Date: Tue, 2 Jan 1996 08:59:12 -0500
Subject: Re: appropriation/free art


>Honoria wrote, and then Saul wrote:
>
>>> The values that mail art thrives upon
>>> - free exchange, no sales, documetation to all,mutual respect, no jury -
>>> are values that breed variety, experimentation, fringe connections,
>>> trust....friendships, a global open studio.
>
HOW MANY MAIL ART SHOWS HAVE YOU SEEN WHICH TRANSCENDED THE MEDIOCRE?
RATHER I THINK, SPEAKING HERE AS ONE WHO HAS BEEN DOING MAIL ART SINCE
1959, THE PURPOSE OF MAIL ART IS NOT TO MAKE CREDIBLE EXHIBITIONS FOR A
LARGER PUBLIC BUT FOR THE NETWORK OF US OUTSIDERS, THE BRINGING OF US
TOGETHER WITHIN A SOCIETY TO WHICH ONE IS MARGINAL AND WHICH WOULD RATHER
WE DID NOT EXIST (THUS MR. GINGERICH AND THE GINKIES' ACCUSATIONS OF
ELITISM). THIS IS NOT TO SAY THAT WE WOULD NOT PREFER TO WORK FOR A LARGER
PUBLIC, BUT THAT AS AN AVANT GARDE WE MUST ACCEPT THAT WE ARE STARTING WITH
A SMALL ONE FOR WHOM WE MAKE PROTOTYPES. YA GOTTA START SOMEWHERE, RIGHT?

>> For the most part they are also the values of late capital at least in
>> terms of culture.  It allows for free experimentation, marginalization
>> Globalism. the only difference is that in the end corporations appropriate
>> the most successful forms and styles. Imagine mail art just like the WEB
>> and the net are a labortory for  capital in which the idealists work for
>> free given that theyhave been convinced that they should not  sully their
>> self-expression with commerce.
>
>I have a question: why this concern with "appropriation"?  What does it matter
>whether corporations appropriate something?
>
CORPORATIONS CAN AND DO APPROPRIATE THINGS-GOVERNMENT GRAZING RIGHTS,
INVENTIONS OF LONE INVENTORS, ETC.

>The issue of working for free has more resonance for me.  If one works for
>free, then (assuming one isn't rich) one has to make a living doing something
>else, which means that one may not have enough mental breathing space
>to do the kind of art one wants.  There is also a kind of self-marginalization
>involved: one accedes to not necessarily doing the art one wants, and to
>relegating these activities to the status of "hobby", something that can
>be done "on the side" -- as opposed to "big", institutional art, which is
>a full-time activity.  I would be very interested in hearing what kinds
>of in-betweens there are: ways of making a living at art without having
>to institutionalize oneself.  Bartering one's work for various life-stuffs
>is one way; selling it in the street is another.  What else?
>
WELL IT BEATS BEING HOMELESS. AS ONE WHO IS UNEMPLOYED AND MORE OR LESS
UNEMPLOYABLE I AM THREATENED BY THIS AND CAN TELL YOU RIGHT OUT THAT WORRY
MAKES IT HARD TO DO MY WORK. IT UNDERMINES MY CONFIDENCE AND IS AS MUCH A
THREAT TO MY PRODUCTIVITY AS LOST TIME WOULD BE WHICH WAS GIVEN TO SOME
SUPPORTIVE EMPLOYMENT.


>-malgosia
>
>
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Dick Higgins
P O Box 27
Barrytown, NY 12507
        Tel- (914) 758-6488
        Fax- (914) 758-4416
        e-mail- dhiggins-AT-mhv.net




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