I keep thinking about Jen’s summing up those Keltie Ferris paintings with three perfect words: fluidity, tension and compactness. I’m thinking that’s a good game for Freed’s paintings. You get three words, try to say as much as possible about the work with them.
I was excited about the shapes he was making when I thought those were the edges of his working surface, but disappointed when I saw the gallery shots to see the square canvases.
I totally disagree about the shapes of the supports, the way the the shapes bump and push, bunch up, bounce off, etc the edges of the square canvas is full of metaphoric possibility—all lost if the canvases themselves were shapes. A lot of the sense of tension/pressure and variation/movement that keeps coming up in the comments comes exactly from the interaction of drawn shape and square support.
I know there are people who push past the novelty of the un-square canvas: Elizabeth Murray, Polly Apfelbaum, etc. but there’s a lot of expressive force that those square sides still have.
i would have to agree with Chris that to dismiss the importance of the rectangle would be nearsighted. i’m not sure if the Eric who wrote in, is an Eric that i happen to know, but if so, kudos for being i believe, the only other uncg person to venture into the dialogue.
I’m probably a different Eric I did my undergrad at IU, where Chris was my first drawing instructor while he was getting his MFA. I enjoy the dialogue though, keeps my brain working.
I see what you mean about the edges. It’s a little hard to get a feel for them on the web, since it’s white on white. Maybe it’s totally different, but I still think they have a nice energy, motion, etc. when they exist as just the shapes themselves. Maybe it’s less tense and more free, which might just be personally appealing. I’m talking more about the big solid shapes. I think paintings like “Ladder” probably exist better in the square.
Yeah, it’s a good point. As big shapes on the wall they would be more free. I think the fact that they invoke that impulse to be wild and carefree, but do have these limits, is what makes them more true and able to turn the mundane into drama. There’s a sort of realist, as in the opposite of escapist, tendency in that.
man Eric, sorry, but thanks for contributing!
i tend to think these oppose the constraints of the rectangle, while still acknowledging its authoritativeness as a force for ubiquity, extending across the range of shapes.
the shapes on the wall might work well of their own accord, but possibly only in a format in which negative shapes, created between the shaped surfaces, were also attributed significance. the singularity of each individual rectangle tends to demand that we evaluate it as the ultimate limit.
I think that as a perceptive/receptive viewer you can stretch the meaning and significance of this work far beyond the intention of the artist. I’m not 100% sure how Freed intended for these images to be read, but there is a interpretive strength in abstraction that leaves the viewer with a certain power over the work. I like the idea that you don’t have to pin something on abstraction, you can/should let it be full of possibility.
whoa. dennis, i love that idea of the viewer “a certain power over the work.” it seems like you’re suggesting more than merely the standard interpretive subjectivity we all have when we come to works of art. can you elaborate? is it only that the work is open to interpretation or that it necessitates it or forces it in some manner?
I definitely believe that there is much more to it than subjective interpretation, that’s really only the surface. I am obsessively drawn to very formal and elemental abstraction because I do beleive that it engages the viewer’s sense of perception in such a primal way. I think that great abstraction does demand to be understood or decoded.
There is some sort of cerebral hum that I get from connecting with a work of art, It’s almost as if you have to tune into a certain frequencey or signal to understand or experience the work. I don’t think I’m alone in this feeling, but I like to be educated and challenged by work, I want it to expand me beyond myself. Perhaps above all, I am suggesting that all art is as generous as the viewer’s perceptions will allow.
Matt, I’m curious if we’re coming up with some kind of hierarchy here. And how this follows through.
I can agree that there’s a low end of art appreciation: the “I may not know art but I know what I like,” approach, which makes judgments but deflects responsibility for judgment.
I can see the open to interpretation approach, as in “I like Caravaggio because of he gives expression to a Catholic outlook on life, you like Caravaggio because of the formal rigor, she likes Caravaggio for the courage expressed through the thinly coded homosexual innuendo, he for finding drama in the mundane, etc. etc.” All thoughtful, all valid and allowing for some comparison/debate.
But how would you describe that next level, forcing an open-ended reading? And I’m curious about paintings that we think do that. I can see that Cubist or Surrealist works might do that by playing counter to innate human tendencies to find order and understanding. Are there other ways that paintings make this active interpreting necessary?
Good questions Chris! I’m really interested to hear Matt’s response, but as for me I think abstraction itself provides fertile ground for this type of interpretation you mention. Most of the time I take into consideration what the artist intended for the work to say, but there is always something more potent to me about the image of abstraction itself.
Personally, I probably romanticize the notion of abstraction, but I can own that, because I study it and I feel it. Furthermore, I see people who feel the same way about abstraction without understanding or being able to express it. I think the whole idea of Modernism is a bit absurd, but I do think the AB-Exer’s were on to something when they stretched abstraction as far as they did and yet 50+ years later abstraction is still being stretched and too many, it is just as vital as ever. Therefore, to me there is something in the form of abstraction that forces or necessitates (as Matt suggested) deeper investigation into a realm of openness.
