Contemporary art is an ivory tower of exclusive definitions and arbitrary meanings. While throughout history, art’s goal has changed immensely from dissemination of basic information from the dawn of organized thought, representation of life and its relationship to the divine, a challenge to traditional ideas associated with the definition of art, to an ultimate search for meaning and purpose from both the process of artists to the understanding of viewers.

Currently, art is a means to hoard market value for a small group of art world stakeholders (public and private collectors,) and despite the diversity and scope contemporary art does technically encompass, those are not the experiences being platformed. The institution of art is rife with tokenism as an excuse for diversity, publicly funded installation work that serves as marketing or tax write-offs, and an immense market of abstract paintings that are more or fewer carbon copies of work from The New York School which the older generation of collectors can’t seem to move past.

What makes one a successful artist in the majority of cases isn’t beautifully executed skill or innovative ideas; it’s having a good pedigree (in terms of education and connections) and belonging to a specific in-group (race, class, nationality, gender, etc,) and frankly reflecting on the canon of art history, which is decidedly western-focused and Eurocentric, these are unavoidable truths that have negatively affected the visual narrative of human history. How much of cultural history is lost when we only hear the voices of the few? The overwhelming majority.

The important question is to ask: who is making these decisions about which artists and artwork are deserving of a public platform. This is not a democratic decision where the masses decide which artwork speaks to them and fulfills an aesthetic need; it’s decided behind the closed doors of private and public institutions by a group of people already immensely wealthy, privileged, and while sometimes willing to take risks, are overall more interested in the value of their amassed collections than in any other one thing. The type of qualities that make businessmen successful, namely narcissism, self-centeredness, and a lack of empathy are unfortunately also the qualities prized by successful artists, rather than talent and the ability to offer new perspectives through their work.

The anatomy of an exhibition is then, a curator, pressured by institutional shareholders, is forced to jury work by either well-established and market-friendly artists or works by emerging artists that art speculators have decided will be worth value in the coming years. The idea that art speculation is something that exists single-handedly undermines art as a cultural force, but I digress. These exhibitions are then put forth to the public in a massive display of self-aggrandizing pseudo-philanthropy. The public is forced to agree, with no other option, that yes this is in fact what comprises good art and is thankful for the opportunity to act as spectators to a culture they’re active participants in. It should then be no surprise that art museum visitors treat the institutions with the same reverence as a religious service: they understand innately these are important objects but they don’t understand why. Curators and critics further obscure any emotional connection the public may have to these artworks by telling the viewer exactly what they should gain from this viewership and by offering an abstract word salad in place of a justification for why exactly these artworks should be viewed together.

My own experience viewing these exhibitions is while the artwork may be nice, the curatorial statement is nothing short of eye-roll and groan-inducing for both the Frankenstein words (that any competent language professor would immediately fail you for using) and the nonsensical grammar for how it’s all strung together. This type of ‘academic’ art writing has skewed artists' ability to speak about their work and continued the negative feedback loop of viewer disconnect from artworks.

While the mainstream and commonly accepted art world is certainly not an encouraging or inspiring place, exciting projects are being executed at this very moment that seek to challenge and upend these static and outdated norms. One project that is especially meaningful for me is independent curator Miss Baik’s MAYFLY project, which first started in 2015. Like the life cycle of a mayfly, which only lasts one day, these guerilla exhibitions give the public an immediately intense but short-lasting look at what real artists are making today, unconstrained by the market and institutional definitions. Miss Baik utilizes both white-wall galleries and anti-establishment artist-run spaces as focal points for her curation, which expands the contexts for the works to be experienced in and highlights the fact that art can exist outside of the institution of art itself. Her actual process for artwork selection is completely democratic: artists fill out an online form for submission and send the work they would like for consideration. Every artist who follows the format is included, and then Miss Baik selects works from each artist to exhibit. MAYFLY exhibitions have had as little as 3 artists or as many as 36, and on the opening night, all artists are required to engage the public about their work in an artist talk. Through this project, Miss Baik can provide a platform for a truly diverse pool of artists irrespective of academic or cultural background. The exhibition model is also open-source which means any curator or artist can utilize its template to recreate their local MAYFLY exhibitions.

I have participated in MAYFLY as both an artist and an assistant curator to Miss Baik, and not only have these exhibitions been an intrinsic place to track the growth and development of my work, but also an opportunity to view and interact with the works of other artists working in Seoul. I have met cubist painters, nihilistic installation artists, a street artist collective, and audience-interactive performance artists. I have also met artists with insulting justifications for controversial work, egomaniacs, and generally un-self-aware people whom I am reluctant to refer to as artists due to their lack of any real ability and tone-deafness. Every artist I’ve exhibited with or curated though was a real person with their own rich lives who sought to express themselves, however competently, through their work and those are experiences worth treasuring. For I am not alone in finding contacts, friends, and collaborators through these exhibitions, and for finally having a platform to discuss and engage with things that are important to me.

I am grateful for the fact that a project like MAYFLY exists, and continues to thrive and provide a positive environment for artists and viewers. While mayflies only live a short time, this is not a sign of failure of each organism, because, for each mayfly that dies, another will be born which assures us of the existence of them long into the future. May MAYFLY live forever.