Organized Art:Why art is antagonised by organisation

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Organized(1) Art: Why art is antagonised by organisation?

Fragment 1 Contradictory: art resists organisation and resents being organised, and yet there is a culture of Art and Exhibition.Criminal: collective intent corrupted by media, capitalism and the sporadic and wilful acts of individuals.Americanised: language as power.Conceited: a gesture toward the academic form and function and what feels like false authority on the part of its author.


Preface

Organisation is as discreet as it is obvious - describing the territory for investigation has proven difficult and open-ended. As a means of tying-off certain threads I have inserted fragments where further research presents itself. The territory of this thesis is in fact a reduction of my original intent - to describe the inter-related spheres that influence the situation of the contemporary artist, and the socio-political context for artistic practice in Britain at this time. It’s a big ask, but that’s what I’m interested in. Research of a more specific nature might have yielded a more academic thesis but it would not have supported my ‘studio practice’ in the same way – unless I had planned to write several – as such I set out to write a broad survey of the administration and accountability of individual and organised activity in relation to social and economic policy (from the point of view of an inexperienced artist who has not worked with the Arts Council).


Introduction

“Organisations of convenience in an antagonistic society must necessarily pursue particular ends; they do this at the expense of the interests of other groups. Therefore obduracy and reification necessarily result. If such organisations continue to occupy a subordinate position within which they were totally open and honest towards their membership and its direct desires, they would be incapable of any action. The more firmly integrated they are, the greater is their prospect for asserting themselves in relation to others… Their external effectivity is a function of their inner homogeneity, which in turn is dependant upon the so-called totality gaining primacy over individual interests, so that the organisation [in the capacity or function of organisation] takes the place of such interests. An organisation is forced into independence by self-preservation; at the same time this establishment of independence leads to alienation from its purposes and from the people of whom it is composed… Finally – in order to be able to pursue its goals appropriately – it enters into a contradiction with them.”(T.W.Adorno (Ed. J.M.Bernstein), Culture and Administration, The Culture Industry. Routledge, 1991)

In his book Inside The White Cube Brian O’Doherty asked if the gallery was able to meet the requirements of contemporary practice. He questioned the suitability of what has become a formalised cultural object as the ‘official’ location for art that has an increasing awareness of its setting. Why does art continue to patronise such a situation? It represents a diminishment or restriction of communication when the logic and ambition are pushing toward a wider, more explicitly social activity. The broad concerns for social practice discussed here stem from my personal appreciation of the context for contemporary art practice and an application of the principles of site-specificity to culture itself. In this case the cultural location is one where art is employed as a laboratory for development and an instrument of regeneration - interaction and participation are seen to have an outcome/effect or a social value. It is the basis for what Pierre Bourdieu refers to as exchange and, for better or worse, easily recognised as ‘product’ in a culture that seeks to capitalise upon the assets of its creativity. Suddenly we’re talking about art in terms of culture industry, sectors and markets. An economy driven by social capital supported by institutions and organised cultural workers – what happened to artists?


Fragment 2 Art for advancement - as an extension of critical debate.Art that plugs directly into the available system – fulfilment of Marxist distraction and commodityArt that is invisible or indistinguishable from reality – that rejects the gallery as its principal location.Art as mediation and response to experience.

Organisation in art is worthy of suspicion. Why is so much effort directed toward the development and management of something supposedly unproductive? As actualised individuals artists want to earn a living from art, but perhaps it’s not appropriate. The presence of such intent points toward its practical function in society. The practice of art at the beginning of the 21st century is one of near constant negotiation with various forms of organisation - institutions, galleries, agencies and various funding authorities assert themselves to corrupt the utopian image of the artist secluded in their studio. The artist working in Britain could be forgiven for thinking that they have lost all authority over their practice. Any idea that negotiation of that practice is a creative or productive act is severely tested by the artist that encounters administration. The artist’s pursuit of opportunity, income or a livelihood is characterised by compliance and compromise. The increasingly professionalised practice of art finds its subject determined by bursaries, sponsorship and competitions or sales. This research is prompted by (what appears to be) an infiltration of the vocabulary and practices of business into the sphere of The Visual Arts . Art practice and education are organised into provable modules and ‘Learning Outcomes’ to be realised as cultural tools and validated product; Rousseau’s Social Contract has been superseded by Public Service Agreements and an obligation to measurement, accountability and financial self-sufficiency. The urge for cynicism is difficult to resist but connections can be drawn between the type of projects promoted through an agenda of funding and a determined effort to sell the idea of creative Britain. Regeneration and cultural development are both valid aims but, like so many of the policies of UK plc, their integrity of their deployment and their effect has been dubious. In order to examine how best to turn ‘aims into action’ we might turn our gaze, as artist Michael Asher did, to the grey mechanics of administration, audit and the accountability The Visual Arts. In 1972 Theodor Adorno argued that the very categorisation of art [in culture] authorises its freedom and therefore deprives it of its spontaneity or spirit. Further to this, institutional procedure threatens to shape art to mimic its own structure. Jeremy Valentine’s recent examination of institutionalised representation, Art and Audit, describes the hopelessness of objectivity and shows that even in its most rigorous quarters society is determined by interpretation and subjective judgement.

The phenomenon of organisation represents the formal and rational arrangement of separates into a whole. It is that invisible hand that guides our choices, where known practices and technologies can enable and constrain. Constraint is not necessarily so bad. Art has prospered where boundaries and restrictions have been self-imposed or enforced - an indication that art is a technology to respond to problems, its ‘solutions’ offering some form of communal therapy or social catharsis. What is the fate or value for art that is predicted or predetermined by auditable structures and arts subsidy? At first glance organisation would appear to be a complete hindrance and spiritual opposite to art. The practicalities of self-employment and small business test the notion of the artist as free spirit. Wherever artistic activity has to represent itself – CV’s, proposals, media, accounts, exhibition and ‘the market’ – art is subject to authority and must comply with the orthodoxies of those systems in order to benefit from what they have to offer . This kind of organisation in art is surely a corruption, and yet if art is disorganised it risks failure to communicate and realise any cultural value. Subjectivity and the individual are celebrated almost irrationally and largely ignore the benefits of networks, families and group activity. If one truly wished to challenge culture, is it not appropriate to model a solution? – The way that visual art challenges the reading of an image.

My enthusiasm for social practice aspires to the complexity of real life and an exaggeration of the shared/communal experience. I’m not questioning the extent spectators are unified by experience of painting or sculpture but feel these modes emphasise the individual over a sense of anything shared. That the basis for the individual is social - the construction of identity being oriented toward self-image and projection of self-image – and that the speed and scale of humanity obscure the connections between individuals.


Fragment 3 There are issues related to the use of media and its power over primary experience and oral history that relate to myth and normalisation of art that are beyond the scope of this research.


