John Rapko - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Book by John Rapko
johnrapko.com, 2024
A critical review of Charles Taylor's recent book in the philosophy of Romantic and post-Romantic... more A critical review of Charles Taylor's recent book in the philosophy of Romantic and post-Romantic poetry. I sketched Taylor's basic concerns, summarize the argument of the book, and dispute his diagnosis of recent post-Romantic poetry with a short analysis of a few words from the poet Lyn Hejinian's My Life. This is a lightly edited version of a three-part blog post on johnrapko.com from July 2024
johnrapko.com , 2024
A short review of Raymond Geuss's review of essays. Geuss's characteristic concerns are sketched,... more A short review of Raymond Geuss's review of essays. Geuss's characteristic concerns are sketched, and philosophically significant points from the book are discussed, in particular Geuss's attack on the idea that there is or can be a single standard that determines whether a human life is successful.
johnrapko.com, 2024
A short review of Tim Ingold's book The Rise and Fall of Generation Now: A brief sketch of the ph... more A short review of Tim Ingold's book The Rise and Fall of Generation Now: A brief sketch of the phenomenon of generations is offered through a summary of Karl Mannheim's essay 'The Problem of Generations'; then the book is summarized, with a critical question briefly raised at the end.
johnrapko.com, 2023
Originally published as a blog post at johnrapko.com, this is a partial summary with critical re... more Originally published as a blog post at johnrapko.com, this is a partial summary with critical remarks of Edward Winters's Architectural Aesthetics: Appreciating Architecture as an Art (2023)
Retorno a la Oscuridad, 2023
My second book in the philosophy of contemporary art published by uniandes press of the Universid... more My second book in the philosophy of contemporary art published by uniandes press of the Universidad de los Andes in Bogotá. The book is based upon three lectures I gave at the Universidad in 2015. The first chapter considers the characterization of contemporary art as 'post-conceptual', with special reference Jeff Wall; the second the distinctive character of recent artistic practices, with special reference to the later work of Philip Guston; the third on some distinctive kinds of artistic meaning in contemporary art, with special reference to the piece 'Trust Me' by Gema Alava.
johnrapko.com, 2023
A summary of the central interpretive claims in Darryn Ansted's The Artwork of Gerhard Richter (2... more A summary of the central interpretive claims in Darryn Ansted's The Artwork of Gerhard Richter (2017). Two claims in particular are discussed, and some questions are raised about Ansted's analogy of Richter's paintings with Adorno's negative dialectic, and with Ansted's employment of the concept of an oeuvre. This is a lightly edited version of a post on John Rapko's blog on March 6, 2023.
johnrapko.com, 2023
This is a partial summary of Klinger's book on Gerhard Richter, focusing in particular on Klinger... more This is a partial summary of Klinger's book on Gerhard Richter, focusing in particular on Klinger's account of the pictorial mechanisms whereby Richter transforms source materials in paintings that exhibit distinctively artistic form. It was first published on John Rapko's blog on 1/21/23.
Return to Darkness (johnrapko.com), 2022
In Philosophy of Painting, Jason Gaiger claims to give a partial account of contemporary artistic... more In Philosophy of Painting, Jason Gaiger claims to give a partial account of contemporary artistic painting and, in particular, a 'non-conservative defense' of it. Here I summarize Gaiger's account and offer some criticisms. This piece was first published as a blog post on John Rapko's blog Return to Darkness (johnrapko.com).
johnrapko.com, 2022
A review of Dylan's book, including a brief summary, some remarks on the philosophy of song, and ... more A review of Dylan's book, including a brief summary, some remarks on the philosophy of song, and an attempt to place the book in the context of his earlier prose of Chronicles: Volume One and The Nobel Lecture. The review initially appeared John Rapko's blog on December 4, 2022
johnrapko.com, 2022
This is a lengthy review of Crowther's book, and largely focuses on his account of sculpture gene... more This is a lengthy review of Crowther's book, and largely focuses on his account of sculpture generally and of contemporary sculpture in particular. I argue that his account fills a major lacuna in the canonical account given by Rosalind Krauss in 'Sculpture in the Expanded Field', though it needs supplementation to provide a conceptual repertoire sufficiently rich to make sense of contemporary sculpture.
