• Straight from an Art-academics mouth.. "critic and conscience" bating meeting the university's insistence that lecturers "will not bring the university into disrepute." is why he feels that he doesn't need to promote his University Employee status when he does his work... at least I think this is what he means eh Bryce Galloway?

    • Janniot Schneider likes this.

    • Sarah Jane Parton Tao, I think you completely misinterpreted what Bryce had to say. Like, really. And here's something that may come across as a low blow, but it's my opinion, and I have been mulling over it for a while: I actually think that you ask masking some resentment towards academic artists because they have financial security, access to multiple resources, and art practices that are not only supported by encouraged by their workplaces - something many artists who operate outside of universities would give their right arms for. You and I taught together at Massey, and I am pretty sure that if you had been offered a permanent position you would have taken it. As Bryce says, you don't seem to have a major problem with academics outside of Aotearoa - this appears to be a NZ specific gripe. I think it pays to be honest about where you are coming from with this criticism. You want artists who hold positions in universities to be upfront about where they're coming from - don't you think you should also do this?

    • Rob Ueberfeldt I well imagine Tao would have taken such a lucrative job offer. That doesn't mean he shouldn't be critical of the power that position brings.

    • Sarah Jane Parton Being critical is fine, but Tao is asking artist academics to be upfront about their position. I think he needs to be similarly upfront.

    • Sarah Jane Parton By fine I mean 'necessary'.

    • Sarah Jane Parton Also, I get the impression that Tao sees himself as the only politically active artist/artist making overtly political work in New Zealand. This is not the case.

    • Wells Tao That's a bit mean Sarah Jane Parton, and if possible can we stick to the points that are not personal as I feel that I have a strong argument and challenging me personally, given that this is a failry enormous issue, puts undue pressure on me.

    • Sarah Jane Parton I don't wish to be mean, Tao, and I am sorry if I have hurt you.

    • Wells Tao When we did the "Beneficiary's Offcie" it was in my opinion the very fact that we promoted our status as welfare recipients and CNZ recipents that we felt we were assured of a large audiece.

    • Wells Tao AS of challenging this mysterious academics outside of NZ... the law is substantailly different, while the principle may apply , I am not well versed in the million plus other contexts that this principle and in NZ the interpretation of the law, applies

    • Sarah Jane Parton You never answered my initial question, which was "Can you please tell me what you guys consider to be 'political' art - and please don't be deliberately obtuse - I'd love a straightforward answer from each of you. Maybe accompanied by an example. " I know that you're under no obligation to answer this, but I'd be keen to hear who you think *is* making "political" art, and what you consider "political art" to be.

    • Wells Tao As for challenging personally artist-academics from other countries, I have tried to, I took the issue up with Chris Kraus for example, but was met with a blanket denial that it was an issue, which surprissed me but the fact that she would not go into her reasoning other tahn to say that the laws were differnet for the schools she taught at.. (all private ivy league types) , so I accepted her point and tried to argue the principle.. I got no wehre. She on the other hand was well supported in the argument by another MAssey Lectuere, shoe name I forget who was a part of the discussion at the time.

    • Wells Tao What are you looking to hear Sara Sarah Jane Parton, I could offer a hundred defintions, but I'd rather not do the leg work for you to make your argument, si that ok?

    • Sarah Jane Parton I really wish I had attended that Chris Kraus talk at Massey. Does anyone know if there is footage of it available anywhere to view?

    • Wells Tao yes of course i have it here.http://vimeo.com/31671923

      Chris Kraus and Tao Wells In Conversation

      Critic, author and film maker Chris Kraus puts Tao Wells' work "The Beneficiary'...
      s Office" into context via the work of philosopher and activist Simone Weil and the…
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    • Wells Tao and here http://vimeo.com/33429659

      L'Institution Diabolique: For the LULZ

      Vimeo is the home for high-quality videos and the people who love them.

    • Wells Tao Can I ask you what you mean by myself needing to be upfront... this is entirely my intention, what am I missing here..

    • Barry Thomas I agree with Tao in the need to be as up front as possible in and around the contents and contexts of any art. Acadenics wearing artist and teacher hats water down both - esp. the artist hat. Curators like Moore and Letting space - also trying to wear artist and curator hats inevitably harm both as well So the debate then centres on institutional sanctioning (academic and curator) and the fiscal supports that come with the "jobs" making the reading of the work - less, weak, conditioned by the gagging clauses of the jobs etc. This leads to specialist academics and art institutional curatorial "industries" increasingly removed from real world art and real world issue... ie. real political social environmental change. Bryce should do work that talks about the power relations with students and his contractual obligations - oh and who he invites for BBQs ha.

    • Sarah Jane Parton If every artist academic made work about being an artist academic, would that fulfill their obligation as the 'critic and conscience of society'? I think not. Hope you're being facetious!

    • Wells Tao ok I follow your point a little more now Barry Thomas, thanks..

    • Wells Tao Yeah just to be clear I am not suggesting in any way that artist-academics need to make particular work, only they need to actively promote it as employees. and what has been suggested I think quite farily is that artist-academics risk bringing the insititution into disrepute simply by doing the job they are already doing.... which is very interesting.

    • Sarah Jane Parton I guess I'd like to know what you would do/what you did do if/when you were an artist employed by a university. How would you play the game any differently? And I'm not asking you to do the leg work for my argument - I want to see you back up yours.

