Perhaps one of the biggest voids between art critics and the other side of the fine arts equation (artists, gallerists, and curators), is that most art critics seem to be fond of always giving the other side advice. This advice is generally not only wrong, but often naive to the extreme of being laughable.
For example, there was the art blogger who once wondered online why most galleries didn't publish nice fancy catalogs with each exhibition and recommended that gallerists do this in order to be taken seriously by art critics. Gallerists who read this advice immediately filed it in the round file while at the same time they try to balance the gallery books using magic in order to pay all their bills on time.
So I think it is a good thing when an art critic or an artist tries his hand at organizing an art show from idea to exhibition, including dealing with other fellow artists and/or art critics.
And so we come to the exhibition titled "Supple" and organized by fellow Washington, DC area blogger J.T. Kirkland, who for the past few years has developed, before a worldwide online audience, into an artist, a writer, an opinion voice of other artists' works, a critic of exhibitions, and now a first-time curator.
Currently on exhibit through May 12, 2007 at the Warehouse Gallery complex on 7th street, NW in D.C., Supple is an interesting example not only of the curatorial process itself, but also of the evolving nature of what it takes to be a good curator. It is an excellent exhibition, packed to the rafters with an enviable "Who's Who in D.C." of a particular nuance and sense and genre of art that has a direct link back to the curator's own work in the way it looks and feels.
The fact that a first-time curator, with no previous curatorial experience under his belt or even that deep of an exhibition record as an artist, was able to put together a really good exhibition of several of the D.C. area blue-chip artists speaks volumes both about the curator himself, his work ethic, as well as about the power of the web.
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