Art too Easy

Here's a contoversial article by Raphael Bendahan in Toronto's Now Magazine about the malaise of contemporary art. Bendahan's chapbook, Sit Up, has recently been published by Sky of Ink Press -- more about that later.  My own take?  I agree with both RB as well as most of the critical comments pasted below the article.  The article is intended as a polemic, to provoke readers (and artists) out of today's complacent and overly polite malaise into a (hopefully) constructive and consciousness-raising conversation.  (Now actually asked for a rant.) RB is fully aware (I've talked with him about it) that there are exciting exceptions to his thesis about contemporary art -- and that what is exciting is always exceptional, even rare. I've also told him that the same article with slight variations could have been written in the 50's or the 20's.  As Stephen Pinker points out, though, it is our bias is to react to general observations as if they are meant to apply to every last case -- and, of course, to over-react as a consequence.