Reviewing the Arts – Summer 07

8 responses so far ↓

• 1    John // Jun 7, 2007 at 12:56 am

  Joyce Carol Oates provides an intelligent, well-articulated response to Arlene Croce’s essay. Yes, she takes offense to the term “victim art” (which she calls “crude” and “reductive”) and considers the very idea “appalling”. She disects Croce’s argument piece by piece, responding to her claims with well-thought counter-arguments. In response to Croce’s idea that victim art forces the audience to feel a certain way, Oates says, “Doesn’t all art, even the coventional and pleasing, have the goal of affecting the audience’s emotions?” In response to the way Croce feels that victim art is too focused on self-victimization and pity, Oates states, “Many of our human stories end not in triumph but in defeat. To demand that victimized persons trancesnd their pain in order to make audiences feel good in another kind of tyranny.” I couldn’t have said this better myself. I think Croce’s obsession with the feeling that she gets from victim art is just her own guilt surfacing, which she projects onto the “victimized” person or group. When art has a feel-good message, the audience doesn’t have to confront their own relationship to the issue at hand, and is free from responsibility. Oates doesn’t see why “issue-oriented” art would be beyond critisicm. She discusses famous works of art in recent history that have used “real” material (and fall under the category of victim art according to Croce) that have been of great importance in the arts and the focus of critical discussion and debate. Oates concludes her essay by proposing a new way of thinking about art criticism: that it should evolve and change in purpose, just as art itself does. She also makes the good point that art isn’t necessarily made to be reviewed. “If art is [considered to be] too “raw” to be reviewed, shouldn’t it be witnessed, in any case, as integral to cultural history?”

• 2    Gabriel // Jun 7, 2007 at 12:45 pm

  Oates article is a well thought out response to Croce’s article. She backs up her ideas clearly and uses many examples, although I am not familiar with many of them they seem to be mostly liturature, poetry, and painting, which are fine examples of “victim art” or “authentic experience, but I see these examples in a differant classification than Bill T. Jones’ still/here which is in the class of performing art/dance and is interactive.

  After the first page of this article which gets into Croce’s article and oates dismisses the term of victim art as being an”appaling concept” and a “crude and reductive label” she raises the question–”Why should authentic experience, in art, render it “beyond criticism”?”. For me this statement really says it all, and is promptly supported by numerous examples. Another well stated point by Oates is ” If art is too “raw” to be reviewed, shouldn’t it be witnessed, in any case, as integral or cultural history” this statement is very valid and reveals the ignorance of Croce in her dismissing still/here as unreviewable and refusal to see it.

  At the end of the reading it seems that Oates give some credit to Croces writing as being inovative, ” an evolving art form” and mabee setting a new ground for the art of critism. Croce must have done somthing right as an artist because her article was payed much attention to and riled up emotions which I believe is the goal of the artist. I like the way Oates sums up Croces article, the way she paraphrases makes it more clear and understandable.

• 3    Kaaren // Jun 7, 2007 at 12:55 pm

  What I found most offensive about Croce’s article was her attitude towards oppressed groups, who she saw as being incapable of producing art that is not what she calls “victim art”. Oates discredits much of Croce’s argument by providing examples of “great” art made about human suffering. However, Oates does not show her readers why this art is great; we hear the name Dostoyevsky and we can’t debate her. By using artists who are traditionally considered part of a canon of great art, she leaves her argument impenetrable. She asks, “why should authentic experience, in art, render it beyond criticism?”, but this question is never answered. It is rhetorical, and in using it she distances readers from their ability to comfortably ask questions, assuming that the answer is simply common knowledge. Ironically, many of the artists Oates name drops are themselves beyond criticism. Hypothetically, I could review Faulkner’s “The Sound and the Fury” and assess that I thought it was childish, crude, and a horrible piece of literature (this is just an example, I haven’t read Faulkner). However, because Faulkner already rests firmly in the canon of American literature, my opinion would be irrelevant.
  Oates’ response is also exclusionary, because the reader must be familiar with many of the artists that Oates lists in order to have any idea of what she is talking about in a large part of her essay. Oates does make several important arguments, however. She points out that asking people to “transcend their pain in order to make audiences feel good is another kind of tyranny”, and challenges Croce’s treatment of traditionally oppressed groups. She also argues that “if art is too ‘raw’ to be reviewed…it [should] be witnessed…as integral to cultural history”, pointing out that Croce has failed not only in her assessment of “victim art”, but also in her role as a cultural critic. However, the most important issue in Croce’s essay is the way that she marginalizes groups that she considers “victims” in society. Oates emphasizes “great” art that happens to deal with human struggle, and avoids discussing the more important issue of Croce’s single minded and destructive view that people who have suffered are only capable of making “victim art”.

