Review: We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live curated by Sean Horton
Using identity politics as a curatorial shield—and still missing the mark
I'm confused by Marc Straus. I can’t tell what their mission or focus is, but I’m certainly annoyed that they have a sizable space in Chinatown that doesn’t even offer good exhibitions.
I feel bad for their artists, who are violated by horribly curated group shows. I’m usually hesitant to call something “bad” curating, but the works by different artists are scattered through the space without any comprehensible logic or visual flow. Yet, Marc Straus often exudes delusional self-seriousness in press releases, referencing a bizarre assortment of contemporary issues and philosopher names. Is this what happens when an oncologist starts a gallery?
What’s really happening is the formulaic use of social work as a mask for curatorial work, which, in the end, just serves the art market.
The exhibition "We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live" presents itself as an homage to Joan Didion’s exploration of narrative and identity, but it falls into haphazardly capitalizing on identity politics, relying too much on the marginalized status of its artists without fully engaging with the complexity of their experiences. Instead of showcasing these artists' work as independent explorations of identity, the curation leans heavily on their ethnic, racial, and gender identities as the defining framework.
For example, Julie Buffalohead’s work is framed almost entirely through her Native American heritage, with a focus on racial injustice and Indigenous rights. While these themes are valid, the exhibition's emphasis on her ethnicity reduces her artistic practice to a simplified cultural narrative. This really baffles me because on Buffalohead’s website, she explicitly says that her work “speaks to issues of commercialization of Native culture.”
Similarly, Ambreen Butt’s work on Muslim identity in America is presented through the lens of her post-9/11 experiences, with little attention given to the intricacies of her labor-intensive, conceptual art.
The exhibition’s choice to frame nearly every artist by their marginalized identities—whether it’s Dinorá Justice’s ecofeminism, Angela Fraleigh’s reimagining of women’s history, or Jaune Quick-to-See Smith’s Native American symbolism—feels opportunistic. It risks overshadowing the diversity of their voices by reducing them to representatives of their communities rather than creators with work that transcends identity-based labels. I’ve made similar critiques in the past, and I’ve since been thinking about how artists with so-called marginalized identities may find their identity to be all-consuming in their daily lives and creative processes. That’s valid, but it’s the commodification of their underrepresented status that concerns me. The art world seems to be leaning militantly into this.
I guess another reason I’m so annoyed by the exhibition is because Marc Straus used to have pretty good exhibitions in their older space. I enjoyed many of the exhibitions curated by their former director Ken Tan, but he has since moved on and is now a director at Lehmann Maupin. It’s just sad to see a gallery take up this much space, have a history of some good exhibitions, yet not reach their full potential, which subsequently impacts how thoughtlessly their artists are curated.
We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live
Julie Buffalohead, Ambreen Butt, Angela Fraleigh, Dinorá Justice, Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, Orkideh Torabi & Marie Watt
Marc Straus Gallery
October 8 - November 3, 2024
Unfortunately many galleries are giving themselves away to these kind of discourses where it seems the only thing that exists in an artist life and work is where they come from and what is their cultural background. What makes me a bit nervous is that they believe to be protected from any kind of criticism about the artworks themselves, or a bad curation as you say here, cause then they can always claim you are being racist or short minded and don't understand their causes. Identity is getting commodified, which is the worst that could happen to identity. I really like Rona Pondick's works, but never been in this gallery so I don't know how they curate her work. It's interesting how much curation can affect the art itself. Anyways, thanks for the article! :)
While I agree with some of what is said here, I'm confused by Counter Service. With a self-frustrated tone, the author seems either grossly naive or startlingly delusional about the function of commercial art galleries and how (or why) they come into being. They seem to confuse The Met with Bergdorf Goodman, and curatorial responsibility with merchandising.
The author poses false, monotonous questions and then offers whiny, meandering answers that do little more than express their own conflicted attitude towards participating in the industry. [See the most recent post: "Really, I am just spiteful of the dilemma: we all see that the system is fucked up, but we still prostitute our art and labor to the wealthy whenever we are given the chance."]
The author knows enough about Marc Straus Gallery to namecheck a director who departed in 2019 but is apparently oblivious to the well-documented fact that the gallery is the vanity project of a rich art collector. They resent the fact that the gallery "takes up this much space" in Chinatown without acknowledging that the owner inherited several buildings in the neighborhood. They mock the gallery's affinity for "self-serious" and "bizarre" writing without realizing that the owner is also a self-published poet. They rightfully identify the gallery's declining quality and sense of objects-in-space without considering that perhaps the aforementioned owner is elderly, or even ill.
But the author continues to unwittingly dismiss the very artists and artwork that they pretend to champion. They bemoan how this exhibition overlooks the complexity and independence of the artists' lived experiences or the nuances of their formal processes, yet they resort to the same "bad" descriptors (ie Ambreen Butt's "work on Muslim identity" or "labor-intensive, conceptual art"). They "feel bad" for the gallery's artists because of the grouping of their artwork, yet their own cynical, quasi-savior voice overshadows any appreciation of the artwork itself.
The author also fails to realize that artists willingly, and often enthusiastically, consign artwork to commercial galleries for exhibition and sale. Or that in many cases artists even suggest other artists whom they admire, and with whom they want their own work contextualized. Maybe these artists all really like each other, wanted to hang in a room together, and it doesn't have to carry the burden of solving the world's problems...today, at least.
"Is this what happens when an oncologist starts a gallery?" Yes, of course. Now move on to something more interesting, or impactful. At a time when everyone is a critic on social media and there is a serious dearth of true art criticism, please be better.