Academic Irit Rogoff concurs with our daughter’s verdict that ‘Art’s just chatting.’
We happened to click onto the e-flux journal and found an essay by Rogoff. In it she examines ‘the educational turn’, describing how, in the wake of Documenta X and Documenta XI, the art world has encouraged the emergence of a conversational mode:
‘And so the art world became the site of extensive talking — talking emerged as a practice, as a mode of gathering, as a way of getting access to some knowledge and to some questions, as networking and organizing and articulating some necessary questions. But did we put any value on what was actually being said? Or, did we privilege the coming-together of people in space and trust that formats and substances would emerge from these?
Increasingly, it seems to me that the “turn” we are talking about must result not only in new formats, but also in another way of recognizing when and why something important is being said.’
And, our daughter might add, did we think about how all this talk can sound to younger ears like blah blah blah blah.
