ Writings (2012),¹²² which is pretty comprehensive; or the many artists’ website examples. Notice how no two are alike. Smithson’s inspirational writings are almost diaristic: about his travels; visionary thoughts of what art could be; and imaginary remaking of the universe, for example. Some are conversational; others almost manifesto-like; others academic. The extracts given in this section deliberately differ from each other, to show myriad options.

2 They are boring

Usually, the boredom factor is in exact proportion to the degree of imprecision; smart detail will make your statement stand out and hold interest. Be specific; your statement should be uniquely applicable to your artwork alone. Avoid overused art metaphors; re-read about concrete nouns and adjectives, and creating images through words (see ‘Practical ‘how-to’s’). Specificity is the distinction between ‘I think artists should help the world’ and a statement like Bruce Nauman’s (overleaf).

‘The true artist helps the world by revealing mystic truths.’ BRUCE NAUMAN 123

3 They sound phoney

Inexperienced artists can mistakenly believe that their job is to second-guess what readers want to hear. Remember—especially if you’re writing for a gallerist, academic, admissions-officer, fund-operator, collector, or curator—your reader may have seen hundreds of these. They have an in-built radar to detect false notes just as they are keenly able to spot an original. Usually, your readers are looking for what honestly motivates you and keeps you going.

The words should ring true to you; if when re-reading you think ‘that should fly’ rather than ‘that’s exactly what I’m thinking’, something has gone awry. Readers want to hear the voice of a real person behind the work, and get a sense of what makes this work alive and singular, rather than just defensible.

4 They have nothing to say

Some artists work intuitively, and worry that fixing their thoughts in ink on paper might kill them. Many memorable artists’ statements boil down to tracking the artist’s decisions, such as Marcel Broodthaers’s often quoted statement from 1964, explaining his decision, aged 40, to improvise artistic success.¹²⁴ Which decision (whether hard-won, accidental, or bearing unanticipated results) produced the most meaningful outcome, for you?

In this example from the journal of Anne Truitt (1929–2004), the late American sculptor gave this anecdotal explanation behind her choice of material:

[…] I thought of making bare, unpainted wooden sculptures for the outdoors. On the National Cathedral grounds in Washington there is a carved wooden bench honed to honey color by weather. It stands under a tree, and so could be a sculpture; this was my thought last spring when I ran my fingers over the pure, bare surface of the bench. I have been thinking about Japanese wood and the heavenly order of humble materials.

I come to the point of using steel, and simply cannot. It’s like the marriage proposal of a perfectly eligible man who just isn’t loveable [1]. It is wood I love.

Source Text 50 ANNE TRUITT, ‘Daybook: The Journal of an Artist, 1974–79’, in Theories and Documents of Contemporary Art: A Sourcebook of Artists’ Writings, 2012

This statement may seem corny to some, but that final paragraph (see ‘Simile and metaphor: use with caution’) about the Mr Right who just turns you off [1] really gets across how Truitt just couldn’t help it: metal left her cold; gorgeous wood set her pulse racing. And it sure beats: My art explores the beauty of wood and simple Japanese forms, and examines how wood—my favourite material—absorbs the elements.

5 They read OK, but don’t actually get at the core of the art

Beware of digressive information about cultural context (‘Women make up 49% of the workforce but constitute 59% of the low-wage workforce’); these statistics may have spawned your thinking, but ultimately made little impact on the resulting art. Rather than recount all your starting points—some of which may have borne little fruit—trace back to find the real shifts, even slighter ones. Which moments changed everything? What were you really excited about as you worked? Edit out the rest. A good but very brief story—if 100% pertinent, and easily told—may be useful here. Sometimes an inspirational quote or statistic can stand outside the body of the text.

6 They are indecipherable

Re-read the section about not layering abstractions, and explaining at least in brief what the art is before extracting its possible meanings (see ‘Practical ‘how to’s’, especially points 1–3). Remember that terms such as ontology, epistemology, and metaphysics carry specific technical meaning; use sparingly, and only if essential. Bringing your ideas round to the media you’ve chosen is a must. Ground your reader in media or images they can see, in the accompanying work or photograph. You might try techniques suggested elsewhere in this book, such as identifying a key theme, idea, or principle that holds your art together (see ‘How to write a short descriptive text’). What really gives you satisfaction in your work—the materials? The technology? The process of making, or hunting for sources? The human relationships that build? Start there.

