Where the political left was once the clear bastion of free speech and expression in the U.S., it could be argued that the new left silences thought and speech perceived as antithetical or offensive to its values almost as much as the right wing does, or did. This is a problem for culture, and evidently, for art. “Political correctness,” says Slovenian philosopher and cultural theorist Slavoj Žižek, “is a desperate attempt by the public norms to tell you what is decent, what is not.” What Žižek suggests here is that political correctness can be harmful in its ability to obscure the truth and dilute public discourse; by sanitizing rhetoric we sanitize cultural meaning. This climate of over-the-top, politically correct theatrics has infiltrated the art world; art’s job is ultimately to push back on societal taboos and interrogate prevailing norms. Good art is almost always offensive to someone. Click here to read more
Spain & 42 St @ Foxy Production
SPAIN & 42 ST. is the title of a William S. Burroughs cut-up poem that transforms found fragments of text into a new whole. The works in the exhibition challenge the narratives of photography and fashion and parallels between them, just as Burroughs constantly challenged the structure of prose. They move beyond expectations of fashion or fine art: they are neither exclusively one nor the other. Each is a cut-up in itself and within the context of the exhibition, which features artists Darja Bajagić, Jimmy DeSana, Peter Hujar, Robert Mapplethorpe, Paul Mpagi, Sepuya Heji Shin, Laurie Simmons, and Deborah Turbeville. SPAIN & 42 ST. will be on view until January 31, 2015 @ Foxy Productions, 623 W. 23rd St. New York.