johnrapko.com, 2022
A review from the blog of John Rapko of Saltz's recent book. The meager content is summarized, an... more A review from the blog of John Rapko of Saltz's recent book. The meager content is summarized, and then investigated in light of Alasdair MacIntyre's conception of a practice in After Virtue and of his account of the role of the artist's project in modern morality from Ethics in the Conflicts of Modernity.
Papers by John Rapko
The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 2000
johnrapko.com, 2023
In this semi-popular piece some recent discussions of contemporary art criticism by the art criti... more In this semi-popular piece some recent discussions of contemporary art criticism by the art critics Sean Tatol and Ben Davis are discussed. Canonical pieces by Arnold Isenberg and Monroe Beardsley are introduced as a way of throwing some light on the issues. This originally appeared as a four-part blog post in late Fall of 2023.
johnrapko.com, 2023
An interpretation and analysis of Muqi's 6 Persimmons--The question of whether and in what sense ... more An interpretation and analysis of Muqi's 6 Persimmons--The question of whether and in what sense 6 Persimmons is about ineffability is pursued. The painting is analyzed formally, the background in Chan Buddhism is sketched, Richard Wollheim's account of textual meaning is introduced and supplemented by Dan Sperber's account of focalisation, and recent work on ineffability by Graham Priest and Silvia Jonas is introduced. This originally appeared as a three-part blog post.
En Retorno a la oscuridad se presentan tres conferencias en las que John Rapko reflexiona sobre e... more En Retorno a la oscuridad se presentan tres conferencias en las que John Rapko reflexiona sobre el papel del arte contemporáneo y su relación con la sociedad actual. Basado en la idea de Philip Fisher de que el arte moderno es una reacción a la claridad óptica del impresionismo, en este libro se plantea que es necesario mantener la tradición de misterio para evitar que continúe siendo un arte del inconformismo, burocratizado y cooptado institucionalmente. En estas páginas, Rapko propone la idea de un arte posconceptual que combine la idea con la encarnación y la práctica, y que así las obras tengan la capacidad de rivalizar con la falsa claridad de la omnipresencia de la contaminación mediática.
Some critical remarks on issues related to the use of animals in art, in the form of a review of ... more Some critical remarks on issues related to the use of animals in art, in the form of a review of an exhibition entitled 'Wrong's What I Do Best' at the San Francisco Art Institute in 2014
A short explication of White's explication from my blog, with special attention of the relation o... more A short explication of White's explication from my blog, with special attention of the relation of the work to its source, Velazquez's The Surrender of Breda.
Some philosophical remarks on the controversy surrounding the Guggenheim's withdrawal of three wo... more Some philosophical remarks on the controversy surrounding the Guggenheim's withdrawal of three works, each accused of containing images of animal abuse, from the show 'Art and China After 1989: The Theater of the World"
The following is a piece written and published in three parts for consecutive issues of the San F... more The following is a piece written and published in three parts for consecutive issues of the San Francisco Arts Quarterly. A series of analyses of the sort of discourse used by contemporary international curators is presented. The first part argues that part of the opacity of the curators' discourse stems from its insulation from criticism. The second part notes and analyzes the discourse's lack of a conception of artistic process. The third part suggests that the curators' focal concern with 'contemporaneity' is mystified and debilitating.
johnrapko.com, 2024
A critical review of Charles Taylor's recent book in the philosophy of Romantic and post-Romantic... more A critical review of Charles Taylor's recent book in the philosophy of Romantic and post-Romantic poetry. I sketched Taylor's basic concerns, summarize the argument of the book, and dispute his diagnosis of recent post-Romantic poetry with a short analysis of a few words from the poet Lyn Hejinian's My Life. This is a lightly edited version of a three-part blog post on johnrapko.com from July 2024
johnrapko.com , 2024
A short review of Raymond Geuss's review of essays. Geuss's characteristic concerns are sketched,... more A short review of Raymond Geuss's review of essays. Geuss's characteristic concerns are sketched, and philosophically significant points from the book are discussed, in particular Geuss's attack on the idea that there is or can be a single standard that determines whether a human life is successful.