7 They’re too long

Artists’ statements can vary in length from a Tweet to a full-length dissertation. Find the right length for you, but generally, the shorter the better (about 200 words). Some formats—admissions applications; grant proposals; gallery submissions—stipulate a word count. If you are uncertain where to edit, usually chop the preamble. Let your text start only when you really get going.

8 They fail to communicate what the reader wants to know

You might tailor a basic statement to suit different purposes: don’t change your art-making, just shift the text’s cut or emphasis. A short catalogue introduction is usually an unregulated open space; a funding application may need to fulfill special criteria, so read the fine print. For gallery submissions, for example, you may need to explain why your art suits the space, perhaps how you envision your work might be installed (with some flexibility, if possible). You may include technical or budget info regarding the feasibility of your show, at least to convince that you are aware of practicalities.

9 They sound megalomaniacal

Avoid sentences that begin, ‘Like Matisse, I …’. Any influences or parallels should be named with razor-sharp precision, and explained. Injecting other people’s praise (‘My work has been described as magical’) is unadvisable; outside endorsements are usually irrelevant. An excellent, brief phrase by someone else about your art which helped you understand it better might be a worthwhile addition, but remember: the crux of this exercise is your ability to articulate what you do. Telling your reader what to think is another no-no; avoid sentences that begin with ‘You will feel…’ or ‘The viewer reacts by…’. That does not mean to start every sentence with ‘I’, but keep the focus on what you do and think, not dictating the reader’s response.

Jennifer Angus explains how her artistic interests intertwine with her personal life:

In my work I combine photography with textiles. I have always been drawn toward patterned surfaces, and particularly textiles in which pattern is inherent. Initially, it was simply visual pleasure that entranced me; years later, through study, I am impressed and fascinated by the language of pattern. It can identify a people, a region from which they come, as well as a person’s age, profession and social status within a society. Using both patterns occurring in nature and from existing textiles, I create a language that informs the photographed subjects which are juxtaposed with backgrounds of pattern.

The photography is my own, with the exception of obvious historical sources. I have traveled extensively in Northern Thailand, the home of my husband’s family. He is of the Karen hilltribe who reside along the Thai/Burmese (now Myanmar) border. My work features the people of this tribe and their neighbors primarily. I am interested in the idea of ‘The Other’, whether it is my husband within my culture or myself within his.

Source Text 51 JENNIFER ANGUS, ‘Artist Statement’, The Centre for Contemporary Canadian Art website, n.d.

You may not see your art and life as being as enmeshed as they are for this artist, but Angus believably communicates her fields of interest, how these relate to her materials and life circumstances, and what continues to motivate her.

10 Artists communicate better in images than in words

Fortunately, the caricature of the artist as divinely inspired but monosyllabic, awaiting the critic/spokesperson to apply fancy words to the art, has gone the way of the smock and the beret. Dan Graham, Mary Kelly, Jimmie Durham: we can all think of notable exceptions, visual artists also blessed with splendid writing talent.

Perhaps you don’t fall in that happy category, and writing is a struggle. Try writing out pages in longhand; from that flood of handwritten text extract and develop the moments that feel most promising. Usually you’re writing for a curious, empathetic reader who’s interested in your art and wants to know more. To help envision this, imagine you’re writing directly to the one person who understands your work best. Keep the image of her or his encouraging face in your mind’s eye as you write. If you prefer talking, try asking your art-loving friend to record an ‘interview’ with you, the transcript of which can provide the basis of a written statement.

> The unspoken eleventh pitfall

11 The statement’s fine. It’s the art I’m worried about.

A great statement will not compensate for less-than-riveting art. Your statement should not be subtitled Great Expectations; nor should it upstage the art. Ensure the correlation between what others see in your art and what they read matches up. Write a great statement, then live up to it. And finally, unless writing is central to your art-making, in general spend heaps more time creating artwork than writing about it.