Yeah. I should have mentioned abstraction. Especially abstraction in the last few years, as the interest in Greenberg’s modernism has waned, or at least become less of an imperative for abstract painters. As look-ers, we benefit from wondering what the artist means to say, but with the understanding that other meanings may be found in how they’re saying it, or in which particular conversation the work is situated in.
i guess i’m aiming to grasp something that operates within those normal modes we’re mentioning above, but has an added dimension of pressure or necessity.
for instance, an artwork carries both the intention of the artist and allows fro the inferential interpretation of viewers. let’s say that if that equation always persists, another layer may also be present, one that operates only when the viewer is in the attempt of inferential interpretation (i.e. forcing a read), is activated by that forced, idiosyncratic, subjective viewing experience, but that puts pressure on that forcing viewer to come to a certain conclusion or specificity of experience.
so the viewer tries to constrain the work and thereby allows the work to force a specific read. the viewer enters into the necessary read of the work by their own attempt to interpret.
So the viewer in interpreting closes a loop, but then, as soon as they express that interpretation (say, on an artblog) then it’s opened back up? I think that happens.
is there any clear way then to close the loop for good? other than attempting to locate the point at which engagement in the act of interpreting opened up the loop?
what if because of subjective circumstance, the same (or a similar) interpretative loop is always engaged. does that happen? and how can interpretative reformation be arrived at unless said reformation is allowed for? what would that look like?
Going back to the example of Caravaggio (and I’m only going to be addressing part of your question here), we have an artist whose work ceased being interpreted for a very long time. Or maybe whose work ceased being considered worthy of interpreting for a very long time. So much so that we end up with better paintings in small-ish midwestern collections (Kansas City, Fort Worth, Cleveland) than in New York or Washington DC. And then at some point, maybe through a combination of historical circumstances, that loop opens up again. Maybe because of the similarity between the handling of form and light in a Caravaggio and that in early photographs, because of how important the individual’s gaze is, because of the culture’s changing attitude toward homosexuality, whatever.
So in my mind, cases like this make the argument that there’s not really a permanent closing, as long as works are able to be reconsidered. And that’s a good thing.
For the second part of your question, you’re meaning what if people just keep saying the same shit about, say Duchamp? On and on over and over again for ever.
i guess i’m more curious about specificity of experience as an individual viewer. in the example involving Caravaggio, it would seem that the loop was reopened because of some sort of change in cultural climate. the work isn’t really driving that change, but it reenters because it seems relevant for it to exist again or to be visible again.
but, i’m interested in what i think Matt is identifying, i.e. pressure and necessity; and what you seem to be saying with the notion that the loop is opened via expressing words about a work; and what Dennis is saying when he speaks about romanticizing abstraction. all of these things seem a little more insular and contained and even possibly thematically driven. like, when i look at most (or possibly even all work) i am thinking primarily about a couple of big things: time memory etc. so, these are the limitations i bring to the work. and also the limitations that bookend my ability to speak to anything.
is the quality that forces openness of interpretation a quality that you see situated in the work itself, or is it based on the ways in which we come to change our criteria for looking and speaking?
With regard to forcing a read, I think that Anselm Kiefer and Francis Bacon exert such a strong visual pull over me (and many others) that I have no choice but to respond to the work. It always forces my mental hand and as Bacon is fond of suggesting, one experiences the sensation of the work so strongly that you are affected at the level of the nervous system… it is a visceral engagement.
A dialogue and relationship opens up between the work and the viewer. I never know for certain if I am properly perceiving a work, but I always want to be in pursuit of understanding or engaged in seeking. As a viewer I want to build my own context around teh art that I view or experience, I like to make it my own in my eyes.
And yet as the work is perceived and expereinced in my eyes something of the artists intent peirces me. Ultimately the work is always a collaboration of creation and perception. Transmitter and Receiver
I think that I’m pretty much in agreement with Dennis that the ideal situation is a collaboration between artist and viewer, both being thoughtful, engaged, alert in their task.
For the sake of discussion maybe I would suggest that an artwork like any other form of expression is subject to express any number of codes outside of the artist’s intent. Just like if Dennis asked me how my classes are going, my body language, tone of voice and phrasing could indicate other sorts of meaning. The way I answer could also point to religious, cultural, gender identity, to something I’d heard someone say on the news that morning, to worries about flu pandemics and the stability of my source of income. So I could lean toward saying the work contains the possibility for multiple interpretation.
i guess what i’m suggesting is that works of art may, on some level, work like a chinese finger trap.
that is, while they may be used/interpreted by viewers and have multifaceted valid readings, or instead be slavishly read according to the artists’ declared intentions, there may also be a kind of “correct” (i really didn’t want to use that word) read.
i’m not saying definitively that this happens. i’m just suggesting that there may be a mode of reading the work where the work can’t be unlocked entirely UNTIL the force of viewing and the force of the work are participating in tandem in a certain, particularly keyed kind of way (you release your fingers from the trap not by working against the apparatus, but by working with it).
there are all sorts of works that, upon a first read, appear to be stupid or annoying, or we simply don’t get them. after learning more, having certain visual experiences, or simply returning again and again to reconsider, suddenly the force of our investigation becomes harmonically aligned with the capacities built into the work, and our read sings in the particular key or tone the work has built into it. i do think this happens. and while this experience may indeed remain subjective and somewhat specific to an individual, it seems to me that in these moments of real resonance a viewer is actually reading the work in a range of “rightness” and in so doing is therefore sharing some sort of sympathy with others who have read the work in this range as well.
think of a perfectly arranged stereo system – there is a small range of absolutely excellent audio presentation in the room. you don’t have to experience the music from that position, and you certainly have a valid musical experience even if you aren’t exactly in that position, but there is something specifically unique to the aural reality in that zone of designed, perfect, aligned presentation. i really wonder if this is what we’re all doing, trying to get into the “stereo sweet spot” with artworks. i wonder if that’s what all of our discussion, all of our contemplation and consideration is really all about. not really about “THE ONE CORRECT READ” but more about finding a true subjective resonance with the work, the making, the seeing, the interpretation, the being – all that’s bound up in art.
