[iDC] death of the artist?
Patrick Lichty
voyd at voyd.com
Thu Feb 9 10:14:55 EST 2006
This is fascinating, as I see the parallel here to the original viision of
the Internet - challenging boundaries, elimnating difference, really
flattening the social structure.
The thing that I wonder about, as there have been some prestigious low-res
(and I say that with all double entendre intended) programs like Caiia, is
that a plethora od minimal residency progvrams will spring up. This will
create a brief era of possibilitty (<> 10 years?) at which time there may be
a potential for the extant power structure to reassert itself.
This could reveal itself as a refusal to recognize these programs, or a
raising of the bar (once more). For example, I'm hearing that many art
programs in the UK want PhD's in their programs, and not MFA's.
Could there be a requirement for 3 years of postdoc, or the requirement for
2 or more PhD's? It seems like an academic arms race that is centred around
the rejection of asymmetricl legitimation. This means the legitimation of
the small, decentralized power structure that moves more quickly than the
traditiional 'nation-state' of the university/institution. The academic
hegemony will wish to keep their power centre as more people are 'certified'
in the emerging fields (and so 'threatening' the traditional structures) and
seek to reinforce them. This is pretty evident in global culture, as shifts
in power relations create a panic state in those traditionally in privilege,
and so seek to preserve it.
I am neither a determinist nor Luddite on this subject; the changes are
here, and conversely, they should be seen as opportunities for progress by
the institution. Integration is probably the goal, but details in funding
and certification would be a battleground as the implant of the
decentralized, cellular network culture begins to knit with the bone and
sinew of the extant institutional structure.
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