> How to write about a single artwork

An artist’s writings about a single artwork can give clues as to what prompted the work’s making, as well as underlying themes or processes—and how these might have changed as the work took shape.

Artist and filmmaker Tacita Dean’s paragraph below offers an almost literary introduction to her film installation about an abandoned (now demolished) 1970s Modernist structure in Berlin, Palast:

It is the building that always catches and holds the sun in the grey centre of the city: its regime-orange reflective glass [1] mirroring the setting sun perfectly, as it moves from panel to panel along its chequered surface [1], drawing you in to notice it on your way up the Unter den Linden to Alexanderplatz. For a time, when Berlin was still new to me, it was just another abandoned building of the former East that beguiled me despite its apparent ugliness [2], tricking and teasing the light and flattering the sensible and solid nineteenth-century cathedral opposite with its reflections [1]. Only later did I learn that it was the Palast der Republik and former government building of the GDR, a contentious place that concealed its history in the opacity of its surface, but had now been run-down, stripped of its trimmings and was awaiting the verdict on its future […]. [T]here are those who are fighting to keep the Palast standing who believe to level such a building is to level memory, and that a city needs to keep its scars [4] […].

Source Text 52 TACITA DEAN, ‘Palast, 2004’, in Tacita Dean, 2006

Notice how some of the suggestions listed above are at work here. Dean identifies precisely what she is visually intrigued by in this very location [1]. She explains what triggered her curiosity, and how this led to her decision to film the Palast [2]. She articulates a principle at stake for her, which continues to hold her heartfelt interest [4]. Compare Dean’s evocative statement with the flatness of ‘My art explores the relationship of architecture to history, particularly in Berlin.’ You may not possess Dean’s literary flair, but you can fill in some detail.

In this example following, video artist Anri Sala concentrates on the process behind his thinking both before he started and while making a specific artwork. Here, the artist explains his initial decision [1], then describes his thoughts as he watched this idea follow its own course [2]. This style may be too descriptive or poetic for some, but Sala gets across his motivation when he set off on this process-based work, and, using most of the senses—the feel of the wet plastic; the (absent) smell of the night rain; the sound of the heavy raindrops and loud music competing with the fireworks; the image of a ‘battled sky’—puts into words the impressions that the actual event triggered in him [2]. Detail makes all the difference between ‘My art explores music, sound, and city life’ and:

Soon it will be New Year’s Eve. Fireworks and the smell of expended explosives will take over the city. The green sky of the ending year will turn red as the new one approaches […] I asked a DJ friend to spend with me this moment of change between the years [1]. He would play loud against the sky and I would help him. We took position on the roof of a building with an elevated vista and set up an improvised DJ unit under a large plastic sheet. It was raining very hard, but it didn’t smell like rain. Official fireworks were quickly overshadowed by people’s pyrotechnics. While the music reached a battled sky, at times I believed that the fireworks were being hijacked and manoeuvred by the beat [2].

Source Text 53 ANRI SALA, ‘Notes for Mixed Behaviour’, in Anri Sala, 2003

I think these evocative artist’s notes add something ‘more and better’ (Schjeldahl, section 1) to this artwork—just as you want your statement to do.

> Final tips

Before sending your statement out, get feedback from a trustworthy reader—or two. In general, and especially if writing doesn’t come naturally, keep sentences short and to the point. An artist’s statement is not a CV. Do not list your education, exhibitions, press, or awards, which go on a separate sheet. Sometimes artists include a photograph of themselves, maybe in the studio; personally, I find this a little tacky. Admissions offices and galleries accepting artist’s submissions may post guidelines or examples online. Take these into account in your lightly adjusted statement. Your words should change over time. Ideally, writing is not just a chore, churned out to satisfy other people, but can help you track and develop your thinking.

As a bonus track, this final section includes multiple short texts on a single subject: the Modernist-façade paintings of American artist Sarah Morris. These examples typify the content and tone generally expected in the spectrum of art-writing formats, suited to a range of purposes and audiences. More than that, they may demonstrate some of the art-writing advice found in previous sections, moving from basic ‘explaining’ texts to ‘evaluating’ and interpretative texts, before concluding with the artist’s own words. Her website, sarahmorris.info, attests to the volumes of writing on and by this artist.