Well said, I know exactly what you mean. It sounds like some sort of universal subjective. The only problem with this is so many people miss this concept and leave a work of art before they get close to the so called “sweet spot”. It’s sad that so much criticism is really about offereing up an opinion rather than being in the service of understanding. To really reach this domain of the correct read that you speak of requires a truly perceptive viewer with extreme patience and perhaps some knowledge beyond mere observation.
On the other hand, I have to concede that there is work out there that I give up on far before I have reached any position of correctness in my read. One way or another, it seems my own personal subjectivity at times overrides all else. As Chris mentioned, I think there is definitely a critical loop in which the meaning/read of particular work changes over time with each new context.
Anyone seen the current Artforum? Someone was telling me this morning that in a review of Danto’s new book on Warhol, Daniel Birnbaum takes Danto to task for claiming that only a the proper reading of Warhol’s work is Catholic, and any reading from any other perspective is somehow lesser. I haven’t read the review or the Danto book, so I’m wondering if anyone has?
It seems like there could be a danger of assuming the existance of that perfectly arranged stereo experience of art, just in that it could make viable claims that only a select few can properly find that perfect spot for any given work.
That seems like a rather subjective thing to say, that the proper reading of Warhol’s work is Catholic. I could see a 13th century crucifixion painting having a proper Catholic reading, but even then there could be other readings, other ways to approach it. For some reason, Warhol’s work, and Warhol the person, don’t scream Catholic to me. I haven’t read either the book or review, but it would be interesting to see how he backs up that claim.
It’s all about intention, right? Sure, a viewer can approach a work of art and take away anything he/she wants from it, but if the viewer takes away what the artist intended, is that more proper or correct? I think the answer to that is highly subjective as well. If the intention is there it makes a little more sense, but if Warhol didn’t intend to have a Catholic reading of his work, I can’t really see how that could be the proper reading of it.
I haven’t read the book or review, so that’s what I was told that Birnbaum said Danto said. The idea of reading Warhol in terms of Catholicism is fairly accepted…he was a practicing Catholic, from a Polish background and referred to the Elvises and Marylins as ‘icons’. So it’s a valid reading. It’s probably intended, or something that Warhol himself was aware of. But it is subjective trying to say it’s the most proper reading.
I guess, the troubling thing is that you could turn that around and get exclusive about who has access to the claim of understanding a work of art.
chris, all of what you’re saying is right, but, honestly, ever since reading “interpretation and overinterpretation” i’ve wanted to push back against the overarching control that the postmodern critique has exerted over interpretation – basically claiming that works are inherently open as a first order condition of their existence. this is a conceit that favors critics and theorists over the makers.
i really am not trying to become roger kimball here. i am, however, firmly ensconced in eco’s camp: there is a real intention of the work. my clumsy dialogue above was an attempt to marry the inter-subjectivities of artists, viewers, and critics into a continuum of interpretation where dialogue and openness are favored but where we can say, yes, this work is about x, y, and z in terms of its first-order qualities. i’m trying to do this without disqualifying anyone, which may be impossible.
on some level my work is more about what i have made it to be about than what others believe or extrapolate about it. it has elements that are certainly open to that interpretive action, but it has other elements that are what they are (part of this is how much the individual can exercise control over context and wrestle their own read from contextual legacies of which they are a part). there must be a way to maintain a kind of equilibrium amongst all these forces…
danto *might* be correct about warhol’s work… but him being correct doesn’t necessarily disqualify other reads.
Over the weekend, I was rereading Berger’s Ways of Seeing, thinking about trying to work it into a freshman class. The book has some problems, but I remember it as being really eye-opening (pardon any pun) when I was 19. It makes a pretty convincing case that seeing and depicting are never neutral.
But, anyway, I think some of Berger’s fight-the-power discussion about access and control of imagery as a form of authority is influencing that argument I’m making about interpretation. Anyway, I think we can all agree that it’s a different world than the one he was writing about.
Actually, I would be interested in taking the discussion in another direction: how much is too much authorial control over the reading of a work? I’m kind of thinking about a topic that we’ve tended to avoid: the difference between illustration and painting (or at least the idea of a difference, it plays out less in reality than in a lot of academic discussions of painting).ACTUALLY, I’M GOING TO RETRACT THIS. THIS POST IS GETTING LONG AND HARD TO FOLLOW AND PROBABLY DOESN’T NEED ME TOSSING IN ANOTHER TANGENT.
But back on topic: Maybe I’ve been thinking down the wrong path here. Could it be, Matt, that rather than trying to argue for a proper way to read artworks, or a hierarchy of interpretation, or greater authorial insistance, that what you’re doing is making a case for more engaged and responsible artists and viewers who work to make this resonant experience with artworks happen more often?
Okay, bad run on sentence there, Chris. One more time: you’re not saying there’s a best way, you’re just wishing that we all worked a little harder?
yeah, in a sense. i think there can be a right way without there being a RIGHT WAY. something subtle and nuanced, an experience that’s not meant to pit exclusivity against generosity. some people get there, some don’t, but it’s not a character flaw or a virtue. it’s just one more part of the whole continuum.
i do like what you’re saying, chris, about all of us working harder whether it’s as makers, viewers, or thinkers.
