{"id":3440,"date":"2014-11-12T20:07:14","date_gmt":"2014-11-12T20:07:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/raulmourao.com\/blog\/?p=3440"},"modified":"2014-11-12T20:07:14","modified_gmt":"2014-11-12T20:07:14","slug":"know-your-critics-what-did-irving-sandler-do-by-blair-asbury-brooks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.archive.raulmourao.com\/blog\/?p=3440","title":{"rendered":"Know Your Critics: What Did Irving Sandler Do? By Blair Asbury Brooks"},"content":{"rendered":"

l\u00e1 no artspace.<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Irving Sandler<\/strong>\u00a0is an artists\u2019 art historian. In contrast to other prominent midcentury art critics\u2014like the\u00a0New York Times<\/em>\u2019s\u00a0John Canaday<\/strong>, who warned him against fraternizing with artists for fear of impairing his critical distance\u2014Sandler purposefully immersed himself in his subjects’ milieu, first in his days as a young reviewer for\u00a0Artnews<\/em>\u00a0and later as an art historian. Summing up his writing career in 2006, Sandler proudly wrote: \u201cThe thread that runs through my writing is a concern for the intentions, visions, and experiences of artists.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

What follows is a brief look at Sandler\u2019s career, and what makes him tick.<\/p>\n

WHAT DID HE DO?
\n\"sandler<\/strong><\/p>\n

Irving Sandler considers his lifework to be his four-volume history of the art of his time, which he began writing in the 1950s and carried through to the early 1990s. The first book was to be titled\u00a0A History of Abstract Expressionism,<\/em>\u00a0until the Book of the Month Club requested 10,000 copies from his publisher\u2014on the condition that it had a \u201clivelier title.\u201d Thus \u201cA History\u201d became\u00a0The Triumph of American Painting<\/em>. And the tome is not as dogmatic as its title implies. Sandler\u2019s goal has never been to stake out his own stance on new art but rather, as once said, citing Woodrow Wilson, \u201cto reflect \u2018the sympathy of a man who stands in the midst and see like one within, not like one without, like a native, not like an alien.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Triumph of American Painting<\/em>\u00a0is a work of participatory, living historical activity. Most of his research was artist-based, a fact he makes clear in the book\u2019s acknowledgements: \u201cMy first debt is to those artists who generously submitted to interviews, engaged willingly in lengthy discussions, and searched hard for answers to specific questions.\u201d It’s not unusual for an art historian or critic to mingle with artists; it is unusual for an art historian to turn those interactions and the firsthand knowledge that results into the basis for scholarship. This was Sandler\u2019s gift. As he explained, it allowed him to deal \u201cwith artists\u2019 intentions precisely in order to capture the embryonic period in the development of their styles\u2014before they were assimilated into art history.\u201d (Sandler admits he did not know the artists of the remaining three volumes as well as he did the artists in\u00a0Triumph<\/em>, since\u00a0\u201cgiven the number, it was not feasible.\u201d)<\/p>\n

In the Abstract Expressionist period of the 1950s, when the principle artists made up a small community in New York, Sandler ingratiated himself with them by showing up at their hangouts\u2014first the Cedar Street Tavern then the Club on Eighth Street\u2014for more socializing and discussions. He befriended artist great and minor, and was purposefully \u201cinclusive,\u201d even in his writing, but he came to develop his own personal “pantheon” of favorites. These\u00a0included: Mark Rothko,\u00a0Philip Guston<\/a>(\u201cPhilip would say again and again\u2014as if he had never said it before\u2014that everything in a work of his had to be \u2018felt\u2019\u201d), Franz Kline (he \u201cheld court at the Cedar Street Tavern almost every night after ten\u201d), David Smith, Tony Smith, Robert Motherwell, Ad Reinhardt, Jackson Pollock, Barnett Newman, Hans Hofman (\u201cI always admired Hans\u2019 painting and believe that certain of his pictures\u2014Lava<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0Agrigento<\/em>\u00a0come to mind\u2014must be numbered among the greatest abstract expressionist canvases\u201d), Willem de Kooning, and Clyfford Still (\u201cas a de Kooning man, it took me time to appreciate Still\u2019s innovation\u201d). Sandler\u2019s \u201cpals\u201d included:\u00a0Alex Katz<\/a>\u00a0(they\u2019re still friends today), Philip Pearlstein, Al Held,\u00a0Mark di Suvero<\/a>.<\/p>\n

