Week 2
The Machine
The Machine
This class we talked about equity statements and the buzzwords that tend to repeat in these statements. In my Pepper-posted response to our group activity, I made a comment about left-leaning arts organizations having pretty good equity statements, but because of their tendency to have more leftist people as patrons and collaborators, such as artists and people involved in radical politics, they have more scrutiny on them than huge companies like a McDonalds. I feel like most people don’t expect much progressive politics from a McDonalds, so why would we go after them as far as their practices? It just feels less pressing and more far away from our reality, from a leftist artist perspective.
Both this activity and the reading Avoiding Racial Equity Detours made me think a lot about the experiences of myself and my peers with arts organizations. The art world is all about trends, when it comes to what work gets shown and who gets funding. Sometimes, and I hate to say it but it's true, the trend is diversity itself!! I was talking with a friend of mine and former studio-mate, a wonderful sculptor named Kuh (Seriously, she’s amazing), about her recent successes. She was getting so many shows and residencies, it was a huge year for her! She told me however that she had a lot of reservations about this recent onslaught of wins, and she wondered if it was only because of the colour of her skin, and the current climate of performative equity. The way she looks and the art she was making had become trendy, and she was feeling deeply conflicted about it. We talked about how it feels like there's no way for an artist of colour to feel like they're winning there, even when things are good, they have to question if they're being tokenized in order for a gallery to check a box! The beast of the art world is ever-changing, and who's to say who will be trending next.
The discussion in the reading about foot-dragging institutions getting more patience and sympathy to account for their racial inequities, than the racialized people experiencing the actual harm rings true for me. I think about the AGO letting go of Wanda Nanibush after a pro-Israel group complained. And then every week for months, dozens of artists protected and picketed at the AGO’s entrance demanding justice, including some artists who had previously worked at or shown at the AGO! What did the AGO do? Stay silent.
Honestly, a very large part of the reason I am at OISE right now, is that I wanted to step away from the art world, and opt out of the machine that doesn’t actually care about the artists whose art it needs. It feels like we’re all fighting for this little piece of a little pie and relying on funding from banks and governments who seem to all stand for things opposite to what I believe. I have more to say on this and I will elaborate in future entries I’m sure!
References:
McBride, J. (2024, August). Why Did Canada’s Top Art Gallery Push out a Visionary Curator? The Walrus. https://thewalrus.ca/why-did-canadas-top-art-gallery-push-out-a-visionary-curator/
Del Rosario, K. (2024). https://kuhdelrosario.com/