feedback.vancouver

In an attempt to intervene in the lackluster state of arts criticism in Vancouver, we, a group of artists, educators and curators, have developed a feedback system that is committed to honesty and rigor. Anonymity allows us to say the things that the institutional politics of art makes prohibitive.

POST #1: eXponential Future press release and its unexamined assumptions

We appreciate the opportunity to revisit the concept of an emerging artist show as a follow up on 6: New Vancouver Modern. While the first one had its problems (don't get us going), eXponential Future has us running from your "complex reality of urban life" for the hills. When you state "Vancouver artists continue to be better known in the U.S. and Europe than they are in their own city," better known by whom. The unexamined assumptions and biases underlying your proposal are egregious. Who exactly is your audience? It apparently is not the local arts community who are already acquainted with the selected artists in eXponential Future. If you were interested in introducing Vancouver artists to the city, the Belkin exhibition would include a public program that remedied our alleged lack of awareness. Further, the claim that this exhibition is an "overview of the new artistic thinking of our time and place" seems a bit grand, especially when your selection represents artist who do not directly engage with the Vancouver urban landscape. And don't get us going on Tim Lee whose work we have seen enough of to last three parallel eXponential Futures. But more than anything, we thought the days of archaic curatorial premises grounded on notions of exploration and identification of local trends was a thing of the past. It just makes us wonder who has an investment in identifying the next hot little things.

dazed and confused,

Vancouver 911