READING GUIDE FOR CHAPTER 3 - Post-Conceptual Painting

note: this is the last chapter out of TCA that will be "testable" on the Midterm.

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What was the changed view of painting in the 1960's and why was that threatening?

What is wacky connection with Marcel Duchamp?

What are some ways that a "crisis in painting" might be described?

There are two really good questions on the bottom of p. 89... how can those be answered (after finishing the reading)?

Discuss the subject of a painting, the painted surface and "the dynamic interplay between the two" (90)... how do the artists in this chapter do that?

What is the significance of perception both *inside* the painting and also the viewer's perception of an *illusion*?

How did photography "problematize" painting?

Note Klee quote on p. 90. It's a good'un.... how does it relate to painting as more MODERN than postmodern?

What are the two significant challenges that painting faced in the 20th century (and continue today?)

Why was there a "loss in confidence in abstraction"? (91)

How did Performance Art and Conceptual art "problematize" painting?

What was the significance of CURATING the Neo-expressionist shows? Why did they need a manifesto and what points did that manifesto make?

How might Neo-expressionism be seen as "inauthentic"?

p. 98, Three ways to see Buren's projects... fyi I looked up chiliastic in my well-thumbed Webster's and it's not there... so I presume he's meaning to use chili (like, the spice) as an adjective... in other words, "hot-headed" -- might be British slang... but I digress.

Note that the third way is how Gaiger proposes to view Gerhard Richter's production. Note too the importance of Richter's WRITINGS...There are lots of good quotes... see esp. the one about painting being TOTAL IDIOCY on p. 99.

Pay attn. to question and answer session on pp. 107-108.

How might photographs be considered readymades? What are the three reasons Gaiger gives that Richter's use of photography is DIFFERENT from Duchamp's conception of a readymade?

How/why did Duchamp claim that painting was a readymade-aided enterprise? Do you agree? Why or why not? Perhaps more importantly, what would be AT STAKE by claiming that painting was readymade assisted?

Think about the term FRAME and FRAMEWORK with painting... what does they suggest? How might those terms be related to other things we are studying like Conceptual Art, for instance...? And the enterprise of postmodernism in general? Do those terms suggest Modernism in their very nature? Given this, how might we approach Richter's Four Panes of Glass (p. 116). Yes it is in response to Duchamp (so it's a type of appropriation)... but what else does it suggest to you that might make it seem the most POSTMODERN of Richter's works?

Artists:

• Gerhard Richter (note the various phases... why does he have more than one signature style? How is he an interventionist? What are his views on photography? (See esp. quote on p. 102). Note his use of a "worklist". Note use of nostalgia, purpose of grey, significance of his work falling "between representation and abstraction" (p. 119).
• Sigmar Polke (term: rasterization; this is his signature style). Why was he interested in kitsch? How is his technique similar AND DIFFERENT from Warhol and Lichtenstein?
• Georg Baselitz (note: he paints his subject matter UPSIDE DOWN.. ON PURPOSE... shut up! This is his signature style)
• David Salle (note his approach... this is his signature style).
• Julian Schnabel (in passing, why?)
• Daniel Buren (note his approach... this is his signature style... what was its original purpose and how did its significance become COMPROMISED?
• (and note who is NOT here... Chuck Close, and about a BILLION other people... why do you think that is???)

Term:

• absent reality
• Trans-avantgarde
• Neo-Expressionists
• Interventionist (!) -- note use here to describe Charles Saatchi (an Interventionist collector... what does that mean?) and also to describe Gerhard Richter...
• residual humanism, anthropological constants (these are fancy schmanzy phrases Gaiger uses... can you put them in plain English?)
• art informel
• fluxus
• Capitalist Realism
• benday dots (w/raster)... how do they "perpetually cheat" what is "perpetually promised"(p. 110)

Critics:

• Clement Greenberg (sigh...)
• Benjamin Buchloch
• Hal Foster
• Douglas Crimp (esp. his essay The End of Painting, see p. 97)
• Peter Osborne (see esp. his discussion of Photo-painting quoted on p. 115).