• 4    Collin // Jun 7, 2007 at 2:21 pm

  Discuss Oates response to Croce with a focus on the term “victim art.” Does Oates take primary offense at the use of the term “victim art” or Croce’s claim that such art is “beyond criticism”?

  The article I just read talks about Croce and her review on Jones work. She also states about various artists and authors that were once panned and then praised by the public just because of the public position and backing towards their work. They make light of the fact that when modernist artwork arrived from overseas how it was not brought into the forefront with rave reviews. Another interesting point I found was how none of Dickinson’s work was ever published during her lifetime. Notably over the years it has been found that when a persons dies they are then accepted as great works but during the lifetime of the artist the art is considered mediocre. Think about how once something can no longer be made the art is then considered more valuable since the hand that once made it no longer exists. Anyone can draw these pieces of Art; however, the thought and mind process from that one artist is what becomes cherished.

  Then the piece comes to talk about how critivs find artwork to be too strong for a public to view. In my eyes I think this threshold has been broken and this piece is talking about the past considering the world has access to everything and the worlds ability to handle pain, suffering, and “victim art” is at a level so tolerable we the viewer rarely feel emotion when seeing something that our ancestors would consider appalling in their generation. The world of art is changing drastically and few seem to notice that it is solely from the internet. Many people stand there jaded, not realizing the opportunities of globalization through various websites such as Youtube and MySpace. You can be nobody and have a piece of art or even a documentary that is supposed to provide change, and through these programs millions of people can view your work and make the proactive choice to unite towards these changes……

• 5    Laura // Jun 7, 2007 at 2:31 pm

  Discuss Oates response to Croce with a focus on the term “victim art.” Does Oates take primary offense at the use of the term “victim art” or Croce’s claim that such art is “beyond criticism”? Why? Explain your response and provide textual evidence (quotes, paraphrases and/or examples from the text) to back up your conclusion.
  Oates takes a strong disagreement with the term “victim art”. In that field I will have to say I agree with Oates. I found the term to be a bunch of nonsense. I really enjoyed how in the article by Croce she said that this “victim art” manipulates the audience in to feeling a certain way whether it be pity or sadness. Oates responded well to that saying that all art does that. I couldn’t agree more with that, if art doesn’t do that to you than what is it supposed to do just sit there in a review on a table in someone’s kitchen.
  Oates and I agree that to say that things are un-reviewable because you can’t review someone you feel bad for is complete nonsense. There are plenty of artist who draw inspirations from sad subjects like Diane Arbus or who use their own sad past and history themselves. For example there is a lot of art out there now that is taken from this awful war. Most of it has been reviewed, some good and bad. Because it’s not the about how you feel about the person who made it, it’s about what the person made.
  You are in control of your own feelings. If Croce could not get past the fact that she felt bad for the performers and review them she was being discriminative. They are artists and more likely than not they don’t want you to feel bad for them. They want to make you aware of what they are doing what they are putting out there. Receiving feedback, good or bad won’t change that fact that they are sick, nor will the fact that you feel bad for them and feel you can’t review them.

