Chapter 7 response

This chapter was a basic description of how an art critique is orchestrated and how to develop your ideas with these questions in mind. When I first started my undergraduate years, I used to dread having to present my work for critique. My work was something that was precious to me and personal. It was hard to listen to people telling me what they thought or what they would of done differently. I am now entering my second year of graduate school and I have participated in more than my fair share of art critiques. What I have learned is that an art critique, especially one that is done in the context of other educated artists, is a valuable process, and one that you will learn to use to your advantage.

As an artist, we all have a clear vision of what we want to present. The difficulty comes when you have a particular message that is subject to the interpretation of your audience. The questions that are asked at a critique are the same questions that your audience will be asking themselves when they view your work. My advice is to never receive constructive criticism with a closed mind. When your art is critiqued, it is not your job to go on the defensive. The suggestions are all relevant and the artists job is to sort out what advice will be useful for improving upon his own ideas.

When an art critique focuses mainly on the craft (the objective part), it usually means that there are issues with the way that the project was fabricated. This could be due to a lack of skill or experience with a particular medium. The medium is a big part of the message. If there is something suspicious about the craft then the message can become cloudy. Did this artist intentionally make these choices? Does this have something to do with what he wanted us to see? Poor craft is inexcusable in the professional art world and lack of experience is no excuse. Your audience will not be sympathetic to an artist that is sloppy in his execution.

At a graduate level, the craft is rarely discussed (in my experience) unless it is an issue. Critiques mainly focus on the idea itself. Is your idea trivial? Does it reach people on a universal level? Does it fit somewhere in the context of art history and does it relate to the contemporary art world? What can you do to make your idea more ambiguous or less ambiguous. There is a fine line between being ambiguous and being presumptuous. You can't presume that your audience can read your mind or know what you're talking about if your idea is so personal that only you can relate to it.

Personally, I like to have my own work critiqued before and after it is completed. Progress critiques are a way of pointing you in a direction when you are lost with your own ideas or when your ideas have strayed too far from their origin. Knowing how your audience will respond before it is presented as a finished idea will help you to make more successful work. Remember, the best critiques are often the most brutal. If all your colleagues do is exonerate your work, then the only thing that you walk away with is a bigger head.