Management is inescapable, from wardrobe to workplace, so how can it be reclaimed? The invitation to self-organise proposed by Howard Slater’s Ourganisation Project and practiced by Copenhagen Free University (CFU) question the authority of the institution. Superflex and General Public Agency (GPA) occupy a state of flux between art and establishment where Lucy Kimbell and Carey Young both inhabit modes of business. This research represents an effort to engage with the stealth and extent that contemporary freedom is authorised by organisation and administration – the technologies of efficiency and effect – and how some artists and groups challenge the implicit integrity through the use of those same technologies. Laughably it is the management of management. But it is also evolution - each development brings adjustment – and negotiation.


Subsidised Art and The Creative Industries

“Those industries which have their origin in individual creativity, skill and talent and which have potential for wealth and job creation through the generation and exploitation of intellectual property” (Department for Culture Media and Sport (DCMS), 2003).

This research is dominated by the Arts Council of England (ACE) and a suspicion of top-down social engineering and exploitation of the artist - as an instrument of change and cultural identity - If an area is going down the toilet or needs putting back on the map ‘get some culture in there!’ As a Non-Departmental Government Body (NDGB) the ACE is an agency for the implementation of government policy via its Funding Agreements with the DCMS. It is an extension of the education system oriented to the professional cultural worker of an aspirant knowledge economy - far removed from the morale-boosting efforts of Lord Keynes’ Committee for the Encouragement of Music and the Arts (CEMA) and formative notions of state patronage . In Government and the Value of Culture (2004) Tessa Jowell, Culture Secretary states that art contributes to “…a national identity, which is uniquely ours. Culture defines who we are, it defines us as a nation”. Government has invested to respond to the needs of the creative industries where previously it might have been sceptical toward their social and economic contribution. Prior to the 80’s (Myerscough, 1988) ‘evidence’ was only available in the vernacular of sub-sectors (aesthetic discourse for art). Since the consolidation of the ACE and DCMS the direct and indirect impact, and output, of the visual arts have become subject to the scrutiny of the industrialised. Art shares its concern for social and cultural wealth with the DCMS but is surely motivated differently . The funding of the arts is not to be confused with the essence of art itself. It is to be read as the promotion of values that government sees as desirable for a competitive nation - a conscious and stimulated society is a productive one. If the hand of government is too heavy, any utility to art will become tainted with the cynicism and incredulity that has infected political campaigning. Surely there’s some middle ground between propaganda and hollow Public Art. What seems relevant is that there are agencies whose purpose has something in common with those of artists, and that art is field-tested in such a way as to prove or disprove its effect. It is the responsibility, to themselves and to the integrity of practice, that artists should approach any working relationship as live/social material, negotiated with all the senses. Convergence between politics and art upon the objectives of social engagement suggest a legitimate space for creative industry. GPA want to see government working for communities – extending the culture of consultation, but accountable to citizens (not systems). In their document Culture At The Heart Of Regeneration (2004) they put themselves forward as just such a consultancy (with the necessary and ‘proven’ skills) to assist in exploring effective and sustainable delivery of DCMS strategy. For hierarchical structures this introduces yet another ‘procedure’. Whereas, if we pursue decentralisation, Charles Handy (1978) explains that individuals [of organisation] acting autonomously within a networked organisation are more able to solve problems. Responsibility must be complemented by skill - the most rigorous and efficient system is only as good as its people. Skills are expensive but the theory posits that networked (groups) and cellular (individual) structures are balanced, as they require less management. This kind of provision is familiar in the example of paramedics or any kind of task force. The key figures of GPA come from backgrounds in architecture and curation. It seems like an art project that has become a victim of its utility and conscience, but I was unable to get any information to clarify this.

The practice of art, as a consequence of society (through arts education and everyday life) is intrinsically administered and increasingly vocational. Although art desires to contribute to an “egalitarian” society “at ease with its diversity” (Noble: Wallinger & Warnock 2000, p.76) it is questionable that art can be pointed at a problem (defined by government objectives) and asked to ‘make things better’ without undermining its intrinsic freedom. Truly art is motivated by a challenge but, as Lord Keynes pointed out in 1945, it is also prone to go off subject . Creativity directed toward a ‘solution’ must be checked against its purpose. The internal process of art checks itself against critique and theory but with licence to change the ‘purpose’ of its exploration – it is self-determined. Arts Council policy is dogmatic in this respect – ‘Accessibility, Growth, Diversity’ are to be enforced and monitored , as are the bureaucratic procedures that deliver them. The same discipline (or compliance) is extended to the artist (or organisation) – although they have the choice not to enter into a contract. The offering of any bequest, bursary or award is as a gesture of power over the social context of the work, to the extent that the work is begun in response to a brief. The strategies of the DCMS perform a seduction upon its constituency in an effort to realise its objectives. Money is offered in return for ‘services’ and valuable feedback . To some extent artists are complicit in the malfunction of arts utility. Reluctant or cynical participation in methods put forward for measuring the arts undermine attempts to institute a relevant policy. Apathy and activism will stall arts commoditisation, but what do we as artists want, if not to be stakeholders in society (by virtue of our intellectual capital)? The ACE questions artist’s awareness of their own role, claiming ‘lack of interest’ and a perception that “evaluation is additional, rather than integral to arts activities” (Reeves 2002, p.34).



Administration

“Whoever speaks of culture speaks of administration as well...” (Adorno 1991, p.93)

The antagonism between the way things are (for culture) and how it is organised accumulates with arts commodity and utility. In terms of significant influences upon practice the contemporary landscape would seem to be dominated by administration. The artist, motivated by the need to succeed seeks validation and support through galleries and creditable projects. Both ‘the market’ and ‘establishment’ are becoming goal oriented and make demands that take the commitment of the artist for granted.

European culture groans to the demands of administration. The conditions of economic unity and cultural standardisation throughout the EU, as well as developments in business practice, technology and sociology combine to emphasise its presence. It is the spread of the traditionally faceless, specialised, inflexible and impenetrable in the name of legislated equal rights and opportunity, but how does it affect the substance of those rights and opportunities? Theodor Adorno’s essay Culture And Administration is a critical and political study of the consequences of legislation and government upon art and culture. Although dated, and somewhat challenging, the discussion endeavours to unpick the historical antagonism between the spiritual and the mechanical. The grudge against the Free Market and organisation in art seems to be founded on the principles of enlightenment and laments an era when art existed as a purely spiritual enterprise. Adorno felt that art created for the princes and patrons of the renaissance, being specific to the desire of one person and grounded in service to religion, was more integrated into reality and therefore more culturally and politically effective - reminding everyone that they were in the service of God. Although the authority of the state is analogous to the Medici, it serves society, and as such endeavours to provide a morality and a mirror to society. (If the Medici were culturally integrated, what does that make BP or Unilever?) Adorno’s identification of The Culture Industry is loaded with remorse for high modernism and contempt for mass culture. The contempt is directed toward capitalism and its character to impinge upon fundamental freedom and social potential. Adorno believed that tools of capitalism were fundamentally inappropriate for social development and only served to dominate through integration and organisation, seeing the culture industry as a means to manipulate ‘free’ time toward [capital] production. In the introduction he is described, by J. M. Bernstein, as an elitist with a strong belief in the spiritual power of art. The essays, collected for their analysis as much as Adorno’s position, provide an interesting contribution to the postmodern discussion and Nicolas Bourriaud’s invitation to revise modernism.

