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Tuesday
Jul292008

Art in a Handbag: Business as Usual or a New World Order?

DateTuesday, July 29, 2008 at 11:12PM


Chanel's "Mobile Art" pavilion is designed with the quilted CHANEL "2.55" handbag in mind, and it lands in Central Park this fall. Arts patronage is no longer a matter of a full spread announcing the sponsorship of a blockbuster show, but has become the design of the space of exhibition itself as a branding and marketing tool - in this case, plopped down like a handbag.

While the issue of branding has been in the art world for some time, in this year the pitch is remarkably high. Since Rothko, Klein and Warhol there has been an awareness of the artist's work as either susceptible to or embracing of the logic of the brand. But only today does there seem to be a widespread acceptance of it as the condition of art, if not subjectivity at large. Wrote Ben Davis of the "superartist": "appreciation of the work tends to be an appreciation of being part of a collective, as opposed to an individual, esthetic experience, just as the works themselves tend away from personal statements and towards blank social referents -- death, change, media, atmosphere."* There is also Dan Levenson, whose brand "Little Switzerland" presents the work of a single artist as the fictional gallery stable. At this same time, the "personal brand" is currently a very real market in the identity business.

And galleries as well are considering what they do in terms of branding, so that artistic practices, rather than settling into their proper names over time and from within a diverse critical discourse- as Minimalism did, for example - might in the near future (if it has not already happened) be decided upon through a gallery's branding strategy.

As with the Chanel pod above, branded space comes into full play as well. The advice of a gallery consultant is to always send the same size of invitation so that there is a branded space not unlike the Fed Ex space Walead Beshty describes. One might also say that Deitch's consistent practice of enlisting street artists to do full gallery installations is a curious form of branding, let alone that of the pseudonyms the artists themselves - "Swoon," or "Os Gemeos" - are likely to use.

Even further, we might think of the artist's collective as participating fully in the branding exercise, as though taking up residency there for lack of an historical avant-garde. A visit to Critical Art Ensemble's website adequately reveals this.**

How can we speak of the brand with reference to art? Is this a major shift in contemporary art and culture at large? Might it have very real consequences for art and society both? Or is it just business as usual, merely showing itself for what it has always been?

By Catherine Spaeth

Image Credit: Zaha Hadid, Chanel Mobile Art pavilion; Sylvie Fleury, Cristal Custom Commando, both from the New York Times.
* Eric Gelber led me to this article.
**And it was an exchange with Jonathan T.D. Neil that led me here.

Catherine Spaeth

AuthorCatherine Spaeth | Comment24 Comments |
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Reader Comments (24)

I think the truth lies somewhere between "business as usual" and "emergence of a new paradigm". For years now, when an Impressionist, Post-Impressionist, Vermeer or van Gogh exhibition rolls into town the museum gift stores go into high gear. They will print images of the worls of art on any object that they think will sell; scarfs, coffee mugs, postcards, posters, coffee table books, bags, t-shirts, pencils and pens, notebooks and sketchbooks, etc. So in a sense you could say that artists like Murikami, Koons, et. al., take inspiration from the museum gift store model.

Here are a few things that contemporary artists have done, in the sphere of branding, that I think are unprecedented. The partnership between Takashi Murakami and Louis Vuitton, and the appearance of a Louis Vuitton boutique at the heart of a Takashi Murakami retrospective. Damien Hirst's marketing of "For The Love of God". Not only it is the most expensive work of art in terms of its fabrication and its price tag, but it was bought up by Hirst's corporation, only to be reused as a logo. Hirst's company, which now owns the platinumdiamond encrusted skull, sells prints of it and articles of clothing with images of it printed on them. Hirst's maniuplation of the press, prior to the first public showing of "For The Love of God" is unprecedented.

So I guess you could say that the marketing phenomena surrounding these two artists are unique to our age.

July 31, 2008 | Unregistered Commenterericgelber

More on Murakami: Prior to his retro at BAM, no artist's retro ever included a fully integrated boutique in which items designed by the artist for a famous luxury item company (or any company for that matter) were placed in a context in which the luxury items would be considered part and parcel of the artist's body of work. This wasn't the museum gift shop. There was no invisible wall separating the art from the merch. And in one instance a critic actually said that the Vuitton boutique was the most best looking part of the retro (I think it was Roberta Smith). Andy Warhol appeared on an episode of the Love Boat and many artists have endorsed various products through the years (Jim Dine, Chuck Close, etc.) but this is different.

Julian Schnabel appeared in a MasterCard advertisement. There is nothing new about celebrity artists hawking a product. But the fact that he took part in a contest sponsored by the credit giant, in which the winner would get a picture painted by Schnabel specifically for the winner of the contest, is something entirely new.

So I guess the lesson an artist should take away from all of this is that you must be a successful business man/woman in order to exist in the art world.

July 31, 2008 | Unregistered Commenterericgelber

I was watching The Gallery Channel last night, and their commercial blurb was something like”Artists make something out of nothing and sell it.” It seems that, according to this televsion station devoted exclusively to visual art, it is mainly for this reason that we should be interested. Whatever anxiety once existed about the work of art as a commodity has vanished, and artists are relating to the practice of doing business that involves branding as it's vehicle - this seems to be what's going on with "For the Love of God": the commodity has been withdrawn from the market in favor of its role as a branding opportunity. It is almost as though what Buchloh referred to as the aesthetic of administration - where art “deprives itself voluntarily of the rights to intervene within the political decision making process in order to array itself more efficiently with the existing political conditions” - has taken a whole new form upon itself. The audience for art is being constituted by its effects. And that even non-art individuals are investing in their own personal brand identities, and that we are increasingly able to think of space as branded - these are very interesting things.