    • Sarah Jane Parton I missed where you got this last point from...

    • Wells Tao Sarah Jane Parton, the entire time you and I were teaching together, I was doing my masters, which was some what of a condition for my employment in the first place, but given that my Masters work casued an enormous amount of institutional and personal distress, (I was critiiquing the hisotrical and contemporary pracitces of "avant-garde in realation to the art post grad actuality) not to mention my particiapation with an industrial dispute against the University, I am curious to what you think my politics are? After this I was not offered a contract to return...

    • Sarah Jane Parton Tao. I started that industrial dispute. No need to mansplain at me, thanks.

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    • Sarah Jane Parton I guess, from my perspective, the artist-academics (as you have coined them) I know are just people doing their jobs. Their jobs which are teaching and admin and art making. Some of these people share my values, some don't. All make work which is political on some level. Some of the work isn't very good, some of it is great. Some of the politics are overt, some are subtle. Some miss the point they are trying to make entirely. Some nail it. The responses they receive critically often reflect how well they are doing as the 'critic and conscience of society'. Sometimes the works don't receive any critical response at all, but they might still be strong and effective works. Or not. There are robust systems in academia in NZ, and there are shoddy ones. It's all a mixed bag, and once you start generalising and calling for some sort of overhaul or something then shit gets problematic.

    • Wells Tao That's fine Sarah Jane Parton, if you don't agree or don't want to particiapte, that is no reflection on you we all have stuff to do and choices to make. All good.

    • Sarah Jane Parton I think we're talking on two entirely different planes here. Justine's right! Next time I see you, mate.

    • Wells Tao take a number... ;)

    • Sarah Jane Parton For the record, I'm all about workers' rights, as you know, and that's where I'm coming from, 'kay?

    • Wells Tao you just said that it's all to hard too criticise the system , too problematic, obviously i couldn't be further from that opinion. NOt because i think anything will change, I simply find the contradictions, attractive enough to enage with.

    • Sarah Jane Parton No, I didn't say that - I described some of the complexities of the system, to illustrate the need for a complex response. For criticism that isn't blunt or attack-y.

    • Wells Tao Well that is what you want, I'm sorry I can't address your particular needs, really.. perhaps you can find a way to work with it anyway..

    • Wells Tao I too am critical of my method, i have made a conscious decesion to align my self with the styles of the "conspiracy theorists" and that whole scene , for I feel that a lot of the material that our public institutions have avoided engaging,.. 9/11 etc.. I'd like to find a way to take the shock of the new and make it pedestrian, but well. I'm this way...

    • Wells Tao I also work with a model of society that includes radicals, they link to translators, who interpret for the masses... we all play these roles, at different times.

    • Barry Thomas Radical means... the growing tip. but who "pays" for work done 35 years ago as a then radical act ... now almost a semi industrial act. Artists are not only translators but meme re-directors (the role in itself being one such act/meme).

    • Barry Thomas One further solution is... who wants to start our own Black Mountain, Bahaus school? The next, next, next generations need the likes of this debate - firmly on the art academic agenda nay?

    • Bryce Galloway Just to say that the quote that started your dialogue was misinterpreted AND taken out of context. Yes guys, that's a low blow, and shoddy blogging. I won't bother contributing more Tao, as I find our conversation particularly prone to misinterpretation.

    • Richard Benjamin Keys I would just like to come on the record and say; "Art" (the institution) is a bourgeoisie pastime and the the "Arts" as they exist in the Academy are a padded cell in the ivory tower for those that are too smart for their own good, where people write papers on papers on papers... and overly intellectualized art with about as much revolutionary potency as a Che Guevara t shirt.

      I say this as someone currently employed by the academy - a pact with the devil - ....

      Good on ya Tao, atleast you evidently know how to 'critique' in a manner that challenges, and demands some sought of response.

      Meanwhile, back to my editing and footnoting :-)

    • Richard Benjamin Keys Might I also say - overhaul the motherfucker. The ivory tower is redundant, lets smash it down, and disperse the cultural capital they have been hoarding to the multitude.

    • Barry Thomas Go the Big footnoter - well said Rich... shooting the big footnoters... it's an whole new art form... like Yeti hunting nay? Hey Rich - maybe one day art will solve or help solve homelessness - till then we will poke sticks at the insular ivories in the big foot noters mouths... god don't you love a multi mixed metaphore or seven

    • Wells Tao Well I think it's about time you took the high road Bryce as I've been trying to demonstrate you (art-academics) don't seem to have a leg to stand on...

    • Barry Thomas Hang on - big foot noter doesn't have a leg to stand on - coz he shot it off - I love it

    • Richard Benjamin Keys Mummified in red-tape, repeating footnotes in chicago style compulsively, he was taken from the Ivory tower to the Insane Asylum, to be heavily, heavily medicated.

    • Barry Thomas Aparently "being "round the bend" came from Bedlam (London) havinga curved road to prevent the mad fucker watchers seeing all the mad people

    • Barry Thomas Nutter touriam

    • Barry Thomas nutter tourism that was

    • Barry Thomas How about "Occupy the academy"???!!!???

    • Barry Thomas Academics operate in a circular (closedish) circle niche... If you footnote or reference someone outside the usual suspects you risk being a laughing stock. Pure ideas artists re-write the memes with the bravery they lack. Very few people have original thoughts and need less padding.

