There is a startlingly candid moment that occurs between Thelma Golden, the Director of The Studio Museum in Harlem, and the artist Glenn Ligon during a conversation featured in the catalogue accompanying βGlenn Ligon: America,β a mid-career retrospective at the Whitney Museum of American Art.
Golden speaks of Ligonβs efforts in encouraging a new generation of artists, mentioning the behind-the-scenes role he played in organizing βFreestyle,β an exhibition of emerging talent mounted by the Studio Museum in 2001. A generous gesture on Ligonβs part, you might think, but youβd be wrong. Explaining how younger black artists arenβt all that interested in identity politics or βreparations to artists of colorββhow, in fact, they consider themselves mainstreamβLigon goes on to say that this βindifference to those issues opens space for me.β Laughingly referring to his own self-interest, Ligon cops to wanting to keep the competition small, navigable, and under control.
Whatβs noteworthy about this exchange isnβt that an artist is looking out for number one or choreographing the most expedient way of insuring career longevityβartists have been engaged in such maneuvers since day one. Instead, itβs the casual, even light-hearted tone of Ligonβs admission. Like any number of art-scene operators, Ligon is savvy to the prerequisites of the market place. Heβs less interested in the hard-won victories of pursuing an individual vision than in establishing and sustaining the Ligon brand. As such, heβs adept at pushing certain buttons even as the work, shrink-wrapped as it is in certainty, goes