As a form of organisation that produces communication, or communion, administration shows characteristics of language. Through generalisation, that which is represented (as word or category) is made serviceable. Administration is often accused of limited engagement with its subject; the same accusation can be leveled at language. These common descriptors, as an administration of meaning, can only ever be indicative since language is the superficial form that transmits intent to represent an idea (which itself must be realised in language). The common frustration with administration (usually bureaucracy) is of its non-negotiable subjectivity - administration is the reification of organisational values. When the individual interacts with the persona of organisation they are reduced to valuable criteria – a meaning is enforced upon their identity. Nobody likes that. When it comes to Adorno, and Keynes for that matter, the preferred values would seem to be those of religion and the enforced meaning to be enlightenment – the elevation of the individual. This would seem to be dependent on the differentiation of ‘culture’ “…through its emancipation from actual processes of life…” (Adorno 1991, p.101). Which in that era amounted to forms of mechanical production and reproduction. In the absence of this common purpose what are the values of the here and now? Adorno himself recognised bureaucracy as the machine to forms of non-mechanical production (Adorno, 95). And this was way before any notion of a knowledge economy.

The application of language to art can be said to contribute to its undoing. As representation, language enables the artwork to be consumed from a distance. As much as it opens up the work through communication (of the fact) it diminishes the potential for individual interpretation. The defining of ‘Installation’ , or the debate for appropriate descriptors for sub-genres in music are illustrative of the vitality that exists prior to classification. We can see how creativity is agitated by administration, and betrayed or simplified through its prescriptive vocabulary. ‘Culture’ is administration; it classifies the nice stuff that isn’t so good for making money. The relationship between the two is symbiotic rather than one of opposition. Administration exists within the individual. Any specific situation contains its own spontaneity (creative potential) and presents its own materials – some are more to hand than others. Whatever decisions contribute to the situation of the artist, constitute a disguised (self-)administration (Adorno 1991, p.106). Structuralism and semiotics theorise that “even the most avant-garde” situation comes pre-administrated. When the artist reassembles culture to propose a new ‘word’, using the semiotic toolkit, the ambiguity of the new word establishes a meaning in the revised and reorganised dictionary of reality. Drawing upon the aesthetics of a situation is analogous to administration (from above). In keeping with ethnographic identification, appropriations are capable of reinforcing identities as much as renegotiating them.

Culture is damaged when it is administrated but threatens to disappear if it is not (Adorno 1991, p.94). How is culture damaged? What happens to it? Administration is about denominators and the application of positive and negative judgement: Negatively this implies standardisation, encroachment upon personal liberty, categorisation, bulk processing; Positively it ‘produces’ connections, opportunities – actualises and empowers. This power of qualitative differentiation reflects the ‘discipline’ of [organised] society (Foucault 1979, p.170) and the transition from culture to capital. It also represents the pressure of rationalisation upon the irrational - that profit (in whatever form) is serviced by availability and echoes the exchange function in art.

Through ambiguity, art is shelter for displacement and renegotiation of the particular – productive toward the new particular. “Administration necessarily represents… the general against this particular” (Adorno 1991, p.98) as if administration exists to generalise everything and extinguish the particular through its definitions and categorisation. Where does this get us? An administrative totality would see a category for everything. It is the antagonistic character of unification that sustains culture’s ‘perennial’ resistance.

“For the moment the simple fact must be recognized that that which is specifically cultural is that which is removed from the necessity of life” (Adorno 1991, p.94)

Administration organises the useful – why organise otherwise? This in turn suggests that culture is usefully useless, or that it is useful to know what is useless and where to find it. Adorno complained that culture suffered spiritually by its use in entertainment (as bourgeois or capitalist distraction). The contemporary problem is that the usefulness of the useless now extends to national identity and quality of life and whether this facilitates the spiritual suffering of The Visual Arts. So far, counter-elitist ambition of ‘art for all’ is compromised by market and state imperatives. The paradox for culture separated is that it is more available for application and with that availability comes further, more intimate administration. Adorno’s moral inquest does not extend to the ‘discipline’ of religion. When he says “There is no pure immediacy of culture: wherever it permits itself to be consumed arbitrarily by a public as consumer goods, it manipulates people” he basically makes a moral judgment in his distinction between manipulation and enlightenment. Claiming that the innocence [of art in service to religion] could not be recovered through the “imagined communal will” (Adorno 1991, p.101) of capitalism and validation of the self through work (Foucault 1979, p.242). From here we can interpret that [the spirit] of art will continue to be corrupted in its own exaltation - art can only be art when it rids itself of that ambition.

Broadcast media encourages the acceptance of cultural forms – being respondent to markets media must fulfill expectation. Although media creates its own instances, the individual is in danger of losing their ability or confidence to cope with the particular or unfamiliar. Through administration the potential for diversity is eroded and created, dependant upon the strategy or intent of its framework (Adorno 1991, p.93) and detachment relative to its object. Instances of criticism or subversion provoked by tradition are quickly assimilated in such a fast and aggressive environment – you have to be on your toes not to get ripped-off. Fleeting relevance in such a fluxing context presents its own societal microcosm. If one accepts the relentlessness of capitalism, and by default culture, we might see the lived experience develop just as rapaciously. For art that engages with media it seems more productive to embrace the obsolescence of ideas - to accelerate culture’s synthesis – and modernise the system of values. Art less amenable, or resistant to representation is more apt to hold on to its particularity - the ‘aura’ of subjective experience that is transformed by media’s approval – and interact with society through direct osmosis. Here it seems that culture is recognised to preserve the conditions of the particular and, what Adorno refers to as ‘the irrational’ (Adorno 1991, p.98).

As a contributing factor to its professionalisation, and academic parity, art is validated by its relationship with research and critical theory. In pursuit of credibility (and funding) critical theory audits the methodical and logical inquiry of contemporary practice and education (to say nothing of an instituted hierarchy of references). At the time he was writing his essay Adorno noted “the continually growing alienation of administration from culture” and it was administrations flaw to be unlike culture. In keeping with the trajectory of other sub-cultures it might be recognised that administration has become [its own] culture and it is now the flaw of Culture to be unlike administration. Fortunately for Culture, it is irrational and can be as unlike as anything it pleases. This is of course not a true unlikeness since (Post-)Post-modernism requires a likeness (simulacra will do) to exist for the sake of comparison – one can always claim re-contextualisation.

