SHARKFORUM: OPINION WITH TEETH

He has a fine, clear and descriptive style. No mean feat, let me add, since the opposite is often encouraged in schools. I particularly have enjoyed his writing in artnet.com, such as that on Chicago's Craig Anderson. His opinions are frequently quite different from mine, but agreement is not the point in reviewing. Expressing your views well is.

Granted, I know nothing of him personally, and the quotations from Cassidy seem not-well-researched and vicious --- or at least rather spitefully anti-Kimler. But, Wesley, you do seem to bring that out in some people. Remember, this is an art world where only the artists are encouraged to openly attack one another! Everybody else is not accustomed to this! I realize that is their problem and there is no reason for our Shark to mollycoddle them, but maybe he could make his (often justified) attacks a bit less personal?

Another Art in America writer of fine quality who covers the Chicago beat is Susan Snodgrass. I beg you all also to remember that criticism is essentially an unpaid hobby, which also nowadays brings NO power (unlike Greenberg's heyday). So it occurs as a gift of time and thought from the reviewers. They are possibly the only people lower than us-artists on the artworld totem pole. Try and cultivate critics by helping encourage new ones, or support those now publishing when they do a job you like. Of course, I am also a part-time art critic, but that is why I encourage people such as John Haber, presenting him here in a previous blog entry. This will work better than attacks (yeah, yeah, I know I also have a tendency to have a rebellious, bad attitude and chirp away about curators and all ... so maybe it takes one to notice one...)

The amount of coverage specific cities get in the essentially NYC-based art publication world is directly tied to the general perception of how exciting and active the art scene there appears to be. Entities such as The Art Letter and, of course, most thrillingly, Sharkforum, will help this.