regionalism

Over at Artblog.net Franklin asks about regionalism and what a regional style would look like. I've lived in six cities in the past decade and didn't see a regional style in any of them - the closest was in Austin where many of my professors had a narrative painting style, but there were lots of artists there doing completely different things. The only regional differences were is how much money was floating around to support all the crazy stuff, but the styles were all mixed up.

The problem with regionalism now is how easy it is to find a community online for one's work when it doesn't fit into an area's narrative. I don't know many artists here in Charlottesville, but I've been able to hook up with people who do work right along the lines of mine via email, blogs and websites. It's might not be as rewarding as hanging out after openings, but I do have relationships (including collaborative art projects) with artists from DC to Denmark.

When people ask me where I grew up I say the suburbs of DC in northern Virginia, but I also add that that landscape and culture is remarkably similar to Richmond's West End, to North Austin, to the outskirts of Albany and the depths of Long Island. I have more in common with someone who grew up near the malls outside St. Louis than I do someone who grew up 10 miles from me in urban DC.

Regionalism in art is as meaningless as regionalism in politics - there really aren't any red or blue states, just shades of purple. In DC, Kelly Towles shows his graf-inspired work next to J.T.Kirkland's precise minimalist pieces. I'm not saying "Let's all get along" and "there's room for everyone" - I mean that it's mattering less and less where you are when you make your work when you can find support and community among people outside your immediate area. Besides, regionalism probably wasn't real anyway - I'm sure in the heyday of the New York School there were plenty of artists doing all kinds of different things - they just didn't make it into the history books.

PS: One exception though - money - that matters a lot and I am still learning that to get work shown and sold where you are really does matter. So my thoughts above are naive and hopeful but in the end kind of bone-headed.