The change in morality, away from enlightenment as such, contributes to the “…secretly practical character” in contemporary practice that is both seized upon and nurtured by government. Cultural policy presents a ‘framework’ or context for a purposeful art and social engagement – provided that practice has an affinity with its objectives and is able negotiate the language . Art is compromised by its relation to the market, or by artist’s relation to the market, and funding initiatives. The total state of compromise that is evident in contemporary practice almost designates art as a state of being - how the artist, as a citizen simultaneously committed to reflection and experimentation, realises their own existence. Fragment 4Self-enlightenment or administration of the self has been greatly assisted by network computer technology e.g. The Internet and the availability of commutable information. As discussed by Matthew Fuller, this empowerment of the individual – apparently released from institutional morality and free to enjoy the notion of autonomy - benefits from the rampant connectivity only to be subject to systematic political and ideological regulation of the developers.


Audit and representation

Audit and administration are both key technologies of the knowledge economy and mechanisms that delivers art to its audience. Administration is the means by which context is authored. It represents actions based on decisions – informed or instinctive (rational or irrational in Adorno-speak). In the essay Culture And Administration Adorno declares culture to be irrational, founded on a myth of artistic spontaneity, questioning whether such a thing ever existed – that like personality, spontaneity is the logical accumulation of circumstances - a relocation of the debate of nature versus nurture. As individuals we author ourselves through experience. Here I will discuss the influence that these technologies bring to bear upon the possibilities for experience.

Audit is the means by which administration, as a function of organisation, knows itself. Through a vocabulary of measurement and accountability audit engages in the detailed survey of “…actions and relations” (Valentine) in pursuit of efficiency and effectiveness. For example: How best to implement the specific objectives of Tate’s charitable status? What are the most appropriate curriculum and delivery for a BA in fine art? An audit would assess the validity and the response to those specific conditions and present a model for effective administration. However, the objective criteria for that assessment and the subjective opinion of the auditor ask for an impossible representation, suggesting that the process of audit should be available for assessment. Jeremy Valentine suggests, “… audit is sustained by this distinction between representation and that which is represented as audit itself resists representation.”

What are the implications for formal processes that are appropriated as material for art, as in the case of Lucy Kimbell’s Audit (2002) or Carey Young’s Incubator (2001)? Displaced from one sphere of production to another, the borrowed technology and vocabularies from accountancy and investment respectively, become affected by some element of Adorno’s uselessness. When such resolutely rational cultural objects become involved in a discussion grounded in ambiguity and aesthetics Culture (in this case art) performs its function. Their implication signals toward the irrational. Hopefully, something more than a gambit for novelty and exoticism. Lucy Kimbell imports audit into the cultural economy where its flawed objectivity is accentuated - it “… repeats the offences committed by culture itself in that it ever degraded itself to an element of representation…” (Adorno 1991, p.109). Despite Adorno’s arguments of the uselessness of culture, audit is re-contextualised for the fact of itself – its own efficiency and effect are open to scrutiny through art. Though it could be said that this is merely a displacement - within the cultural sphere the object [audit] is audited according to a different set of criteria - critique. Kimbell invokes the technology of the survey, which implies both an author and the authority of a recipient or secondary audience (that interprets and acts upon the information), but also transforms the participant into what Valentine calls ‘actor’. The actor represents an exciting development to Roland Barthes idea, in The Death Of The Author, of the reader and their contribution to the artwork as well as a curious link to the worker as co-creator in organisation theory . The actor (that participates in the survey, or inhabits the work) is the subject-object of specialisation (the author and interpreter). Their ability and their desire to respond are governed by their options; they are authored by the context of the survey. In the language of Foucault the survey is the instrument of discipline that, through surveillance, proves the individual and makes them accountable to the institution (Foucault 1979, p.170). Issues not represented carry a subtext of irrelevance; those that are represented are reinforced . Power of this kind is perceived as restrictive, dominating and out of reach before being productive, constructive and accessible toward any idea of freedom or autonomy (Foucault 1979, p.194). Through art the functionality of the survey is displaced and the dubiousness of the technology becomes apparent, unethical and at best nothing more than an indication - ordinarily the outcome would form the basis for commercial or political decision. It is a site for negotiation and administration. Art invites a response from the actor while consumerism asks a question.

“Audit is a method for producing representations and linking those representations with other representations.” Valentine’s definition for audit suddenly seems interchangeable with curation, media or language, rather than anything as dry or factual as stocktaking or accounting, in fact it reads like an extract from Bourriaud’s Relational Aesthetics. What does it mean that audit might be comparable to curation or perhaps more ‘specifically’ relational aesthetics?


Fragment 5 Copyright and autonomy of the individual is even more tenuous than property – we have less control over our ‘use’, particularly if we have made ourselves available through representation (electronic purchasing, driving license, any kind of form).

On one level organisation and administration define the boundary between art and the reality of culture – but only so far as art that resists the culture – or context – of its own situation. As with other sub-strata, art is able to declare an ideology that is separate, but with that separation it loses some of its relevance and accessibility. In this sense independence is counter-productive. If the project of art is viewed a social or cultural one, would it not be more productive to think in terms of development rather than position and opposition? As the CFU says “The heroic avant-garde artist of yesterday will become the scab of tomorrow” (CFU, 2001).

Audit is subject to the same shortcomings – that representation is not a substitute for what is represented. Where would a discussion on ‘Audit And The Aura’ take us? At its extreme audit embarks on a never-ending pursuit of the life-like. Impressionist, photo-realist, the tighter the margins the more detail e.g. arts funding and education – although this would seem to be where one would least expect it. The ambiguity that can exist comfortably in art operates with a different form of capital and therefore a different idea of profit. In the sphere of arts funding, supported by the technologies of administration and audit, are we then confronted with a situation where artists and proposals are compared for their effectiveness or ‘social profitability ’? We are back with tacit function and objectives. As the mother tongue of administration audit proves policy because it provides the means for the process to know how successful or unsuccessful it has been. Through aesthetics art becomes justified through audit, or the effective use of language (administration). Unless the artist finds a strategy for production through misguided time and effort, the system must be played.

