In its 30.000 years of history, art constantly was shaped by the search for new forms, techniques, aesthetics, concepts and had various roles and functions within society. Besides being an instrument for magical or religious purposes, a way of recording personal or public incidents, a symbol of economic or political power, a prove of class distinction regarding cultural or educational background, as well as a decorative and profitable investment item, the basic character of art always prevailed: Art is a field of expression and instrument of communication. So, how come that its discussion and critical review today became so difficult, even impossible for some experts?

Considering the last thirty years, one understands that due to contemporary art’s complex formal, aesthetical and conceptual character, a change in the understanding and critique of art had to take place, as the traditional working methods of iconography and iconology did not quite function anymore with post-war movements like e.g. Arte Povera, Minimal Art, Fluxus, Happening and Performance. The difficulty of evaluating and criticising them according to traditional art historical canons became impossibe with the eclectic, heterogeneous and pluralistic character of today’s art. Post-structuralism’s loss of absolute knowledge, truth and believe in reality plus postmodernism’s critique of originality, the grounds of difference and the grand narratives finally destroyed all absolute, universal and conventional agreements on what art is and how it can be reviewed. This is one of the main reasons for the crisis of art’s criticism in the second half of the 20th century.

We still discuss how to criticize art in times where rules and standards do not exist objectively but only subjectively, locally and temporary. We still question whether art criticism still functions as an instrument for the production of knowledge. Today, we understand knowledge as being formed and limited by its temporary, socio-cultural as well as geo-political contexts. That is why we constantly have to question and renew it. Also, as it became relative and lost its status of objectivity and absoluteness, it only exists as local, multiple and temporary social agreements on a common sense. Therefore, we feel that the traditional approaches to the production, mediation and (re-)collection of knowledge are not adequate anymore. Today, linearly scientific methods usually fail to solve the heterogeneous and pluralistic chaos that we live in. Therefore, we need to look for alternative ways to deal with knowledge, and this automatically requires another way of observing and reviewing our world. Contemporary art gives us alternative insights in our realities, as it goes beyond the known. Obviously, it does it with multi-layered, often strange and non-orthodox methods. In order to be able to understand contemporary art, its criticism needs to adapt itself to art’s matrix and syntax, where it should develop the same flexibility, in order to question traditional and generalized forms of knowledge production. So, what we need is a liquid and dynamic form of criticism, which constantly questions and renews itself.

A second reason for art criticism’s current crisis is the integration of the art scene into a powerful cultural industry, where the impact of a compulsive and extensive art market influences the formal and conceptual structures of the whole field. Art’s interrelation with commercial interests became so deeply interwoven that works increasingly are evaluated in the context of economic data and PR-strategies of a speculative but not less wild capitalist system. The relationship between art and capital interests is not new of course, but exists at least since the mid of the 18th century when art became a social system with its own space, education, research discipline, review mechanism and market. Though, due to the high number of auction houses, commercial and corporative galleries as well as collectors and sponsors, we understand that the influence of the market is stronger than ever before. This impact on the production and mediation, which for many artists, art-historians and art critics caused the loss of originality and independency of art, became an indicator that the end of art, its history as well as its criticism is given.

In my opinion, this end is not absolute. I believe that we face just another end of a certain notion of art, its history and criticism, as artists today against all odds still produce, art historians still research and critics still write. In this way, the crisis seems like an intrinsic problem of an intellectual elite. Since the 16th century, the western art history is full of depressions and early declarations of deaths and ends. Nevertheless, every now and then, such a discussion is healthy for the whole system, as it makes its producers review, question and reconsider its working structures. 

