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| Bill Clinton, Ben Stiller, David Zwirner |
For those of you living under a
rock (or in the real world), and you haven’t read the profile of David Zwirner
in the current issue of The New Yorker go and do so now, or as soon as you can
spare a few moments, or whenever really.
The profile is called Dealer’s Hand
and it is written by Nick Paumgarten, a young, sharp-witted writer who has a
wide swath of journalistic curiosities such as culture, sports, art, economics
and anything else that any fine cosmopolitan may want insight on. His lengthy, though briskly readable,
piece on David Zwirner and the inner world of an art dealer, has art people in
a froth, or at least me, and I consider myself very unfrothable so I can only
imagine what it is doing to the rest of this petite bourgeoisie called the art
world.
What makes this such a captivating
read is that it gets to the thick of things and with the clarity of an
outsider. Paumgarten is not from
this world and he writes that way and wants to be seen as such. There is a reason why Peter Schjeldahl,
the art critic emeritus at The New Yorker didn’t write this expose. One, it’s not Schjeldahl’s style, it’s
a form of journalism that just isn’t his deck of cards. It would be like asking a cat to
sing. Possible, maybe, but not
pleasant for anyone to witness or attempt. Anyways, Paumgarten talks about Zwirner and the art world
that is his empire in making in the same way any good journalist would on any
subject chosen. There are facts
given, backgrounds placed and quotable insiders to back things up
throughout. What had me enthralled
was how right Paumgarten got it, it being the art world and it’s apparatuses
and recent histories. Facts reveal, even in the most secretive of industries, and it is refreshing to see this
possible.
The profile is about David
Zwirner, who he is, how he got there and what he is doing to make himself so
damn successful. He is not the
king, aka Gagosian, but there is something more cunning and subtle to him that
makes him seem like old money while Gagosian is the gawdy nouveau riche. The way that Zwirner comes off is
carefully relayed with consideration but there is also stark reveals here and
there from the words quoted out of Zwirner’s own mouth and others. But it must be said, this is more then
just a profile of David Zwirner, it also peels away some of workings of how
things are on top and what is involved in staying there and rising.
Things such as the importance of
secondary market sales, auctions, the HR, PR of sales and how things are priced
and sold, the meaning of a building, the meaning of an artist gained or lost
are all divulged, even if only in discreet bites.
Those that are in the art world
know most of what is written in this piece. This strata, that Zwirner exists in is only participated, in
real degree, by a handful of top galleries but the emulation and the stratagems
used there are being replicated down the gallery food chain. This is a new type of art world. It is a professional, market strategy
driven world and it is wildly successful and becoming painfully formulaic. This is not only Zwirner’s doing or
fault. In a way, after reading
this you have to admire his ‘professionalization’ of this bananas art
market. He is attempting to make
chaos reigned, bottled and corked for sophisticated consumption. Everyone likes fancy, reserved, rare or
at least the illusion of it. Even
with the knowing though it is another thing entirely to read/feel the
avalanching snowball about to hit your face that is the art world of the now
and future.
There are a few dissenting voices,
as any journalistic piece of this sort has to inject, but there is no hint of
alternative, or a changing tide.
The saddest thing to see in print is another known truth. “Meanwhile, many of the most
established and esteemed gallerists (Marian Goodman, Barbara Gladstone, Paula
Cooper) are over seventy.” Pang in
heart. Notice they are all women
besides. Anyways, the truth is
that there is a generational shift occurring and there are very few that have
ability or merit to sweep up the artists left in the wake of the inevitable
closings of such legends in this field.
Cringe at this thought, it’s like somehow the thing called ‘a soul’ will
dissipate in the art world when this happens.
The Zwirner profile was quite
possibly the clearest paraphrase, profile, insight, what-have-you, on this
bizarre, money obscene art world that we exist in. In a corresponding audio conversation that Paumgarten has
with Schjeldahl on this subject/article they talk of the art world in a big
culture way and at one point they are talking about auction results and the
record breaking bids of late. They
both say quickly that this money, these auctions, are not effecting the way
artists are making work today.
This, I have to sort of disagree with. I think that the auctions do affect art making
today. The game of art, the
intention of art, the structure of art has definitely changed because of the
impact of money. There may not be
a direct one to one but the way that money has made art an industry, a huge
industry with programs, professions, and all else feeds off this
potentiality. This does effect the
way an artist beings, enters, finds themselves in this world and also how they
want to participate and be seen in this world.
Another article that is related in
a way but very different in tone and form is Joel Mesler’s (co-propieter of
Untitled Gallery in New York) article in Gallerist, called The Art of Art
Dealing. It is a satire doing what satire does, tells the brutal
truth with a twist of eye-rolling glad-handing. It’s a post-it-note of another type of revelation to follow
your epic de-Zwirnering of the art world read.
Enjoy both. Don’t fret, it is as bad as you think
it is but isn’t that truth sometimes so surreal/insane that it seems beautiful
in a way?
