[The following is lifted from the comment section of an insightful post by
, author of Iconoclasm, Identity Politics and the Erasure of History, which I should have reviewed a long time ago. Read his post and then come back here.]For what may be obvious reasons given the name of my journal, I think about these issues often and I'm glad to know that someone is doing such fine intellectual work on them as you.
It seems that the foremost obstacle in the present is that there are no discernible movements going on of any kind. It's one thing to have a Salon des Refusés when there's a recognizable hegemonic, old-guard style going on in French painting at a time when art was valued by the public. Now we have outsize, maybe absurd levels of pluralism in a time when visual art is largely an afterthought in the public mind. It's a wildly different dynamic.
I know of a single instance in which the rebels had to fight for the freedom to be left alone by the forces of institutionalized progressivism, and that is the Wuming Painting Collective in Beijing. The work they produced is good but not groundbreaking like the Impressionists, surrealists, symbolists, and Viennese Secessionists were at one time. Possibly the last dissident art movement of any note was the Stuckists, who were specifically opposed to conceptualism. I'm still making up my mind about Meow Wolf, but they did perform a viable end-run around the institutions.
My own focus of opposition is on bureaucratic culture. That jibes with your intention to disdain “the interference of the state and quasi-state actors.” There needs at least to be an independent support network, and given the extent of contemporary bureaucracy, that may mean extremes such as independence from state money itself, which now possible through cryptocurrency. Wuming, the Stuckists, and Meow Wolf share an awareness of how to produce work that is comprehensible to people who don't have a degree from Yale or Slade or whatever; I believe that consideration is necessary, though not to the detriment of ambition or quality.
There is much work to do. I'm heartened to see your contributing to it.
I expect it would take more than dissident artists, though their involvement is obviously required. It should also involve a variety of people connected to the art world (assuming enough uncorrupted ones are left) as well as outsiders (like me) who simply love art as such, rather than as a means to sociopolitical ends and associated personal image and status concerns (read opportunism).
Alas, the overall situation has degenerated to such an extent that, if it weren't for the big money still supporting it, it might have devolved into something like what happened to serious music--which may ultimately still happen. The general public has lots of competing options clamoring for its attention, time and money, and it cannot be expected to take the current art "scene" especially seriously, if at all. Even those inclined to partake of it (as I was) may not put up with it for long, nor should they.