As art educators (although I teach elementary art), I think that we also have a responsibility to push the issue of correct engagement. Artists will be artists and critics will be critics, but I think that educators have been marginalized in a sense, so we should always assert the perspective of one trying to cultivate new generations of creators and viewers. The context of art is changing all the time, who better to know this than educators?
I agree with the sentiment 100%. I am still a little skeptical about the word ‘correct’. Could we just say a ‘richer engagement’?
Saying ‘correct’ engagement makes other forms of engagement necessarily incorrect. And, though I’m fending off the Berger influence, there is still a cultural implication of access. How do we look at the Chinese scrolls there at the Nelson? How do we look at a Vermeer. We can’t possibly, no matter how much we study, have a ‘correct’ read of those objects.
Also, there are artists whose work seems to be richer and engaging to audiences in many, many more ways than they appear to intend. Richter, for instance.
i don’t know. i think we can be too smart by half if we say “nothing is correct/everything is correct.” it’s just the same as in practice: just because everything is acceptable/doable, doesn’t mean everything is good/applicable.”
i’m not trying to be priggish here, but i absolutely believe that you have a better grasp and connection to the real deep intentions of your work than, for instance, i do. “correct” as i am using it here is not an “either/or” proposition (which would definitely be the exclusionary, controlling thing you’re referencing). i’m seeing it as more like “both/and” in the sense that, yes, my read of your work is valid in its conceits and subjectivities, but it is necessarily limited in some way. it is less extensive and encompassing than your read would be. your own read triangulates more, grasps more, does more with the work than mine does.
this holds for chinese scrolls and vermeers, too. we simply do not have access to the entirety of the read, the fullness of intention, the nuance of implied meaning. and that is ok. we can still appreciate and love the work and get a tremendous amount from it. but i can’t say that my reading of a chinese scroll is in any way as expansively valid as, say, the audience for which it was made and those whose authority and social/cultural capital originally required/embraced/appreciated that sort of work. just because i have less access doesn’t mean that’s bad, or wrong, or necessarily denigrating my view. i am what i am, fully vested as a white male of anglo-saxon, english-speaking, western-canon-of-knowledge background. these things are as much a great benefit as they are a hamstringing of certain potentials.
why isn’t it ok to say “i can’t know this part of the work” or “the read available to me is necessarily limited” or something similar? isn’t that what we’re telling freshmen when we ask them to learn about how to see, how to make, how to think about making? they gain access by their work. sometimes there is a limit to that access, as i describe above. is that necessarily bad?
i really am not trying to be an ass here, and really am interested in the questions/answers/thoughts of others here on this…
I agree with all of that, and that’s why I suggested the word ‘rich’, thinking it indicated that continuum of degrees of engagement, and degrees of syncing up with intention. Where ‘correct’ is by definition any state other than incorrect. “Rich” I think also resists the urge to relativism. Hallmark cards, as a text, can be as ‘correct’ as American Pastoral, but not possibly as ‘rich’.
There is probably a better word, but ‘correct’ doesn’t seem like it can be the one.
I think that when I mention the term correct, I don’t necessarily mean one and only all encompassing, but more the correct way. And as far as that is concerned I think that the correct way to view art is with a measure of humility and an awareness of your limitations as a viewer (which Matt and Chris spoke of). No one’s authority is complete with regard to art. Even the creator is missing a part of the puzzle and that’s whats so great… art needs an audience for it to be fully realized.
I suppose someone may say they do art for themselves alone, but the art still says things apart from the makers intent. Ultimately, the viewer activates the true potential of any work. Without following the correct path to engage a work of art, so much of the experience isn’t even activated.
In the end, I am a huge advocate for the notion of “correct viewing”, but this is entirely different than the notion of a “correct read”. I think a lot of the mystery and power of art would be lost if there were in fact a such thing as a “correct read”. Having said that, it doesn’t stop me from pursuing the idea, because I do love Matt’s concept of a perceptual “sweet spot”. A place where the power and meaning of any given artwork is intensified and expanded if you position yourself in the proper context.
Just missed the point— If I were to define “correct viewing”, I would have to paraphrase Matt’s description of the pursuit of the correct read. The mere attempt to locate the correct read is the point at which the viewer engages the work in a full and complete way and grows closest to the actual point of “correctness”.
I was just reading back through this whole series of exchanges and there’s some pretty solid stuff here. It may just be a lot of riffing on established ideas (Eco/ Berger/Danto), but I like the conversation. I think there is a level of authority to actual artists talking about concepts of the viewer and audience engagement, which is traditionally the realm of the critic. Critics sometimes speak from some elevated place apart from the act of creation, but the truth is critics need to be pushed back a bit from the other side and more artists need to recognize this.
I was looking at the Winkleman blog a few weeks back and one of the conversations centered around the need for more critical dialogue to originate from artists. I think that this post is an excellent example of this variety of discourse.
Thank you for providing the forum, it is a pleasure to engage in conversations that are hard to find in the flow of everyday life (at least mine).
I keep thinking about Jen’s summing up those Keltie Ferris paintings with three perfect words: fluidity, tension and compactness. I’m thinking that’s a good game for Freed’s paintings. You get three words, try to say as much as possible about the work with them.
Here are mine:
Tidy
Inquisitive
Containment
Your turn.
tension
liminality
pressured
(been obsessed by these for a few days. not sure what to say about them. kudos to chris for the three-word option.)
braced
propped
compressed
I love word associations… nice contributions thus far!