To facilitate comparison between texts, the chosen extracts concentrate primarily on Morris’s abstract works c. 2000–7, rather than her films and other painting series. Responses to this artist’s widely admired and sought-after architecture-based paintings have been penned by some of the art-world’s best-known voices, among them Douglas Coupland and Isabelle Graw; notice how each art-writer applies her or his distinctive art-writing style and perspective to their shared subject.

> A brief introduction

Art Now is a popular survey-book of over 130 contemporary artists, a who’s who for a quick-fix readership wishing to become—or stay—in the know. Text snippets of little over 100 words introduce hot-list artists to readers with varying levels of art-world literacy. This basic ‘explaining text’ (see section 1.1) covers Sarah Morris’s films and paintings primarily by identifying a single theme running throughout—the modern city [Th]. The writer provides minimal biographical information [1] before grounding the reader in the artworks’ material appearance, to which detail is gradually added [2]. The writer lists an assortment of city-specific titles of artworks, to reinforce the urban theme [3].

Sarah Morris, 1967 born in London, lives and works in New York (NY) USA, and London, UK [1]

Sarah Morris’ colorful images modeled on architectural façades [2] first brought her to public attention. Few artists have been as rigorous as this resident of New York and London [1] in aesthetically translating the themes of ‘new urbanism’[Th]. Her main interest is reserved for American conurbations, and in her three most recent projects—Midtown (New York), 1998, Las Vegas (2000) and Capital (Washington), 2001 [3]—Morris gave her attention to the special character of these exceptional cities […] She creates seductive, high-gloss surfaces with foreshortened perspectives and spatial distortions. [2] What at first glance seems like pure abstraction rapidly begins to act as a vortex [4].

Source Text 54 ‘A.K.’ [ANKE KEMPES], ‘Sarah Morris’, in Art Now: The New Directory to 136 International Contemporary Artists, vol. 2, 2005

Toward the end of this overview we find a proto-interpretation through which to consider the art: these dynamic paintings ‘act as a vortex’ [4]. For some reason, in much introductory-level art-writing one simple idea or catchy term can attach itself almost parasitically to certain artworks, recurring in text after text. In this artist’s case, that ‘vortex’ simile has clung to Morris’s glossy surfaces like a barnacle, trawled out in introductions, press releases, and more.¹²⁵ Beware of such hubris: all-purpose interpretative slants may be passable in brief overviews like this one, but overused ideas should be marked ‘avoid’ if you’re attempting more developed, original critical writing.

> A museum collection website entry

This signed entry presents a painting in the Guggenheim Collection Online. It ventures into somewhat more independent interpretative ground than an exhibition wall-text, while similarly giving full technical details [1]:

Sarah Morris, b. 1967, Kent, UK Mandalay Bay (Las Vegas), 1999 [fig. 33]. Household gloss paint on canvas, 84 × 84 × 2 inches (213.4 × 213.4 × 5.1 cm). Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York. Purchased with funds contributed by the Young Collectors Council, 2000.121. © Sarah Morris [1]

Painter and filmmaker [Sarah Morris’s] colorful large-scale paintings recall early 20th-century hard-edged geometric abstraction and evoke the history of the modernist grid [2]. […]

Executed in household gloss and saturated neon colors to achieve a slick industrial sheen [3] that echoes their subjects, Morris’s paintings isolate and abstract iconic architecture, reducing the façades of various structures to angled grids with colored cells that suggest the reflected glow of the urban environment. Mandalay Bay (Las Vegas) belongs to a series of paintings based on hotels and casinos on the Las Vegas strip [3]. The artist was interested in the way in which Las Vegas hotels integrate giant electronic billboards that advertise no product but themselves [4], thereby echoing the hermetic and self-referential nature of much of abstract painting. In such works, Morris mimics the way in which architecture serves as a seductive sign for corporate power—in this case, that of the entertainment industry [5].

Source Text 55 TED MANN, ‘Mandalay Bay (Las Vegas): Sarah Morris’, Guggenheim Collection Online, n.d.

