When the Seattle Times eliminated its art critic, Seattle shrugged. The art critic the paper had employed (Sheila Farr) was visible mostly in her absence. Only the truly out of it bemoaned the nonexistent loss.
I despise the Seattle Times, partly because of its right wing editorial page but largely because of its we-know-what’s-good-for-you tone and its ability to take good writers (such as Farr) and turn their work into drivel.
As long as I’ve been in Seattle, the ST has been certain it represents the best of all newspaper worlds. In visual art, it had no reason to think so. I resented it as a missed opportunity. Why should the largest paper in the state so poorly serve the art interests of its community? Newspaper-to-newspaper competition would have been nice.
As the art critic at the now defunct version of the Seattle PI, I had none, save, for a brief period, from Robin Updike, who’s smart and willing to look around.
A funny thing happened after the position was axed. The paper, now fighting for its life, has
given visual art a prominence previously unimaginable in its pages. Credit must go to ST’s A&E editor Lynn Jacobson, who turned Gayle Clemans and Michael Upchurch loose to cover the field.
Both are alert, awake, aware and willing to tackle art that requires work to produce even a semi-adequate response. Their reviews are not placeholders. They are evidence of engagement.
Because of them, my anti-ST rancor is toning itself down. If they keep it up and publisher Frank Blethen steps aside ( assuming he is not replaced by an equally weird family member), I might eventually let bygones be bygones and subscribe.
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