Following up on yesterday's unveiling of The Broad's design by DS+R, ARTINFO has published an interview with Eli Broad. The interview addresses criticism of the design by the Times' critic Christopher Hawthorne, parking issues, working with the architects, relations with neighboring MOCA, and other issues relating to art and Los Angeles. ARTINFO
4 Comments
art business has became less and less about art and more and more about power politics, real estate and commercial property development, dictation of culture, deciding what brand of art public should see and be educated with, elitism, corporate culture, money, tax write offs, private individuals using public money/property in the name of culture production, arrogance under the guise of public good, marketing professionals as art curators, arbitrary censorships, all part of this so called culture industry now...
it is really weird to hear centralization of art district within three urban core city blocks from a person who made his fortune selling spread minded artless suburban homes to working class people who need to commute long hours to get to their service jobs.
like many people, i am tired of hearing eli broad's blue chip art collection over and over as if the public owes him a great deal for his art fortunes and collecting obsession. what an ego! we don't need him adding + adding cash value to his private art collection disguised as culture carrot.
there are only handful of artists every museum shows to no end.
because it doubles, triples and quadruples the value of private collections. originally the artists themselves were paid very little for most of these works.
anyway, i care less about trite collections that tycoons decide and impose on us, the public.
i know a lot of people get upset at this kind of talk, however, following type of questions have constituency too.
are we still given art lessons by self declared medicis in this century? art and culture are very important, do i take eli broad's decisions as granted? just because he has wealth, should the public let him (or others like him) lead the development of culture without critical examination?
is this really the definition of culture, art? is he in charge of these important components of society at large?
art + auction + elevator music..
did anyone else catch or already know that DS+R are getting help in the form of Gensler as executive architect on the project??? Is that usual?
Orhan - agree with you & if you want to be even more ticked off have a look at this article, here's the abstract:
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/12/06/101206fa_fact_bruck
Orhan,
Great comment.
I'm glad that you put it into context. For ages no one remembers that these great "benefactors" and philanthropists have in fact captured their wealth by doing some pretty horrid things that we all have to live with daily - in his case a vast suburban wasteland and more recently the great insurance finance industry: SunAmerica / AIG... All this to now rehabilitate his public image and become a philanthropist? To give back to us the poor uncultured masses.
I think he and other similar figures dictate the direction because sadly for us as a "public" there are no alternatives to the medici figures -we as a culture are essentially selfish, distracted and have no imagination or energy after slaving away to believe otherwise. We value money and not much else.
We have the art and culture we deserve: corporate.
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