The looming presence of audit is in direct relation to the shift in government policy and the role government sees for art in society. The argument that art can be socially or politically effective is characterised by the activity of the Situationist International (SI) in Paris during the 1960’s or the contemporary collective Superflex. What has changed for art, possibly in response to the ‘success’ of its strategies? What is recognised to produce social capital is now appreciated to have an economic effect. Audit is not necessarily interested in proving or disproving this idea, only to report on its own effect. Any success at regeneration for example can only be represented to the extent that it can be measured i.e. immeasurable or unprovable success will register as ‘other’. To this end, audit’s viral presence is felt all the more, the more resistance it encounters the harder it tries. Whether it is in the service of a cynical and dispassionate government, looking to cut costs by improving the condition of communities, or a development in social capitalism. Inevitably born through the audit process, any administrated arts initiative is validated by its existence, any failure is an opportunity to reassess and revalidate. Any successful strategy will become part of the ‘proof’ for effective art (as well as audit) and thereby colonise and potentially formalise funded practice. These circumstances are disastrous for any [Marxist] artists that have attempted to outmaneuver the value system of art and the market.

Audit is presented as rationalised interpretation. In order to generate some confidence in the method of translation it seems that audit itself must be audited. As with other systematised activities it still seems vulnerable to human error – Barthes reader it must be accepted as part of the impossible promise that audit cannot be completely depersonalised. Representation requires a language, as does interpretation - some form of elemental language must be used to translate or convert an instance into usable information. To understand the implications or connectivity of an instance in the wider context is a task akin to weather forecasting. Fuzzy logic and complexity theory are the basis for trends rather than facts but no less invested in prediction. The point of detailed mapping is to better prediction. Administration determines the resolution of that map, through categorisation, as a function of internal efficiency. The administrative body will endeavor to map at the lowest resolution, as less detail will be cheaper. It is possible that unethical generalisations of peoples, circumstances, and problems are performed

Audit is propelled by profit in any form, any situation that wants to improve or expand its effect or product. Organisations seek to expand in the belief that it will improve objectivity and profit. Through critique and media an instance of art may well expand, but society’s profit would seem to diminish some aspect of the art instance. Art, which can be said to profit through ambiguity, although there is an experiential dimension to this particular economy. The minimalism that was proposed before it was labeled as such could be said to have possessed more potential [for effect] upon the spectator/actor because it was more ambiguous, less known. This potential exists where the spectactor has to ask themselves more questions – in proportion to the ambiguity of the situation – contributing to the work and self-authoring through personal experience. The minimalism that is perceived today has formed into a practical and theoretical vocabulary that sees a reduction in this potential. When encountered in contemporary discussion it is recognisable as a post-modern character.

“Audit can simply point to the transformation from the non-auditable to auditable as the verification of its own effectiveness.” What is so uncomfortable about the idea that art might be subject to a process of audit – that at some point its logic and intent are questioned along with its materials and processes? Art is partially audited through critique, found objects and recontextualisation indicate its own powers of verification – its art because someone says it is. Rigorous critique is an equivalent of audit, through its questioning of art, it demands more art. Perhaps the discomfort for art and artists is a fear of misrepresentation? This seems not so far removed from the [dis]function of media. Misrepresentation brings misunderstanding, but art thrives on ambiguity and questions. Maybe it’s the invitation to question? Experienced in fact the work and the spectactor have their own conversation, as with audit and the context of experience, there is always more to take into consideration – the gallery/site, curation, how the spectator comes to be there…

“The more precisely the position is determined, the less precisely the momentum is known in this instant, and vice versa.” (Heisenberg, Uncertainty Paper, 1927)

Valentine suggests that the power of aesthetic experience is in the value of ‘play’. It is understood that this creates a space for experimentation – where forms may be de-contextualised, liberated from their associations – to generate new words for the cultural text. What is at risk is the license for this play. As a technology the methods of audit and administration resolve to a translation of analogue to digital. It is a challenge to the sensitivity of the language of these technologies and the ability of the interpreter who, as participant-observer, authors the subject. In its ambition to measure art/culture and make it accountable audit and administration inevitably alter the situation. The desire for objectivity affects the subject, which requires a new objective position, and so on. As an aside it may be fascinating to anticipate, as with computer technology and software, that development in the ‘resolution’ of audit and administration might well present its own unique forms.

Valentine references Ranciere’s interpretation of Schiller’s Letters On The Aesthetic Education Of Mankind which itself parallels Adorno’s assessment of the privileged position of the aesthetic experience and autonomy of art. “The key formula of the aesthetic regime of art is that art is an autonomous form of life.” This disconnection or divorce from reality (and association) would seem to deny any common language, which brings us to a state of constant, subjective translation. The net result of this is a complete confusion of communication and common purpose that frustrates any political ambition for art, and calls for more administration and for more art. The corruption of identity fuels the antagonism between the artist and organisation(s) - That approval is inferred by participation. The individual, as an expression of organisation, embodies the values of its parent

When Valentine locates culture “… in relations of political causality.” it becomes difficult to understand the two spheres separately – it is additionally complicated by the presence of two forms of culture: culture in the particular and the general such that culture (1) is response and question to culture (2). The notion of culture as the nurturing of something natural is interesting at this point. The culture of and represented by television is a mediated and therefore determining vision of occurrences in reality. In this sense television audits reality by proving what makes good television - adding some substance to claim by critics “… that culture simply becomes a word for ‘everything’.” As far as it comprises some form of cultural assessment, art is similarly an audit – though it is sometimes difficult to follow Valentine’s discussion, as art and culture (2) seem interchangeable. If we see politics as the practical application of ideology, informed by culture, it is easy to follow Valentine’s vision of politics aestheticised. Politics becomes art – art becomes politics – when ideology collides with ambiguity, culture (the general) may be invigorated by possibility. A utopian extreme is perhaps a reflexive society swimming in multiple possibilities. However, this potential that is the function of art presents an ethical dilemma for art and artists operating with a socio-political agenda. Does art that aspires to change or affect experience a transition from art into politics the more successful it becomes? Valentine argues that the success of (political) art depends upon its failure to realise its political objective. This sets up an ethical challenge to the integrity of the artist as to their commitment to art or their acquired cultural subject – whether to pursue a project or practice to its tangible effect/usefulfulness or to retain its playfulness and allow it to fail, reinforcing the uselessness that Adorno cherished in art and culture. This is perhaps where (government) speculation in the creative industries of The Cultural Sector would see this potential transformed into GDP through society and the market - like some kind of ideological Frankenstein – art as cultural R&D for organised and disorganised reality. As a self-confessed ‘change agent’ Carey Young, provocatively placed this speculative rationale into the art sphere with Incubator (2001) with the objective ‘to increase profit’. The work is, interestingly, confused by the ambiguous or reluctant role of the gallery, as site (outlet) and agency (promoter). There is something theatrical in the ‘costume’ of the corporate environment – ‘Pssst… I’m really an artist!’ - but also earnest field work directed toward subversion; at times the work seems more interested in its exoticism than questioning the efficacy and ethics of its means. As active counter-counter culture the appropriated business forms take on an acceptable dimension. Young herself is actually interested in front-lining this aspect of artistic practice citing it as social sculpture. It is conspicuous work, more of the readymade than ‘where to next?’. It is curious to note, given the relation of culture (1&2) to politics, that ‘everything’ constitutes a third of a government department for ‘emerging markets’ (DCMS).


