#institutionalcritique

Week 3 | July 21st, 2021

In his three-part essay entitled Inside the White Cube: The Ideology of the Gallery Space, published in 1976 in Artforum Magazine, Brian O'Doherty takes us on an overview of the history of the gallery space. We start from the 18th and 19th-century salon-style hangings to the present-day white cube, where the author reserves a stark criticism. The term 'white cube' is used to reference the mode of display of white walls with artificial light sources that have long since been the established default in galleries and museums.

There are two arguments in O'Doherty's text. The first is that the white cube came about because of our changing notion about the edge. Previously the frame was used to contain an illusion into a 3D space, similar to a window frame. As art became flatter, such as in Monet's work which is the example given in the text, it eroded the edge. Thus, the frame became obsolete and was replaced by white walls to objectify the work and provide a type of palette cleanser between artworks to avoid the pictures becoming a single perceptual field. His second argument is that the white cube alienates everything that is 'other.' It not only alienates the presence of the body, but it exploits the art by making it expensive and excluding. It puts the art on a pedestal. O'Doherty writes: "In this context, a standing ashtray becomes almost like a sacred object […]" In this context, the fact that it is art cannot be questioned anymore.

Consequently, an even bigger problem arises; the art gallery becomes a secular system with a closed system of values conforming with the social order. Therefore, it has never truly been as neutral as its white walls might otherwise suggest. "This, of course," O'Doherty writes, "is one of modernism's fatal diseases." The essay was so popular that it was republished in a book and deeply discussed. It was a turning point in contemporary art theory as O'Doherty's criticism tapped into what many people were thinking but had not yet put into words.

While I agree with the essay's main arguments, there is no doubt a generalization in his second argument. Specifically, it comes from this last quote where he calls the white cube "one of modernism's fatal diseases." The fault is that this supposes that this problem caused by the white cube is uniquely a modernist one. As mentioned before, O'Doherty main issue with the white cube is that its neutrality is an illusion. Therefore, if the artist accepts the gallery space he is showing in, he conforms to the ideological state apparatus. But hasn't this always been the case?

The white cube indeed excludes everything that is 'other;' poor people, people of colour, uneducated people, queer people, etc. However, this was also the case for the gallery space even back in the 18th and 19th century salon-style hangings. During this time in Western society, not everybody was allowed to produce so-called "art." It had to be one of the 'classical' arts, and it had to be taught at an institution; this meant that it wasn't accessible to people who didn't have the means to pay for an education, people of colour, and women. There was no illusion that the art world and, therefore, the space in the gallery was an inclusive one. The system that controlled what was considered art and who could produce art back then is still very much the same today. In the case of the white cube, I would argue that it is actually more obvious that the gallery space and the apparatus behind it aren't 'neutral' or inclusive. Now, instead of simply knowing at the back of your mind that your body is an intrusion onto the space, you feel it instantly when you walk into the hermetically sealed white cube. Therefore, as the art world stands today, even if you strip today's art gallery of its white hermetic walls, the institution that transforms ashtrays into sacred objects is still there; it will still be biased, the art object will still be deified by its mere inclusion into a gallery space, and the 'other' will never feel as if they belong.  

That being said, the art world isn't hopeless. There are ways to counter the problem of the white cube. Many artists have chosen to simply not exhibit in formal gallery spaces and instead utilize public space or other unconventional spaces to display their art. For example, David Hammons refused to exhibit any work in art galleries, museums, and very acclaimed art exhibitions but instead opted for Church basements and street corners. Additionally, some artists have found ways to critique the institution behind the white cube (also called institutional critiques, which falls under conceptual art) while operating within the system. Perhaps one of the best-known art stunts was Hans Haacke's MoMA Poll in 1970 (pictured above), where (without letting the Museum know what he was up to) asked visitors to vote on socio-political issues. For example, one poll asked: "Would the fact that Governor Rockefeller has not denounced President Nixon's Indochina Policy be a reason for your not voting for him in November?"  By doing this, Haacke was directly commenting on the involvement of MoMa's major donors and board members. Haacke thought that the artist's job was to expose the institutional framework of the gallery as a kind of inside job to disillusion the general public as to the so-called neutrality of the white cube. Since then, many other artists have taken up the flame, such as Matthieu Laurette, Andrea Fraser and Fred Wilson.

In the end, like O'Doherty hints to in his writing, the form of the art gallery will change again once art itself goes through another metamorphosis. I cannot help but wonder what this new phase will look like.

 Sources:

Filipovic, Elena. David Hammons : Bliz-aard Ball Sale. London, (England: Afterall Books) 2017.

"Moma Poll, Hans Haacke." WikiArt, October 5th, 2012. https://www.wikiart.org/en/hans-haacke/moma-poll-1970

O'Doherty, Brian. Inside the White Cube : the Ideology of the Gallery Space. Expanded ed. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999.

Image 1: "Christine Ay Tjoe Spinning in the Desert." The White Cube. https://whitecube.com/exhibitions/exhibition/christine_ay_tjoe_hong_kong_2021 

- Anneke Lucas