Monday, May 23, 2016

Gobbledygook...



My interest in photography and all things creative allows me to read thousands of website spiels, blogs, artist profiles, and yes; even those dreadful "artist's statements".

Unfortunately, the vast majority of what I read, is quite frankly, pretentious waffle: gobbledygook, the worst of which would put school headmasters, university lecturers and new age prime ministers to shame.

(It seems that mention of prime ministers may be apt, as many “artists”, especially photographers and strangely, models have found the word “artist” too egotistically limiting, and have decided to position themselves among politicians and reluctant movie stars, and call themselves “public figures”....pretentious waffle meets delusional stupidity.

The usual excuse of course is I am a visual person, not verbal, which is a variation on the old pretense about left brain /right brain, or I can't think business because I am an artist, and in itself one great heap of BS.

Just about the entire population has been through primary school, and as a result the majority of us, even artists, are able to construct a meaningful sentence to communicate some information which can be relatively easily understood. But yes, it does require thought and a little effort...two qualities seemingly lacking in many artists and much of their art.

OK, so a visual work of art doesn’t need words to explain it, or at least shouldn’t...however websites, catalogues, profiles, press releases, advertising, marketing, even facebook comments and twitter tweets, as well as all those other written pieces of information necessary to an artist's life, do need words. And with the sheer numbers of self styled “artists” swanning around these days, probably the most creative and productive thing any artist could do to set them apart from the wannabes, would be to stop trying to live the “image” of the artist..a pretentious myth which never existed in the idealised past, but which has become the holy grail for all except the those few with actual talent.

It would seem the less actual talent possessed, or the greater the unwillingness to develop any talent possessed, or even the more averse to work: the greater desire to project and immerse oneself into mythical existence as an "artist"

Gilda Williams in her book, “How to Write About Contemporary Art”, while talking about how “Art English” arose, which quickly degenerated into “Art Gibberish”, sums up her observations in regards to these attempts at communication:

Good art-writers, despite countless differences, essentially follow the same patterns:
+   their writing is clear, well structured, and carefully worded;
+   the text is imaginative, brimming with spicy vocabulary, and full of original ideas, which are substantiated in their experience and knowledge of art;
+   they describe what the art is; explain plausibly what it may mean; and suggest how this might connect to the world at large.
Inexperienced art-writers repeat similar mistakes:
+   their writing is waffly, poorly structured, and jargoned;
+   their vocabulary is unimaginative, their ideas undeveloped, their logic flawed, and their knowledge patchy;
+   assumptions are not grounded in the experience of art, which is ignored;
+   they fail to communicate believably the claimed meaning behind contemporary art, or its relation to the rest of the world.

So if, as a visual artist, your words have shown signs of falling into bad habits of pretentiousness and waffle, of non communication, of gobbledygook, 

“How to Write About Contemporary Art” 

would be well worth a read. 

©Copyright: Stephen Bennett, 2016

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