Analytic
Systematic
Calculated
Okay, round two, with the disclaimer that I came back planning on using the word “pressure”, not remembering that Matt had already used that one:
Verge
Tetris
Nordine
(as in Ken, ’cause there’s something kind of abstract- jazzy and smooth about these paintings, in a good way)
Blocky
Patterned
Dynamic
I was excited about the shapes he was making when I thought those were the edges of his working surface, but disappointed when I saw the gallery shots to see the square canvases.
departure
migration
arrival
I totally disagree about the shapes of the supports, the way the the shapes bump and push, bunch up, bounce off, etc the edges of the square canvas is full of metaphoric possibility—all lost if the canvases themselves were shapes. A lot of the sense of tension/pressure and variation/movement that keeps coming up in the comments comes exactly from the interaction of drawn shape and square support.
I know there are people who push past the novelty of the un-square canvas: Elizabeth Murray, Polly Apfelbaum, etc. but there’s a lot of expressive force that those square sides still have.
New three:
Brazing
Next
Love
i would have to agree with Chris that to dismiss the importance of the rectangle would be nearsighted. i’m not sure if the Eric who wrote in, is an Eric that i happen to know, but if so, kudos for being i believe, the only other uncg person to venture into the dialogue.
spontaneous
congruous
delineation
I’m probably a different Eric
I did my undergrad at IU, where Chris was my first drawing instructor while he was getting his MFA. I enjoy the dialogue though, keeps my brain working. 
I see what you mean about the edges. It’s a little hard to get a feel for them on the web, since it’s white on white. Maybe it’s totally different, but I still think they have a nice energy, motion, etc. when they exist as just the shapes themselves. Maybe it’s less tense and more free, which might just be personally appealing. I’m talking more about the big solid shapes. I think paintings like “Ladder” probably exist better in the square.
Bold
Machine
Jigsaw
Yeah, it’s a good point. As big shapes on the wall they would be more free. I think the fact that they invoke that impulse to be wild and carefree, but do have these limits, is what makes them more true and able to turn the mundane into drama. There’s a sort of realist, as in the opposite of escapist, tendency in that.
(Thanks for getting into the discussion, Eric.)
man Eric, sorry, but thanks for contributing!
i tend to think these oppose the constraints of the rectangle, while still acknowledging its authoritativeness as a force for ubiquity, extending across the range of shapes.
the shapes on the wall might work well of their own accord, but possibly only in a format in which negative shapes, created between the shaped surfaces, were also attributed significance. the singularity of each individual rectangle tends to demand that we evaluate it as the ultimate limit.
limited
repressed
broken
I think that as a perceptive/receptive viewer you can stretch the meaning and significance of this work far beyond the intention of the artist. I’m not 100% sure how Freed intended for these images to be read, but there is a interpretive strength in abstraction that leaves the viewer with a certain power over the work. I like the idea that you don’t have to pin something on abstraction, you can/should let it be full of possibility.
whoa. dennis, i love that idea of the viewer “a certain power over the work.” it seems like you’re suggesting more than merely the standard interpretive subjectivity we all have when we come to works of art. can you elaborate? is it only that the work is open to interpretation or that it necessitates it or forces it in some manner?
I definitely believe that there is much more to it than subjective interpretation, that’s really only the surface. I am obsessively drawn to very formal and elemental abstraction because I do beleive that it engages the viewer’s sense of perception in such a primal way. I think that great abstraction does demand to be understood or decoded.
There is some sort of cerebral hum that I get from connecting with a work of art, It’s almost as if you have to tune into a certain frequencey or signal to understand or experience the work. I don’t think I’m alone in this feeling, but I like to be educated and challenged by work, I want it to expand me beyond myself. Perhaps above all, I am suggesting that all art is as generous as the viewer’s perceptions will allow.
Matt, I’m curious if we’re coming up with some kind of hierarchy here. And how this follows through.
I can agree that there’s a low end of art appreciation: the “I may not know art but I know what I like,” approach, which makes judgments but deflects responsibility for judgment.
I can see the open to interpretation approach, as in “I like Caravaggio because of he gives expression to a Catholic outlook on life, you like Caravaggio because of the formal rigor, she likes Caravaggio for the courage expressed through the thinly coded homosexual innuendo, he for finding drama in the mundane, etc. etc.” All thoughtful, all valid and allowing for some comparison/debate.
But how would you describe that next level, forcing an open-ended reading? And I’m curious about paintings that we think do that. I can see that Cubist or Surrealist works might do that by playing counter to innate human tendencies to find order and understanding. Are there other ways that paintings make this active interpreting necessary?
Good questions Chris! I’m really interested to hear Matt’s response, but as for me I think abstraction itself provides fertile ground for this type of interpretation you mention. Most of the time I take into consideration what the artist intended for the work to say, but there is always something more potent to me about the image of abstraction itself.
Personally, I probably romanticize the notion of abstraction, but I can own that, because I study it and I feel it. Furthermore, I see people who feel the same way about abstraction without understanding or being able to express it. I think the whole idea of Modernism is a bit absurd, but I do think the AB-Exer’s were on to something when they stretched abstraction as far as they did and yet 50+ years later abstraction is still being stretched and too many, it is just as vital as ever. Therefore, to me there is something in the form of abstraction that forces or necessitates (as Matt suggested) deeper investigation into a realm of openness.
