Identity politics in art: Art needs obstinacy

In the grip of capital and identity politics. Current discourses and wokeness are not necessarily decisive for artists working autonomously.

Criticism of society can be included in art, but should not be mandatory Illustration: Katja Gendikova

Political influence seeps through every crack. It brings about a domestication and thorough management of art and turns the enjoyment of art into an experience that dislocates your jaw when you yawn. Many avengers of the disenfranchised cavort in the art sphere and let their mania for control run free with the conservativeness of a garbage-separating German janitor.

Reading Wolfgang Ullrich’s book “Art after the end of its autonomy” finished me off and prompted me to write a reply. In the book, the Leipzig art historian proclaims the end of autonomous art. He regrets the death of autonomous art, but he portrays it as if the paradigm shift is inevitable and that unfortunately one has to come to terms with it. Firstly, I strongly doubt that, secondly, that would be terrible, not only for artists, but for society as a whole.

I contend that the autonomy of art has developed in parallel with the development of the idea of ​​the individual, an image of man that has been established since the return of humanism in the Renaissance. Over the centuries it has meant the laborious and violent emancipation of the individual from the interests of the state and religion. Since the time of capitalism, in the field of art this has also meant emancipation and self-assertion from the interests of the market.

The growing awareness that the interests of society and the interests of the individual sometimes diverge is an achievement of Western societies. Artists working autonomously are the best example of how one can find oneself in an ongoing process, a back and forth between being a social and political being and imploding into inner worlds. The creative output results from both and enables an openness and the necessary ambivalence of the artwork.

The external position of the artists was untouched for a long time

The privilege of art has so far been characterized more by an observing external perspective, either analytical and rational, also political, or to comment on the world from demonic abysses on intricate paths of subconscious perception, of humor, of the disturbing, the disturbing, the wonderful life, in people, in society and in the world.

This external position of the artists, this autonomy of art, was relatively untouched, they were granted the freedom to fool, which was hard won. It was worth a fee for the wealthy part of society, just as the state generously supported and paid for the existence of the artists.

There are artists who feel like they are outsiders and observers, and there are those who feel more comfortable with the idea of ​​being embedded in a social context, i.e. being “inside” and campaigning for critical issues. These varieties flow into each other, they mean a pluralistic variety of species in culture, which also reflects society.

Criticism of society should not be an obligation

Incidentally, artist collectives also mostly work within the scope of a free art that individual artists have fought for. Everyone involved benefits from the synergy effects and that makes it exciting.

Criticism and participation in society can in the capacity of an artist or a human being, but should not be compulsory. But that is an increasing demand on artists from politics, increasingly also from curators and parts of the artists themselves. If the work does not incorporate certain topics that are currently the subject of political discussion, in a sometimes blatant way, they want the art brand as not relevant to society. good trick.

But why would one want to squeeze art into narrow terms like “autonomy” or “non-autonomy” and send it through the forced mill of woodcut-like political scrutiny, which in the end represents a pure hindrance to art?

We are talking about identity politics and gender issues

Is it about exposing the individual as the nucleus of neoliberal evil and placing it in its supposedly dusty corner of history? And the idea of ​​the autonomous artist as the embodiment of ultra-individualism? But unfortunately, the exclusivity with which political issues come to the fore does not correspond to the contexts and motivations from which most artists work.

For some, frustration over the art debate boils so much that it smokes Image: Angela Fette

Which discourse-determining political issues am I actually talking about? I’m talking about identity politics, gender issues, postcolonial discourse, racism, classism, climate politics. These questions can be hung very nicely on the person of the artist. It’s about who made it, not what’s there to see.

This provides the educators with readily accessible textual material, but the intellectual under-complexity of the named themes when applied to art causes discomfort to the point of pain.

The mediation of the work often falls by the wayside

Biological and biographical characteristics of the artists that come into play in identity politics are easy to understand and convey: skin color – check, age – check, nationality – check, gender – check, migration background – check. And already you generate meaning, you participate in “significant upheavals in society”.

The sensitive processing and mediation of the actual work often falls by the wayside, also due to the system due to too much pressure, too much time pressure, little money for a lot of effort or a lack of education on the part of the art mediators. Too complicated, too much work to dig into the thoughts and feelings of an artist, to understand and convey the intricate paths from the head and brain via the hand to the canvas, as well as the sensuality of the work. It’s better to check whether everything in the checklist is correct, then you can save yourself having to deal with the actual work again.

The individualities of the viewer and buyer, which are necessary for a functioning art system, also suffer from the prescribed discourse. In exchanging art for money, they can experience a strengthening of their own convictions, the opportunity to live out the spiritual, ethical and aesthetic judgment and to find themselves in an inner dialogue with the work of art: the art in the eye of the beholder. If that too is placed under a prescribed discourse, the system harms itself.

Political discourse is in vogue

The strong interlocking of discourse and market does the rest. Criticism independent of the market has become rare. And whoever has the power to define which art is relevant in the discourse also has an influence on who earns the money on the market: Art criticism supplies the free market with the sales arguments. This mutual influence works in both directions, but is impervious to external influences.

It’s about money. Topics from the political discourse area have become a fashionable trend and a selling point that brings in ratings and increases visitor numbers. This is also a disgusting instrumentalization and monetization of the social upheavals that are actually taking place for art. Under the pretext of creating a “better, more just world”, free expressions of art are to be branded as unworthy of discussion and pushed off the market.

The state intervenes passive-aggressively, for example by approving money or not. By giving jobs or not. By adding money for exhibitions or not. Here, too, the biologistic-biographical checklist applies.

These phenomena lead to a narrowing and shortening of the discourse and make the necessary openness and ambivalence impossible. The narrowing down to political discourses and the strict separation into disciplines ultimately serves to split and weaken the artist community.

art as propaganda

This attack on free art is particularly harmful when it comes from within the own ranks. The trick is to condemn the traditional idea of ​​the classic avant-garde, which is often male and white, in order to form a new, externally determined pseudo-avant-garde according to its own standards, which is dedicated to the prescribed political issues. The alleged paradigm shift is here.

This “enlightened” movement uses the same chauvinistic-provocative attitude, totalitarian, exclusive, authoritarian and absolutist, as the classic avant-garde did: Everyone out there, here we come. Ultimately, however, they are sawing the branch they are sitting on, unless there is someday a complete meltdown of art and politics. Voilà, then we have art as propaganda again.

In this way, the new identity-political pseudo-avant-garde is the most reactionary, conservative, boring thing that can currently be found on the colorful fair of discourses and art scenes.

So: Leave art alone! If art is to remain the mirror of a pluralistic society, we have to be careful about what we throw at it.