July 31, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterCatherine Spaeth

Over-consumption is just plain ugly. There really is not a real lot more to say about it. Lust. Eat. Buy. Ravage the planet while you can. Experiment with a blank cartridge how to kill yourself 44 times. The subversive in these stockings is a game. Subversive has filtered down to the wealthy and desire, redressed as beautiful, marvelous, witty, and always endearing. Head further down If you are interested in older models who now sell after christmas merchandise.
New paradigm! Smart?
It you take a look the planet is dying, first-world nations are obese. There is nothing pretty in that. Nothing profound. It's not a secret. it's sad.
From a distance the planet earth is bright blue, like a jewel. Heaven forbid anyone who comes down for a closer look... please explain the suggested new paradigm!
'We can do better than that!'.
c.p.

July 31, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterAnonymous

I think the truth lies somewhere between "business as usual" and "emergence of a new paradigm".

c.p. that was a rehashing of Catherine's initial post. The "new paradigm" is nothing more than bolder marketing and the complete disintegration of the wall between commerical and fine art. There are no gray areas. Artists can open up shop right in the middle of their own museum retrospective, artists can paint paintings solely for crtedit card contests, and artists can buy up their own work, turn it into a logo, and then sell it back to the people in the form of various luxury item merchandise and t-shirts for the plebs. In the past when artists were shills for various products they were acting as celebrity spokespeople and then went back to the confines of fine art making (Warhol is the exception and messiah). Now we admire an artist's business savvy more than their imagination or ability to make things we really care about.

August 1, 2008 | Unregistered Commenterericgelber

"Please explain the suggested new paradigm" - A part of this might be whether or not what we are calling "the brand" is a very specific form of representation. Does it have qualities of its own? A defining feature of postmodernism was simulation, it's more (postmodern) modernist version the index. How does a brand operate, why do we speak of brand exercises and opportunities? How is it different than a name? etc...?

August 1, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterCatherine Spaeth

Thanks Eric!
Some famous guy said eons ago that "Hack work is not the result of either clumsiness or provincialism; it is the result of the market making more insistent demands than the art". Hack work is now replaced with 'diinterested'.

Catherine, I'm sure you have heard the term 'tofu'. It means being able to morf into any indentiy, desire, or meet the demand with minimal knowledge or expreince [keep reiventing the self 'in pefect replica of the other'].
If you saw the first Matrix, you'd remember Trinity did this. She was a computer generated program.

August 1, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterAnonymous

What is "The Gallery Channel"?...asks the man without cable...

August 1, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterEdward_

“I'm sure you have heard the term 'tofu'. It means being able to morf into any indentiy, desire, or meet the demand with minimal knowledge or expreince [keep reiventing the self 'in pefect replica of the other'].”

The purpose of the brand is to distinguish oneself from your competitors, who are basically providing the same thing that you are. So the idea that branding is matter of reinventing the self in perfect replica of the other is perhaps close to the situation. But really interesting is that the brand accrues value - branded toothpaste is worth more than generic toothpaste, which is why coupons have always been useless to someone who wants to save money - that is not really the point at all.

I couldn't get the link to work, but if you just google "what is a brand" the first page lists sites with definitions - regarding value, it is curious that to be branded can also mean to be stigmatized. It’s history is a violence upon the body in relation to ownership.

August 1, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterCatherine Spaeth

It's HDTV, VOOM! Which had an exhibition of their art commercials at Paula Cooper not too long ago.

http://www.voom.tv/galleryhd.html (I liked Artland, which they feature on the site. The leggy woman knew nothing about art and was quite willing to sneer at Jason Rhoades - she got the job for her experience giving bus tours of sex in New York.)

August 1, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterCatherine Spaeth

I keep getting these emails with the offer to click the buy button for a 'BRAND' new limited edition of a bunch of whatever that not only presents the scalawag 'genius' artist, but also me. In a sense I should feel happy I've been noticed. Not as the person who can offer "BRAND" the next big deal, though I am important enough to get the email. I am being asked to join the "BRAND' franchise wheel.
Here we are not talking product we are talking mind. We are talking loaded ideas of artist and 'genius' once attributed to the fine soul that would open the world to some fine or deeper experience, or knock up a few model drawings for Nuclear Submarines. When I click on the mail's buy button, I am... all that... when I lasso the new "BRAND" show On "BRAND STREET"... I am. However, in very real terms, the object and it's location is simply an advertising setting. That fact is in "BRAND" we are post object. In a post Object BRAND WORLD any object will do. If any Object will do, then why not ask the brand-makers what they would like in place of nothing--the people, average Joe, the academics, the muses, the what-else is making news. BRAND is no one thing. It is the mind--all the same, but not equal in the merry franchise wheel.
Art is just another way to the people: A project for diversity, paperback fiction, the funnies -- A Product of the Mind Indistinguishable, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHPA79XQL6s" REL="nofollow">Woo hoo!
c.p.

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