Already Hegel claimed in his 1828 published book Lectures on Fine Arts that art has lost for us genuine truth and life, and has rather been transferred into ideas instead of maintaining its earlier necessity in reality and occupying its higher place. Heidegger asked around 100 years later in Origins of the Work of Art whether art still is an essential and necessary way in which truth happens. Since then, Danto, Belting, Kuspit and others declared art, and its history as ended. Until recent years, the end of art and art criticism was bound to art-internal, structural, or conceptual reasons. Now, the discussion is rather contextual, and is based on the fact that art became a part of a cultural industry and market. In 2012, Sarah Thornton, the author of the book 7 Days in the Art World, declared her withdrawing from the increasingly infamous art market by publishing a manifesto of 10 reasons not to write about the art market. In the same year, famous art critic Dave Hickey has quit and retired, as he finds the working situation of art critics so disgustingly dependent on the art market that he compared his colleagues with chief-waiters for the rich. He exposed a general degeneration of his field, where anyone who has read a Batman comic would qualify for a career in the industry. Besides this, he blamed the contexts of art for the decreasing quality of art works and artists. Both authors did stop writing art critiques but continued as authors of research based books on art.

Thornton and Hickey’s decision caused a discussion about the state and future of art criticism also here in Turkey. Ali Artun underlined that we would live in a post-critical time for quite a while, and exposed that due to the overwhelming impact of the market, which would not allow any criticism from outside the system, criticism had died a long time ago. (E-Skop, 02.01.2013) Seven years before his declaration of the end of art criticism, Artun was still hopeful, as he wrote that the end was not given yet, but quite the opposite would be the case: “Eleştiri, daralan, uzmanlaşan, tüketim kültürünün işleyişine feda edilen kabuğunu kırmaktadır. Ve en geniş anlamıyla eleştirel düşünce içinde, kültürel eleştiri bağlamında yeniden doğmaktadır.”  (http://www.aliartun.com/content/detail/25) It is quite interesting to see how radically he has changed his mind. Against Artun’s position, Ali Akay exposed in an article in Radikal newspaper that art criticism is not dead but changed its form, contents and working methods. (http://www.radikal.com.tr/hayat/sanat_yazisi_devam_ediyor_formu_degisti-1116319).

Ebru Yetişkin underlined in her Text Şikayetim Yaratana that “bugün mesele eleştirinin ve eleştirmenin oynadığı işleve yönelik bir baskıcı dönüşüm arzusu ve bu baskıcı dönüşüm arzusunun ortaya çıkardığı hegemonic güç ve iktidar ilişkileri içindeki üretimin niteliği. Mesele eleştirinin ve eleştirmenin bilgi üretim yolları ve formları yaratmaya açılıp açılmaması... Bugün giderek büyüyen ‘sektörel’ bir güncel sanat ağı içinde bir pazarlama ve promosyon aracına dönüşebilen eleştirmen ve eleştiriden kolaylıklabahsedilebilmekte.” (http://www.academia.edu/3234588/Sikayetim_Yaratana_Cagdas_Sanatta_Elestiri_ve_Elestirmenlik_Neden_Bir_Bilgi_Sorunudur).

Elif Dastarlı also discussed the crisis of art criticism in her article Bıçak Sırtındaki Sanat Eleştirisini Yeniden Düşünmek in the February issue of Gençsanat, Şubaby, 2013. Though, instead of focusing on the interrelationship between the art critic and the art market, she criticized the degeneration of the field and the general low quality of critical writing. “Şu da bir gerçek - Çoğunluğun sanat yazarı ya da sanat eleştirmeni denen kişiden anladığı basın bülteni yazan iletişimciden ya da bu bültenden haber derleyen gazeticiden farksız.”

(http://www.academia.edu/6693142/Bicak_Sirtindaki_Sanat_Elestirisini_Yeniden_Dusunmek). She underlines that art criticism is a specialist field that requires knowledge and engagement as well as independency. 

In the end, Ayşe H. Köksal raised in an article an important question: Bu tartışmaların diğer ilginç bir boyutu ise, yıllardır Türkiye’de sanat eleştirmenliğinin yokluğundan şikayet edilirken, birdenbire post-eleştirel bir dönem üzerine konuşulmasıydı.

