Selling out: The willoughby sharp show and the televisation of the east village artworld
Author(s)
Date Issued
2022
Citation
Olin, Benjamin (2022 Jul 14). Selling out: The willoughby sharp show and the televisation of the east village. Approaching Downtown: Avant-Garde Cultural Production in New York City, 1970s-1990s – An Interdisciplinary Symposium, Vernon Square.
Type
Conference Paper
Abstract
This paper reconstructs the history of the Willoughby Sharp Show, a cable-TV show hosted by the artist Willoughby Sharp from 1985-1986. Produced by Sharp and video artist Susan Britton, the show was fully funded by Time Inc., who—in an attempt to get an insider scoop on the burgeoning East Village art scene—provided state of the art equipment, a full production team, and sponsored lavish screening parties at downtown clubs. Following the format of a commercial chat show, the show documented the mutually entangled worlds of storefront galleries, underground film, nightclubs, and fashion, featuring in-studio interviews with East Village luminaries, alongside in-the-field bulletins presented by a team of specialized correspondents from the local magazine East Village Eye. Carlo McCormick reported on art, Cookie Mueller on health, Tessa Hughes-Freeland on film, Stephen Saban on nightlife, Tim Goslin on fashion, while noise artist Boris Policeband provided off-beat musical accompaniment.
Drawing on close analysis of episodes, and personal interviews conducted with members of the cast and crew, this paper will contend that the production and exhibition of this show constituted a vital—and currently obscure—feature of the East Village art scene. It will argue that not only did the Willoughby Sharp Show play an important role in defining local counterculture, but that there was something inherently televisual about the art scene which it documented. I will explore how, in terms of both form and content, the codes and conventions of commercial television suffused East Village art—influencing performance, film, music and painting, and shaping models of stardom and artistic personae. Reading key scenes from the show alongside editorials from the local underground press, this paper will argue that the discourse of “selling out” and becoming a small screen celebrity was integral to the collective imaginary of the mid-1980s East Village artworld. I will explore how a purported eagerness to produce populist, bankable art and to eschew local grassroots community in return for—largely elusive—global fame and fortune served as a shared structure of feeling which (perhaps paradoxically) bolstered the independent East Village art scene of the period.
Drawing on close analysis of episodes, and personal interviews conducted with members of the cast and crew, this paper will contend that the production and exhibition of this show constituted a vital—and currently obscure—feature of the East Village art scene. It will argue that not only did the Willoughby Sharp Show play an important role in defining local counterculture, but that there was something inherently televisual about the art scene which it documented. I will explore how, in terms of both form and content, the codes and conventions of commercial television suffused East Village art—influencing performance, film, music and painting, and shaping models of stardom and artistic personae. Reading key scenes from the show alongside editorials from the local underground press, this paper will argue that the discourse of “selling out” and becoming a small screen celebrity was integral to the collective imaginary of the mid-1980s East Village artworld. I will explore how a purported eagerness to produce populist, bankable art and to eschew local grassroots community in return for—largely elusive—global fame and fortune served as a shared structure of feeling which (perhaps paradoxically) bolstered the independent East Village art scene of the period.
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