Controversy!

Fun little back-and-forth happening on Franklin Einspruch's Artblog comments board in response to Franklin's latest post. Below is the excerpted post, after which follows the pertinent comments. Any further comments you might like to add please do so on Artblog, it's easier than trying to follow on two different comment boards.

Franklin's Excerpted Post:

I love Tyler, but he doesn't love me back; to him I'm just "some clever blogger." (Sniff.) (Source here.) PS: look, man, I'm sure that Brian Sholis is a perfect, plump little peach of a person, but when Anaba called him out he answered with a this-whole-affair-is-beneath-my-dignity non-response, so I think he deserves whatever he gets. Furthermore, his so-called clarification that you put him up to is the fattest, steamiest turd of accidental self-parody in the history of artblogging.

From The Comments Board:

Tyler Green -

LOL, sorry. I knew I'd read it somewhere but couldn't remember it where!

Brian's response at Anaba (or wherever) was appropriate: If the blogger in question had picked up the phone and made a call to check to see if his item was accurate before writing it, the whole absurdity could have been averted. When it turned out the item was inaccurate, he never addressed it.

With publishing comes responsibility.

Franklin -

I'm all for responsibility, but what about a comment like: "Dear Martin, this whole NADA thing is a big misunderstanding, and here's why... (etc.) Fondly, Brian." Hey, it's the blogosphere, and he set himself up to get eaten alive.

By the way, why is this NADA thing a big misunderstanding?

Tyler Green -

Yeah but why should he bother when the writer has so clearly failed to do even the most basic fact-checking or homework before throwing around rather egregious charges? I wouldn't have either.

NADA is a not-for-profit industry association, just like a zillion other industry associations such the Chemical Manufacturers Association or the American Booksellers Association. As a one-time employee at a gallery that was a NADA member, Brian was listed on the page. (A page which hadn't/hasn't been updated in eons, as a simple glance probably would have told anyone who was at all interested in accuracy.) Pretty straightforward. Nothing scandalous. Probably less eye-catching than George Stephanopoulos being on ABC.

Franklin -

Fair enough, though I see nothing on NADA's members page indicating that it is out of date, including in the source code, and no gallery is listed next to Brian's name. Brian could have cleared this up in a trice if he hadn't opted to condescend to Martin instead.

Tyler Green -

Bottom line: If you're going to slam someone, make a phone call first to make sure your facts are right. That simple.

Martin Bromirski -

So Tyler, if I change that post from "Nada member Sholis" to "NADA founding-member Sholis" would I have everything straight enough for you?

The point of the post , which seems to have gotten lost, is the absurdity of Artforum's having a NADA member (or founding-member ) covering NADA - and the difficulty that presents in any further reading of Brian Sholis' criticism. I will always wonder what the angle is.

You can spin all you want, but the crap won't come off.

UPDATE 1/25/2005 : As far as Brian is concerned, I called him out on a glowing review of a collection of commercial galleries(NADA) he was formerly a member of. My assumption that Brian was a current member of NADA was taken from NADA's own website, listing current members and naming Brian. Neither Brian nor Zach denied Brian's membership when they posted comments in response. I certainly regret now not double or triple checking the facts - but even had I known that Brian had left NADA within the previous six-months my post wouldn't have changed other than to hyphenate "member" to "recent-member".

By the way, the Walker never got back to me about the Fogle thing, and MoMA is no longer answering even Tyler Green's phone calls.