To: artforum/talkback
Subject: Foul Perfection
Date: 2002.12.27 15:01
D. Diederichsen's review of Mike Kelley's (forthcoming) FOUL PERFECTION in
ARTFORUM January 2003 contains a poignant Kelley quotation:
"Official art culture is much more effective in its control of history than
Republican strategists, for it knows that the best way to treat
contradictory material is not to rail against it, but simply to pretend it
didn't happen."
I like this quotation because it provides a clear indication of what
real/true history comprises.
Diederichsen's review overall hinges on the polemics(?) of an artist being
both inside and outside the art (history) realm. It is worth noting,
however, that this same condition is expertly addressed within the first
chapter of Huizinga's HOMO LUDENS: A STUDY OF THE PLAY ELEMENT IN CULTURE ,
specifically where Huizinga addresses the role of the "spoil sport" within
play. For example,
"The player who transpasses against the rules or ignores them is a
"spoil-sport". The spoil-sport is not the same as the false player, the
cheat; for the latter pretends to be playing the game and, on the face of
it, still acknowledges the magic circle. It is curious to note how much more
lenient society is to the cheat than to the spoil-sport. This is because the
spoil-sport shatters the play-world itself. By withdrawing from the game he
reveals the relativity and fragility of the play-world in which he had
temporarily shut himself with others. He robs play of its illusion - a
pregnant word which means literally "in-play" (from inlusio, illudere or
inludere). Therefore he must be cast out, for he threatens the existence of
the play-community. . . . In the world of high seriousness, too, the cheat
and the hypocrite have always had an easier time of it than the spoil-sport,
here called apostates, heretics, innovators, prophets, conscientious
objectors, etc. It sometimes happens, however, that the spoil-sports in
their turn make a new community with rules of its own. The outlaw, the
revolutionary, the cabbalist or member of a secret society, indeed heretics
of all kinds are of a highly associative if not sociable disposition, and a
certain element of play is prominent in all their doings."
I look forward to reading all of FOUL PERFECTION myself.
Subject: Foul Perfection
Date: 2002.12.27 15:01
D. Diederichsen's review of Mike Kelley's (forthcoming) FOUL PERFECTION in
ARTFORUM January 2003 contains a poignant Kelley quotation:
"Official art culture is much more effective in its control of history than
Republican strategists, for it knows that the best way to treat
contradictory material is not to rail against it, but simply to pretend it
didn't happen."
I like this quotation because it provides a clear indication of what
real/true history comprises.
Diederichsen's review overall hinges on the polemics(?) of an artist being
both inside and outside the art (history) realm. It is worth noting,
however, that this same condition is expertly addressed within the first
chapter of Huizinga's HOMO LUDENS: A STUDY OF THE PLAY ELEMENT IN CULTURE ,
specifically where Huizinga addresses the role of the "spoil sport" within
play. For example,
"The player who transpasses against the rules or ignores them is a
"spoil-sport". The spoil-sport is not the same as the false player, the
cheat; for the latter pretends to be playing the game and, on the face of
it, still acknowledges the magic circle. It is curious to note how much more
lenient society is to the cheat than to the spoil-sport. This is because the
spoil-sport shatters the play-world itself. By withdrawing from the game he
reveals the relativity and fragility of the play-world in which he had
temporarily shut himself with others. He robs play of its illusion - a
pregnant word which means literally "in-play" (from inlusio, illudere or
inludere). Therefore he must be cast out, for he threatens the existence of
the play-community. . . . In the world of high seriousness, too, the cheat
and the hypocrite have always had an easier time of it than the spoil-sport,
here called apostates, heretics, innovators, prophets, conscientious
objectors, etc. It sometimes happens, however, that the spoil-sports in
their turn make a new community with rules of its own. The outlaw, the
revolutionary, the cabbalist or member of a secret society, indeed heretics
of all kinds are of a highly associative if not sociable disposition, and a
certain element of play is prominent in all their doings."
I look forward to reading all of FOUL PERFECTION myself.