(http://www.academia.edu/3319167/Bir_Yigin_Sistem_ve_Nazariyeye_Bir_Yigin_Ikrar...Genc_Sanat_Subat_2013_Sayi_213)

Contrary to authors like Sarah Thornton or Dave Hickey, I am sure that there still are ways to criticize art. More important, especially in times of an all-over influence of the market on all of us, I believe that art criticism is needed more than ever. In spite of the market’s impact on the production and reception of art, institutional and infrastructural problems, difficulties regarding the freedom of thought, expression and (auto-)censorship, as well as art-intern post-structural difficulties, there are still ways to write about art without falling in the trap of economic, political or career-wise dependency. Obviously, the current state of the arts requires flexible, multi-layered, and process oriented approaches to criticism, as we cannot use the old approaches of art history.

Indeed, as Hickey and Dastarlı underline in their articles, with much more artists than ever comes much more bad art, and weak writing. Though, the conclusion would not be giving up and leaving the field to amateurs, but stay and fight. Believe me, artists and readers still can differentiate between a strong and a weak text.

Also, due to the power of our digital visual culture, visibility is easier than ever. In the past, an artist had to do an exhibition, or be published in a magazine to gain recognition. Today, social networks, blogs, video platforms and web-sites allow him easily and effectively to share his works and thoughts with the world. In the first place, this is good of course. Though, this situation causes a cacophony of uncountable art works and texts. Here, the art critic is more than ever needed for evaluation and feedback. I am not calling for an elitist circle of experts, who have a monopoly-right to write. Though, let us not forget that art is a complex and complicated semi-autonomous social system with its own history and certain conceptual as well as formal and aesthetic ideas. I would never write a critique about physics, mathematics or even a simple sport that I do not know. The same respect I expect for my field.

Another problem in Turkey is the lack of criticism in general. Traditional family structures, as well as school and university do not prepare the individual for a culture of criticism. It seems like age, social class, hierarchies, levels of education, income and status have to be respected, not questioned or criticized. Maybe this is the reason why we constantly fight and do not discuss. Though, in some fields, quite the opposite is the case. 

Just turn on the TV on Sunday night and you can watch hours of football shows in various channels, where people discuss and criticize games and players. So, if it is easily manageable for football lovers to criticise, why so difficult for art lovers?

Thornton and Hickey, as well as a part of the art critics here in Turkey blame the art market for the impossibility to criticise. Against this I would raise the question: Do we only write on shows of famous artists in commercial galleries? I doubt it! Though, this way of dispute seems familiar in the Turkish art scene, as we once again discuss everything but art itself. Sometimes it seems that the discussion about the end of criticism is just an end to commercialized art criticism that circles inside the art marked. Though, was this field ever free and independent? The market should not be blamed for our crisis. We are responsible! If you do not want to be integrated in the market stay out of it, find niches and blank spots inside the system and write about them. There, you will find numerous artists, initiatives and incidents, which are worth writing and discussing.  

Criticism is needed and wanted. Who every has visited an artist studio will be confronted with the question “Well, what do you think”? The worst answer would be: “I do not know, I cannot say”. Artists need feedback, they want feedback. They request it from colleagues, friends and experts. Without criticism there is no improvement.

Also, authors declaring the end of criticism often blame artists and the rest of the art world for being commercial. I know a lot of artists who are either avoiding any involvement in the market or are at least critically towards it. Besides this, there are numerous of independent and emerging artists, which did not enter the art market yet, but are worth to be reviewed. So, there are a lot of non-commercial artists, exhibitions and incidents to write about.

A last reason of the crisis in art criticism is grounded in the various problems with editors and magazines regarding professional working conditions, author independency and fees. Though, are art magazines the only platforms for art criticism? No, as in times of social networks, video-forums, web-sites and blogs, there are numerous ways to publish critical writing. Also, in studio visits, symposia and conferences, there are many chances for developing critical thought.

Whatever you do, art criticism should be first of all about art and art works. So, first, you should write for passion, research and interest. Then, you should look for ways to publish. You might gain some visibility and appreciation. You might even make some money with your writing. Though, these are secondary matters. In the end, the way of the critic resembles the way of the artist, and therefore proves once again how closely art and its criticism are interconnected.