    • Barry Thomas and less patting

    • Richard Benjamin Keys I would say "very few people" given the society we live in/constitute... and it's educational systems. I notice children seem to be far more prone to the sought of "original thinking" & spontaneity that you outline.

      That is until you've been strapped enough times for fucking up your times tables or drawing over the lines.

    • Richard Benjamin Keys https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0eVTeQi06c

      This Heat - S.P.Q.R.

      This Heat - S.P.Q.R. Deceit 1981 Amo amas amat amamis amatis amant We are all ro...
      mans unconscious collective We are all romans we live to regret it We are all...
      See More

    • Barry Thomas wow - funny you should say that... I just remembered Brice is the guy who gave my son a bad mark for his first film!!! - goddam - who would do that? and why?

    • Richard Benjamin Keys "We are all romans, & we live to regret it, and we know all about straight roads, every straight road leads home, home to rome... 2+2=4, 4 + 4 = 8!"

    • Barry Thomas Hey richard - how much do you get the "dickeys" name put down thing?

    • Richard Benjamin Keys It has happened Barry. Primarily back in the school yard funnily enough.

      --
      It's funny how the ahhh "defenders of the faith" in this thread all work for( or have) Massey University?

    • Wells Tao or use to, Massey was a pretty radical place when I first got there.. well it had this one crazy paper... Boot camp.

    • Wells Tao If we can try to keep this non personal debate, (i'm trying!) I'd appreciate it... ;)

    • Jakki Newton ....as a wife, and a mother, as a women, as the subject of much of Bryce Galloway's work ... I know how political it is. It speaks about the challenges, stereotypes and expectations of contemporary domestic life. What could be more political than that?

    • Sarah Jane Parton I don't understand how you think you can separate the personal and the political, Tao. To me that smacks of the white supremacist capitalist patriarchy.

    • Sarah Jane Parton I'm not saying we all need to bare all, but I do think that we need to talk from our own POVs and attempt to understand the POVs of others. Which means getting a little bit personal. Ideas are not lofty things floating around the buena vista - they don't spawn forth from a vacuum. Ideas come from people, real people like us lot, even when we are separated from our more corporal realities via the internet.

    • Richard Benjamin Keys Hahaha. Isn't the central issue here that the university/academy as a institution has a conflicting self-definition? Not Taos white supremacy (he is a card carrying member of the KKK -clearly or lack of a blue collar, sport loving lifestyle)

      The "average person" wants revolution - I asked them-, but they just have too many damn HP's...

    • Sarah Jane Parton White supremacist capitalist patriarchy = a term coined by bell hooks, Richard. I'm talking about seeing things as political from a point of view that is not privileging a) whiteness, b) capitalism, or c) maleness.

    • Richard Benjamin Keys In other words... are these not the central issues?

      Has the university become as dominated by neo-liberalism as the rest of the quickly receeding "public" sphere?

      Is being the "critic and conscience" of society mitigated by the ""will not bring the university into disrepute." clause?

    • Sarah Jane Parton And avoiding condescension (aka comments about HPs).

    • Sarah Jane Parton Only if your primary focus is critiquing the university, and only then if you were to do so in an ill-informed/shoddy manner, I reckon.

    • Richard Benjamin Keys Sarah, you have out intellectualized me, replete with references and seemingly missed my point?

    • Sarah Jane Parton What do you even mean by neo-liberalism? Christ, people really do bandy such terms about willy-nilly.

    • Sarah Jane Parton Please explain your point again - I am totally lost!

    • Sarah Jane Parton Look, I'm not defending the 'university' as an institution, nor am I maligning it. It is our responsibility as members of society to critique all of the institutions we have established/maintained. I am dead against attacking individuals, especially workers. I am dead against attacking artists. This has never been a good thing in any society. I really don't think it's productive. I think engaging with folks about their work is valuable, but not backing them into corners.

    • Richard Benjamin Keys In relation to the neo-liberalism in the university... I was simply suggesting maybe the university is increasingly becoming a business, orientated by financial dictates over its traditional directives as outlined above.

      In saying that hasn't the university always been a central institution of the hegemonic order.

    • Sarah Jane Parton Yeah, but I think that is changing, I really do.

    • Richard Benjamin Keys Personally, I'm not interested in that either.

      But I am skeptical of the universities role in terms of providing the above critique, and then importantly that this critique is translated into some sort of meaningful socio-political change.

      From the inside, it does seem like alot of writing papers, about papers...

    • Sarah Jane Parton It will take ages, for sure, but the three universities that I have been involved with over the past three years have all been moving forwards in leaps and bounds in terms of breaking down hierarchies and dismantling the hegemony. They are much more progressive that corporates, who have more money, or other areas of the public sector, who (it could be argued) have a stronger mandate. The only area I have seen things move faster is in ECE.

    • Sarah Jane Parton Yeah, but ^ that's the kind of glib thing one can throw about without truly engaging, innit?

    • Richard Benjamin Keys I think thats true... to a degree.

      But it shits me that the knowledge that it produces is so unaccessible to a large amount of the population.

    • Richard Benjamin Keys I.E it feel's like alot of preaching to the choir, and being balked at by the majority of students as a crazy leftist bohemian. Though it's always worth it when the penny drops, and you seem them thinking, and questioning in a transformative way.

