post discussion

yesterday's discussion topic resulting from heidi's post on douglas huebler’s 42° Parallel Piece was of some interest to me. mainly because of the overall reaction from the class, which seemed to be quite negative. I guess I can understand the position, but it still does not trouble me to consider this piece as art.

if i remember right, ryan peter made a comment along the lines of, "you either need to decide from the beginning that a piece is indeed art, or that it's not and then discuss why or why not"...something like that. and that totally makes sense to me. personally, i would say that i fall into the first group — when i go into an exhibition or gallery, i've already decided that what i'm going to see is art in some form or another. that said, i do not claim that i will always understand the art or its purpose, but only that i accept that it is art. so that is perhaps why it was not difficult to accept huebler's piece as art. sure, it's just a line on a map, but perhaps the concept behind it and the process have more to do with the piece than the final product that we see here. and i've seen a ton of other pieces that made me scratch my head even more than this. see my earlier post on cory arcangel. either way, i find the discussion as to whether something is or isn't art quite interesting and an ongoing, endless topic.