johnrapko.com, 2024
A short review of Tim Ingold's book The Rise and Fall of Generation Now: A brief sketch of the ph... more A short review of Tim Ingold's book The Rise and Fall of Generation Now: A brief sketch of the phenomenon of generations is offered through a summary of Karl Mannheim's essay 'The Problem of Generations'; then the book is summarized, with a critical question briefly raised at the end.
johnrapko.com, 2023
Originally published as a blog post at johnrapko.com, this is a partial summary with critical re... more Originally published as a blog post at johnrapko.com, this is a partial summary with critical remarks of Edward Winters's Architectural Aesthetics: Appreciating Architecture as an Art (2023)
Retorno a la Oscuridad, 2023
My second book in the philosophy of contemporary art published by uniandes press of the Universid... more My second book in the philosophy of contemporary art published by uniandes press of the Universidad de los Andes in Bogotá. The book is based upon three lectures I gave at the Universidad in 2015. The first chapter considers the characterization of contemporary art as 'post-conceptual', with special reference Jeff Wall; the second the distinctive character of recent artistic practices, with special reference to the later work of Philip Guston; the third on some distinctive kinds of artistic meaning in contemporary art, with special reference to the piece 'Trust Me' by Gema Alava.
johnrapko.com, 2023
A summary of the central interpretive claims in Darryn Ansted's The Artwork of Gerhard Richter (2... more A summary of the central interpretive claims in Darryn Ansted's The Artwork of Gerhard Richter (2017). Two claims in particular are discussed, and some questions are raised about Ansted's analogy of Richter's paintings with Adorno's negative dialectic, and with Ansted's employment of the concept of an oeuvre. This is a lightly edited version of a post on John Rapko's blog on March 6, 2023.
johnrapko.com, 2023
This is a partial summary of Klinger's book on Gerhard Richter, focusing in particular on Klinger... more This is a partial summary of Klinger's book on Gerhard Richter, focusing in particular on Klinger's account of the pictorial mechanisms whereby Richter transforms source materials in paintings that exhibit distinctively artistic form. It was first published on John Rapko's blog on 1/21/23.
Return to Darkness (johnrapko.com), 2022
In Philosophy of Painting, Jason Gaiger claims to give a partial account of contemporary artistic... more In Philosophy of Painting, Jason Gaiger claims to give a partial account of contemporary artistic painting and, in particular, a 'non-conservative defense' of it. Here I summarize Gaiger's account and offer some criticisms. This piece was first published as a blog post on John Rapko's blog Return to Darkness (johnrapko.com).
johnrapko.com, 2022
A review of Dylan's book, including a brief summary, some remarks on the philosophy of song, and ... more A review of Dylan's book, including a brief summary, some remarks on the philosophy of song, and an attempt to place the book in the context of his earlier prose of Chronicles: Volume One and The Nobel Lecture. The review initially appeared John Rapko's blog on December 4, 2022
johnrapko.com, 2022
This is a lengthy review of Crowther's book, and largely focuses on his account of sculpture gene... more This is a lengthy review of Crowther's book, and largely focuses on his account of sculpture generally and of contemporary sculpture in particular. I argue that his account fills a major lacuna in the canonical account given by Rosalind Krauss in 'Sculpture in the Expanded Field', though it needs supplementation to provide a conceptual repertoire sufficiently rich to make sense of contemporary sculpture.
johnrapko.com, 2022
A review from the blog of John Rapko of Saltz's recent book. The meager content is summarized, an... more A review from the blog of John Rapko of Saltz's recent book. The meager content is summarized, and then investigated in light of Alasdair MacIntyre's conception of a practice in After Virtue and of his account of the role of the artist's project in modern morality from Ethics in the Conflicts of Modernity.
