Christine Buci-Glucksmann by Joseph Nechvatal
Joseph Nechvatal on the Influence of Gilles Deleuze

Web published at The Houston Literary Review
March 2008 Featured Artist Page
http://thehoustonliteraryreview.com/Joseph_Nechvatal_March_2008.aspx

Review of DEEP TRANCE BEHAVIOR IN POTATOLAND
(A RICHARD FOREMAN THEATER MACHINE)
by Joseph Nechvatal
DEEP TRANCE BEHAVIOR IN POTATOLAND

The Parallax View
by Slavoj Zizek (MIT Press)
Reviewed by Frederic Jameson

Painter Charline Von Heyl recently described Americans' disconnect between the personal and political this way: "While almost everything in the outer world feels messed-up, our inner lives aren't altogether messed-up." The current art world, awash in money and success, is shot through with a similar disconnect.

To some, the art market is a self-help movement, a private consumer vortex of dreams, a cash-addled image-addicted drug that makes consumers prowl art capitals for the next paradigm shift. This set seeks out art that looks like things they already know: anything resembling Warhol, Richter, Koons, Tuymans, Prince, and Wool could be good; any male painter in his thirties could be great. To others, the market is just a jolly popularity contest, or as New York Times reporter David Carr put it about having his own blog, it's like "a large yellow Labrador: friendly, fun, not all that bright, but constantly demanding your attention."

INVENTED GOD

The title piece, Would You Rather Be a Loser or a Pig? offers the viewer an extreme choice between one of two free bracelets: one reads "Loser," the other reads "Pig," reflecting the increasing tendency within the art world to define achievement solely in terms of financial earnings and conspicuous consumption.

Faced with the choice by Jennifer Dalton I took the coward's way out chosing a bracelet from the offered box blindly and came up a "PIG". If I'd only known this years ago...