Without going into excessive art-historical detail, writer Ted Mann sets the work in relation to 20th-century abstraction [2]. He succinctly covers the three basic elements of art-writing (see ‘The three jobs of communicative art-writing’) in this (mostly) ‘explaining’, general-audience text: what is it? [3]; what might it mean? [4]; and how does this connect to the world at large? [5]

> An exhibition review

Adrian Searle, chief art-critic of the UK’s Guardian newspaper, is skeptical of Morris’s beguiling architectures: the artist has a ‘great eye’, he recognizes, but he sees her talents better evidenced in her film than the canvases. The paintings at this exhibition, to Searle, look mechanical and ‘soulless’:

Sarah Morris […] paints towering walls of concrete and glass [2] as a canvas-filling, yawning grid. Her paintings at MoMA look back at us, flatly [1]. The architecture pitches upward and away, it slides off at an angle into an unseen distance. Her paintings stomp out the rhythm [3] of the city, the glitz and the shimmer, the law of the grid […] Her paintings are relentlessly impersonal [1], her masking-taped cells of rollered-on household gloss paint [2] impervious to the mess of human existence [1]. It’s. It’s all tempo, all beat, all metronomic regularity. The color sings, but it is a synthetic, high-keyed march [3].

[…] Morris makes painting look like a joyless mechanical work too. The grid divides as much as it connects [1]. Morris’s paintings would look great in the loft-style apartments [2] of the people who might collect her work: soulless paintings for people with grids for brains. […] Morris has a great eye for filmic composition [4]; why none of this gets into her paintings escapes me.

Source Text 56 ADRIAN SEARLE, ‘Life thru a lens’, Guardian, 4 May 1999

Searle pens an intensely idiosyncratic description of Morris’s paintings [1] which reinforces his critical response to them: these are desirable canvases, but for him somewhat deadening. Plenty of solid, visually rich nouns and a few precise adjectives create vivid and tactile sensations for the reader [2]. Notice the consistent musical metaphor [3] (see ‘Avoid mixed metaphor’): ‘stomp’; ‘rhythm’; ‘tempo’; ‘metronomic’; ‘sings’; ‘high-keyed’ are used to express what this critic sees as the paintings’ confounding mix of harmonious painterly technique and drumming repetition.

Note also how Searle does not respond with a blanket negative verdict on the whole, but weighs up the exhibition’s success (‘the color sings’; the artist displays considerable instinct for filmic composition) alongside its perceived weakness. This even-handedness does not lapse into wishy-washiness because Searle pinpoints exactly where he has determined the strengths and the failures (see ‘How to substantiate your ideas’). New art-writers can imagine that, to be convincing, their pronouncements must be seamless: a ‘negative’ review must despair over an unremitting disaster; a ‘positive’ response glow only with ecstatic praise. Consider both the highs and lows of the exhibition; look at artworks one by one, and take stock of which moments of the exhibition affected you differently. Interestingly, when reviewing a gallery exhibition by this artist almost a decade later, although Searle had softened his opinion about Morris’s painting he remained ambivalent: ‘Her work at once captivates, intrigues and resists me,’ he wrote, echoing this earlier response. ¹²⁶

fig. 33 SARAH MORRIS, Mandalay Bay (LasVegas), 1999

> A review of a group show

‘Painting Lab’ was a private-gallery group show staged back in 1999, which examined emerging artists who mixed the age-old medium of painting with then-recent advances in photography, science, and graphics. Art-critic Alex Farquharson explained why he was unimpressed by the results:

‘Painting Lab’ groups together ten London-based artists whose paintings have an angst-free relationship with new technology […] [1] Sarah Morris lets the software do much of the work [1] of turning her photos of ’80s corporate offices into glossy, schematic takes on de Stijl painting. It’s only the slight perspective described by the window frames that alerts one to the fact that we aren’t looking at a grid of colored rectangles [3] […]

[M]uch of the work is if anything too obedient to the rather strict rules of [curator] Mark Sladen’s laboratory. […] It is a timely essay on painting after the computer [3], but much of the work in ‘Painting Lab’ reiterates the point made by its neighbor [3], while substance is sometimes slight [2] beneath the deliberate banality of the smooth, synthetic, sweet-shop surfaces. [2].