As an art critic, Sandler did not proclaim works to be good or bad\u00a0in the ex cathedra manner of Clement Greenberg<\/a>. Instead, he would ask: \u201cWhat is an artist\u2019s vision, how is it expressed, and is the work a singular achievement?\u201d Greenberg chastised him for his method in a letter, writing, \u201cyou don\u2019t mix enough criticism with the description & narration & explication. No artist\u2014no public figure\u2014should be taken at his own word. In the end you do yourself a disservice by that acceptance, however much it wards off what\u2019s called controversy. You have your opinions: why not express them?\u201d<\/p>\n

For his part, Sandler felt that too much criticism and art history were written for the writers\u2019 sakes\u2014not truly for the art, or the artists, or even, really, the readers. It was against this type of \u201cself-promotion\u201d and the notion of \u201cwriters focused on ideas about art rather than on actual works\u201d than he purposefully sought to place the artists\u2019 thoughts before his own. Although he found much of the art criticism of the 1950s and ’60s to be lacking\u2014or, in the case of Clement Greenberg, having \u201cundue influence\u201d\u2014he did write that \u201cIf I had the choice to be someone else, it would be\u00a0Meyer [Schapiro]<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Today Sandler continues to monitor the art of his time as an art-historian-about-town, writing his books, popping up at gallery openings, and even curating the occasional show, as he did at the Cue Art Foundation in 2010 with Robert Storr. As one article began: \u201cIs there anyone in our Manhattan art world who does not know Irving Sandler?\u201d<\/p>\n

BONUS FACTS
\n\"sandler<\/p>\n

\u2013 The first work he \u201creally saw\u201d and which \u201cchanged his life completely\u201d was Franz Klein\u2019s\u00a0Chief<\/em>\u00a0(1950) at MoMA in 1952.<\/p>\n

\u2013 Sandler met Mark di Suvero in 1959 when he was looking for an artist in need of work to paint his apartment. Mark di Suvero got $75 and lifelong champion for his efforts.<\/p>\n

\u2013 He managed the artists\u2019 cooperative Tanager Gallery on 10th Street from 1956 to 1959.<\/p>\n

\u2013 Sandler became the administrator of the famed artist discussion haven the Club in 1956 (until 1962), volunteering when there were thoughts of disbanding it altogether.<\/p>\n

\u2013 He was a senior critic at\u00a0Art News<\/em>\u00a0(1956-62), a critic at the\u00a0New York Post<\/em>\u00a0(1960-64), and is currently a contributing editor at\u00a0Art in America<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u2013 He held a New Years party in 1964 for 200 people. It was \u201ca blast\u201d and, as Sandler later wrote, \u201cturned out to be the major social event of my art world\u201d as the end of Abstract Expressionism\u2019s reign was nigh.<\/p>\n

\u2013 Sandler co-founded\u00a0Artists Space<\/a>\u00a0with Trudie Grace\u00a0in 1972<\/span>, and ever since the indespensable SoHo nonprofit\u00a0has maintained an artist registry called the Irving Sandler Artists File that has since been transferred online, garnering over 10,000 users.<\/p>\n

\u2013 He has been on faculty at SUNY Purchase since 1972 and is currently professor emeritus.\u00a0 Throughout his tenure at SUNY, he lobbied to remain in the Visual Arts department (with the artists) rather than be transferred to the Humanities\u2019 Art History Department as the university wanted.<\/p>\n

\u2013 He once served as the director of the\u00a0Neuberger\u00a0<\/span>Museum<\/span>\u00a0of Art.<\/span><\/p>\n

MAJOR WORKS<\/strong>
\n\"lecture\"<\/p>\n

\u2013\u00a0The Triumph of American Painting: A History of Abstract Expressionism<\/em>\u00a0(1970)
\n\u2013\u00a0The New York School: The Painters and Sculptors of the 1950s<\/em>\u00a0(1978)
\n\u2013\u00a0American Art of the 1960s<\/em>\u00a0(1988)
\n\u2013\u00a0Art of the Postmodern Era: From the Late 1960s to the Early 1990s<\/em>\u00a0(1997)
\n\u2013\u00a0A Sweeper-Up After Artists: A Memoir by Irving Sandler<\/em>\u00a0(2004)
\n\u2013\u00a0From Avant-Garde to Pluralism: An On-the-Spot History<\/em>\u00a0(2006)<\/p>\n

RELATED LINKS<\/strong><\/em>
\nKnow Your Critics: What Did Harold Rosenberg Do?
\nKnow Your Critics: What Did Clement Greenberg Do?
\n<\/a>Know Your Critics: What Did Meyer Schapiro Do?<\/a><\/p>\n