IF SHARKS WERE MEN (from Stories of Mr. Keuner)

“If sharks were men,” Mr. K. was asked by his landlady’s little girl, “would they be nicer to the little fishes?”

“Certainly,” he said. “If sharks were men, they would build enormous boxes in the ocean for the little fish, with all kinds of food inside, both vegetable and animal. They would take care that the boxes always had fresh water, and in general they would make all kinds of sanitary arrangements. If, for example, a little fish were to injure a fin, it would immediately be bandaged, so that it would not die and be lost to the sharks before its time. So that the little fish would not become melancholy, there would be big water festivals from time to time; because cheerful fish taste better than melancholy ones.

“There would, of course, also be schools in the big boxes. In these schools the little fish would learn how to swim into the sharks’ jaws. They would need to know geography, for example, so that they could find the big sharks, who lie idly around somewhere. The principal subject would, of course, be the moral education of the little fish. They would be taught that it would be the best and most beautiful thing in the world if a little fish sacrificed itself cheerfully and that they all had to believe the sharks, especially when the latter said they were providing for a beautiful future. The little fish would be taught that this future is assured only if they learned obedience. The little fish had to beware of all base, materialist, egotistical and Marxist inclinations, and if one of their number betrayed such inclinations they had to report it to the sharks immediately.

“If sharks were men, they would, of course, also wage wars against one another, in order to conquer other fish boxes and other little fish. The wars would be waged by their own little fish. They would teach their little fish that there was an enormous difference between themselves and the little fish belonging to the other sharks. Little fish, they would announce, are well known to be mute, but they are silent in quite different languages and hence find it impossible to understand one another. Each little fish that, in a war, killed a couple of other little fish, enemy ones, silent in their own language, would have a little order made of seaweed pinned to it and be awarded the title of hero.

“If sharks were men, there would, of course, also be art. There would be beautiful pictures, in which the sharks’ teeth would be portrayed in magnificent colors and their jaws as pure pleasure gardens, in which one could romp about splendidly. The theaters at the bottom of the sea would show heroic little fish swimming enthusiastically into the jaws of sharks, and the music would be so beautiful that to the accompaniment of its sounds, the orchestra leading the way, the little fish would stream dreamily into the sharks’ jaws, lulled by the most agreeable thoughts.

“There would also be a religion, if sharks were men. It would preach that little fish only really begin to live properly in the sharks’ stomachs.

“Furthermore, if sharks were men there would be an end to all little fish being equal, as is the case now. Some would be given important offices and be placed above the others. Those who were a little bigger would even be allowed to eat up the smaller ones. That would be altogether agreeable for the sharks, since they themselves would more often get bigger bites to eat. And the bigger little fish, occupying their posts, would ensure order among the little fish, become teachers, officers, engineers in box construction, etc.

“In short, if sharks were men, they would for the first time bring culture to the ocean.”

George Grosz, Die Besitzkröten (Toads of Property), 1920

Kazimir Malevich, Red Square: Painterly Realism of a Peasant Woman in Two Dimensions, 1915

Swim in the lake, for pleasure. The water
Which could drown you
Buoys you up.
Swimming you cleave it, behind you
It comes together again.

Robert Rahway Zakanitch at Samuel Freeman. Zakanitch is now in his 70s.

Next door, at Greenfield Sacks and Frank Lloyd, Ed Moses, now in his 80′s, continues his own exploration of pattern and decoration.

Mary Reid Kelley

Robert R. Zakanitch

Ed Moses

The first version of the program, which produced black-and-white images, ran from 8 April 2006 to 3 June 2008. A revamped version of the program, which produced color images ran from 23 December 2007 to 6 November 2008.

A review of Code X by Christian Bök appeared on Harriet, the blog of the Poetry Foundation.

Flash animations of the accumulated images can be viewed on the Code X project page.

Code X 2008-11-06

I failed to mention how the social clique I was trying to delineate, which was well represented in Frankfurt, was specifically reflected in the December 2007 issue of Artforum. John Kelsey had gone to the Miami Basel art Fair with 13 unsold paintings of mine ­ as my gallerist at Reena Spaulings Fine Art ­ and simultaneously listed my book Relax It’s Only a Bad Cosima von Bonin Show as one of his Top Ten tips of the year. If I was my enemy, I would find this disturbing. John Kelsey himself is registered as one of Jack Bankowsky’s “Top Ten” – just as “John Kelsey, critic”, himself a living cultural artefact (as well as critic, artist, curator and dealer). Meanwhile a review of my show at John’s gallery is in the same issue, along with countless other mentions, reviews, and features by/of other participants of the symposium: Melanie Gilligan casually reviews a fearsomely complex Adorno book, as well as a show by Nils Norman and Stephan Dillemuth. Johanna Burton reviews Sherrie Levine; she is the partner of the editor of Artforum and contributes frequently. Daniel Birnbaum, co-founder of the Insitut für Kunstkritik with Isabelle Graw and Rector of the Städelschule, writes his Top Ten. Perhaps the art world is shrinking.

Merlin Carpenter, “The Tail That Wags the Dog“