Conceptual Art: A Critical Anthology - uncopy

formula purveyed for its own sake. Those not initially involved in the consumption of the
inaugural art statement are denigrated as a kind ofentombment society. Carl Andre phrases
the argument quite belligerently: “Art is what we do; culture is what is done to us,”—an ungenerous
half-truth. The absorption of art into a framework of meaning beyond the mystique of
its practitioners, necessary to the morale ofall artists, is considered suspect, inimical, even a
betrayal. Doubtless there are many risky factors operating in the trade-off between the avantgarde
and its wider potential audience. What we see here, however, is the attempt to institutionalize
a social antagonism without observing whether a base for such antagonism any longer
exists. And even more, without substantiating a subversive slogan by a subversive content.
What, after all, has Lawrence Weiner done? To take a known example, he conceived this
specification for a work ofart: “an abridgment ofan abutment to on, near, or about the arctic
circle.” Lucy Lippard describes the execution ofthe work at Inuvik, arctic Canada: “Using
whatever is at hand, in this case a cigarette package, he leans it against a broken pile ofdirt.”
It is a tale oflittle consequence that loses in the telling. But from such a nonevent it is an
ideological pebble’s throw to Weiner’s grandiose indications: “1.) The artist may construct the
piece. 2.) The piece may be fabricated. 3.) The piece need not be built. Each [sic] being equal
and consistent with the intent ofthe artist, the decision as to condition rests with the receiver
upon the occasion ofreceivership.”
In other words, it seems a matter ofindifference whether any experience takes place at
all, as long as the notion that it may take place is suggested. This insinuation, after all, is the
art part. It consists ofbegging such questions as to why something should be done, how it
should be done, and for whom. How significant that Weiner uses the economic term “receivership,”
a protesting too much that significance has only to be declared to exist. In an unsettling
way, it deprives us ofever finding significance for ourselves.
For the optionality ofConceptual art is non-leading only on face value. Theoretically it
represents a “further” stage in modern art where the withdrawal of constructive (in all senses
ofthe word) decision and the rejecting ofresponsibility for the thing presented close the possibilities
ofinterpretation. We are strenuously directed to see that thought itselfis up for grabs.
Yet it is also shrewdly anticipated that putting the exchange between the giver and the receiver
in the conditional tense (may—may not) equates any conceivable outcome with any other.
Once more, therefore, the argument hinges on a bind. All “morphological” art, that is,
painting and sculpture, has been superseded and demoted to the status ofa historical curiosity
(Kosuth) because it does not question the nature ofart. But Conceptual art induces only a
mood ofnonexpectancy because its questioning has no form, only a principle, and may be said
max kozloff the trouble with art-as-idea 275