THE ARTIST
AS & GOOD SPORT

by PIETER KOS

Competition in art through prize giving and/or juried shows
is deplorable because it makes a contest of an aetivity which,in
its truest sense, is both individually authentic and soiritually
communal.

Yet art competition abounds with the frequence of juried
shows and presence of the gallery institution. Many artists
endorse ita method to achieve 'success'; most all accept it
as a necessary evil, playing the art game while harbouring their
own authentic motivations. What is it that makes it necessary?
What are the extenuating circumstances which make the
competitive condition acceptable? What is the attitude which
gives rise to it, and what are the ends by which the means
are justified?

A dramatically new attitude to art, which is with us now,
was born in the Renaissance. Rather than art being a vehicle
for universal social values (as in religious architecture, music,
stained glass, frescoes, sculpture) art became a vehicle for
individual expression. The question of quality became a question
of taste; and expression became commoditized with it bought
and sold according to the buyer's taste. The rise of the middle
class with its Lockean liberal philosophy developed a new notion
of 'success' and the artist took the same cues as the ent®preneur.
The artist became a professtonal specializing in the production
of aesthetic objects and/or works which expressed our humaness.
(1 recall such a line from Bob Michener, Painting instructor).
He/she produces seriously, not frivosely, and therefore shculd he
compensated financially. (Thus to an equation Bob Featherston, Ptq Istr
might have scribed: art = work, work = wages, ..art = wages )

SO, given art as a marketable commodity aualified by taste,
the notion that some works of art are more worthy of esteem than
others becomes obvious. To many this may seem a truism, but in
fact it is only a recent idea in human history, limited largely
to the Western civilized world. From such a position it does make
sense to have work rated in group shows by resnected connoisseurs.