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Alfredo Jaar
The closest to pure ideas I have seen. Meaning, a set of events or interversion into a space or city or community evokes a concept so clearly I can't believe it: how can it happen that such broad applications can be so precise? Also, I am amazed by his ability to deliver consistently different stuff visually, and even more so, am awed by his ability to do this when he is commisioned, so probably not giving anyone what they had anticipated.
Thomas Hirschhorn
- Jerry Saltz on Superficial Engagement
Hirschhorn, 48, is a no-nonsense character who talks about "moral responsibility," "justice" and "art's power to change reality." He's desperately earnest and doesn't shy from pronouncements like "I don't make political art, I make art politically," "I fight hierarchy and demagogy," "Nothing is impossible with art," "Energy yes; Quality no," "I am an artist, a worker and a soldier." He scorns political correctness as "a sophisticated American invention to dissuade small-minded and fearful European artists from addressing the real questions in art." All this connects him to true believers of the modernist faith: people like Mondrian, who called for the "abolition of every hierarchy," Malevich, who talked about "the beauty of speed" and "the zero of form," Naum Gabo, who asserted "the active is beautiful; quality is garbage," and Robert Smithson, who wrote, "The rat of politics always gnaws at the cheese of art."
Hirschhorn says he uses cheap materials because "people understand them." This feels false: People understand polished aluminum as readily as cardboard. Nevertheless, Hirschhorn's mania for accessibility