Fragment 6 Two threads from here:1) The relationship between the notion of cultural research and the practices familiar to forms of academic research – whether this perception is enforced, actively encouraged or propelled by expectations – make it possible for the state and the market to identify art as a tool for research. Art enjoys validation and funding at the expense of the prerequisites of academic practices. This condition was seen as the ‘selling-out’ of art education. 2) The facility of art to negotiate its own usefulness – what might be interpreted as usefulness in the work of art is it’s exchange value – through the practice and materials of artists the work indicates a set of relations, where, as a consequence of the flexibility and availability of art, it can be entered into in a subjective and ‘useful’ way (Bourriaud 2002, p.42). In curious parallel to audit Nicolas Bourriaud attributes this to a transparency of means, that knowledge in and around the ‘work’ enables the spectator/actor to negotiate their position in relation to the work itself.

An appreciation for copyright presents a further dilemma – if an artist exercises these rights of property do they then confirm the usefulness of the work and author its passing from the ambiguous to the administrated?

“To illustrate this opposition we can consider a classic formulation in which cultural autonomy is opposed to the heteronomy of administration such that within administration culture aspires to be heteronymous in order to preserve its autonomy.” (Valentine).

Valentine reviews Adorno’s analysis that administration and culture experience a symbiotic autonomy, perceiving administration to have the edge since it endeavors to govern cultures political ambition and potential, which in turn seeks to de-stabilise administration. There is something of the Yin and Yang, of force being met with equal and opposite force. Art and culture aspire to anarchy, to keep ‘everything’ up the air so long as administration attempts to optimise reality. It would seem that neither was desirable as a total state and the hope that Adorno speaks of is for is presumably for a more liberal balance. All contribute to an ever-changing context for the artist and the cultural actor.

This linear description is falsely simple in that there are many cultures in tandem with many forms of administration. Valentine suggests that postmodernity and globalisation have thrown these structures into flux – pending some form of meta-administration and meta-culture – making it difficult to locate cultures opposition administration. At its most powerful culture is beyond administration, but never for long – once documented it can be absorbed into the objectivity of administration, creating a need for a new opposition. More culture please. In addition Valentine seems to suggest that culture is able to out-maneuver its administrative pursuant, staying ahead of own trail, like some kind of nomad or outlaw. Administration is currently and publicly engaged in the legislation of Individual mobility as migrant workers, immigrants and refugees threaten relative domestic objectivity – particularly among EU member and soon-to-be member states – in contrast to organisational mobility. In this condition of infinite hybridity there is no typical situation to have objectivity over and consequently no opposition for culture to take. That’s not to say there is no place for either but the fluidity of the situation calls for flexibility and increased agility on both sides in response to the groundlessness for identity and decision-making. This agility is already visible in some aspects of government in its program for decentralisation. Top-down managerialism on a nationwide scale has been exchanged for a network of autonomous nodes in the form of Public/Private Partnership, non-governmental agencies and service outsourcing. Through a commitment to the social project government continues to develop its effectiveness. As a function of increased agility agencies and artists are instrumental in the machinations of government through policy and funded initiatives.


Self-Organisation

The organisational aspects of this enquiry are explored through instances of collaborative and open practice, namely the service provision and ‘tools’ of Superflex and the DIY/anti-institution of self-organisation (CFU and The Ourganisation Project).

What does it mean to organise or establish an organisation? To organise oneself toward a particular ambition, or multi-task to maintain several ongoing interests, is to operate subjectively according to ones ethics or morality. To establish or work with(in) an organisation is to engage with the values of an entity – if formalised that organisation is an identity with the kind of accountability associated with an individual. True to the individual this identity can be characterized by experience, prejudice and expectation as well as a human/inhuman dialectic: To behave as a role model and respect other individuals, to conduct itself with moral and social responsibility; To exhibit a tireless unsympathetic omnipresence or ‘superpower’ that enables it to be constantly aware. The relevance here is one of social context. The recent collaboration between CCAD and Tate Chelsea curates Late at Tate (2005) is illustrative of the organisational friction generated through individualised relations. Such that Ian Drysdale and Darrel Stadlen were compelled to respond with what is typified as ‘institutional critique’ or just as easily an audit. As with other instances of such work (notably Hans Haacke’s Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Estate Holdings, a Real-Time System, as of May 1 1971 (1971)) the function is ambiguous. Neither the artists or the institutions involved are obliged to respond to the work beyond their immediate interests (the PR departments of Tate and CCAD negotiated to delay the distribution of the critique. The Guggenheim cancelled the Hans Haacke exhibition).

Organisation applies to the self as much as any collective effort and I have so far tried to keep this aspect of the discussion open. In relation to misinterpretation and the preservation of individual integrity the discussion must address the subjectivity and commonality experienced through encounter or participation in organisation. Howard Slater’s Ourganisation: An Open Letter Of Invitation discusses the informal not-for-profit organisation, or self-organisation, of DIY culture. Interestingly it is organisation as an opposition to organisation (ethnographic identification applied to an entity). Slater’s invitation is to respond to the failure of the tools of democracy to represent society and community. For me it expresses the circular nature of democracy and the free market – societies/markets inevitably homogenise ideas/products, and create the need to diversify. Politically, self-organisation is the re-invigoration of the citizen and the authority to realise “shared imaginaries” (Nestor García Canclini: Valentine), through the appropriation of organisation. The assertion does away with the stylistic rebellion of ‘alternative spaces’ and the avant-garde’s separation from the general that is fixed in opposition. As a tactic it is more of a blurring of The Social Project of art and “learning to live in the world in a better way.” (Bourriaud 2002, p.13). It seems more like constructive criticism, expression of personal responsibility toward community and a commitment to the development of a pluralist society, conscious that “…we produce ourselves by being together.” (Slater, 2001). The basis of this thesis is pinpointed here – that every interaction defines the context and consequences of the individual and the ‘other’.

“So the first object of a politics of autonomy: help the collectivity to create the institutions that, when internalised by individuals, will not limit, but rather, enlarge their capacity for being autonomous” (Cornelius Castoriadis: Slater).

Where educational institutions have slowly (because of funding and accountability) adopted hierarchical structure of organisations there must be an expectation that they will take up the less hierarchical, horizontal and open network models being explored in the business environment – witnessed in the decentralisation of government and devolution to NDGBs. Henriette Heise and Jakob Jakobsen attend to the authority and purpose of the university with the CFU. This instance of self-institution questions the kind of knowledge that is ‘valorised’ as ‘product’ to the knowledge economy and at the same time recognises its own production (as I do through this thesis).

“…the possession of educational patents increasingly represses talent – or ‘charisma’, for the spiritual cost of patents is always slight and does not particularly decrease with mass production” (Adorno on Weber 1991, p.97).

