Apr 25, 2008
Art—or Not Art?
Art Chicago descends upon us this weekend, and, along with it, that age-old question of “What is Art?” For every awesome Jaume Plensa sculpture or Tony Oursler video, there is something raggedy, like a twisted old rope mounted in a canvas or an ugly naked lady holding a dead flower. You try to act polite and not stare and whisper to your friend, What the hell??? But then you drink too much Grolsch at the opening party and end up wearing a trucker hat and getting all vocal about things and the “shushing” starts and …
OK, enough about last night. Between beers, I managed to take some photos for a little game called Art—or Not Art?
Please play. Oh, and silliness aside, I’ve been to several iterations of Art Chicago, and this one is mightily impressive. It’s up through Sunday, and a $20 tickets gets you into all of the companion exhibitions, including the Antiques Fair, the indie Artists’ Project, and Next. In particular, I'm enthusiastically recommending Next, which is the emerging artists’ fair on the 7th floor spearheaded by local curator Kavi Gupta—there’s a lot to see, there’s a great vibe, and there are corn dogs in a rocking little makeshift bar near the elevators (warning: the rest of the food is not so good).
Here we go, Art—or Not Art? Vote and comment below!
Case Study #1: Sculpture
One of these things is by sculptor Robert Arneson; one of these things is owned by Sam Zell. Which one is the Arneson piece?
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Case Study #2: Everyday objects
One of these things is by an artist named Susan Loliss; it’s from the London gallery Seventeen. The other is, um, infrastructure. Which is which?
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Case Study #3: Apparel
Which of these is art by Shinique Smith, from a Paris-New York gallery named Yvon Lambert?
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Case Study #4: Cultural commentary
One of these things is art by Guma Guar; the other is something we’ve been making fun of in our office. Which is which?
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Posted at 01:20 PM in Coda | Permalink
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Coda is a blog by arts and culture editor Cassie Walker, who, love it or hate it, always has an opinion. During the course of her weekly culture hunting, she reviews high art and pop culture events so you'll know what you need to check out and what you can miss.
Comments to this blog are moderated. We review them in an effort to remove foul language, commercial messages, and irrelevancies.
Reader Comments:
Case Study #1: The first photo is art.
Case Study #2: The second photo is art.
Case Study #3: The first photo is art.
Case Study #4: The first photo is art.
How is the wall with two nails art!
I'll pass on the game, but the tie in case study three is amazing. It is art regardless!
I want to know the answers. I'm disgruntled sitting in my 9-5 office right now thinking I should have come up w/ 2 nails on the wall instead. Damn.