Source Text 57 Alex FARQUHARSON, ‘Review of “Painting Lab”’, Art Monthly, 1999

Farquharson’s first line introduces readers to the concept of the show: ten UK painters’ relaxed attitude toward digital technology [2]. Notice how, when writing for an art audience, Farquharson can leave art-historical terms such as ‘de Stijl’ undefined. Each artwork is examined in relation to his overall assessment: for Farquharson, the exhibition’s subject may be topical, but the curatorship is over-regimented, and the results repetitious [2]. The critic’s analytical description of Morris’s painting [3], as with the other examples cited in this review, is in terms of his assessment of the exhibition as a whole. Toward the end, Farquharson singles out the personal intimacy of Jochen Klein’s work (featuring ‘a boyfriend in a field of dandelions’) as an exception to the show’s tendency: the equation resulting from the experiments in this ‘lab’, the critic concludes, might be summed up as ‘technology equals monotony’.

> A magazine article (mainstream press)

In this entertaining Sunday-supplement profile, non-art-specialized journalist Gaby Wood integrates first-hand comments drawn from her interviews with Morris with glossy-magazine-style glamour (‘today, [Morris] is wearing a tailored black designer suit with a bright yellow shirt’) to introduce this artist principally to general readers, with an emphasis on biography and ‘lifestyle’. This excerpt briefly addresses the paintings:

[Morris’s] paintings—graphic configurations of color that might be Mondrians seen through a politically inflected kaleidoscope [1]—use buildings as a starting point (the Pentagon in Washington, the Revlon building in Manhattan, the Flamingo Hotel in Las Vegas, the Department of Water and Power in Los Angeles) and break down the façades to dizzying effect. ‘I always thought that the (actual) architecture was beside the point with the paintings,’ Morris explains. ‘I’m more interested in strategies of architecture—how it makes the individual feel empowered, or plays with distraction or scale.’ [2] Douglas Coupland, who has written a catalogue for her forthcoming exhibition at White Cube gallery in London [3], says of Morris’s paintings that there is the ‘paradoxical suggestion that in reducing these systems of power, in simplifying them, she gestures toward what’s left out of the picture—what, you wonder, is behind this after all?’ [4]

Source Text 58 GABY WOOD, ‘Cinéma Vérité: Gaby Wood meets Sarah Morris’, Observer, 2004

Wood pithily describes the artworks by grounding her discussion in a famous historical figure (Mondrian) with whom a newspaper audience will be familiar, and naming a few Modernist-style buildings found in the paintings which readers can readily imagine [1]. To broach the art’s deeper meaning, the writer wisely quotes the artist directly [2] rather than play art-critic. The timeliness of the interview is established by the forthcoming gallery exhibition—which probably persuaded the editor to splash out on this four-page spread, and hints at top-notch gallery/press relations able to access this scale of mass-media coverage [3]. Students worry about inserting smart critics’ quotes in their texts, but pro’s like Wood know how to borrow clever lines from writers like Coupland [4] and ride piggyback, letting good-quality secondhand texts spice up their own writing.

> A magazine article (specialist journal)

This feature in art journal Modern Painters—similarly published on the occasion of an imminent gallery show—is aimed at the art-initiated reader. Like the Observer’s piece above, Christopher Turner’s combines accessible writing with first-hand artist’s statements; however, the writer demonstrates more attuned art-world knowledge—for example, Turner opens with a studio visit, as compared to the wardrobe report toward the start of the Observer’s profile. In this excerpt, the writer offers some basic biographical and source-material background.

