H Boone

Review of Atlanta Contemporary Art Cente...

My wife and I are art professionals -- she an art...

My wife and I are art professionals -- she an art historian with a specialty in Contemporary art, and I am a painter and art professor. Our artistic interests are varied and forward-looking. That said, a visit to the Atlanta Art Center yesterday to view the Biennial Exhibit was most disappointing to say the least. Frankly, it is demoralizing to consider that the Southest has a wealth of artistc talent that deserves to respresent current artistic currents in region, but the ACC has chosen some of the most inept and sophomoric of work to display. There was one line artist, Perez, whose pastel and charcoal work was gripping and truly meritorious. Other than that, most of the other work was facil and uninspiring at best and others just plain awful. The curator seemed to choose work by artists who in some way are marginalized (e g., mentally ill), and not consider artistic merit. If they want to have an exhibit of untrained and clueless artists okay, but then call it that. Don't present this as representative of arts in the Southeast (which is the purpose of a biennial). I'd like to think that maybe there simply was a very poor pool of applicants, and not that the curator was so terribly inept.

Atlanta has not done well compared to other cities in establishing itself as an important "art city". Save a few very good private galleries, one or two good nonprofit spaces, the Carlos Museum, and the High, there is a terrible lack of artistic leadership and
here. When the local press publishes an article it is often about street or pubic arrt, thus offeri g a myopic view of Atlanta art When it was the Nexxus years ago, the ACC was considered favorably. But this exhibit and previous exhibits indicate a management that really has no business running such a space that could be doing great things. They are in fact only celebrating and facilitating mediocrity.