looking back and forward

Since I used my blog time this week to write a short article on the MoMA opening for kunstkritikk.no, I've been reading some other blogs and online reviews about the event to catch up on the past few days. Among my favorites is Jerry Saltz's column in the Village Voice. In his booklet What happened to art criticism? (2003), James Elkins critiques Saltz's "positionless position" as an art critic, but acknowledges that his approach has granted him "any number of wonderful insights." I think Saltz's call on the problem of space in the galleries of the remodeled MoMA is interesting, and helps answer my own question about why the 4th floor galleries - with all of the masterworks by Johns, Pollock, Rothko - on and on - didn't seem to have the same dynamic interplay experienced on the floor above. Without enough space to really explore and present other lesser known (for example, female) artists, there will likely be more of a need to play it safe with the public pleasers.

Even though modernism never really took off in Norway, maybe we'll get to have these kinds of discussions when the new National Museum of Art opens, supposedly, in a few years. Unfortunately, most of the time is spent quibbling over things like who should design it, where it should be, who gets to be in it, and in the name of full democratic participation, what it should look like. Needless to say, nothing ever really happens because nobody can agree and architects have learned to run the other way. Of course I have been away for six months so I guess I'll have to do my homework and see if the contemporary art museum is any closer to getting out of the old bank building. It's not really fair to make comparisons with world class art museums, especially in terms of collections; on the other hand, it's not only inevitable but probably good for us to take a critical look at some of our "local" museum practices and what's going on in the rest of the world. This will be my next blog project starting this weekend.

For other blogs following the opening, and some nice installation photos see
artsjournal

artblog