    • Sarah Jane Parton So what do we do about that? I mean, in the suburb I grew up in, just thirty minutes from Wellington by train, there are teenagers who have never been to the city. This isn't a new thing. I discussed this problem - the issue of singing to the choir - with a guy who I'm in an exhibition with at the moment, who I've know for years, and who still lives out there. He thinks it's hopeless, that the divide is growing, and that there's nothing we can do about it. I remain optimistic, but think it's a long and difficult project. Proselytizing ain't gonna get us nowhere, but working and communicating just might. Bryce's zines, for instance - they have potential on that front. If they work their way into the libraries in the provinces, or the high school curriculum - well, that's a start. Small steps.

    • Richard Benjamin Keys Sure... one step at a time.

      I talk to people, and I mean everyone, and discuss issues/ideas I care about... using the terms best suited to the context as I am able, I also mingle with people from a fairly range of socio-economic classes, backgrounds etc. I think this is significant in itself.

      -communicating-

      I think certain academics who have a strong critical voice have been getting more exposure in the "popular" world too - Zizek as an example -esp through the blogospher, youtube videos of lectures etc... which is promising.

    • Jakki Newton "I don't understand how you think you can separate the personal and the political, Tao. To me that smacks of the white supremacist capitalist patriarchy." Sarah Jane Parton I agree with this. Wells Tao idea of what is 'political' seems particularly narrow.

    • Barry Thomas Perhaps this is the new academy... teaching the perverted... joke... I mean - what better place to debate and contest and resolve (as opposed to run away to the safe ivories of academia BRYCEE... Tao and I have discussed something similar but hey... here for your eyes only... YMEDACA... the new academy... why not - it's about as free an institution for learning as i can know. oh and it can travel - to places 30 mins away (by which you mean Sarah Jane Parton that you are in a better more important place than them?!?)

    • Richard Benjamin Keys Sounds like something a bloody urban capitalist would say huh Barry. Haha.

    • Sarah Jane Parton No, by which I mean, Barry, that they are 30 minutes away from the university. That's all.

    • Jakki Newton What do you do Barry Thomas that gives you the moral high ground?

    • Richard Benjamin Keys Maybe Barry is taking the piss Sarah... in reference to when you implied Tao was a white supremacist capitalist patriarch, and I hate on the working class cause I made a joke about HP's.

    • Richard Benjamin Keys I'm pretty sure he is Christ among men.

    • Jakki Newton sounds like it

    • Sarah Jane Parton I didn't imply that Tao was a white supremacist capitalist patriarch, but I will state that I think that he is perpetuating the white supremacist capitalist patriarchy through the way he insists on defining the 'political' in art. And Barry... jesus, mate. Barry's an artist and a great community volunteer and a good dude, but he does seem to me to have a chip on his shoulder right now. I mean, Barry, you would love Bryce's work, if you haven't seen it already you should check it out.

      • Wells Tao "I think that he is perpetuating the white supremacist capitalist patriarchy through the way he insists on defining the 'political' in art." how's that SaraSarah Jane Parton? Care to explain?

      • Sarah Jane Parton Because you seem to think - or at least this is how I am reading your position - that the only way art can be political is if it yells at everyone, loudly, from some sort of pedestal. And gets everyone's attention that way. That it's only successful if everyone hears it, and that it's only worthwhile if it espouses the same politics you hold dear. That is, of course, only my personal reading, informed by listening to you speak and reading your facebook posts and interpreting the art of yours which I have had the opportunity to experience. I am happy to be wrong here, but I don't think that I am. I think that if I was wrong, then your voice wouldn't be quite so loud and insistent, because you would understand the position of privilege you are speaking from, and you would want to allow the space for the voices of others, those who are marginalised and disenfranchised, to be heard.

      • Wells Tao that is not my position.

      • Wells Tao Umm... I do not follow your line of reasoning Sara Sarah Jane Parton, and don't know what to make of your assumptions about my intent, or for that matter your summary of my effect. Except to say that if you feel that my bringing up this argument about art-academics takes space away from the voices of others as you have implied then I have made a tremendous mistake.

      • Wells Tao But I do not see how. I am using every bit of leverage and positioning I have to get this argument on the "books' So to speak and after a year, I am still spending a great deal of time trying to explain concepts I would have thought were straight forward enough to be fairly self evident. I have to say I am a bit shocked at the smugness of "opposition" in this line of comments... Seems to be the standard I have encountered in other contexts of "forget the principle or the reason, we protect our own" kind of logic of the gravy train.. can I ask are in line for a job at Massey Sara Jane?

      • Wells Tao There was one going recently

      • Sarah Jane Parton In the time you've know me, have I ever been one to shy away from criticising institutions? I'll answer that: no. I have no problem with criticising the things that don't work in university art schools, be they at Massey, or Elam, or Ilam, or wherever. Ironically, in the context of this here discussion, I've just written a novel as my MA thesis that on one level works as a critique of university art schools. Am I up for attacking workers who do their jobs, however? No. I don't think that's constructive. I also don't like these weird attacks that arts practitioners in NZ keep making on 'artists'. I keep laying eyes on these all over the internet. What sort of a community are we wanting to foster here? One of nasty attacks that serve no one?

      • Wells Tao Sarah Jane Parton, I have made a small flotilla of video's and on line arguments that document my argument, that these workers that I am "attacking" in your language, criticizing in mine, are precisely NOT DOING THEIR JOB. I have tried to make this clear but not one of my arguments have made an impression on you at all. You do not see my point, and have insisted that i give you a personal tour of the idea, and that too has failed. I'm not sure that more can be asked of me or you at this point.
      • Write a reply...

