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Yves Klein's poses and Benjamin Buchloh's ressentiment

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al F r e d o T ri F f I'm a fan of Yves Klein's art. There is something unique about his messed-up theology & outlandish cerebration, his ability to reinterpret, reinvent and re-appropriate the avant-garde that is very telling of his time. Above all, I enjoy Klein's perverted sense of humor. He may have pursued his art with obliged doses of [avant-garde] "seriousness."*  However, one would surely miss a great deal in Klein's "actions" if one were looking for a pellucid correspondence between what he said and what he did  — or what he did and what he meant. **  So, I was baffled when, in recapping some of the existing literature on Klein, I found Benjamin Buchloh's Klein and Poses, an article for Artforum International (Vol. 33, Summer 1995). Buchloh's tone betrays ideological ressentiment:  The property claim and the administrative, legalistic approach measure both his mania and the misery to which the neo-avant-garde would advance in
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Women prefer men with full beards & heavy stubble over clean-shaven guys

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Beardness or non-beardedness?  It's a bit puzzling. Full beards and heavy stubble edged out light stubble and the clean-shaven look. The conclusion is based on a study of women's judgments of attractiveness, health, masculinity, and parenting abilities from photographs of clean-shaven men, lightly or heavily stubbled and fully bearded. How about non-beardedness? Surprisingly, men rated full beards and heavy stubble as most attractive, followed closely by clean-shaven and light stubble as least attractive. Well, a dose of male narcissism is to be expected here. Men and women agree on male beardedness, i.e., masculinity ratings increased linearly as facial hair increased. The study is overlooking a social side effect. Keep in mind that our culture promotes and rewards a "clean" male image over its bearded counterpart (which may explain why beardedness is a less common trait than non-beardedness). How does that prove the study's conclusions regarding female cour
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La obra de arte no existe

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al F r e d o T ri F f Comenzamos con el primer anatema del arte:  La obra de arte no existe.  El hecho está fundamentado en la aporía oculta de la estética.  La estética es la disciplina que estudia la filosofía del gusto y la belleza. Sin embargo, el arte se hace tal  — se dice — por medio de la obra de arte.  Partimos así de una redundancia definicional (el arte "jinetea" la obra). Sí, se habla mucho de ella; tomos dedicados a su aparente explicación, pero esa defensa  no hace más que ocultarla.  La obra pasa inadvertida, nadie le hace caso a la cosa misma.  En el principio era la cosa, fría, densa, en-sí . Un trozo de mármol ahí, blanco, cristalizado, descubierto por el ojo del artista, haciéndola candidata al comité del arte.   Ipso facto , la técnica del escultor transforma el bloque inerte en viva escultura.  ¿Se forja así el arte?  La pregunta  qué es arte  va dirigida a un observador hipotético. Arte, especie de  Museum Excelsus  de la percepción (mientras, la obra br
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