In accordance with Foucault’s theories on discipline we must look at the how of our institutions to comprehend the opportunities for diversity. The CFU might be interpreted as an un-productive institution working against the production of ‘useful’ knowledge. It is actively “…engaged in exposing the antagonisms, which, under the surface characterise society…” (CFU, 2001). CFU attempts to discredit or reclaim knowledge from productivity - it is oriented toward the actualisation of desire. For Heise and Jakobsen self-institution is an experiment that gives form to the desires of participants. Their ‘exchange situations’ reference the tactics of Situationist International (SI) and subtract from the notion of a rationalised curriculum. The porous structure provides a locus for peer-to-peer learning and a metaphor for administrative transparency. The spectactor as such is free to contribute to the renegotiation of the institute by visiting the university (a room in their flat) or creating their own instance. The law of diminishing returns and the economics of a knowledge economy would see ‘useless’ knowledge disappear, however, through the CFU culture is already fulfilling its intangible ‘purpose’ by experimenting with new formations of knowledge (‘products’).

How is self-institution not the emperor’s new clothes or the same old leftist politics? Self-institution is more like self-help – more task-oriented – in that it resists the fixity and inflexibility of the institution or collective, gambling integrity or substance for specificity. Fear of being useful restricts art in its ability to represent and question behaviour and structure. The functional (or functioning) aesthetic of self-organisation is directed toward the development of actionable forms, of what Nicolas Bourriaud calls ‘operational realism’ (Bourriaud 2002, p.112) - the expansion of aesthetics to include how elements within a situation are recognised to relate to one another.

The economics of an organisation (even of one) determines the form of that organisation. As with Superflex’s Biogas the counter-economics of Guaranapower sees profit in excess of traditional economics (Giles, 2004) and relies on the world beyond exhibition to continue to operate – and avoid being left in the gallery. Politics are forgotten just as easily, if not more so, than aesthetics. Or rather aestheticised politics are more easily neutralised through exhibition. It’s too easy to say ‘oh that’s interesting/terrible/great!’ and for that response to stay with the work. As a project Guaranapower is active within its own cultural specificity – the soft drinks counter. The organisational entity is a performative one – how it finances itself is an expression of its ethics and moral intent and as such informs its substance/content. In the individual this is more easily forgiven as ‘getting by’, but classically, the means of survival is constructive toward identity, hence Foucault’s ‘morality of work’ and the desire for a more rewarding job. No matter where the artist positions themselves (in Britain) organisation will impose itself as a requirement – pitching for funding, proposals for competitions, negotiating exhibitions. To return to Brian O’Doherty’s thesis of context as content it is essential for artists to question the circumstances in which they find or put themselves as it impacts on their existence as a citizen.


Summary

The ambition of this research has been to examine the antagonism between organisation and art, and to attempt to understand the influence of some of the structures that accompany, or have become part of, the practice of art. Not necessarily through specific examples – though both The Market and Arts Education and funding are referenced. The convergence of public and private is used in context of shared technology – that the state adheres to rigid forms of organisation and administration but strives to enjoy the agility of those developed in the free market – less bureaucratic, networked or horizontal structures. Through Organisation Theory it is understood that organisation itself plays a huge role in the subjectivity of the entity and its human resources, and how it/their actions are interpreted through encounter and representation. As a result there is something performative and ongoing to the structure and behaviour of organisations that exists on an everyday level, that is to be explored in the name of profit (social and economic) and The Social Project. Creativity has become auditable through academic validation and an active political tool, used and to some extent abused, in the interest of efficiency and the national economy. As a reflection of culture and its own subjectivity art experiences an invigorated relationship with politics and its own usefulness – as possible extension of engagement with social and relational aesthetics. Where art of the 60’s and 70’s challenged its own commodification, the dematerialised art object is engaged in ethical debate with an economy that commodifies services and ideas. Legislation is still grappling with the speed and mobility of near instantly and infinitely reproducible ‘products’. As a context for artistic production this presents huge challenges to management and ownership to the individual and the entity.

The dialectic between idealism and [economic] realism has become that much closer to debate over language - discussions of intellectual copyright and open source are propelled by the attempts to rationalise the use and content of the Internet. The importance of the other technology – network computing – must not be overlooked. It is the fundamental technology behind the acceleration in the (legal, illegal and unlegislated) sharing of information and ideas arguably responsible for the acceleration in debate. The power of network technology sees the tools and assets of The Social Project globalised – anyone with a computer and a phone line has access to a vast resource. The debate has never been more utopian. The availability of information sees a reduction in the possibility of objectivity through the accelerated exchange and synthesis of ideas. How the human and economic desire for objectivity responds to the situation will be interesting since the situation holds massive potential.


Appendix

GPA Q&A

How is the agency funded?

O Govt. O Non-Govt. Agency O Private/corporate O Independent Other…


What are the origins of the group/project? (Response to policy, invitation…)


What structure or hierarchy does the group have?


How does the group decide what it is going to say/do?


Could you say something about GPA’s ambitions for art and political effect?


Where would you draw the line between consultancy and active citizenship?


How has your approach been received by the DCMS – can you see your model being replicated?


How does it feel that clients may not be obligated to act on your advice?


What is your response to the legislative and administrative demands of being GPA?


Are you in competition / How are you perceived by other agencies and organisations?


Bibliography

Books Adorno, T.W. (1991), Culture And Administration in The Culture Industry: Selected Essays on Mass Culture, Ed. J.M. Bernstein, Routledge. Albrow, M. (1997), Do Organisations Have Feelings? Routledge. Barthes, R. (1977), The Death Of The Author: Image, Music, Text, Ed. Heath, Stephen, London: Fontana Bourdieu, P. & Haacke, H. (1995), Free Exchange, London: Polity Bourriaud, N. (2002), Relational Aesthetics, Dijon: Presses du reel. Clifford, J. (1988), The Predicament Of Culture: Twentieth-Century Ethnography, Literature, And Art, London; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Davies, A. (2001), The Surge To Merge Culture With The Economy, Copenhagen Free University. Douglas, M. (1987), How Institutions Think, Routledge & Kegen Paul, Syracuse University press Ford, S. (2004), The Situationist International: A Users Guide, London: Black Dog Publishing Foster, H. (1996), Return Of The Real: The Avant Garde At The End Of The Century, MIT Press, London; Cambridge, Mass. Foucault, M. (1979), Discipline And Punish: The Birth Of The Prison, Peregrine Books Handy, C. (1976), Understanding Organizations, Penguin Books Handy, C. (1978), Gods Of Management, Souvenir Press Ltd Heartfield, J. (2000), Great Expectations, Design Agenda Kimbell, L. (2002), Audit, Book Works, London Lévi-Strauss, C. (1968), Structural Anthropology, London: Allen Lane. Mauss, M. (1990), The Gift: The Form And Reason For Exchange In Archaic Societies / / foreword by Douglas, M. / translated by W.D. Halls, London: Routledge. Myerscough, J. (1989) The Economic Importance of the Arts in Britain, Policy Studies Institute, London Owens, C. (1992), Beyond Recognition, Oxford; Berkeley: University of California Press. Power, M. (1997), The Audit Society: Rituals of Verification, Oxford University Press. Selwood, S. Ed. (2001), The UK Cultural Sector, Policy Studies Institute Warnock, M. & Wallinger, M. (2000), Art For All?: Their Policies And Our Culture, PEER. Wu, Chin-Tao, (2002), Privatising Culture: Corporate Art Intervention Since The 1980s, London: Verso.