The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 2000
johnrapko.com, 2023
In this semi-popular piece some recent discussions of contemporary art criticism by the art criti... more In this semi-popular piece some recent discussions of contemporary art criticism by the art critics Sean Tatol and Ben Davis are discussed. Canonical pieces by Arnold Isenberg and Monroe Beardsley are introduced as a way of throwing some light on the issues. This originally appeared as a four-part blog post in late Fall of 2023.
johnrapko.com, 2023
An interpretation and analysis of Muqi's 6 Persimmons--The question of whether and in what sense ... more An interpretation and analysis of Muqi's 6 Persimmons--The question of whether and in what sense 6 Persimmons is about ineffability is pursued. The painting is analyzed formally, the background in Chan Buddhism is sketched, Richard Wollheim's account of textual meaning is introduced and supplemented by Dan Sperber's account of focalisation, and recent work on ineffability by Graham Priest and Silvia Jonas is introduced. This originally appeared as a three-part blog post.
En Retorno a la oscuridad se presentan tres conferencias en las que John Rapko reflexiona sobre e... more En Retorno a la oscuridad se presentan tres conferencias en las que John Rapko reflexiona sobre el papel del arte contemporáneo y su relación con la sociedad actual. Basado en la idea de Philip Fisher de que el arte moderno es una reacción a la claridad óptica del impresionismo, en este libro se plantea que es necesario mantener la tradición de misterio para evitar que continúe siendo un arte del inconformismo, burocratizado y cooptado institucionalmente. En estas páginas, Rapko propone la idea de un arte posconceptual que combine la idea con la encarnación y la práctica, y que así las obras tengan la capacidad de rivalizar con la falsa claridad de la omnipresencia de la contaminación mediática.
Some critical remarks on issues related to the use of animals in art, in the form of a review of ... more Some critical remarks on issues related to the use of animals in art, in the form of a review of an exhibition entitled 'Wrong's What I Do Best' at the San Francisco Art Institute in 2014
A short explication of White's explication from my blog, with special attention of the relation o... more A short explication of White's explication from my blog, with special attention of the relation of the work to its source, Velazquez's The Surrender of Breda.
Some philosophical remarks on the controversy surrounding the Guggenheim's withdrawal of three wo... more Some philosophical remarks on the controversy surrounding the Guggenheim's withdrawal of three works, each accused of containing images of animal abuse, from the show 'Art and China After 1989: The Theater of the World"
The following is a piece written and published in three parts for consecutive issues of the San F... more The following is a piece written and published in three parts for consecutive issues of the San Francisco Arts Quarterly. A series of analyses of the sort of discourse used by contemporary international curators is presented. The first part argues that part of the opacity of the curators' discourse stems from its insulation from criticism. The second part notes and analyzes the discourse's lack of a conception of artistic process. The third part suggests that the curators' focal concern with 'contemporaneity' is mystified and debilitating.
This is a short catalog essay written for a show of the work of Frances McCormack and Danae Matte... more This is a short catalog essay written for a show of the work of Frances McCormack and Danae Mattes at the Sonoma Valley Museum of Art. I offer some reflections on ways in which their work might be thought to rehabilitate aesthetic contemplation in contemporary art.
Some philosophical-cum-art-historical reflections on the question of taste: Why is it impossible ... more Some philosophical-cum-art-historical reflections on the question of taste: Why is it impossible for people with some appreciative interest in contemporary art to like the work of Thomas Kinkade?