    • Jakki Newton Exactly Sarah Jane!

    • Richard Benjamin Keys I kinda seems like people are debating different-overlaping issues. And Tao and Bryce are almost being scapegoated as representing certain broader trends?

    • Jakki Newton 'Political' is the detail. The everyday. Politics aren't just policy and parliament.

    • Jakki Newton Tao isn't being scapegoated. He started this discussion.

    • Wells Tao great to see some interest in this idea, perhaps sometime we will actually get to debate the merits of the idea. It's over a year old, and shows no sign of going away...

    • Barry Thomas Jakki Newton - I once (Sarah Jane Parton) did a painting of "Self portrait with a chip on my shoulder" (it was crinkle cut) Then another "Self portrait with a spelling mistake on my shoulder" (a sailing "ship") - what do I do? I guess I think and react and leave traces of that thinking - Sarah knows me a little - she knows about 4 of the hundreds of works of art I have made and probably none of the hundreds of films I have made - Moral High ground - I dunno about that - I like Tao - I like his ideas - why? because I recognise a fellow traveller who is preparred to rise above the purse strings and think about deep contradictions and come out the other side with dignity and (sarah) humour. What forces you to ask Jakkkkkiiiii? Sorry decent to petty. I reckon this is good healthy debate and rare - keep it up folks. Most academics take the hegeMONEY and play the game - their connection to the real world - as you point up Rich - is increasingly a paid for industrial backhander exercise so the institution is increasingly sidelined as not affecting the real world other than pumping students through the sausage machine.

    • Barry Thomas Tao - exactly what was the idea again? Political art? art/academics and their two hats compromises? lack of honesty?

    • Tim Barlow And so artists should be debating these issues! without the personal subtexts! They seem fundamental questions to me, 'what is the critical and social responsibilty of artists ( and art academics)' ,' how do they reconcile politics in their practice to their public role', ' 'why is $1m of public money spent on a Parekowhais work'. Many artists have been asking these questions increasingly over the last few years, if not decades. Good to see Adam Art gallery tackling these issues( in their own way) recently. Strange to hear Gap-filler claiming they have a determined apolitical position, can public art practices be apolitical? I don't think so. Is political context more important than political content?, Political context becomes more significant at times when elites, cliques and instrumental organisations have increasing power. Also good to see Wells Tao , Barry Thomas, Sarah Jane Parton, Bryce Galloway, and others,some of the more interesting voices of this debate leading the charge. I don't have a problem with artists critiquing other artists, its just when the arguments go pear shaped due to misunderstandings of humour/irony etc. it can sound really catty!

    • Barry Thomas Go Tim... Yes I thought Letting Space and Gap Fillers' determined answers to my question of the perceived "movement" which their recent City art gal PR stunt - a week back when I asked if this required a re-defining of art - both LS and GF determined said no! worse that wha both organisations did had little to do with art!!! crap. I mean both engage with and employ artists - so is what they make then not art?!? doh. Your angle they / others - esp in the "participatory arts world" too - that they are de politicised is truely scary mate - What they are saying therefore is: if we say it's not art or political then - THE FUNDERS WILL LIKE IT???

    • Barry Thomas Radical is always political because the new memes on offer challenge the status quo - being nice doesn't cut the mustard - change makers, new meme creators will get precisely nowhere if they / we do cute stuff that panders - ie. here's a really hard edged verson... if we take environmental damage as subject and western civilisation's addiction to crop and say dairy production as egs of how environmental damage occurs - rather than doing a cute song or picture about it - exactly what actions demonstrate the imperitive to change?

    • Tim Barlow That reminds me of something Martha Rosler said once when she tried to produce political billboards specifically about localisms, labor, class politics her ideas were rejected, but if they were about more general issues ,in this case feminism, the sponsoring art institution lapped it up

      • Barry Thomas Yeah but... what I am getting at is... if (as with many of the things I have done - and you I understand...) take the art to the marketplace - to the feilds, the deserts etc and in my posited example - into the dairy farms of aotearoa and take action - as art - then you have the chnce that it will spreahead revolt within the contexts of that niche - as well as the art world. sadly Tao's bene office got headlines for poor reasons pointing up a severly right wing media with no brain for real change and or debate. So did beneficiary protocols change for the better? - well at worst at least alternate questions were raised. but if the art had actually gone down to WINZ and DSW head office - as "gallery" it could well have taken on an whole other dimension. The mere fact that it honestly showed it's "arse" in saying how it was funded - became the headline - which was very sad... perhaps naiive of how current media works. But going back to my environmental issues as art... what happens if 50 artists use roundup across the country's paddocks to deliver messages about environmental degradation? World news right?
      • Write a reply...

    • Jakki Newton to Barry Thomas - the debate is fine ... to criticise individual artists when they don't even know their work is not fine. To call someone a fraud when their work specifically critics and challenges these hierarchies (universities, museums, galleries) is not fine. It is ignorant.

    • Barry Thomas I haven't called anyone a fraud have I? I know how I have been treated by Victoria University and art academics oh and one lecturer at Massey - sorry if you have taken offense please explain?

    • Jakki Newton Wells Tao called Bryce a fraud.

    • Wells Tao yes Jakki Newton, that is my assertion. All art-academics that receive public money to take a public role and knowingly don't adequately promote that fact so that the general public sees that the job they are paying for is being done, perpetuates a fraud on that paying public.

