Reciprocity - do i trust you?

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Since thinking about collaboration and what it means I went on to think about reciprocity and trust. I found this diagram and then remembered laughing when talking to someone the other day who said if her colleague said reciprocity once more she would happily commit a violent act - which i think means the cycle within the diagram in their office had broken down! Which then led me to thinking, we must continually question what the utopian idea of an authored convivial non antagonistic act in the name of art does. Strikes me this creation of a 'community' in an apparent reciprocal space, does nothing more than celebrate the coming together. Does it build trust, co-operation, synergy or does it reiterate a hierarchy, control and competition? Self promotion [individualism] under the guise of pro-sociality?
Instead it seems simple, yet almost impossible, that we must create an atmosphere and space born out of need, where trust is built and where co-labouring occurs through deep discussion, doing and friction. Difficult, political but relevant and 'Arts' got not much to do with it but being artful has. Seems our theory for our art needs to become a theory of the society we want.
Beacon taught me if nothing else that - as an artist in the world, I have a duty/responsibility to ask questions of 'Arts' role in a wider social context and our actions as artists in association with it, whilst debunking a notion that artists are special. Seems pertinent that Tim's - "Give them fucking Art" is a statement we need to grapple with and Big Dave's question - "If its successful what does it do?" seems more relevant now then ever before.

Comments

  1. spodsheff6 May 2012 at 04:55

    There seems to be a point in some artists or academics careers where they can say "We are not artists anymore. Like the "Grizedale Boys" turning up and saying "we don't even want to call it art" but it seems to me that you only get to this point when you are perceived as been "Very successful" as artists so the need to be called it becomes irrelevant - you just "Are it". For me the role of artists allows me to cross - it is my "Talisman" when people say - "What are you doing in the room" I can say I am an artist of course - this doesn't mean I think an artist should be in the room it just means I think somebody different should be in the room. Perhaps one small answer to "Big Daves question is " We want to put somebody different i9n the room?

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  2. Mary Steele24 July 2013 at 00:52

    Art, as beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. Artists are not only found in the 'art community' but, often, behind closed doors, away from the public eye and therefore without recognition. The language wrapped around art (and I don't mean the 'f' word which seems so prevalant in some artists work) is often what separates the 'naturally gifted' man-in-the-street from the artist fostered through the educational system. Piccasso, Rembrandt and other masters demonstrated what art can bring to the world but they were true artists. To believe one is an artist is not the same thing.

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