What are the ethics around a critic collecting art? I want to write a review of a dazzling painting show. While I can’t afford one of the paintings, I would like to buy one of the artist’s works on paper. Is there an ethical problem of covering this show and buying a piece not in the show—as long as I don’t write about the artist in the future? 

On Kawara. Paris–New York Drawing No. 144, 1964; graphite and colored pencil on paper, perforated top edge, 4 9/16 x 18 1/16 in. Photo: David Zwirner, New York/London.

I once walked into an exhibition and fell in love. The artist had restaged her childhood photographs with her adult body; the two images were framed side-by-side and titled with the hand-written captions from the original photo’s verso. At the time, I was examining my own identity and progress through life, and these images resonated on that same wavelength. They were priced at $600, which was the outer limit of what I could afford, and I made a quick calculation: I could buy one, or I could write a review. The former would give me a single possession that I might enjoy for my whole life; the latter would allow me to consider the entire suite of works and support the artist in a different (but no less tangible) way. In the end, I chose to review the show.

Undoubtedly there is a range of opinions on this subject; the field of art often appears to be a mucky marsh of ethical gray area. But to me, reviewing an artist when you own a piece of their work is unethical, even if that particular work is not in the show that you’re writing about. Exhibition reviews have the power to raise the social and economic value of an artist’s oeuvre, and if you own work by that artist you are—even inadvertently—raising the value of your own collection.

As usual, I asked around to see what others thought. Jen Graves, the visual arts writer at The Stranger, immediately sprang to mind; in 2007 she published an article that indicted critic Matthew Kangas for impropriety and conflict of interest. In that article, she wrote, “The emphasis on reporting instead of criticism, or in addition to criticism, has dragged critics into the same spotlight reporters work under, where lapses of judgment are firing offenses. Today, being embedded is looked at with suspicion, and being detached is more in vogue. Each position certainly has its merits. But the industry is still struggling to combine the two approaches in a way that keeps critics passionate, engaged, and knowledgeable, without allowing their biases to be, or to appear to be, personal or financial.”

Nine years later, I knew Graves would have more thoughts on the matter, and here’s what she has to say now: “The ethics around a critic collecting art aren’t particularly clear but the stakes are fairly obvious. Here’s what I do: I own very few works of art. I have two rules: I never sell anything (and wouldn’t want my children, grandchildren, etc. doing it, either). And I never broker with artists myself. I either buy from a listed price, or if a price is not listed on an artist’s website, say, I have someone else inquire about the price for me. I never want to get a deal, is what that’s about. I guess the whole point is that you don’t want to inflate the prices of an artist by writing about the work in order to turn a profit from your supposedly non-financially-interested opinion. I don’t steer clear entirely of collecting. But I am pretty wary.”

I also wanted to talk to Victoria Camblin, editor and artistic director of Art Papers, a magazine that (like this one) has an explicit conflict of interest policy. Camblin had some good advice about how to think through this issue:

“There are (or should be) policies in place at any art magazine, and the editorial staff there will have a clear answer as to what theirs are—so this is first and foremost a question of disclosure: communicate with your editors honestly about your relationship to the artist and/or gallery.

“As an editor, after a while you develop an internal ethical monitor. If something feels unsavory, you don’t go forward until you have found an approach that feels right.

“Artists, writers, collectors, and curators all work together in a highly collaborative professional community; often, one individual occupies several of these industry roles. Conflict-of-interest policies are important, but mustn’t stifle the work that might emerge from the intimacies of these connections. There are some creative and ethical ways that editors and writers can harness these relationships, nuancing and unpacking them by diversifying content styles, for instance, and thus building a disclosure into the final product. (A personal essay about why you were moved by the work enough to collect it, or how it has influenced your output as a writer, might not be a good fit for every art magazine, but may well find an appropriate niche outside of a ‘reviews’ section.)

“If you and your editor cannot find a way of editorializing this that works, then you cannot force it; you have to kill the piece. But you can write to your editor and suggest that they find a colleague to cover the fabulous show. If it’s a good fit for the publication, chances are the editor will have another writer for the job, or will be open to solid suggestions from you once you explain your relationship to the work.”

In the end, if you’re wrestling with the question, I’d say your instincts are good. Perceived conflict is as important as a real conflict, so bear in mind how your relationship to artists and/or their work will appear to your readers. Put your faith in truthful disclosure, and when in doubt, ask your editor. Don’t be afraid to walk away from a review—or to refrain from buying a work; your future credibility is more important than what’s hanging on your walls. Good luck!

The circumstances of this terminus are echoed in an interview between Art Papers‘ Editor/Artistic Director Victoria Camblin and Jay Kinney, the founder of the journal Gnosis, which operated in San Francisco from 1985 to 1999. In the excerpt below, the two discuss spirituality, technology, and alternative publishing. This article was originally published in the Sept/Oct 2014 issue of Art Papers.

Left to right: Bijou Funnies #1 (Fall 1968), illustration by Jay Lynch;
page from Bijou Funnies #1 (Fall 1968). Images courtesy Jay Kinney.

Victoria Camblin: I have this theory that society’s interest in esoterica spikes during periods of technological progress. In the late 19th century you had an Industrial Revolution, and you also had a resurgence of occult societies, the tarot came back, the mysteries of Ancient Egypt were all the rage. Now, with the tech industry boom, you have dot-commers going to healing ceremonies, and so on. I can’t help but think of the paths of the Whole Earth team: one direction gave us Wired, and the other, Gnosis, as though technology and inner traditions came out of the margins together.

Jay Kinney: Gnosis was certainly a continuation of the underground media in the 60s and early 70s, when you had cultural permission to make untraditional or alternative publications, and the sense that there might well be enough of an audience so you could get by. Underground newspapers were also made feasible by the fact that you had web offset presses starting to become available all over the country. If the printers weren’t totally freaked out by the content, then you had relatively cheap means to publish a weekly newspaper. So the underground press really benefited from that technological development.

VC: Did that impact the format, too?

JK: I more or less based the first issues of Gnosis on Weirdo magazine, which was published by Last Gasp [an underground comix publisher] and had been edited for several years by R. Crumb. I basically used the same page size, the same cover stock and interior paper, and we could gang up color covers in the same press run: Gnosiscould do a cover run with an issue of Weirdo or some other Last Gasp publication. So my involvement with underground comix made it possible to fit Gnosis into an arrangement with the printer where we only had to pay for half or a quarter of the color cover run. In terms of industrial or cultural changes, the first issue of Gnosis coincided with the year Aldus introduced the PageMaker page-makeup software, which we used to do one or two of the articles in the very first issue of Gnosis. We were one of the first magazines on newsstands to have desktop-published layouts.

VC: That’s incredible for an independent special-interest magazine. Were these alternative publications at the technological forefront just because of your proximity to the tech industry in California?

JK: Well, Stewart Brand had the idea of jumping on the bandwagon with PCs and Macs, which were just starting in 1984. He got in tight with the PR firm that was promoting the very first Macintosh, so I had the opportunity through Whole Earth to get one of the first 128K Macs at a discount—though it was still something like $3,500 bucks—to get the first Apple laser printer, and a beta version of PageMaker that had been provided to Whole Earth to try out and review in anticipation of its imminent release. I was the one who ended up learning PageMaker and doing a sort of trial run on it for a section of The Whole Earth Software Catalog, which came together around that time. I have to say, the beta version of PageMaker that I was working with was maddening. It would crash every two minutes, I would have to save constantly or I would lose my work—and I was saving to floppy discs!

Read the full interview here.