"Culture in Action" and New Genre Public Art

Suzanne Lacy links the occurence of new genre public art to the development of various groups, such as Marxist and feminist artists, who have interests in leftist politics, community involvement, social activism and new audiences. "According to Lacy, such interests lead to an attack on aesthetic categories bound to specificities of media, as well as the space of their presentation, and challenge the established criteria of cultural value based on aesthetic quality and individualistic notions of artistic competence" (Kwon 106). In other words, artists and activists begin to stray from common and generic pieces of art to impose new artistic ideas that further involve audiences and the community. This is all in order to challenge cultural status quo.

The project, The Chicago Urban Ecology Action Group, involving Mark Dion and the Chicago Urban Ecology Action Group, is an example of new genre public art. Instead of building a statue of a golden tree on a certain block of town to help spur environmental action, a generic example of art that does not involve the community, Mark Dion creates a new environment study group of twelve local students. The group met every week for one year and Dion was the team leader and also the teacher. Miwon Kwon writes about the "Culture in Action" art initiative of 1993 in Chicago and classifies Dion's work (part of this initiative) as a temporary creation of a new community. The creation "became synonymous with Dion's own artistic production". Dion's group directly involved people. The unique interaction of the students represents Dion's creative project, which brings awareness to the environment. Obviously, social activism is involved because Dion gives students an opportunity to learn and even go on a field trip to Belize. (Kwon 126)

Questions about an artist's goals exist and one begins to wonder how this new genre public art has come about. Along with Lacy's arguments, one can also argue how the freedom of a democratic society has created this start to a new art form that focuses on exploring a revealing new ideas. Also, in a capitalist society, one may want to use this new form of art to promote their own activities. Dion's The Chicago Urban Ecology Action Group certainly brought attention to his other works. Basically, to accompany a "democratic" society, art's progression has involved from metaphorical images to works that everyone can be involved with. Seemingly, artists attempt to bring new significance to art by intermingling it with practical contributions to society, including the development of new cultures.


Kwon, Miwon. One Place After Another: Site-Specific Art and Locational Identity. Cambridge: The MIT P, 2002. 1-218.