A WORD OF CAUTION
AA Bronson
The artist is crap. The artist-run center is crap. Artist-run culture is crap.
The artist is genius. The artist-run center is genius. Artist-run culture is genius.
Therefore, crap = genius, and, conversely, genius = crap.
The genius of the artist is his ability to crap on the hand that feeds him.
The genius of the artist is his ability to crap on the hand that feeds him.
The genius of the artist-run space is its ability to crap on the hand that feeds us.
The genius of the artist-run space is its willingness to crap on the hand that feeds us.
The genius of artist-run culture is its desire to crap on the hand that feeds us.
The genius of artist-run culture is its lack-of-fear-of, its I-can-say-anything-I-want-to the hand that feeds us.
A word of caution: beware of mimicking the hand that feeds us.
In Canada: beware of bureaucratization.
In America: beware of acting like rich folk.
For the Canada Council will never respect you for aping their structure: their charitable status, their boards of directors, their hierarchical structure, their studies, reports and recommendations.
And the rich folk will never respect you for aping their methods: their intense competitiveness, their lawsuits, marketplace manipulations, and lobbying, their willingness to climb on the backs of their fellow man.
Artist-run culture, like an iceberg, is 95% beneath the surface.
Watch for collaborations that remain unfunded, artists groups excluded from the artist-run network, collective projects that escape societal acceptability.
Watch for the perverse, the objectionable, the disgusting, the politically incorrect.
Watch for the stench of the dung heap that we, as artists, are for our society: remember that we are the crap of society.
The artist who smells squeaky-clean is most likely a spy.
The artist-run center that smells squeaky-clean is a zombie interlocutor.
The artist-run culture that smells squeaky-clean is shit.
07.07.07
As one of the three artists of General Idea (1969-1994), AA Bronson founded Art Metropole and was actively involved in the development of the Canadian artist-run network. His book From Sea to Shining Sea (Toronto: Power Plant, 1987) examines artist-initiated activity from 1946 to 1986. He is currently the Director of Printed Matter, Inc., in New York City. aabronson.com; printed mattter
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