Morris, a 41-year-old Brown University semiotics graduate [1] who has always spoken articulately about her work, tells me that she seeks not to represent, but to borrow from architecture. […] Her sources are eclectic: she’s as inspired by the curvaceous and theatrical buildings of architects such as John Lautner (who is featured on p. 60) [2] and Morris Lapidus as she is by the science fiction novels of J.G. Ballard [3] and ‘the way he posits action and ideology in space.’ Architecture, for Morris, is above all about power and psychology, [4] and the colors and cat’s cradle geometry of each series are carefully chosen to create a specific politics and poetics of place. [4]

Source Text 59 CHRISTOPHER TURNER, ‘Beijing City Symphony: On Sarah Morris’, Modern Painters, 2008

This extract flows in logical sequence, from the general to the specific and from what the work is to what it may mean. The writer moves from the figure of the artist herself [1] to outside reference points—in architecture [2] and literature [3]—before venturing into more abstract interpretations [4]. Specific references (Lautner, Lapidus, Ballard) are somewhat more obscure than the Observer’s Mondrian; presumably the average Modern Painters reader will not balk at these.

> A catalogue essay on one artist (employs comparison)

This is extracted from a touring museum-exhibition catalogue essay, which is usually commissioned by the institution (the director and/or curator) in consultation with the artist and possibly the principal gallery, and always written in a spirit of support and celebration of the artist’s work. Author Michael Bracewell is a unique art-writer: an art-critic as well as a novelist and pop-oriented cultural commentator. Bracewell’s visual comparison to mid-century Manhattan architecture and 1950s film noir adds vintage glamour to Morris’s paintings:

The rich tradition of American modernism, as related in the recent paintings and film-work of Sarah Morris, can be seen as derived through the founding architectural statements of architects such as Raymond Hood, in New York—responsible for the Rockefeller Center in Midtown between 1929 and 1939—as much as through the urgent impressionism of Ted Croner’s photographic studies of New York’s streets and buildings in the late 1940s [fig. 34], or the nervous glamour of Alexander Mackendrick’s film of [1957], Sweet Smell of Success.

Source Text 60 MICHAEL BRACEWELL, ‘A Cultural Context for Sarah Morris’, in Sarah Morris: Modern Worlds, 1999

These comparisons are not injected into Bracewell’s text merely to illustrate other pictures that ‘look like’ Morris’s paintings, but to historicize the artist’s fascination with the Modern city, and suggest possible precedents we might usefully draw upon when thinking about her art. As Dave Hickey writes (Source Text 44), ‘works of art [from the past] are orphans, ready to be adopted, nurtured and groomed to the needs of any astonishing new circumstance.’

fig. 34 TED CRONER, Central Park South, 1947–48

> A catalogue essay on one artist (employs storytelling)

From the same touring exhibition catalogue, Jan Winkelmann’s essay opens with this terrifically breathless, name-dropping and jet-setting back-story. Winkelmann’s insider account explains the enigmatic snapshot printed on the artist’s invitation card, which shows a woman’s perfectly pedicured and sandalled feet against a tiled bathroom floor.

On 19th August 1995, Mike Tyson’s first boxing match after his release from prison was to take place in the aforementioned hotel complex. At the eleventh hour, Sarah Morris, Jay Jopling and Jennifer Rubell flew to Las Vegas and succeeded in getting tickets for the big event. The Golden Nugget offered an appropriate setting for the observation of the pseudo-glamorous goings-on of the B-list celebrities and stars of the underworld who shape the atmosphere of this type of event. Iron Mike—living up to his nickname—won by knocking Peter McNeeley out seven seconds before the end of the first round. Sarah Morris took the photo in the bathroom in the MGM just shortly before the fight.

Source Text 61 JAN WINKELMANN, ‘A Semiotics of Surface’, in Sarah Morris: Modern Worlds, 1999

The story is well-chosen: it’s good gossip, but above all embeds Morris’s art in the ‘real’ world, and introduces readers to the atmosphere of Las Vegas seedy glamour combined with an off-register grid pattern which, taken together, encapsulate Morris’s glitzy painted world.

> A catalogue essay on one artist (substantiating ideas through visual evidence)

These two well-known art-writers—Isabelle Graw and Douglas Coupland—write about Sarah Morris’s art partially by conflating the real viewer in the art gallery, literally observing these abstract paintings hung on the wall, with an imagined city-dweller, walking the street and gazing up at these glass-fronted skyscrapers [1]. Despite these critics adopting virtually the same trope, it leads them in different directions: Graw is inclined toward a political interpretation, and senses that an unnamed power lurks behind these façades; Coupland imagines the façades as faces, and turns the paintings into strange abstract portraits.

