The Global Art Fair and the Dialectical Image

The Colonies in Concrete

“…Noting that 'the exhibition salons were full of oriental scenes calculated to arouse enthusiasm for Algiers', Benjamin shows how the atmosphere of the fairs oscillated between a kind of nationalistic jingoism, on the one hand, and the more cosmopolitan agenda advanced by Louis Napoleon on the other (215, citing Gutzkow). As various studies of the world exhibitions and ethnographic displays have demonstrated, these imperatives were in fact remarkably compatible, with the products of empire offering a 'panacea for all ills' that promised an end to scarcity and unemployment and helped to cement national identity and class unity (Coombes 1988: 57;Davidson 2010;Greenhalgh 1988Greenhalgh , 2011. As Ciarlo has recently shown, the chauvinistic climate at such events also resulted from the seemingly innocuous imperatives of entertainment.…”

Editorial

“…This explored in a conspicuously grassroots way, artistic responses to globalised capitalism and world systems politics, and deployed 'visual and linguistic means to make the obscure and labyrinthine causalities of globalisation more visible and legible.' (Demos and Farquarson 2010: 3) There are no doubt numerous other modes and contexts in which globalisation is being explored, including art biennials (see Dimitrakaki 2003;Tang 2007;Anthes 2009;Davidson 2010;Papastergiadis 2010), which are relevant to the art world at large (see King 1990;Wilson and Dissanyake 1996;Joy and Sherry 2003;Ryoo 2004;Schueller 2009). For example, a small and select 'performative symposium' in 2010 in Bangkok organised by ArtHub Asia and funded by the Prince Claus Fund for Culture and Development based in the Netherlands, fostered new alliances and brought together existing networks of artists, critics, writers, in pursuit of 'The Making of the New Silk Roads'.…”