Art Now
Art Now: 81 Artists at the Rise of the New Millennium looked good at a glance. I enjoy modern art more than the old masters because of the variety, inventiveness, and change of subject. I get tired of portraits, madonnas, and landscapes. Unfortunately the book doesn’t cover its material well, at least not if you’re an outsider as I am. It reads like a yearbook. For each of the artists covered, it gives vital statistics, important shows, a quote, a paragraph summarizing the artist’s works, and several photos.
Sounds great, but it’s not. The paragraph is written in psuedo-speak. There’s not a meaningful sentence in there. The photos are often of installations – pictures of video stills from movies or views of some enourmous construction. There’s no way to get a sense of the actual work. Worse, the paragraph and photos don’t correspond. While the paragraph may go on and on about the artist’s most important work, analyzing its so-called meaning, the photo will then be of something else entirely, which is left completely unexplained. It’s as though the book assumes we’re familir with the artist’s work and don’t need to actually see it.
Perhaps if you know these people and their work, this is an interesting remembrance. As a way to learn about modern artists or artistic trends, it’s useless.