    • Wells Tao Perhaps you could watch my videos where I explain in more detail, the idea.. .http://vimeo.com/28767018

      How To Make Money From Art - A Lecture By Tao Wells (2011)

      Wells Group Presents: How To Make Money From Art Introduction (0-3m) Part 1: Th...
      e Art School (3-15m) Part 2: The Bell Curve (16-20m) Part 3: The Vision (20-25m) Part…
      See More

    • Wells Tao http://vimeo.com/33465647

      How To Make Money From Art: The Tutorial

      The question and answer session from the Tao Wells lecture "How To Make Money From Art" (http://vimeo.com/28767018).

    • Wells Tao http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhfYSxaf3Hw

      The Mechanical Canary in the Gold Mind

      Artists Discussion about major fraud perpetuated by Universities It matters who ...
      pays your bills because among other reasons, when you do a job for some one t...
      See More

    • Wells Tao http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRGB7PPfCtM&feature=relmfu

      The Shadow Illuminating the Wall of the Cave - 32min

      Artists Discussion about major fraud perpetuated by Universities It matters who ...
      pays your bills because among other reasons, when you do a job for some one t...
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    • Jakki Newton Wells Tao but most of them are acknowledging they are lecturers ... including Bryce Galloway. They are even writing about the compromises and effects this has on their work. It seems you are making assumptions about many individuals work without fully knowing their work. It seems you are closed to the possibility that they might be acting critically? Or are you making these assertions merely to elevate your own status? Seems like it to me.

      • Wells Tao Hi Jakki Newton, the content of the work an art-academic is not an issue for me because by being state paid intellectuals their work automatically in my opinion is political. My point is that because this quality is able to be inferred on all art-academic work that is state paid, art-academics risk a great deal of debate around the content of their work with said public so don't promote themselves in the same way that say Massey Scientist Mike Joy does, By introducing his funding/ his position as a paid member of an authority, and the responsibilities that entails: FIRST, because, as Bryce had suggested earlier that to do so would dare to go near the job losing quality of "will not bring the university into disrepute". The trade off though for me is that in assertively promoting the art-academics paid position in an institution, the general public once having been given the chance to participate in the work, even at the cruel and debased level of mass media, an impression might be made that there is what there actually is, a paid by the state group of intellectuals who are being the critic's and conscience of society. And in doing so take some of the heat off those not in institutions, not being paid, who are also trying to participate in the public critique of society.

      • Sarah Jane Parton Tao, I'm finding your argument very hard to follow.

      • Sarah Jane Parton I am pretty sure it doesn't make sense, m'dear.

      • Wells Tao I guess I have tried to approach this whole issue as an art work, there is confusion, there are a lot of different complicated ideas, trying to be expressed though one specific idea. And even that particular idea is difficult to grasp for many satisfactorily. But I have to say, that many have. I certainly don't feel alone, nor am I as sensitive to feeling bullied as I feel I have been in the past. This work has been going on for a long time now.. I can see some development.

      • Sarah Jane Parton Just take care not to be a bully in your determination not to BE bullied... it can happen easily.

      • Wells Tao yes, very easily. There are a lot of roles one is forced to take doing this type of work, and it is easy to over look them or to forget them until they are brought to your attention. Similar in nature I believe to what I am trying to suggest art- academics are going through... etc etc
      • Write a reply...

    • Barry Thomas Slightly different tack... BUT - today on 9 to noon (having had email reference between myself and Mark Amery three weeks ago - which connected the current 70's New York/ USA artist's work on homelessness in NY - connecting this to my homelessness "thread" work performed at the same Adam -) Mark A decides to support more provincialist yanky art leadership meme by saying nothing about the thread work. He further went on at length about the revolution in world art of 70's artists finding new support among currrent gen artists... esp political art. So the Academy - paid for double or multiple hat wearing art curator/commentator/artists like SJ and MA happy to promote Billy Apple - in this context not me and my current and old work... Why? because the powers that be LS now firmly among them - plus the Academy - simply want their version of PR history their way... this is what Mussolini, Hitler, Saatchis all do and did. Olgarchy/ hegemony and vested interest cliques desperately locking arms as the pesants circle?

    • Cameron Mckechnie Sounds like Art is being Occupied to me!

    • Barry Thomas Oligarty - now there's a goodun.

    • Jakki Newton come on you guys you are all so self pitying ... comparing Mark Amery to Hitler now. What nonsense.

      • Barry Thomas If you willfully manipulate media and distort truth, fact and what actually happened - you follow the path of Joseph Goebbels - Hitler's PR guru. Saatchis simply stole $1,000,000 from all NZ's green groups in the 90's then smothered the story... the list is endless. Hegemony, oligarchy - it's what markets make...
      • Write a reply...

