Dear List:
Trebor Scholz invited me to join this endeavor. My name is Gregory Sholette.
I am a co-founder of the artists' collectives Political Art Documentation
and Distribution (1980-86) and REPOhistory (1989-2000). In addition, I have
been actively writing/theorizing/historicizing about art collectives and
collective practices for some time now. One of these texts that might be of
relevance to you is my essay Counting on Your Collective Silence: Notes on
Activist Art as Collaborative Practice that was first published in the
journal Afterimage in 1999. You can read the entire essay as well as others
on my WRITINGS page at: http://plaza.ufl.edu/yuezhang/ In brief however: the
text primarily is an attempt to complicate assumptions about collective work
including the notion that it is about finding a "unified voice." I argue
that disagreement and difference is more often the basis for collective work
than unanimity. I also assert that the standard opposition of collective Vs
individual is irrelevant today in so far as we are already collectivized by
corporate marketing technology even as mass media continues to project an
image of hardy individuality. The question/challenge I arrive at is this:
does one ignore these facts and remain collective in a passive, reflexive
way, or choose instead to work actively as a collective force of resistance
and opposition? I am particularly focused on these questions as they relate
to issues of public space, democracy (economic and political), and activism.
Best regards,
gregory sholette
--
gregory g. sholette
<gshol-*at*artic.edu>;
Assistant Professor
Arts Administration;
Visual, Critical Studies
The School of the Art
Institute of Chicago
http://www.artic.edu/~gshole/