Yeah. I should have mentioned abstraction. Especially abstraction in the last few years, as the interest in Greenberg’s modernism has waned, or at least become less of an imperative for abstract painters. As look-ers, we benefit from wondering what the artist means to say, but with the understanding that other meanings may be found in how they’re saying it, or in which particular conversation the work is situated in.
i guess i’m aiming to grasp something that operates within those normal modes we’re mentioning above, but has an added dimension of pressure or necessity.
for instance, an artwork carries both the intention of the artist and allows fro the inferential interpretation of viewers. let’s say that if that equation always persists, another layer may also be present, one that operates only when the viewer is in the attempt of inferential interpretation (i.e. forcing a read), is activated by that forced, idiosyncratic, subjective viewing experience, but that puts pressure on that forcing viewer to come to a certain conclusion or specificity of experience.
so the viewer tries to constrain the work and thereby allows the work to force a specific read. the viewer enters into the necessary read of the work by their own attempt to interpret.
does this happen?
So the viewer in interpreting closes a loop, but then, as soon as they express that interpretation (say, on an artblog) then it’s opened back up? I think that happens.
is there any clear way then to close the loop for good? other than attempting to locate the point at which engagement in the act of interpreting opened up the loop?
what if because of subjective circumstance, the same (or a similar) interpretative loop is always engaged. does that happen? and how can interpretative reformation be arrived at unless said reformation is allowed for? what would that look like?
Going back to the example of Caravaggio (and I’m only going to be addressing part of your question here), we have an artist whose work ceased being interpreted for a very long time. Or maybe whose work ceased being considered worthy of interpreting for a very long time. So much so that we end up with better paintings in small-ish midwestern collections (Kansas City, Fort Worth, Cleveland) than in New York or Washington DC. And then at some point, maybe through a combination of historical circumstances, that loop opens up again. Maybe because of the similarity between the handling of form and light in a Caravaggio and that in early photographs, because of how important the individual’s gaze is, because of the culture’s changing attitude toward homosexuality, whatever.
So in my mind, cases like this make the argument that there’s not really a permanent closing, as long as works are able to be reconsidered. And that’s a good thing.
For the second part of your question, you’re meaning what if people just keep saying the same shit about, say Duchamp? On and on over and over again for ever.
i guess i’m more curious about specificity of experience as an individual viewer. in the example involving Caravaggio, it would seem that the loop was reopened because of some sort of change in cultural climate. the work isn’t really driving that change, but it reenters because it seems relevant for it to exist again or to be visible again.
but, i’m interested in what i think Matt is identifying, i.e. pressure and necessity; and what you seem to be saying with the notion that the loop is opened via expressing words about a work; and what Dennis is saying when he speaks about romanticizing abstraction. all of these things seem a little more insular and contained and even possibly thematically driven. like, when i look at most (or possibly even all work) i am thinking primarily about a couple of big things: time memory etc. so, these are the limitations i bring to the work. and also the limitations that bookend my ability to speak to anything.
is the quality that forces openness of interpretation a quality that you see situated in the work itself, or is it based on the ways in which we come to change our criteria for looking and speaking?
With regard to forcing a read, I think that Anselm Kiefer and Francis Bacon exert such a strong visual pull over me (and many others) that I have no choice but to respond to the work. It always forces my mental hand and as Bacon is fond of suggesting, one experiences the sensation of the work so strongly that you are affected at the level of the nervous system… it is a visceral engagement.
A dialogue and relationship opens up between the work and the viewer. I never know for certain if I am properly perceiving a work, but I always want to be in pursuit of understanding or engaged in seeking. As a viewer I want to build my own context around teh art that I view or experience, I like to make it my own in my eyes.
And yet as the work is perceived and expereinced in my eyes something of the artists intent peirces me. Ultimately the work is always a collaboration of creation and perception. Transmitter and Receiver
I think that I’m pretty much in agreement with Dennis that the ideal situation is a collaboration between artist and viewer, both being thoughtful, engaged, alert in their task.
For the sake of discussion maybe I would suggest that an artwork like any other form of expression is subject to express any number of codes outside of the artist’s intent. Just like if Dennis asked me how my classes are going, my body language, tone of voice and phrasing could indicate other sorts of meaning. The way I answer could also point to religious, cultural, gender identity, to something I’d heard someone say on the news that morning, to worries about flu pandemics and the stability of my source of income. So I could lean toward saying the work contains the possibility for multiple interpretation.
i guess what i’m suggesting is that works of art may, on some level, work like a chinese finger trap.
that is, while they may be used/interpreted by viewers and have multifaceted valid readings, or instead be slavishly read according to the artists’ declared intentions, there may also be a kind of “correct” (i really didn’t want to use that word) read.
i’m not saying definitively that this happens. i’m just suggesting that there may be a mode of reading the work where the work can’t be unlocked entirely UNTIL the force of viewing and the force of the work are participating in tandem in a certain, particularly keyed kind of way (you release your fingers from the trap not by working against the apparatus, but by working with it).
there are all sorts of works that, upon a first read, appear to be stupid or annoying, or we simply don’t get them. after learning more, having certain visual experiences, or simply returning again and again to reconsider, suddenly the force of our investigation becomes harmonically aligned with the capacities built into the work, and our read sings in the particular key or tone the work has built into it. i do think this happens. and while this experience may indeed remain subjective and somewhat specific to an individual, it seems to me that in these moments of real resonance a viewer is actually reading the work in a range of “rightness” and in so doing is therefore sharing some sort of sympathy with others who have read the work in this range as well.
think of a perfectly arranged stereo system – there is a small range of absolutely excellent audio presentation in the room. you don’t have to experience the music from that position, and you certainly have a valid musical experience even if you aren’t exactly in that position, but there is something specifically unique to the aural reality in that zone of designed, perfect, aligned presentation. i really wonder if this is what we’re all doing, trying to get into the “stereo sweet spot” with artworks. i wonder if that’s what all of our discussion, all of our contemplation and consideration is really all about. not really about “THE ONE CORRECT READ” but more about finding a true subjective resonance with the work, the making, the seeing, the interpretation, the being – all that’s bound up in art.
do you know what i mean?