A catalog essay for a show at ProArts in Oakland, California, in the Fall of 2014, of the artist ... more A catalog essay for a show at ProArts in Oakland, California, in the Fall of 2014, of the artist Cate White
johnrapko.com , 2024
Originally published on my blog, here I sketch Bishop's central concept of hybrid attention, then... more Originally published on my blog, here I sketch Bishop's central concept of hybrid attention, then summarize her application of it to some very recently emergent kinds of contemporary visual art. Snarky remarks are made, as well as some substantive criticism.
johnrapko.com, 2023
Alva Noë's new book offers a novel ontology of human life in which he embeds the account of art a... more Alva Noë's new book offers a novel ontology of human life in which he embeds the account of art and philosophy as second-order practices earlier published in his book Strange Tools. Here I summarize his new ontology and consider this new framing for his philosophy of art. I contrast his conception of 'looping' with that of his source, Ian Hacking; then I compare his philosophy of art with Arthur Danto's, and his ontology of human life with Arnold Gehlen's and Helmuth Plessner's.
johnrapko.com, 2023
This is a critical consideration of some of the central parts of Buchloh's massive book on Gerhar... more This is a critical consideration of some of the central parts of Buchloh's massive book on Gerhard Richter. I consider Buchloh's overall account of Richter, then his account of Richter's abstractions and of Richter's series October 18, 1977, and offer some reflections on where Buchloh has gone wrong. An appendix deals with Buchloh's appalling writing style. This was first published in four parts on John Rapko's blog in May-June 2023.
johnrapko.com, 2023
This is a short summary of Neiman's book Left Is Not Woke (2023), followed by criticisms on two p... more This is a short summary of Neiman's book Left Is Not Woke (2023), followed by criticisms on two points: her failure to clarify sufficiently what the terms 'Left', 'Woke', and 'Socialism' mean in this context; and her failure to supplement her advocacy of a quasi-Kantian conception of reason with some sense of imagination.
johnrapko.com, 2023
A short summary of with brief remarks on Planer's and Sterelny's From Sign to Symbol. The review ... more A short summary of with brief remarks on Planer's and Sterelny's From Sign to Symbol. The review is book-ended with considerations concerning the origins of the visual arts, and the question is asked what contribution the authors' account of language might make to the understanding of those origins. This piece was originally published as a blog posting on April 11, 2023 at johnrapko.com
johnrapko.com, 2023
Herein I summarize the account given by Christian Lotz in his recent book The Art of Gerhard Rich... more Herein I summarize the account given by Christian Lotz in his recent book The Art of Gerhard Richter. First I reconstruct Lotz's phenomenological account of the image, which he equates with artistic paintings. Then I consider his most sustained analysis, of Richter's painting 'Young Portrait'. Finally I raise some critical questions about Lotz's central claims and methods. This is a lightly edited version of a blog post published on 2/11/23 at johnrapko.com
johnrapko.com, 2023
A critical appreciation of Jonathan Lear's Imagining the End: Mourning and Ethical Life, original... more A critical appreciation of Jonathan Lear's Imagining the End: Mourning and Ethical Life, originally published on John Rapko's blog on 1/3/23
The British Journal of Aesthetics, 2002
Page 1. What, After All, Is a Work of Art? By JOSEPH MARGOLIS. Penn State Press. 1999. pp. xi + 1... more Page 1. What, After All, Is a Work of Art? By JOSEPH MARGOLIS. Penn State Press. 1999. pp. xi + 143. $16.95 (pbk). NIETZSCHE, we should recall, set aside with high reverence the name of Heraclitus from what he called 'the rest of the philosopher crowd'. ...
In this review I try and show the ways in which Geuss’ new work may advance the (radical) realist... more In this review I try and show the ways in which Geuss’ new work may advance the (radical) realist programme. The main contribution in the new essays, as I see it, is the emphasis on the counterintuitively transformative potential of a realist approach, as opposed to the false promise of highly moralised approaches. I also highlight some open questions about Geuss’ realism, primarily to do with his contextualism and with the role of feasibility constraints.
Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Sep 1, 2000
johnrapko.com, 2021
This blog piece briefly contrasts two different conceptions of contemporary art, a conception int... more This blog piece briefly contrasts two different conceptions of contemporary art, a conception introduced and popularized by Thierry de Duve, and a conception that highlights the emergence and plasticity of new genres and art forms in contemporary art. Kim Knowles’s book Experimental Film and Photochemical Practices (2020) is considered as offering materials tending to support the latter conception
Return to Darkness: the blog, 2021
A review of Foster's book as posted on the blog johnrapko.org on March 25, 2021
Probably no artist has been more widely or more frequently mentioned as the founder of Contempora... more Probably no artist has been more widely or more frequently mentioned as the founder of Contemporary art than Marcel Duchamp. Duchamp was active as a painter in the first decade of the twentieth century, and, despite having proclaimed that he had abandoned art in the 1920's, worked for twenty years until 1966 on his sculptural installation Étant donnés. The body of his work that has allegedly founded Contemporary art is his so-called 'readymades', which he produced in the second decade of the twentieth century. The distinctive feature of the readymade is that the work is not so much made by the artist as chosen by the artist. The object chosen is not chosen primarily for its perceived aesthetic qualities, as a Chinese scholar might choose an especially fantastic rock to display, or the Inka might position and display an especially evocative stone. Rather the object chosen is an industrial artifact-an airplane propeller, a shovel, a urinal-, which is then exhibited as an artwork by the artist-chooser. In some cases the object is exhibited without alteration, but more commonly the object is 'assisted' with minimal and markedly unskillful additions, as with Duchamp's 'Fountain' (1917), a urinal upon which Duchamp has scrawled the
A review and brief discussion of key claims made in Thierry de Duve's Aesthetics at Large: Volume... more A review and brief discussion of key claims made in Thierry de Duve's Aesthetics at Large: Volume 1 Art, Ethics, Politics. This was first published on John Rapko's blog (johnrapko.com) on July 2, 2021
johnrapko.com , 2021
The following is a a review of the anthropologist Tim Ingold's book Correspondences (2021), which... more The following is a a review of the anthropologist Tim Ingold's book Correspondences (2021), which consists of short pieces relating to, or, in Ingold's terminology, 'corresponding' with various exhibitions and artworks. I first sketch his general account involving a rejection of 'hylomorphic' (form + matter) explanation, and proposal of an alternative, then consider his application of the new account with regard to the arts
johnrapko.com, 2022
This is a review of Alva Noë's Learning to Look (2021) published on my blog on 2/12/22. I focus o... more This is a review of Alva Noë's Learning to Look (2021) published on my blog on 2/12/22. I focus on the light this new book throws on issues in the philosophy of Contemporary art and art generally that arise also in consideration of the general philosophy of art Noë gives in his earlier book Strange Tools (2015).
johnrapko.com, 2022
This is a short review from my blog of Andreas Malm's How to Blow Up a Pipeline. Here I largely r... more This is a short review from my blog of Andreas Malm's How to Blow Up a Pipeline. Here I largely restrict to summary and perhaps clarification of what I take to be Malm's central argument, which concludes with the call for violent attacks on property with the aim of halting and reducing the ever-intensifying carbon dioxide emissions of what Malm calls 'fossil capitalism'.
johnrapko.com, 2022
This is a critical review of Ben Davis's book as published on May 3, 2022 in John Rapko's blog. D... more This is a critical review of Ben Davis's book as published on May 3, 2022 in John Rapko's blog. Davis's arguments are sketched, and two objections are raised.
johnrapko.com, 2022
This is a review of Sherri Irvin's book Immaterial: Rules in Contemporary Art. The review was ori... more This is a review of Sherri Irvin's book Immaterial: Rules in Contemporary Art. The review was originally published in three parts on John Rapko's blog in May-June 2022. I summarize Irvin's central arguments, consider the project of an ontology of contemporary visual art general, offer a couple of criticisms of Irvin's account of practices and artistic functions, and suggest the possibility of an alternative approach.
