Date: Mon, 26 Aug 2002 15:21:36 -0500
From: Bill Spornitz <spornitz-AT-mts.net>
Subject: Re: MARRIAGE VOW(EL)S IN DRAG - Part one of a new list from Heart



Now, the avant-garde often refered to here is about art history; at 
one time it was about art - future. Simply: when Cage ate the 
mushrooms, he was eating the mushrooms. When a kazillion smarty-pants 
started going to conferences about Cage and Mushrooms, (growing in 
silence and horse cakes), then the avant-garde was no longer about 
Cage or Mushrooms or Silence or the sound of one hand clapping or 
what have you. Then the avant-garde was about how much one knew about 
the avant-garde. You want the avant-garde today? I think this is 
pretty avant-garde, and it was in today's (electronic) New York 
Times, to whit:

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/26/opinion/26LOMB.html

quoting:

The Environmentalists Are Wrong
By BJORN LOMBORG

COPENHAGEN
With the opening today of the United Nations World Summit on 
Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, we will be hearing a great 
deal about both concepts: sustainability and development. 
Traditionally, the developed nations of the West have shown greater 
concern for environmental sustainability, while the third world 
countries have a stronger desire for economic development. At big 
environmental gatherings, it is usually the priorities of the first 
world that carry the day.

The challenge in Johannesburg will be whether we are ready to put 
development ahead of sustainability. If the United States leads the 
way, the world may finally find the courage to do so.

Why does the developed world worry so much about sustainability? 
Because we constantly hear a litany of how the environment is in poor 
shape. Natural resources are running out. Population is growing, 
leaving less and less to eat. Species are becoming extinct in vast 
numbers. Forests are disappearing. The planet's air and water are 
getting ever more polluted. Human activity is, in short, defiling the 
earth - and as it does so, humanity may end up killing itself.

There is, however, one problem: this litany is not supported by the 
evidence. Energy and other natural resources have become more 
abundant, not less so. More food is now produced per capita than at 
any time in the world's history. Fewer people are starving. Species 
are, it is true, becoming extinct. But only about 0.7 percent of them 
are expected to disappear in the next 50 years, not the 20 percent to 
50 percent that some have predicted. Most forms of environmental 
pollution look as though they have either been exaggerated or are 
transient - associated with the early phases of industrialization. 
They are best cured not by restricting economic growth but by 
accelerating it...



-and so on. We are being led, fed, bred, informed and dis-informed by 
high-priced avant-garde-istes that make Duchamps et al look like a 
bunch of silly rich kids with too much time on their hands.

I said it before; all I hear is the ringing in my ears.


b

>On Sun, 25 Aug 2002, Alastair Dickson wrote:
>
>>  product to be astutely pitched at its field. As these catalogues and
>>  monographs are retrieved from cupboards and files and thrown back into a
>>  rarity market, do they address and define the understanding of what is
>>  avant-garde?

Heiko Responded:


>It was an interesting list of what once was avant-garde, history now, I
>hope. History is important but not everything. How boring is Cage today,
>for example. This shows (for me) that not even the questions, what we can
>learn from history, stay valid over times. Zen is bullshit sotosay now.
>Questions of globalisation today, I dont know what. There is Dokumenta
>now in Kassel, that tries to ask, maybe there are strong things like the
>stuff that was there by Richard Hamilton the last time, I will not go.
>Regionalism and globalism, african artists doing african art that looks,
>how does it look like ? Is it african when it looks like Cage ?
>
>I hate Attac but I dont know any better answer.
>
>
>H.
>
>
>
>      --- from list avant-garde-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---

HTML VERSION:

On Sun, 25 Aug 2002, Alastair Dickson wrote:

> product to be astutely pitched at its field. As these catalogues and
> monographs are retrieved from cupboards and files and thrown back into a
> rarity market, do they address and define the understanding of what is
> avant-garde?

It was an interesting list of what once was avant-garde, history now, I
hope. History is important but not everything. How boring is Cage today,
for example. This shows (for me) that not even the questions, what we can
learn from history, stay valid over times. Zen is bullshit sotosay now.
Questions of globalisation today, I dont know what. There is Dokumenta
now in Kassel, that tries to ask, maybe there are strong things like the
stuff that was there by Richard Hamilton the last time, I will not go.
Regionalism and globalism, african artists doing african art that looks,
how does it look like ? Is it african when it looks like Cage ?

I hate Attac but I dont know any better answer.

H.

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