Well said, I know exactly what you mean. It sounds like some sort of universal subjective. The only problem with this is so many people miss this concept and leave a work of art before they get close to the so called “sweet spot”. It’s sad that so much criticism is really about offereing up an opinion rather than being in the service of understanding. To really reach this domain of the correct read that you speak of requires a truly perceptive viewer with extreme patience and perhaps some knowledge beyond mere observation.
On the other hand, I have to concede that there is work out there that I give up on far before I have reached any position of correctness in my read. One way or another, it seems my own personal subjectivity at times overrides all else. As Chris mentioned, I think there is definitely a critical loop in which the meaning/read of particular work changes over time with each new context.
nice matt.
Anyone seen the current Artforum? Someone was telling me this morning that in a review of Danto’s new book on Warhol, Daniel Birnbaum takes Danto to task for claiming that only a the proper reading of Warhol’s work is Catholic, and any reading from any other perspective is somehow lesser. I haven’t read the review or the Danto book, so I’m wondering if anyone has?
It seems like there could be a danger of assuming the existance of that perfectly arranged stereo experience of art, just in that it could make viable claims that only a select few can properly find that perfect spot for any given work.
That seems like a rather subjective thing to say, that the proper reading of Warhol’s work is Catholic. I could see a 13th century crucifixion painting having a proper Catholic reading, but even then there could be other readings, other ways to approach it. For some reason, Warhol’s work, and Warhol the person, don’t scream Catholic to me. I haven’t read either the book or review, but it would be interesting to see how he backs up that claim.
It’s all about intention, right? Sure, a viewer can approach a work of art and take away anything he/she wants from it, but if the viewer takes away what the artist intended, is that more proper or correct? I think the answer to that is highly subjective as well. If the intention is there it makes a little more sense, but if Warhol didn’t intend to have a Catholic reading of his work, I can’t really see how that could be the proper reading of it.
I haven’t read the book or review, so that’s what I was told that Birnbaum said Danto said. The idea of reading Warhol in terms of Catholicism is fairly accepted…he was a practicing Catholic, from a Polish background and referred to the Elvises and Marylins as ‘icons’. So it’s a valid reading. It’s probably intended, or something that Warhol himself was aware of. But it is subjective trying to say it’s the most proper reading.
I guess, the troubling thing is that you could turn that around and get exclusive about who has access to the claim of understanding a work of art.
chris, all of what you’re saying is right, but, honestly, ever since reading “interpretation and overinterpretation” i’ve wanted to push back against the overarching control that the postmodern critique has exerted over interpretation – basically claiming that works are inherently open as a first order condition of their existence. this is a conceit that favors critics and theorists over the makers.
i really am not trying to become roger kimball here. i am, however, firmly ensconced in eco’s camp: there is a real intention of the work. my clumsy dialogue above was an attempt to marry the inter-subjectivities of artists, viewers, and critics into a continuum of interpretation where dialogue and openness are favored but where we can say, yes, this work is about x, y, and z in terms of its first-order qualities. i’m trying to do this without disqualifying anyone, which may be impossible.
on some level my work is more about what i have made it to be about than what others believe or extrapolate about it. it has elements that are certainly open to that interpretive action, but it has other elements that are what they are (part of this is how much the individual can exercise control over context and wrestle their own read from contextual legacies of which they are a part). there must be a way to maintain a kind of equilibrium amongst all these forces…
danto *might* be correct about warhol’s work… but him being correct doesn’t necessarily disqualify other reads.
Over the weekend, I was rereading Berger’s Ways of Seeing, thinking about trying to work it into a freshman class. The book has some problems, but I remember it as being really eye-opening (pardon any pun) when I was 19. It makes a pretty convincing case that seeing and depicting are never neutral.
But, anyway, I think some of Berger’s fight-the-power discussion about access and control of imagery as a form of authority is influencing that argument I’m making about interpretation. Anyway, I think we can all agree that it’s a different world than the one he was writing about.
Actually, I would be interested in taking the discussion in another direction: how much is too much authorial control over the reading of a work? I’m kind of thinking about a topic that we’ve tended to avoid: the difference between illustration and painting (or at least the idea of a difference, it plays out less in reality than in a lot of academic discussions of painting).ACTUALLY, I’M GOING TO RETRACT THIS. THIS POST IS GETTING LONG AND HARD TO FOLLOW AND PROBABLY DOESN’T NEED ME TOSSING IN ANOTHER TANGENT.But back on topic: Maybe I’ve been thinking down the wrong path here. Could it be, Matt, that rather than trying to argue for a proper way to read artworks, or a hierarchy of interpretation, or greater authorial insistance, that what you’re doing is making a case for more engaged and responsible artists and viewers who work to make this resonant experience with artworks happen more often?