‘[I]n the artist’s recent installation at the Hamburger Bahnhof, […] the paintings were hung all around the walls so that the viewer was literally encircled by them. Everywhere one looked or turned, there were geometric grids of lines reaching for the skies. And the moment the eye moved on to the next picture, everything began spinning as if one were actually surrounded by skyscrapers and their glistening façades [1]. Looking up at them means losing one’s balance [2]. The hallucinatory effect can of course be read as an illustration of the fact that power cannot be simply viewed with detachment, let alone be objectively analyzed because power is blinding, radiant and even embroiling. And today there is no ‘Center’ of power any more—it is everywhere and nowhere.’[3]

Source Text 62 ISABELLE GRAW, trans. Catherine Schelbert, ‘Reading the Capital: Sarah Morris’ New Pictures’, in The Mystery of Painting, 2001

In this passage, critic Isabelle Graw can be said to adopt a phenomenological approach, which privileges the first-hand, ‘inner’, or bodily experience of the appearance—or ‘phenomena’—of art [2], putting into words the sensations and associations generated by this experience. Graw likens being surrounded in a gallery by Morris’s painted façades first to the dizzying feeling of being encircled by skyscrapers [1], and then abstracts this impression further: the all-over, ‘hallucinatory’ effect for Graw suggests unseen forces of power permeating all things [2].

Douglas Coupland is among a handful of noted novelists also respected for his ability to write well about art:

As someone who travels a lot, I have the sensation [1] that Morris’s work is neither a travelogue nor a formal exercise in reduction. It seems to be more a form of portraiture [2] and, strangely, nineteenth-century portraiture at that—lumber barons, textile mill owners and ranchers [2], all of them exuberant and glossy, plump and enjoying the spoils of industrialized capitalism [3] […]. The viewer approaches these portraits as outsiders. Viewers are down on Madison Avenue or the Strip, looking up at the grids [1]. Viewers are also playing a game in their heads as they do so, wondering just who sits behind those windows, and what sorts of dramas are occurring there—a hostile takeover or maybe just a copier in need of a new toner cartridge [4].

Source Text 63 DOUGLAS COUPLAND, ‘Behind the Glass Curtain’, in Sarah Morris: Bar Nothing, 2004

Notice Coupland’s use of the first-person ‘I’ to highlight his strongly idiosyncratic interpretation [1]: Morris’s façades are like portraits, an idea enlivened by his picturing a few old-time capitalists whom he imagines somehow depicted on the canvas, vividly described using solid nouns: ‘lumber barons, textile mill owners and ranchers’ [2]. As a fiction writer, Coupland conjurs ‘faces’ behind all those mirror windows [3], imaginary occupants engaged either in corporate violence or office routine [4]. With these words, viewers are invited to approach the paintings ‘as outsiders’, simultaneously looking at Morris’s paintings and walking the city streets, speculating about the goings-on behind glass walls.

> An artist’s statement

Morris is an unusually capable spokesperson for her work. In this statement, the artist verbalizes what she thinks art should do [1]; the importance, for her, of how all things—not just art—are consumed and received [2]; and finally identifies with precision (colors, brands) the peculiarly glamorous, inter-continental objects and locations that obliquely inspired her [3].

Art should always do at least two things: make people look good and play with the skepticism toward the institution [1]. Just as you cannot avoid the political whether you are making beautiful loops and scribbles, using industrial materials, reusing pornography, or discussing craft—you cannot deny where things end up and how they are used, including how they are made intelligible by the artist. In other words, how things are produced is equally important to how things are consumed and how they are received [2]. A yellow Lamborghini Miura, the interior of the Dulles International Airport, the Princess series of touch-tone phones [1], the red of an Olivetti Valentine, the book jacket of ‘Concrete Island’, the aqua-marine of the Chinese packets of Lesser Panda cigarettes, Lufthansa blankets and American airlines cocktail napkins [3] could suffice.

Source Text 64 SARAH MORRIS, ‘A Few Observations on Taste or Advertisements for Myself’, in Texte zur Kunst, 2009