Cultural Appropriation: When do art critics stop calling it art and start calling it out?11/27/2017 In the New York Times article, "Coming Face to Face With Jimmie Durham", the article rants and raves about the artistic genius within his works. They talk of self invention and gild him golden with somewhat masturbatory praise that, ultimately, if we looked at the truth of his art, should be shameful.
Jimmie Durham is not Native American. He's not Cherokee. Claiming heritage that is ultimately not yours to claim (and doing it for a long period of time) is not subversive--and calling it "politically charged self invention" is far too floral and far too polite to be acceptable--it's cultural appropriation. Initially I'd chosen Jimmie Durham's work to write on because I found it to be incredibly aesthetically pleasing, but now that I have looked into the context of his work (and the artist himself, really), I find it to be wholly unsettling that not only has this man taken up the assumed "allotted diversity spot" for Native American Fine Artists, but rather than be recognized as being in the wrong, he's praised. Cultural appropriation and bastardization within the art world is not a foreign concept. Big names like Pablo Picasso, Vincent Van Gogh, and Paul Gaugin (to list a few) have all been known to draw from other cultures in order to further their own art (Van Gogh with Japonisme, Gaugin and Picasso with Primitivism), but at least they didn't go as far to claim these cultures as their own (though, an argument against Picasso could be made, what with his lack of giving credit to African Art as his muse). Right now there's a question of whether art should be separate from the artist and I argue that in order to fully understand the piece, one must know the context from which it was created. Sadly, these pieces, compelling and beautiful as they are, are forever marred by their insulting artist, and it's disappointing that the New York Times failed to recognize this.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
CategoriesArchives |