    • Barry Thomas What happens is this: 1. A clique forms - be it Surrealist, White Fungus, letting Space, gap Filler even Weta, 3 foot 6 and 7 . and Cubists 2. The media and other "watchers" get on board. 3. Funders play ball. 4. various written and unwritten rules of engagement are accepted and adhered to. 5. Others are then sidelined - including Duchamp with the cubists nay. 6. The prior rules of friendships, collegial affinities are quickly forgotten - esp. if the likes of Tao and myself want to talk about any of this - publically. 7. Those "in the club" develop reduced capacity to smell their own farts, a willingness to piss only in the "in club's" pockets as they diddle paint brushes in the institutional circle of pocket pissers. 8. Ex and current "in clubbers" pay each other to write flattering "essays" of faux history lauding each other as their pockets wett with the DNA of their "members". 9. Alternate and more honest debate develops between those that can see these patterns and wish/ need/ are obliged by their own conscience (latin... to know) to speak freely in this kind of alternate academy. 10. Yes it gets personal - but only if such friendships are of less ultimate value than truth. For which read never. 11. As with the current Adam show of the media collective the willful use of, then exclusion of artists like Stewart Porter (ex Artists co-op) ie. Stewart not even invited to the show but his work with Braille records used in the show - mirrors how the Adam has treated me - and no doubt many others... as Gerrard Crewdson and I said very recently - "simple human respect and good manners would have prevented artists having to speak out about being so badly trreated" - ie. the institution - whilst aiming to demonstrate collectivity, honouring older political artists - simply do not keep them in the "in loop" - so you get arrogance, ivory tower disconnect to the real world of mainly very poor, thinking art leaders used by the institutions as their fodder for their incomes and power and history. 12. So this begins to set down, for the record, other histories of othering.

    • Cameron Mckechnie What happens is this:

      1. A clique forms - be it Surrealist, White Fungus, letting Space, gap Filler even Weta, 3 foot 6 and 7 . and Cubists

      2. The media and other "watchers" get on board.

      3. Funders play ball.

      4. various written and unwritten rules of engagement are accepted and adhered to.

      5. Others are then sidelined - including Duchamp with the cubists nay.

      6. The prior rules of friendships, collegial affinities are quickly forgotten - esp. if the likes of Tao and myself want to talk about any of this - publically.

      7. Those "in the club" develop reduced capacity to smell their own farts, a willingness to piss only in the "in club's" pockets as they diddle paint brushes in the institutional circle of pocket pissers.

      8. Ex and current "in clubbers" pay each other to write flattering "essays" of faux history lauding each other as their pockets wett with the DNA of their "members".

      9. Alternate and more honest debate develops between those that can see these patterns and wish/ need/ are obliged by their own conscience (latin... to know) to speak freely in this kind of alternate academy.

      10. Yes it gets personal - but only if such friendships are of less ultimate value than truth. For which read never.

      11. As with the current Adam show of the media collective the willful use of, then exclusion of artists like Stewart Porter (ex Artists co-op) ie. Stewart not even invited to the show but his work with Braille records used in the show - mirrors how the Adam has treated me - and no doubt many others... as Gerrard Crewdson and I said very recently - "simple human respect and good manners would have prevented artists having to speak out about being so badly trreated" - ie. the institution - whilst aiming to demonstrate collectivity, honouring older political artists - simply do not keep them in the "in loop" - so you get arrogance, ivory tower disconnect to the real world of mainly very poor, thinking art leaders used by the institutions as their fodder for their incomes and power and history.

      12. So this begins to set down, for the record, other histories of othering.

    • Cameron Mckechnie formatted the post for ya! :-)

    • Tim Barlow The issues you Barry Thomas are bringing up are critical. If we look back historically at NZ art institutions support or sponsoring of art and activism it is appalling.(let alone of general political public art practice). The mainstream NZ art industry still thrives on pictorialism, consumerism, ideas of artistic autonomy and control by dealer galleries, collectors and curators. Also think you're wrong on lots of things, I totally support Letting Space for taking on difficult public art projects like with Tao Wells Tao , Mark Harvey and associated talks.I I think Barry needs to be recognised institutionally for his art and activism. However I've multiple problems with the many ideas going on this thread. Facebook is a shit place to debate these things, much better in a physical space, with actions, visuals, people and emotions. Also Tao's fixation on the academics critical conscience is challenging but ultimately a dead end. All he's suggesting is that some artist/academic introduces themselves 'hi I'm Tim I work for Massey or whoever' and the public (which public? the artists listening to him?) are going to be emancipated. WTF ! suddenly radicalism is reduced to interpretation of job description.

    • Wells Tao https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10151127838162181&set=a.10150429143907181.358274.577792180&type=3&theater

      facts as figures


      Art-Academics are important as public symbols paid for by the public to be "crit...
      ic's and consciences of society". Currently their hard work is not actively promoted as representing their employment and in my opinion this contributes to the public impression that there is little to no institutional support for the validity and promotion of personal expression in public, the subjective experiences of politics. Instead we have a kind of no accountability vacuum where nothings sticks unless you are at the bottom of the power pyramid. To me the New Zealand Terrorist raids on radicals, activists and artists, is a perpetual result of this created vacuum. Laura Wells and I spent a year in court facing accusations of fraud for doing "The Beneficiary's Office", we were aggressively persecuted and intimidated by a Ministry because we chose the right to free speech. What we experienced during this time was that we were not a one off exception but just one of the invisibles subject to a system of abuse. One that escalates today. One that we would like some help to criticize.
      See More

      By: Wells Tao

    • Sarah Jane Parton This is what I see happening, and it bothers me:

      A rewriting of what is happening in New Zealand art presently that is willfully ignorant and oversimplifies issues.

      Tao, just because you claim that no artist academics are doing their jobs as the 'c      ritics and conscience of society' doesn't make it true. But if you shout for long enough you'll wear everyone else out, and then nothing will be achieved but a shitty rewrite of history. Some artist academics are doing a good job as the 'critics and conscience of society', some aren't. This is the actual truth, and as someone who knows the work of many artist academics, I am sure you know this. Oversimplifying and generalising to make a point is ultimately pointless. It achieves nothing. That illustration is you mythologising - things are way more complicated than that.

