Why Art Is – and Is Not – the New Fashion

From the New York Times Magazine:

Anyone who would be so bold as to call attention to the fashionableness of contemporary art had better be prepared to duck an angry barrage of paintbrushes. (And anyone who would deny it should perhaps get in line now for a ticket to this weekend's Armory show on New York's Pier 94.) Certainly, the approach on the following pages — which includes a survey of the suddenly hot Chinese art scene, an intimate profile of the art instigator Francesca von Habsburg and a look inside a house designed to accommodate the life and work of a prominent art collector — is as deep as it is superficial. Context is all. Both art and fashion speak in a densely encoded visual language to a certain status, knowledge and taste. Roughly translated, that means an elitism that makes those who know the difference between, say, James Turrell and Olafur Eliasson (or, for that matter, between Prada and Lanvin) feel secure in their defense of social Darwinism. But the point that is not to be glossed over here is that like fashion, contemporary art has infiltrated all aspects of life, influencing the ways we travel, spend our time and increasingly our money, and the way we organize our surroundings. And if we can relax for a moment, we might find how much pleasure it brings. This thing we like to think of as art has as much to do with work hanging on a wall in a museum as fashion does with clothes on models walking down a runway. Which is to say everything and nothing. But how much more interesting to encounter it as it lives and breathes in its natural habitat -- Alix Browne

Three articles:

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Agenda
The new status symbol in the West is a work of art from the East.

We Are Not a Muse
Francesca von Habsburg did not become the art world's leading lady simply by sitting pretty.

Cool and Collected
In this modern Baltimore house, art and life find a happy medium.