Not long ago, in an increasingly common experience, I had a friendly spat with a City of Santa Fe staffer about what they perceived to be my generally pissy outlook on the City's generally laudable efforts in economic development and arts and culture promotion. This now customary exchange apparently gives frustrated civic employees a chance to vent and allows me a chance to reflect on the fact that, despite a history almost as old as prostitution (with corollaries other than age being at the discretion of the reader), people still don't understand the role of criticism. So, accepting that this column has touched on this topic before and without quoting MH Abrams or Horace or anything silly like that, I've got to say that anyone who craves only support and good news and no input other than complimentary is entirely suspect and has probably already been reprogrammed by alien overlords. The point, the usefulness of criticism, at its most basic level, is to call bullshit on the worst of things and-much more important-the best of things. Mediocrity, most reviled of all, is punished by complete omission.
Should I, for example, characterize the not-so-distant public ceremony designating Santa Fe as one of UNESCO's first official "creative cities" as a brutal ass-kissing fest of little to no practical value, there are those who would think me unfair.***image2*** If I sum up the seemingly kind and gracious comments of our nominal leader, Mayor Larry Delgado, during said event, as out-of-touch, facile, self-centered, money-grubbing, embarrassing and failing to recognize a prime opportunity for not only cultural, but also meaningful policy exchange, there are some who might suspect I am attempting to thwart the recognition of all the positive results the city-and its arts and culture industry-has achieved.
If, into the clamoring mouths of those praising the "success" of Santa Fe's recent Design Week, I shove the metaphorical kerosene-soaked rag of the fact that a negligible amount of significant design takes place here, more than a few people would think me a bitter little man with an ax to grind. Never mind the fact that people who actually inquired at the entrance to the "design" exhibition at Sweeney Center, "Is there modern and contemporary design here?" were told "Yes"-only to find, overwhelmingly, a symphony of hide lamp shades and cattle horn coffee tables. Never mind that fact that the currently vogue-ish Tom Ford-ified nouveau Santa Fe Style, can make it appear-should you have only recently begun to notice popular culture-that all things softly and co-optly cowboy are making a comeback. The fact of the matter is that all things '80s are riffing through a retro heyday, just as things '60s and '70s have done, in a quintessentially postmodern process of cultural catharsis, now necessary to engage before our obsessively self-aware society is capable of ratcheting into the future. Doesn't anyone remember the '80s' most significant and profound message?-it wasn't concha belts and four X beaver-the four simple words conveyed in the phrase "Pop Will Eat Itself"?
Well, maybe that's a bit too much conceptual daydreaming to ask from busy folks with plans to make and things to do. The point is, while there's no need to understand why, folks ought to have a basic sense that if it pops up onto a critic's radar for praise, consideration or a complete shredding and utter denouncement, it's probably because it's important. It's probably because, whatever it is, it's addressing something worth caring about that ought to be surrounded by a larger dialogue, a conversation the critic is hoping (likely against hope) will actually take place, thus leading to the best possible evolution of the concept.
How the mayor represents Santa Fe at a UNESCO presentation matters because several individuals worked very hard earn the agency's attention and it is important for us to communicate with other cities celebrating the same assets and facing the same challenges. When a massive event like Design Week could have been significantly better, that fact has to be acknowledged. There are plenty of people around to host a party in honor of Santa Fe's accolades. There are plenty of people around to point out that, if nothing else, Design Week instigated inspiring and unprecedented levels of cooperation between various civic bodies and departments. There are fewer opportunities to suggest a wave of positive energy ought to be harnessed into making something better, rather than squandered on pomp.
Because this issue of SFR is devoted to all things democratically determined to be excellent in the City Different, I'll just add that Santa Fe itself wins a vote here for best place to live. When a place, already beautiful, is capable of such notoriety in terms of arts and culture-containing the bulk of the state's museums, SITE Santa Fe, El Museo Cultural, more annual fairs and festivals than can possibly be attended, a wealth of both hidden taco stands and ranked restaurants, world class opera, chamber and chorale music, an army of theater troupes form traditional to avant-garde-it's something to be cherished and minded. In other words, being lucky enough to live here comes with stewardship responsibilities and anyone representing or making decisions about how and why Santa Fe's cultural treasures are presented, marketed and understood needs to be as open to criticism as the individual creators who make such a dynamic possible to begin with. Most fleeting, here-today-gone-tomorrow performances garner a critical review, so why should policy performances that may well last a lifetime get away with empty applause?
