Connect: "How the Art of Social Practice Is Changing the World, One Row House at a Time" by Carolina A. Miranda and "Outside the Citadel, Social Practice Art Is Intended to Nurture" by Randy Kennedy

Ceramic-tile makers in an abandoned church in Braddock, Pennsylvania, where the artist Swoon has initiated a revitalization effort. The colorful tiles will provide a new roof for the building.

For Librería Donceles, Pablo Helguera filled Kent Fine Art with used Spanish-language books, which he sold out of the New York gallery last year.

         The two articles by Carolina A. Miranda and Randy Kennedy spoke about social practice art, describing what it is as well as giving examples of how it is being incorporated into art education and museums today. I had already read Miranda's article for my curiosity page, but the information was still interesting to read, and I was able to look more in depth with more context after what we had gone over in class. In for Kennedy's article, he provided a better introduction to the concept of social practice art, and also provided examples that were worldwide, focusing specifically on certain foundations and schools that are working to make social practice art more prevalent in today's society. 
          Miranda's article, "How the Art of Social Practice is Changing the World, One Row House at a Time," considered some important points as to how social practice came about and its impact on its communities. For instance, she wrote, "Nato Thompson, chief curator of Creative Time, thinks that the form is a byproduct of our technology-reliant times. “I mean, doesn’t any kind of human interaction that isn’t on the Internet just feel very special?” he asks." (p 4) Similarly, in Kennedy's article, "Outside the Citadel, Social Practice Art is intended to Nurture," he also quotes Nato Thompson, saying how social practice art has changed from the straight forward art that existed years ago. Thompson also said that, "many of the most dedicated social- practice artists see a huge divide between themselves and the commercial art world,'" (p 8, Kennedy). I agree that just like with Romanticism and Neoclassicism, art movements have developed from others in extremes: one is too strict so the next is more emotional and so on. In this way, I believe that social practice art, which deals with human interaction and message, has become more popular today  due to our commercial, technology-focused society. These artists are trying and take care of our communities in search of something "real". However, I also understand that social practice art is not really something that can be considered a movement. Judging by the range of media incorporated into the category, I say it is just that: a category. A manifesto cannot be written specifically to make social practice a movement, and as both articles have stated, it has been around for years, through other movements and without a solid time block that it can be contained in. But this issue of identification also fits into the concept of whether social practice art should be considered art at all and what its true effects on the community are.

          Social practice is all well and good, but what happens to the communities post-art removal? In the articles, the authors helped to discuss this question, but it does bring up other issues. While projects such as The Row House project bring in tourism and help out the families in the area with programs that can help plan their life out long term, things like the Gramsci monument bring in temporary tourism but then become cleared out of the neighborhood. The Spanish book library created a temporary meeting space for Spanish speakers in the area to make long-time connections, and the Pennsylvania Church is being renovated by its community for permanent use, but certain workshops run by the artists don't last forever. Perhaps this comes with the impermanent message of social practice art, but when this point was brought up in our seminar, we discussed the process of gerrymandering and other negatives that can come out of certain works. However, I do think that projects can be left behind--especially those with workshops for self-improvement, without detrimental effects like gerrymandering and without much done to the artist. If the artist goes back and sells items from their social practice art to museums and makes income greater than the impact of their project then that's when I think the concept of art needs to be defined slightly better, as discussed previously. On page 7 of "How Social Practice", the author quotes Kristina Van Dyke: '“To me art is elastic. It can respond to many different demands made on it. At the same time I have to say that I don’t believe all institutions have to do these kinds of things, or should.'" Just like she says, social practice has adapted do different media to suit different needs, but not all social practice should necessarily fit under art. 
      Although the artists involved in social practice claim that their art is meant to be of benefit to the community and fit under the new curriculum for art,  and both articles also mention critics' opinions on this stance. Miranda writes, "Maureen Mullarkey, a New York painter, wrote on her blog, Studio Matters, that such work only confirmed her belief “that art is increasingly not about art at all.” Instead, she argued, it is “fast becoming a variant of community organizing by soi-disant promoters of their own notions of the common good.” (p 7, Kennedy) This statement makes sense, as the artists are focusing on what the community needs and trying to incorporate their message and the community into their works, but also goes into a point brought up by Kristina van Dyke regarding whether this should be art. Following this, on page 9, the author writes, "This issue gets at how social-practice works are critiqued. Should they be evaluated for the social changes they produce, for the elements of performance they incorporate, or for the esthetic qualities of the environments in which they take place?" As colleges are now incorporating social practice art into their curriculum, these artists are now being taught to consider the world around them and what it needs in terms of community improvement. In some cases, such as the Row Houses, I agree that the project extends beyond art, and should not necessarily be considered as such. Of course, artists can freely go out and work with social practice projects, but I think the focus should be on the community, even after the art has been taken away. The community should not be used purely for publicity and should be left better off than before the art took place. 
        These articles, as well as the discussion in class, brought up important questions regarding social practice art, the role of the artist and further talk about what should be considered art. As this idea of making social practice art has become popular in recent years, I think it will be important to continue to follow new artists under the category to shape a better opinion, and I look forward to what new things are created and recreated.

TL; DR: I liked this seminar, social practice is a category not a movement, projects should focus on purely benefitting the community and should leave it better off than it was before, social practice art can be considered art until it affects certain institutions, in which it only becomes social practice and is not appropriate to be labeled "art" despite art being "elastic", and I want to keep following social practice art in the future to see how artists develop and change the world.