Okay, bad run on sentence there, Chris. One more time: you’re not saying there’s a best way, you’re just wishing that we all worked a little harder?
yeah, in a sense. i think there can be a right way without there being a RIGHT WAY. something subtle and nuanced, an experience that’s not meant to pit exclusivity against generosity. some people get there, some don’t, but it’s not a character flaw or a virtue. it’s just one more part of the whole continuum.
i do like what you’re saying, chris, about all of us working harder whether it’s as makers, viewers, or thinkers.
As art educators (although I teach elementary art), I think that we also have a responsibility to push the issue of correct engagement. Artists will be artists and critics will be critics, but I think that educators have been marginalized in a sense, so we should always assert the perspective of one trying to cultivate new generations of creators and viewers. The context of art is changing all the time, who better to know this than educators?
I agree with the sentiment 100%. I am still a little skeptical about the word ‘correct’. Could we just say a ‘richer engagement’?
Saying ‘correct’ engagement makes other forms of engagement necessarily incorrect. And, though I’m fending off the Berger influence, there is still a cultural implication of access. How do we look at the Chinese scrolls there at the Nelson? How do we look at a Vermeer. We can’t possibly, no matter how much we study, have a ‘correct’ read of those objects.
Also, there are artists whose work seems to be richer and engaging to audiences in many, many more ways than they appear to intend. Richter, for instance.
all why try so hard to fend off berger? I watched ways of seeing again on youtube last night, and yeah, it is awesome!
i don’t know. i think we can be too smart by half if we say “nothing is correct/everything is correct.” it’s just the same as in practice: just because everything is acceptable/doable, doesn’t mean everything is good/applicable.”
i’m not trying to be priggish here, but i absolutely believe that you have a better grasp and connection to the real deep intentions of your work than, for instance, i do. “correct” as i am using it here is not an “either/or” proposition (which would definitely be the exclusionary, controlling thing you’re referencing). i’m seeing it as more like “both/and” in the sense that, yes, my read of your work is valid in its conceits and subjectivities, but it is necessarily limited in some way. it is less extensive and encompassing than your read would be. your own read triangulates more, grasps more, does more with the work than mine does.
this holds for chinese scrolls and vermeers, too. we simply do not have access to the entirety of the read, the fullness of intention, the nuance of implied meaning. and that is ok. we can still appreciate and love the work and get a tremendous amount from it. but i can’t say that my reading of a chinese scroll is in any way as expansively valid as, say, the audience for which it was made and those whose authority and social/cultural capital originally required/embraced/appreciated that sort of work. just because i have less access doesn’t mean that’s bad, or wrong, or necessarily denigrating my view. i am what i am, fully vested as a white male of anglo-saxon, english-speaking, western-canon-of-knowledge background. these things are as much a great benefit as they are a hamstringing of certain potentials.
why isn’t it ok to say “i can’t know this part of the work” or “the read available to me is necessarily limited” or something similar? isn’t that what we’re telling freshmen when we ask them to learn about how to see, how to make, how to think about making? they gain access by their work. sometimes there is a limit to that access, as i describe above. is that necessarily bad?
i really am not trying to be an ass here, and really am interested in the questions/answers/thoughts of others here on this…
I agree with all of that, and that’s why I suggested the word ‘rich’, thinking it indicated that continuum of degrees of engagement, and degrees of syncing up with intention. Where ‘correct’ is by definition any state other than incorrect. “Rich” I think also resists the urge to relativism. Hallmark cards, as a text, can be as ‘correct’ as American Pastoral, but not possibly as ‘rich’.
There is probably a better word, but ‘correct’ doesn’t seem like it can be the one.
I think that when I mention the term correct, I don’t necessarily mean one and only all encompassing, but more the correct way. And as far as that is concerned I think that the correct way to view art is with a measure of humility and an awareness of your limitations as a viewer (which Matt and Chris spoke of). No one’s authority is complete with regard to art. Even the creator is missing a part of the puzzle and that’s whats so great… art needs an audience for it to be fully realized.
I suppose someone may say they do art for themselves alone, but the art still says things apart from the makers intent. Ultimately, the viewer activates the true potential of any work. Without following the correct path to engage a work of art, so much of the experience isn’t even activated.
In the end, I am a huge advocate for the notion of “correct viewing”, but this is entirely different than the notion of a “correct read”. I think a lot of the mystery and power of art would be lost if there were in fact a such thing as a “correct read”. Having said that, it doesn’t stop me from pursuing the idea, because I do love Matt’s concept of a perceptual “sweet spot”. A place where the power and meaning of any given artwork is intensified and expanded if you position yourself in the proper context.
Just missed the point— If I were to define “correct viewing”, I would have to paraphrase Matt’s description of the pursuit of the correct read. The mere attempt to locate the correct read is the point at which the viewer engages the work in a full and complete way and grows closest to the actual point of “correctness”.
I was just reading back through this whole series of exchanges and there’s some pretty solid stuff here. It may just be a lot of riffing on established ideas (Eco/ Berger/Danto), but I like the conversation. I think there is a level of authority to actual artists talking about concepts of the viewer and audience engagement, which is traditionally the realm of the critic. Critics sometimes speak from some elevated place apart from the act of creation, but the truth is critics need to be pushed back a bit from the other side and more artists need to recognize this.
I was looking at the Winkleman blog a few weeks back and one of the conversations centered around the need for more critical dialogue to originate from artists. I think that this post is an excellent example of this variety of discourse.
Thank you for providing the forum, it is a pleasure to engage in conversations that are hard to find in the flow of everyday life (at least mine).