Kurt Andersen: Michael Kimmelman's day job is chief art critic for the New York Times. But in his new book, The Accidental Masterpiece, he’s still writing about art, but he seems to have completely abandoned the tough minded, critical, thumbs up or thumbs down mindset. Through his own personal stories and historical anecdotes about everything from the French painter Bonnard, to random family snapshots, to Yoko Ono, Kimmelman is trying to show us how to open our eyes and find for ourselves the art, the surprising glimpses of beauty and truth that are out there, everywhere, all around us. Michael Kimmelman, welcome back to Studio 360.

Michael Kimmelman: Thank you, it’s a great pleasure.

Kurt Andersen: Now, have you gone soft on us, given up your critical rapier, in favor of some kind of self-help guide?

Michael Kimmelman: Well, you know, I actually think criticism involves enthusiasm to some extent. If you’re a good critic, you have to begin with some enthusiasm, otherwise you’re just a complainer. But I would say that what I wanted to do here was not a kind of negative criticism. I didn’t want to take down people here, because I had felt, over the course of doing my job over these many years, that art had changed my life, that I had actually been moved by art, and I had begun to look at the world in different ways.

Kurt Andersen: Who do you think ought to read this book, other than people in the art world?

Michael Kimmelman: Well it’s really not written for the art world, although I do have to say, it’s not written to spite the art world either. The purpose of the book is to be read by absolutely anybody and everybody, who might or might not think that they have an interest in art. Of course, implicit in any kind of book, whether its general tone is more upbeat, is some idea of what merits inclusion and what doesn’t. So I’m not saying it’s an uncritical book. But I do think its driving impulse is the idea of being a good read. There are stories about Ray Johnson, a guy who committed suicide, and kind of turned his suicide into his greatest work of art. It’s a kind of dramatic story, it’s an interesting one, but it’s really also about how conceptualism is, at heart, about turning everyday life, even death--about seeing it as an extension of art.

Kurt Andersen: Seems to me so much of what you’re proposing that people do is be willing to be surprised. Can you find yourself, as a critic, as someone who looks at hundreds of pieces of work a year, and kind of knows it all after having this job for the last couple of decades, can you be surprised?

Michael Kimmelman: Oh, definitely. I know that sounds just like, you know, a platitude, but it’s very hard to do, actually. As we move on in life, we develop certain ideas, and they harden. I think partly because I came from a background that was very politically focused, and determined, and frankly knee-jerk, I think in some ways I went into journalism, and even became a critic, because of the idea that it was possible to look at things, to atomize the world, to take everything on its own terms and consider everything fresh. And that remains my motivating desire, as a critic. I am looking to be surprised, I am looking to not know what I think, and then to have what I think I think overturned. And I think also, just keeping your eyes open in general, it’s a lesson about everything, in relationships, in your opinions about other people, I think that is something that I’m constantly reminded of through art. Time and time again I find myself looking at something which opens out onto some other issues, other thoughts which I had not expected, and that’s what art is supposed to do.

Kurt Andersen: One of the great stories you tell in the book involves somebody, an artist, who has a great ambition to create a piece of monumental art: the artist James Turrell. You visit this extraordinary thing he’s building out in the Western desert. Tell me about that.

Michael Kimmelman: Yeah, I thought it would be more interesting if I actually went to things to look at them. Because, you know, so much art comes to us, really, too easily now. We expect all art to just be delivered like tributes to Caesar, but in fact, so much of what we are looking for in life is this singular experience, this idea of something special that we encounter.

Kurt Andersen: And make a pilgrimage to.

Michael Kimmelman: And so I thought, pilgrimages, which is of course, a root, not just a spiritual thing, but kind of at the root of art as well, this idea of going to something, making some effort, was a good metaphor. So I went out and saw a lot of these things, and I saw Turrell, and he’s been doing this since the 70’s. He bought the land for Roden Crater, and he bought all sorts of land around it. It’s just on the edge of the Painted Desert, and it has a gorgeous view in the distance of the Grand Canyon. And you know, for all these years, he’s been sort of shuttling Japanese business men--and anybody else who he can think of who can help him raise money--around the crater to explain how useful it would be if they just gave him a few million dollars more so he could, you know, move some dirt around and dig this or that tunnel. And I have to say, there’s something very moving about that feeling. It sort of encapsulates this feeling that art can exist both in the process of going to it, in putting yourself in another place, another state of mind, and then, in his case, in things that are in a sense intangible. I mean, it’s made out of the mountain, but the work itself is really about the way light passes through these tunnels, the feeling of air, all these things, creating a space.

Kurt Andersen: The darkness, which you write about very interestingly.

Michael Kimmelman: Absolutely. The movement form darkness to light, and you know, essentially time passing, that all of these things can become part of the experience of art. In a general sense, it’s about how we just can benefit from being more attuned to our everyday occurrences.

Kurt Andersen: Michael Kimmelman, thanks for joining me today.

Michael Kimmelman: Thank you very much.

Kurt Andersen: Michael Kimmelman's new book is called The Accidental Masterpiece.

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