• 6    Cheryl // Jun 7, 2007 at 2:58 pm

  Oates states in The Crisis of Croce’s refusal to review Jones’s “Still/Here” piece. The stand that Oates takes, convincingly or not, is that just as art evolves, critics have to evolve as well. Critics seemingly have the “authority” to determine what is art and what is not art, thus rendering specific pieces beyond criticism, but if this is based purely on personal opinion the critic is at fault. Her review is proliferated with historical examples of how writers, poets, photographers, and artists such as Dostoyevsky, Frederrick Douglas, DH Lawrence, Dorthea Lange, and more were criticized by work they did. In some cases, artists were stifled because of critical review, as in the case of Emily Dickenson who did not publish a body of poetry because a critic called it, “odd, and too delicate”. Critics and artists have had a relationship since the beginning of art. As soon as artists branched out from the commissioned pieces for the church or royalty, they were criticized for finding their own identity. However, as Margaret Bourke stated, “To understand another human being you must gain some insight into the conditions that made him what his is.” The nature of the artist is to create work based on their conditions. In life, not all conditions are positive, pleasingly social, or conservatively political; but this does not mean they are not art. Furthermore, this does not mean that a critic has the authority to not review them deeming them beyond criticism and even worse a form of viewer victim-hood by means of victim art. This manner of thinking is a form of censorship created by a sector of the art population who are supposed to introduce a new view of art to the public. All it takes is one critic to see a piece as art for the public to find it a treasured commodity. In the same respect it takes one critic to state a piece as ‘not art’ or ‘beyond critics’ to control the public’s view in the opposite direction. As long as there are artists, there will be formal or informal critics. Those who are paid to understand this condition and shape the trends of the art-market must first understand that life upsets the cultural, moral, social, and sometimes political expectations of others. To then call something that represents those issues not art or worthy of an art review is silencing the artist and forcing the artist and the viewer to return to the brutishness of the past, most importantly the critic him/herself.

• 7    Michael // Jun 7, 2007 at 4:38 pm

  Joyce Carol Oates uses the term “victim art” to describe the people who are rendered with “injury, illness, or injustice”. She states that “only a sensibility unwilling to attribute full humanity to persons [that have
  illness]” could invent such a phrase as “victim art”. She believes that there is a “strong tradition” of art that is a witness to the suffering of human beings. These artists were trying to affect on-lookers with art that “intimidates [the viewer] to any perverse degree”. I believe here she is suggesting that art is art even if it is hard to criticize the people that have created the art. In history it is prevalent that art sometimes resembled or copied the tragedy of being human in some form. Oates despises the term “victim art” and does not agree with the article by Croce. Oates writes that Croce stated that she is made the feel guilty and have pity for “blacks, abused women, and disenfranchised homo-sexuals”. I feel sorry for those people without having to be an art critic.

  I believe that Oates reply to the Croce article is a well-informed one that rebukes the term “victim art”. Art is supposed to make one feel something and the feeling is greater if the art is tragic or even horrific. A person cannot not be affected by art so therefore all art can be reviewed and criticized. I now feel that Croce did not want to be criticized herself because of how she wanted her paycheck to still be there. In conclusion, art is art no matter how sad or horrific it is and should be up to criticism because of the way that art makes one feel.

• 8    Carolyn // Jun 7, 2007 at 5:48 pm

  Taking a tone of defiance towards Croce’s victimization and manipulation of art, otherwise denoted as “victim art,” Joyce Carol Oates spews her frustration among the pages without giving a lot of reasoning behind her words. Although I may agree with her anger towards Croce’s term, “victim art,” I wish that there was a little more stability behind her statements.

  “Why should authentic experience, in art, render it beyond criticism?,” asks Oates. The question seems to stem back to the idea of Clive Bell’s “aethetic emotion.” Art is to connect with a viewer by any means possible. At least, that is what I am to assume of Oates question, as she never fully answers it. A large portion of Oates’s debate pinpoints her exemplifications that she believes should be made to contradict Croche. She spans from the diary of Anne Frank, to paintings of Goya’s, and even Shakespeare’s Othello. These examples serve more of a stream of consciense or cognitive process thrown onto paper rather than the solidity I believe she was intending. Towards the end, however, her examples begin to become more elaborated upon and serve greater meaning then the prior.

  Although I agree with Oates and the ideas that she presents in her rebuttle to Croche, I still feel that the piece has an overall flimsiness and doesn’t quite pack the punch that it should have.

Leave a Comment