“Working the art world from within”

Szenen postkonzeptueller Selbstverortung um 1980 in Frankreich

Abstract

Focusing on an internationally little-known artistic scene in Paris, the essay addresses the text-based works of artists such as Lefevre Jean Claude, Philippe Cazal, Claude Rutault, and Philippe Thomas. To what extent is their turn to ambiguity and literary methods at the end of the 1970s shaped by their sociopolitical environment? In what way can it be understood as a link between first-generation institutional critique and 1990s relational practices? Can the motif of a critique “from within” be read socially in their works – as a strategy of artistic self-positioning? Offering an alternative to a reading via the lens of literature and language philosophy, the essay understands these works as network-based, as interlinked with the local and international structures of a competitive art field.