    • Wells Tao Sarah Jane Parton, as i've said earlier, I don't see you understanding my argument in any way, but don't feel to puzzled about it. Not many do. I am sorry that I can't make more sense. Of course you know I am trying.

    • Sarah Jane Parton Planets on different trajectories... or maybe even in different solar systems.

    • Wells Tao Well I appreciate that you have tried to engage with my work Sara Jane, as frustrating as it has been ;) I thank you for reminding me (and Jakki Newton) some of the important aspects to this kind of work. Aspects that I was finding very difficult.

    • Tim Barlow I'm probably preaching to the converted but Wells Tao you make me think of John Latham, the English art lecturer who got fired after feeding a university library book by Clement Greenberg to his students back in the 60's (70's?). The institution didn't appreciate the chewed up remains deposited back to the library!. My only point being, why so much focus on the university as the critical conscience?, we know their limitations , (much as the myth of the '68 student revolution at Nanterre and Sorbonne lives on). Activism has long disposed of the university art lecturer.

      • Wells Tao Great to mention this work of John Latham, I remember really struggling with it when I first heard about it, It was a kind of joke shared between art tutors at the time, it's more serious aspects deemed to idealistic to be accomodated locally. Now I relish it's deeply awkward, human qualities and it's brutal juxtapostion and illumination of a systems systematic deletion of unacceptable criticism.
      • Write a reply...

    • Wells Tao Well, mainly because I was so surprised that this quality was listed as a necessity for a university to be called a university, by law. There are actually a list of five if I remember qualities, all worthy of debate. I picked "critic.." for its particular relevance to my own practice, and the way that I feel my market is flooded by a particularly well subsidized competitor.

    • Tim Barlow Yes and I agree with this. it seems to be an exponential trend, but what I think would impress upon 'public' consciousness is facts on this trend, i.e the percentage of university lecturers now being represented in public galleries and exhibitions because this is very different than decision making positions (which I'm sure the public will expect from 'experts')

    • Wells Tao Please be my guest to promote facts on this trend. That would be great to see and I'd enjoy the company. I don't grasp your meaning about "very different than decision making positions". Art academics that teach I believe make decisions all the time about what is "good" and what is not "good" art... no?

    • Doco Stevador What might some nice sanctions be for the already subsidised academic artist so that they don't crowd the space that Tao is talking of? Having worked in both the university and various arts areas, I wouldn't be averse to making an academic position conditional on some restrictions for the time of employment such as inelligibility for CNZ funding, inelligibility for showings outside of university galleries. Obviously this'd make some difficult spaces to delineate (but we don't have committees for nought!) but at least it would clarify the intent around being an artist employed by a university.

    • Tim Barlow Of course, what I mean is that from a public perception point of view I think it would be expected for university lecturers as so-called 'experts' to be in decision-making positions. i.e on art boards, committees etc BUT public perception could have a real problem if these same experts are also being represented in all the exhibitions, art projects etc

    • Wells Tao I don't support any limitations or sanctions on an art academics freedom, I would like them to compete fairly, and for me that simply but powerfully means promoting the finances behind the work submitted.

    • Doco Stevador If anyone is looking for more on the critic and conscience role of academics, I'd suggest Todd Bridgman's work, particularly that which deals with business school academics and the financial crisis. just google it - the link is quite ugly and long.

    • Wells Tao "This article considers the possibilities of, and threats to, the performance of a critical public role by business school faculty, based on an empirical study of UK research-led business schools. Its reference point is a recent debate about the `relev...See More

      Reconstituting Relevance
      mlq.sagepub.com
      This article considers the possibilities of, and threats to, the performance of ...
      a critical public role by business school faculty, based on an empirical study of UK research-led business schools. Its reference point is a recent debate about the `relevance' of management education to management pract...
      See More

    • Wells Tao Great to see this Doco Stevador, really appreciate it.

    • Doco Stevador I know it is not in the area of the arts, but I think it is important to see the C&C ideas in the institutional setting in which they arose. That wouldn't be to distance art academics from their responsibilties/accountabilities, but to show people that there are many people who take this part of being an academic quite seriously.

    • Wells Tao recently i interviewed Dr John Robinson about the idea of perpetual economic growth vs the limits to resources and over population. He related to me a story about how a university which had previously offered him a job to teach economics, now told him that they could no longer encourage him to be a part of their faculty because if students followed the ideas in his teachings, they would not be employed by the institutions that are doing the hiring. Quite simple really. http://thefaceofpanic.blogspot.co.nz/2012_10_07_archive.html

      The Face of Panic: 2012-10-07
      thefaceofpanic.blogspot.com

    • Doco Stevador You're looking all beardy and sexy these days, Wells Tao.

    • Wells Tao why thank you Doc, I do feel rather pungent

    • Wells Tao at the moment

    • Doco Stevador Oh, and one more lil trick: perhaps a OIA request to some department for all of their internal correspondence on the critic and conscience materials. www.fyi.org.nz - this provides hours of (a) employment for administrators and (b) fun for you!

      FYI - Make and browse Official Information Act (OIA) requests
      fyi.org.nz
      Every citizen has the right to access information held by public authorities. By...
      law, they have to respond. Find out more about freedom of information.
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