Lectures and Discussions Jakobsen, H. P. (2005), J’Accuse, South London Gallery, London Lydiate, H. (2004), Human Resources Management, MA Emca, LCC, London Valentine, J. (2004), Art And Audit, Contemporary Art: New Paradigms, Caixa Forum, Barcelona (transcript).

Magazines Davies, A. (2005), Zones Of Creativity, Mute 29, p68 Gillick, L. (2000), A 90% Politeness Trustability Factor, Make, The Magazine Of Women’s Art, No89, Sept/Nov 2000, pp8-11 Kelsey, J. (2002), Carey Young: Business As Usual, Artext No76, Spring 2002, pp46-9 Verhagen, M. (2003/2004), Micro-Utopianism, Art Monthly, No272, Dec 2003/Jan 2004, pp1-4 Yes Minister, Art Monthly No. 277, June 2004, p12 Essays Drysdale, I. & Stadlen, D. (2005), Late at Tate Text (to Joanna Banham), Chelsea College of Art and Design and Tate Britain, London Giles, T. (2004), Modes Of Operation: The Ethics And Effectiveness Of Social Consultancy, CCAD (Stage 2), London.

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Ethical Guidelines, (2003), Social Research Association [Online]

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Endnotes

1. The forceful Americanisation of this document demonstrates the power of software and its developers over users. It is the living evolution of standard practice and arguably an invisible form of colonialism. Matthew Fuller offers a critique on the enormous influence proprietary software can exert over language and conventions of communication in Word: It looks like You’re Writing A Letter (2001). The use of metaphor in software design reinforces stereotypes and equates to the administration of possibilities, where choice is restricted by functionality. Additionally, the use of footnotes inhabits a ‘because I can’ aesthetic and ‘I’m not sure whether this is relevant or necessary’ presence in the academic research of the inexperienced. I personally use it as a means of supplementing text in response to uncertainty as to the function or audience of the writing. To the visual artist, something that looks like academic writing is entirely justifiable. The fear of assessment, or audit, through representation will be predetermining.

2. Mathieu Laurette’s Je passé a la Télé was the first of what he refers to Apparitions(Fr) or Appearances – actions/work located in forms of media. For this, his first show, he invited people to watch the television when he was scheduled to be on the game show of the same name. A gesture of openness. He appropriates the television studio to be his studio and has his a solo show televised nationally.

3. To the extent that London College of Communication runs the MA Enterprise and Management for the Creative Arts that specifically focuses on management skills and tactics appropriate to the cultural sphere.

4. As a gesture taking down the dividing wall between gallery and office of the Copely Gallery, Los Angeles (1974) was a literal removal of the aesthetic division between where the gallery stops being a gallery and where what’s in it stops being art.

5. One might argue that this exchange of opportunity in return for validation was a site of production.

6. Established in 1940 CEMA was “To carry music, drama and pictures to places that would otherwise be cut off” (Keynes: Wallinger & Warnock 2000, p.142) and to support artists whose ‘usual opportunities were reduced by the effects of war’ (ACE, 2004).

7. Although Keynes was a celebrated economist paradoxically he did not recognize cultural value in terms of society’s sense of self but promoted an undemocratic, medicinal administering of the ‘high’ arts toward the elevation of those less fortunate.

8. Advertising, architecture, the art and antiques market, crafts, design, designer fashion, film, video, interactive leisure software, music, the performing arts, publishing, software and computer games, television and radio.

9. Directly or indirectly the objectives of the DCMS/ACE serve to increase the value of Britain’s cultural offering and attract overseas investment.

10. Keynes: Wallinger & Warnock 2000, p.142.

11. The ACE is managed at ‘arms length’ by the DCMS. It operates freely in accordance to its own judgement but must be accountable to parliament and the public.

12. Further research would be necessary to understand why artists (lauded as model workers of the knowledge economy) generally have such a low income.

13. Art And The Encounter, (2004), Whitechapel Art Gallery – In his presentation Bourriaud set out to discuss the problems of multiculturalism and announced that he was ”…in favour of inter-culturalism…” and a second modernity. Being founded on alterity/otherness Modernism promotes the individualisation of cultures but provides no means of diplomacy or exchange. Postmodernism attempts to satisfy the situation but also maintains these ‘identities’ through mimicry and appropriation or “the feeling of the diverse… Modernism has become a caricature or characterised in critical time, but perhaps it is more fruitful to view modernism as an attitude which allies itself with the agenda of context and negotiation of the contemporary.”

14. When a mode of work is typified its ambiguity begins to be eroded and its cultural potential diminished – because it becomes known.

15. UK Garage? 2-Step? Grime? Urban? Eski?

16. Previous objectives have included New Technology, Education, and Cultural Diversity.

17. Though the ACE may issue cryptic rejections they are also open to negotiation and a working relationship can be developed with an ‘Arts Officer’ (Anecdotal evidence from ‘The Business Of Art’ lecture 2.3.2005, CCAD.

18. The administrative body will endeavour to map at the lowest resolution, as less detail will be cheaper. Administration only requires a limited engagement with its object in order to fulfil its aim and so the things that are administrated are known by their distinguishing factors, for the reasons that they are different from the next, rather than any knowledge of the thing itself. This surface interaction demonstrates a familiar disengagement from function.

19. The co-creator is a tactic that attempts to recover a sense of ownership and value in the individual’s relation to production in the knowledge economy. It is the product of a form of management that encourages autonomy and responsibility within task-oriented teams.

20. In Return Of The Real: The Artist As Ethnographer Hal Foster writes about the process of identification. He describes how the use of language and labels has the capacity to reinforce identity. Additionally appropriation is a form of objectification and an exertion of power.

21. The DCMS Evidence Toolkit is for the gathering of background ‘intelligence’ to inform the development of future cultural policy.

22. The ‘visioning’ workshop pitched the directors of Anthony Wilkinson gallery into an aggressive marketing dialogue with a Xerox venture capitalist.

23. Related to peer-to-peer computer technology (exemplified by Napster) that enabling users to contribute directly to a network of shared resources.

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