The critical attitude is the core of Ars & Modus. A well
functioning democracy requires informed and engaged citizens. It
has been claimed that the arts is a vehicle for this engagement.
This has proven to be only partly true since only a small elite-
group relate to the contemporary art discourse. The majority of
?ordinary people? choose not to engage in the discussion.
Yet, creativity is an integral part in every aspect of life, and
has always been. Questioning the way things are being done leads to
improvements in the smallest of places. This attitude is not unique
to the art world or high art.
What then constitutes the gap between so called ?ordinary people?
and the art world? Explanations range from the critical analysis of
Bourdieu and ?i?ek to purely typological categorisation á la Jung.
Ars & Modus has had as its aim since 2004, to investigate this gap.
Numerous projects have addressed this issue in the past, trying to
reach groups of people that seem to be underrepresented in the
contemporary art audience. This benevolent ambition often seems to
end up in body-count instrumentalism. What has made Ars & Modus
work stand out, is that it seems to have bridged this gap over an
extended period of time, namely several years. Working in close
contact, and later also in close collaboration, with the neighbours
in Hammenhög, discussions about art and the art-world have become a
natural part of life.
Somewhere along the line this work caught the attention of the
cultural elite. The perseverance of the project and the results it
was showing proved to be unique. But in gaining approval, the
project was also associated with the instrumentalism it tried to
avoid. To put it bluntly; every citizen risks the migration from
subject to object when Swedish society implements the governmental
cultural policy from 1974.
In the year 2007 the project F.K.I.T. was formed as a creative
answer to the situation. F.K.I.T. ?For the Arts ? With the Times?,
alludes to the motto of the Swedish king: ?For Sweden ? With the
Times?, adding a somewhat ironic angel. The project introduces
institutional critique and media analysis. It takes the
collaboration in the village one step further, making it more
proactive. In an effort to widen the circle of people involved, the
core group invited their friends, and their friends in return.
In this sense, the goal of F.K.I.T. has been to make the situation
for people working in high-arts a bit more problematic. Not in a
purpose of its own, but to introduce yet another level of self-
critique. This relates to what has been said earlier about the role
of art in a democratic society. If one claims that the art-scene is
a vehicle for an engaged and critical discourse necessary in a
democratic society, and at the same time do not reflect over the
fact that very few people take part in this discussion, then there
are serious validity issues in the first claim.
The aim of F.K.I.T. is to point out this discrepancy, using the art-
scene as the contextual framework, thus ?throwing a stone while
living in a house of glass?.
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