Art: For the PEOPLE
now crowned as another champion among all, Steve Keene.
Over the weekend I picked up some more SK paintings from his studio (it's open for selling paintings every Sunday in Brooklyn, most paintings are $2). Two as gifts (a version of the Bowie's Heros and a cutout Banana) and one for myself (my civil war). I also have a couple other's buried in my brother's house and one other (my first) that my brother gave to me when I was in high school. This is not to say 'look at me', but well, as SK sez for himself:
“I want buying my paintings to be like buying a CD: it’s art, it’s cheap and it changes your life, but the object has no status. Musicians create something for the moment, something with no boundaries and that kind of expansiveness is what I want to come across in my work.”
Word. The dude could write a manifesto about the role of Art in life, but instead, or mostly, he just paints and sells paintings (cheap). In fact, at $2-10 his paintings are decidedly cheaper than any CD or record (although maybe not vs used tapes or thrift store vinyl), you could possibly find. SK is theory in practice. (about art production, the art market, ideas about fine art) SK is ethics in practice. (about access, how to live one's life in relationship to your work and your product, about doing) SK is good art. (versions of album covers, art history greatest hits, landmarks, historical figures, in copious copies & translations - moving something from one point to another which shows it in a different way) This is Showing, not Telling. This is not aloof exceptionalism or intellectualism or wonkiness or post-whatever play of signs/symbols/theories/revolution, this understanding (or at least actively trying/acting on) what folks like W.Benjamin would say about art & mechanical reproduction, and bringing it to the world. Sure it's still exclusive and bourgeoisie in it's audience (as in this is still the ART WORLD - not sidewalk art) but it is pushing the borders.
Also I don't think his art is about His method, that is in the way that most contemporary art does not allow for reusing approaches & techniques. I think it's completely valid and appropriate to buy your own plywood, paint & make your own paintings. Hang'em on yr wall, sell'em, make ART practice and seeing part of everyday LIFE. (see the same re: computers & music making & folk art/music etc. etc. etc.)
"No one was really into the paintings, but I was really into painting them, so if no gallery was going to show my art, then screw 'em, I'm going make people see it, just by painting so many, and making them so cheap that people have to buy it."
and a cool little video about SK
Over the weekend I picked up some more SK paintings from his studio (it's open for selling paintings every Sunday in Brooklyn, most paintings are $2). Two as gifts (a version of the Bowie's Heros and a cutout Banana) and one for myself (my civil war). I also have a couple other's buried in my brother's house and one other (my first) that my brother gave to me when I was in high school. This is not to say 'look at me', but well, as SK sez for himself:
“I want buying my paintings to be like buying a CD: it’s art, it’s cheap and it changes your life, but the object has no status. Musicians create something for the moment, something with no boundaries and that kind of expansiveness is what I want to come across in my work.”
Word. The dude could write a manifesto about the role of Art in life, but instead, or mostly, he just paints and sells paintings (cheap). In fact, at $2-10 his paintings are decidedly cheaper than any CD or record (although maybe not vs used tapes or thrift store vinyl), you could possibly find. SK is theory in practice. (about art production, the art market, ideas about fine art) SK is ethics in practice. (about access, how to live one's life in relationship to your work and your product, about doing) SK is good art. (versions of album covers, art history greatest hits, landmarks, historical figures, in copious copies & translations - moving something from one point to another which shows it in a different way) This is Showing, not Telling. This is not aloof exceptionalism or intellectualism or wonkiness or post-whatever play of signs/symbols/theories/revolution, this understanding (or at least actively trying/acting on) what folks like W.Benjamin would say about art & mechanical reproduction, and bringing it to the world. Sure it's still exclusive and bourgeoisie in it's audience (as in this is still the ART WORLD - not sidewalk art) but it is pushing the borders.
Also I don't think his art is about His method, that is in the way that most contemporary art does not allow for reusing approaches & techniques. I think it's completely valid and appropriate to buy your own plywood, paint & make your own paintings. Hang'em on yr wall, sell'em, make ART practice and seeing part of everyday LIFE. (see the same re: computers & music making & folk art/music etc. etc. etc.)
"No one was really into the paintings, but I was really into painting them, so if no gallery was going to show my art, then screw 'em, I'm going make people see it, just by painting so many, and making them so cheap that people have to buy it."
and a cool little video about SK
posted by furtanic at 11:27 AM
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