TAC-KC: 01.26.12

Tracy's Art Calendar — Kansas City for January 26, 2012
Does Art Writing Matter?

The Freight House Pedestrian Bridge was once the Pencoyd Railroad Bridge and was relocated a few years ago by the Kansas City architecture firm BNIM to provide a pedestrian connection from the north/back of Union Station down to the Freight House / Crossroads Arts District. Is it time for Kansas City's art writing likewise to be repurposed?
Image: photo by author, May 2011

Today — Monday the 23rd — is when Plug Projects would like to hear from you about whether you're interested in coming to their discussion on Thursday about the role of art writing, especially for Kansas City's community. Is it critical?

All are welcome; you don't have to be an artist or a writer to have an opinion to share. Click here to read more about Art Writing = Critical and how to RSVP.

Plug Projects is the curitorial collaborative of Cory Imig, Amy Kligman, Misha Kligman, Nicole Mauser, and Caleb Taylor, who run a studio/gallery space in the West Bottoms on Genessee (next to R Bar and across from the Livestock Exchange Building, itself full of artists' studios). The space just opened its first solo exhibition last Friday, MULTI-CHANNEL: an exhibition in flux by Andrew Jacob Schell, and it's an ongoing, Internet-involved, interactive one (which I have not seen yet).

Cory will be back from a recent trip to Oklahoma City, where she and writer Blair Schulman were part of the latest installment of the Oklahoma Art Writing and Curatorial Fellowship. I had the opportunity to participate in 2010 as a mentor (meaning, just one trip). It was one of those things I wish there had been more time for, indeed, and I'm looking forward to hearing what Cory and Blair have brought back so far.

Thursday's discussion, Art Writing = Critical, is being held in the Crossroads area, please note, and it's a "bring your own chair" affair. When I first read "BYOC," I thought, "coffee." And I always hear refrains of (Sir) Elton John's Rocket Man anytime I read about anything funded through the Rocket Grants program — Plug Projects is but one very cool creation to come from that Charlotte Street Foundation / Spencer Museum of Art collaboration (with money from the Andy Warhol Foundation).

Critical has at least two general meanings, one being "offering critique" and another, "crucial or important." If you pop over to the dictionary, you'll find a number of intriguing starting points for addressing whether or not Kansas City's art writing meets these definitions — which might get you started thinking about whether or not it needs to or should.

PS, All opinions here are my own, and no one edits this, so any errors are also solely mine. Corrections are appreciated.