6 Questions for Boris Groys

In the new issue of Art Lies, Kurt Mueller asked NYU's Boris Groys six questions about urban space and its relationship with art.  Here is one of them.

What is the relationship of art to urban public space (in whatever form it exists)? Is this a productive relationship? To what ends?

Every urban population believes in having its own collective psychology. One can ridicule this belief, but it has produced a lot of poetry, music and cinema that we are accustomed to valuing. The volume of poems about Parisian air or St. Petersburg’s weather is a sufficient justification for their architecture. However, if we don’t speak about art that is stimulated by a city but about art in the public space, then one should be very careful. The chance that any really good artwork can go though all possible channels that evaluate it is minimal. And, in general, art that is exhibited outside of arts institutions has to additionally identify itself as art. That makes art shown in the public space even more conservative than art shown within the framework of institutions.

The rest can be found here.

Groys discusses some of these issues in greater detail in his new book, Art Power.  Check it out.