Can’t dismantle the master’s house with the master’s tools, to paraphrase Audre Lorde. For much of his career, Ed Woodham, founder of Art in Odd Places, has worked in performance art, public art, installation, and social practice — those forms created to engage communities outside the white cube. But what do we do when the systems socially engaged art set out to challenge co-opt its forms? Meet Social Malpractice — a workshop, “warning system,” “speculative think tank,” and more. Read Woodham’s opinion piece to learn more about his inspiring work.
Also in this issue, Olivia McEwan takes on Tracey Emin’s cult of personality in a review of her retrospective at Tate Modern, Nathan Gelgud inks an absolutely lovely comic about Frank O’Hara’s lesser-known curatorial work, John Yau studies Anki King’s portraits of isolation, and much more.
—Lisa Yin Zhang, associate editor
Social Malpractice in the Age of Cultural Compliance
What happens when the language of social practice becomes a tool of the very systems it once hoped to challenge? | Ed Woodham
Take Your Practice Further in a Visual Arts Residency at Banff Centre
Engage with leading contemporary faculty, access exceptional studios, and develop your practice in Banff’s inspiring mountain setting.
News
- Artist Ali Sbeity has been killed in an Israeli airstrike in the southern town of Kafra in Southern Lebanon, according to local media reports and Artists at Risk Connection.
- Ghanaian artist Ibrahim Mahama has threatened to sue his government after members of its police force allegedly assaulted him.
In Memoriam
Remembering Calvin Tomkins, Rhoda Roberts, and Agosto Machado
This week, we honor a celebrated art writer, a champion of First Nations culture, a downtown NYC performance artist and activist, and others. | Lisa Yin Zhang
Meet the First Cohort of Haystack’s Artist Grant Initiative
Eight artists pushing boundaries in design and materials find support through mentorship and an unrestricted grant award.
From Our Critics
Tracey Emin’s Cult of the Self
The YBA artist spearheaded contemporary art’s trend of coupling extreme self-introspection with relentless self-promotion. | Olivia McEwan
Anki King’s Nordic Noir
A pervasive sense of self-containment, isolation, and miscommunication flows through the Norwegian artist’s work. | John Yau
Comics
Frank O’Hara’s Curatorial Eye
Though best remembered for his poetry, O’Hara championed artists like Helen Frankenthaler and organized several shows at the Museum of Modern Art during the Cold War. | Nathan Gelgud
Member Comment
Houry Geudelekian on “What Do We Really Think of the New New Museum?”:
From the Archive
The Melancholy Marriage of Tracey Emin and Edvard Munch
What do Emin and Munch have in common other than a burning desire to embrace, and be defined by, the miseries of life? | Michael Glover