A pdf of a review published in the San Francisco Arts Quarterly of the drawings of Red Horse of t... more A pdf of a review published in the San Francisco Arts Quarterly of the drawings of Red Horse of the Battle of the Little Big Horn, as show at the Cantor Art Museum at Stanford in the Spring of 2016. The question of whether and in what sense their is a coherent conception of an intended audience is raised, then partially investigated with the help of a some claims made by Alasdair MacIntyre
John Rapko's blog: Return to Darkness, 2021
This is a piece published on John Rapko's blog that first raises the issue of whether there are k... more This is a piece published on John Rapko's blog that first raises the issue of whether there are kinds of artistic meaningfulness distinctive of ceramics, and then proceeds to an analytic comparison of two pots from the early 20th century by the celebrated Hopi-Tewa potter Nampeyo
johnrapko.com, 2022
Originally published on my blog, here I sketch an analysis of the Brazilian Butoh/Tanztheater art... more Originally published on my blog, here I sketch an analysis of the Brazilian Butoh/Tanztheater artist Carol Trindade's performance in a store window in 2021, and focus on her use of the more typically balletic motif of the animated doll. Trindade's performance is considered in light ideas from Friedrich von Kleist's 'Puppet Theatre' and Adrian Stokes's book To-Night the Ballet.
johnrapko.com, 2022
The art historian Philip Rawson suggests that Poussin was an ontologist and that his works exhibi... more The art historian Philip Rawson suggests that Poussin was an ontologist and that his works exhibit a distinctive visual ontology. Here I consider this claim in relation to two drawings included in the exhibit 'Poussin and the Dance'. After considering suggestions from Philippe Descola and Richard Wollheim, I construct an explication out of remarks by R. G. Collingwood and Oskar Bätschmann. Finally I turn to the questions of why Poussin stopping drawing and painting dances in the mid-late 1630's, and whether the visual ontology embodied therein had any consequences in later art, particularly in Picasso
johnrapko.com, 2022
A review of the work of the designer-artist Neri Oxman at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art ... more A review of the work of the designer-artist Neri Oxman at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in 2022. Some philosophical issues are raised, and the work is compared with the apparently similar works of Eva Hesse
johnrapko.com/blog, 2019
A review of an exhibition in 2019 at the Mills College Museum of the painter Cate White.
A short discussion of Hito Steyerl's poetics with particular reference to her celebrated film ins... more A short discussion of Hito Steyerl's poetics with particular reference to her celebrated film installation 'Factory of the Sun'. Her rejection of Wim Wenders's poetics partially motivates aspects of her poetics, which are further shaped by her use of motifs from Soviet constructivism, especially from Dziga Vertov.
A review of a show in 2009 at the de Saisset Gallery at Santa Clara University featuring works by... more A review of a show in 2009 at the de Saisset Gallery at Santa Clara University featuring works by Gail Wight, Lynn Hershman, and other Bay Area-based artists who work in new media.
A gallery review from 2011 of works shown in San Francisco by Paul Kos, Jim Melchert, and Shazia ... more A gallery review from 2011 of works shown in San Francisco by Paul Kos, Jim Melchert, and Shazia Sikander. The curating of Sikander's show by Hou Hanru is criticized.
A review of a major show of recent Colombian art, including work by Doris Salcedo, Oscar Muñoz, a... more A review of a major show of recent Colombian art, including work by Doris Salcedo, Oscar Muñoz, and Fernando Uhía
The Images used in a lecture on a conception of profundity distinctive of contemporary art.
johnrapko.com , 2021
The following is a condensed proto-draft of a lecture on expression in contemporary art. The lect... more The following is a condensed proto-draft of a lecture on expression in contemporary art. The lecture considers works by Frank Bowling, Nam June Paik, and Carol Trindade as rejecting what M. H. Abrams termed 'expressivist theory', that is, the theory that a work of art primarily communicates to a suitably attuned viewer the artist's mental states, moods, emotions, and/or feelings. Some of Theodor Adorno's essays are considered in light of their contribution to articulating this rejection in favor of the idea that more recent art is more a playing with conventions wherein expressiveness emerges as a result of the artistic process, rather than being pre-supposed by that process.