{"id":1423,"date":"2007-04-02T10:08:03","date_gmt":"2007-04-02T08:08:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2007\/04\/02\/smith-and-western\/"},"modified":"2007-10-19T13:26:27","modified_gmt":"2007-10-19T11:26:27","slug":"smith-and-western","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2007\/04\/02\/smith-and-western\/","title":{"rendered":"smith and western"},"content":{"rendered":"

Do you like my loaded gun pun?<\/p>\n

On this month’s artthrob, Rat Western responds to Michael Smith<\/a> about art criticism in Johannesburg. First, I must agree with Rat that this debate is getting really boring. But I’ve never backed down from depositing 2 pennies on the web…<\/p>\n

Admittedly, I have to eat my words from last month a bit – “Michael also responds<\/a> to Rat Western in the feedback section (a fair and funny and well-informed response all considered…”<\/p>\n

Western’s response illuminates the contexts of her arguments, left out last month. Her point (tho tangential at times) is this: Smith denies an underground in Joburg and yet skips out on the Drill Hall, the Parking Gallery, the Bag Factory (etc). It’s not necessarily his responsibility to go to every show, but Rat’s final argument is, how can you dismiss these spaces when writing about exactly what they do (or, at minimum, try to do)? Not even mention them so as to publicly dismiss them, in fact, but rather, ignore them? This, she says, is “lazy” when writing about the power of critical writing vs the underground.<\/p>\n

Although I mightn’t use her strong language, I could further Rat’s argument. Smith went so far, in his first article<\/a>, as to praise Art Heat, a blog on art in Cape Town, whilst implicitly asking for a speaking back to power-like site in Joburg. This is a direct insult to SAartsEmerging<\/a>, run by the same people who do the above spaces (including her, and founded along with me, Bronwyn Lace and Simon Gush), a site with a very specific purpose:<\/p>\n

“Providing a free South African alternative to the gallery-driven and mainstream media platforms, SAartsEmerging.org is dedicated to featuring emerging South African artists, curators and arts personalities who are not generally, or have not yet been, written about – but who should be. SAartsEmerging aims to \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcdiscover\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 and profile a variety of early-career non-stars working conceptually, and across disciplines.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

SAarts also avowedly gives preference to Gautengers. It, along with the above spaces, was ignored.<\/p>\n

I think Michael Smith is smart; I like his writing, his thinking, his excitement; and I like the great article he did on my AOP show in last month’s artthrob. I’m also not comfortable with some of Rat’s insults (nor am I that fond of his) in this debate, and can see why her “fighting words” might be taken on. But she also offered to get involved, asked Michael to be involved in the spaces he didn’t write about (with the “power” of artthrob and\/or Art SA behind him). We have to remember that these two publications are mostly the only potential connection the rest of the world’s art elite have to some of SA’s newer artists; to say “there is no underground in joburg” is to make it true for anyone who isn’t already involved in Joburg’s, actually existent, and thriving, emerging arts scene (I prefer that term, cuz I don’t know WTF underground means). He seems to have declined her offer.<\/p>\n

read Rat’s response<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Do you like my loaded gun pun? On this month’s artthrob, Rat Western responds to Michael Smith about art criticism in Johannesburg. First, I must agree with Rat that this debate is getting really boring. But I’ve never backed down from depositing 2 pennies on the web… Admittedly, I have to eat my words from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[6,8,25,2,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1423","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art","category-re-blog-tidbits","category-reviews","category-south-african-art","category-stimulus"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9blZT-mX","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1412,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2007\/03\/05\/the-art-she-is-throbbing\/","url_meta":{"origin":1423,"position":0},"title":"the art, she is throbbing","author":"nathaniel","date":"05 March 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Nice issue of artthrob this month (feeling homesick). I'm not even going to get into it with Cape '07 (formerly TransCape, and now it's DEFINITELY \"not a biennale\" in South Africa), but some other great stuff to report... First, a little self-promo, Michael Smith engages with my work at Art\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "art"","block_context":{"text":"art","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1464,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2007\/05\/09\/catch-up-links-tidbits-etc\/","url_meta":{"origin":1423,"position":1},"title":"catch-up, links, tidbits, etc","author":"nathaniel","date":"09 May 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Hey All: Been in Wales at this conference over the last 5 days or so, and lots has happened in the world since then, so this'll be a kind of ranty catch-up of random and, depending on who you are and what you like, potentially unimportant things. Nicole and my\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "art"","block_context":{"text":"art","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1274,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2006\/07\/14\/va-various-art\/","url_meta":{"origin":1423,"position":2},"title":"V\/A (various art)","author":"nathaniel","date":"14 July 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Been doing filler (mostly my own stuff) for the past while on the blog, whilst on residence in Brazil, and not getting out much since going gaga over my daughter. Hit the gallery strip two days ago, tho, and as usual was pleased by the works at Warren Siebrits -\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "art"","block_context":{"text":"art","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"vincent @ parking gallery, a photo by Christo Doherty","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/static.flickr.com\/71\/188915341_00ff7c5c6a.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1394,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2007\/01\/29\/3-point-turn-call-and-response\/","url_meta":{"origin":1423,"position":3},"title":"‘3 Point Turn’ \/ ‘Call and Response’","author":"bronwyn lace","date":"29 January 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"This past weekend has been a really great art weekend, with Simon Gush and Dorothee Kreutzfeldt\u2019s performance \u20183 Point Turn\u2019 \u00a0at the Drill Hall\u2019s Point Blank Gallery on Friday night and Nathaniel Stern\u2019s \u2018Call and Response\u2019 at Art on Paper in 44 Stanley on Saturday afternoon.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0 Here are some\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "art"","block_context":{"text":"art","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"3 point turn","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2007\/01\/3-point-turn2.JPG?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1421,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2007\/03\/21\/saarts-cape-town-manifestation-2007\/","url_meta":{"origin":1423,"position":4},"title":"SAarts Cape Town Manifestation 2007","author":"nathaniel","date":"21 March 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00c2\u00a0 As part of XCape, Cape 07's artists-led fringe exhibition, SAarts will exhibit works by selected artists and writers who have been featured on the site in the past year as well as artists to be featured in 2007. The SAarts Emerging Exhibition: Cape Town 2007 will open on the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "art"","block_context":{"text":"art","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/saartsemerging.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2007\/03\/highresvlogo.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1341,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2006\/10\/03\/1341\/","url_meta":{"origin":1423,"position":5},"title":"SAarts Exhibition and Events","author":"nathaniel","date":"03 October 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"The Bag Factory presents SAartsEmerging 2006, an exhibition and series of events based on the website www.saartsemerging.org, Since January 2006 the website has featured a new artist every third Friday of each month. In celebration of our first year we will be holding an exhibition and a series of related\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "art"","block_context":{"text":"art","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/10\/grey.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1423","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1423"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1423\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1423"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1423"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1423"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}