Critical Issues in Contemporary Art (ARTH3101 - FA25)

"Picasso or Bitcoin" Canaletto, Venice, the Return of the Bucintoro on Ascension Day, around 1732      The article "Picasso or Bitcoin," written by Scott Reyburn, poses many questions, such as whether owning a Picasso is still the ultimate status symbol. Or has that role shifted to things like Bitcoin and luxury experiences? Art used to be a status symbol for the wealthy, but recent data shows its status might be slipping. Auction houses like Christie's and Sotheby's reported that their sales stayed flat in the first half of 2025, instead of showing growth as was expected. Suggesting the market for art is leveling out rather than growing. This comes because wealthy people are now trying to think more financially and question whether art is worth it, given the costs to buy and sell art, and how hard it is to quickly turn it back into cash. Art starts to look less appealing compared to stocks, gold, or even Bitcoin.      The super rich are now focusing on ...

     Do you think that elements such as your private spaces, traumas, and experiences can become art? Tracey Emin provides an answer to this. Her challenging, yet at times beautiful, works are enough to capture people's attention. I too was captivated by the storytelling in her work and found myself looking for her documentary. In this film, she speaks honestly about her career, her skills in creating a wide variety of works, and personal themes such as autobiography, memory, desire, and identity. Early in the film, she says: "I’m an artist because I’m a creative person. If I always say, if I didn’t make art, I’d probably be dead. But let’s, let’s be more realistic about that, if I didn’t make art, and I’ve done well in life, then I probably would not go into retail or something, and I would probably be the person in the shop that would be always organizing the displays and always making the coat hangers look better and always making the notice board look nice in the cant...

Henry Ossawa Tanner’s Daniel in the Lions Den, 1907-1918 Two Centuries of African American Art was an exhibition full of Black art most people had never heard of in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 1976. Then it eventually went to Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, and the Brooklyn museum showing work from Aaron Douglass and Jacob Lawerence.  The summary of the exhibition is still written on LACM)’s website and is as stated: “It was the first comprehensive survey of African American art which, following its premier at LACMA, toured three other major U.S. art institutions. The premise was to acknowledge the work of black artists during the period of 1750 to 1950, whose contributions to American art had largely been neglected. Featuring over 200 works and 63 artists, the show included painting, sculpture, drawing, graphics, crafts and decorative arts.” (LACMA). You can find the complete checklist on there as well which states every piece in the collection by artist, title, and lender. ...

  Deoree Malone Professor Kesten ARTH3101 26 September 2025 Gender inequality Why is Gender inequality happening today? Gender inequality is a big problem in our lives today. Women of color, gay men, and transgenders unemployment is through the roof. Social life, discrimination, politics, world leaders and company owners are all a cause of unemployment. This has to come to a stop; the world is being affected, not just people. Men are also being affected by gender inequality the same as women, gay men, and transgenders are affected. They are just affected in different ways. When women tend to work or get into their professions, women often get treated unfairly.Women tend to be underrepresented on a high level in work. That’s because in the financial industry men senior leadership take over all industries. So that leaves women outnumbered. U.S. Census Bureau data shows that full-time women earned 81 cents to every dollar that men earned in 2024. That increasingly went up from 77 cent...

In this podcast episode of The Lonely Palette it discussed the life of Felix Gonzalez-Torres — a gay man who lived during the AIDS epidemic. If you’re unsure of what that is, the AIDS epidemic was a time in the late 1900’s where HIV/AIDS was on the rise and was transferred more easily through anal sex. Since this is the main way gay men would have intercourse, most people proceeded to blame gay men for this problem rather than focusing on the actual cause of this outbreak.  Felix Gonzalez-Torres made several artworks depicting his feelings during this epidemic, but this episode focused on his artwork ‘Untitled (March 5th) #2. This artwork is a small installation of two light bulbs hanging from wire that’s wrapped around the base and falls to the floor. The two light bulbs are hanging together, their bases touching. This artwork is meant to showcase the everlasting bond of lovers. Along with this, it was made to show how gay men’s lives seemed like replaceable lightbulbs to the outs...

     In the Hyperallergic article, “Laura James Paints What America Wants to Forget,” Alexandra M. Thomas discusses the featured artist Laura James and her practice to preserve Black Americans culture in her works as the US government threatens to suppress and sanitize the country’s history of antiblack racial violence.Laura James is an Antiguan Black multidisciplinary artist from Bronx and the founder of BX200 Bronx Visual Artist Directory. In 1999, she launched her ongoing series “American History” after learning about the brutal lynching of James Byrd Jr. at the hands of white supremacists.      One of Laura James' recent new paintings for the series, “Not Even Past” confronts the normalized dismissiveness towards black people to simply “move on” from systematic racism and slavery when it is deeply entrenched within American society and still affects Black Americans to this day. The painting depicts the various scenes of antiblack violence throughout Ame...

In 2024, artist and actor Lee Quiñones published his first monograph chronicling five decades of influential work as a graffiti writer and studio artist. He spoke with Hrag Vartanian of the Hyperallergic Podcast on the occasion of the monograph's release coinciding with an exhibition Quinquagenary of new work at the Charlie James Gallery in the Spring of 2024. The monograph " Lee Quiñones: Fifty Years of New York Graffiti Art and Beyond " presents a comprehensive view into the artist's body of work as he transitioned from notorious street writer to world-renown studio artist. His detailed sketches and notes speak to the discipline that made his long term success. The monograph placing the work in context providing a well documented history commemorating not just his prolificacy and genius but also seismic shifts in culture over decades. Quiñones, Lee. "Lion's Den" (1982. Spray paint on Concrete, 17 ft x 26 ft. Corlears Junior High School, Lower East Si...

      The Problem of Sleepers In The Art World     On the Art Law Podcast - The problem of Sleepers, Steve and Katie speak with Swiss art lawyer Laure Bandle to discuss the legal sides of art transactions, ethical dilemmas, and structural weaknesses in how the art market operates.     First off, what's a sleeper ? Swiss art lawyer Anne Laure Bandle stated " Sleepers are misattributed artworks and antiques that have been wrongfully identified. They have been underqualified, so we think of them not being worth much although they're created by a master artist." (6:40) The Salvator Mundi, a a  Leonardo da Vinci artwork that was first bought for less than $10,000 and then sold for more than $450 million,This is among the most well-known instances they talked about. not only is there a significant price increase, but there are also serious concerns about Justice in this case. the person who sold it the first time? they got none of the upside. Salva...