No CrossRef data available.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 December 2017
This reflection on the social construction of authenticity analogizes the quest for artistic authenticity to snark hunting. To illustrate the instability of this term, it employs various Canadian examples, including the “Michelangelo” terracotta sculptures donated to the Museum of Vancouver, the “Igloo tag,” the importation of a sculpture by Edward Chukwuweike Madukaego, and the work of Bill Reid. It posits that proclamations of authenticity and fraudulence are ultimately utterances denoting and invoking power relations. It also reveals, through the use of specific examples, how negotiations around artistic authenticity in settler societies can replicate and re-entrench colonialist power.
Cette réflexion sur la construction sociale de l’authenticité tente de démontrer l’absurdité de la quête d’authenticité artistique. Pour illustrer l’instabilité du sens donné à ce terme, divers exemples canadiens sont étudiés, y compris les sculptures de terre cuite supposément de Michel-Ange qui ont été données au Musée de Vancouver, le fameux certificat d’authenticité connu sous le nom de « Igloo tag », l’importation d’une sculpture d’Edward Chukwuweike Madukaego et le travail de Bill Reid. La réflexion permet de constater que les déclarations d’authenticité et de fraude sont souvent, au bout du compte, le prétexte à l’établissement de relations de pouvoir. La présente étude révèle par ailleurs, au moyen d’exemples spécifiques, que les négociations entourant l’authenticité artistique chez les populations colonisatrices peuvent à la fois reproduire et entériner de nouveau le pouvoir colonialiste.
1 Gardner, Martin, ed., The Annotated Snark (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1962), 17.Google Scholar
2 Holquiest, Michael, “What is a Boojum? Nonsense and Modernism,” in Yale French Studies 96: 50 Years of Yale French Studies, ed. Porter, Charles A. & Waters, Alyson (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1999), 104.Google Scholar
3 Douglas, Mary, Rules and Meanings: The Anthropology of Everyday Knowledge (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973), 11.Google Scholar
4 1994 CarswellBC 2051, [1994] B.C.W.L.D. 1669, 48 A.C.W.S. (3d) 317.
5 Clifford, James, The Predicament of Culture (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1988), 221.Google Scholar
6 Supra note 2.
7 Randy Boswell, “Vancouver-Held Sculptures Found Not To Be Michelangelo’s But Expected To Sell For A Tidy Sum,” Canada.com (9 January 2013), www.canada.com.
8 Appadurai, Arjun, The Social Life of Things: Commodities in a Cultural Perspective (Cambridge: Mcabridge University Press, 1986).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
9 Zerubavel, Eviatar, “Social Memories: Steps to a Sociology of the Past,” Qualitative Sociology 19, no. 3 (1996): 287.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
10 Lenain, Thierry, Art Forgery: The History of a Modern Obsession (London: Reaktion Books Ltd, 2011), 14.Google Scholar
11 Schutz, Alfred, “On Multiple Realities” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 5, no. 4 (1945): 533–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
12 Harold Garfinkel, Studies in Ethnomethodology (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1967).
13 Banks, Marcus, “Post-Authenticity: Dilemmas of Identity in the 20th and 21st Centuries” Anthropological Quarterly 86, no. 2 (2013): 481.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
14 Supra note 2, 9.
15 Supra note 2, 10.
16 Supra note 2, 11.
17 Belk, Russell W., “Possessions and the Extended Self,” Journal of Consumer Research 15, no. 2 (1988): 139.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
18 McCracken, Grant, “Diderot Unities and the Diderot Effect,” in Consumption: Disciplinary Approaches to Consumption, ed. Miller, Daniel (London: Routledge, 1990), 124.Google Scholar
19 Sivanathan, Niro, Molden, Daniel S., Galinsky, Adam D., and Ku, Gillian, “The Promise and Peril of Self-Affirmation in De-escalation of Commitment,” Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 107, no. 1 (2008): 1.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
20 LeBrooy, Paul James, Michelangelo’s Models: Models Formerly in the Paul von Braun Collection (Vancouver: Creelman and Drummond Publishers, 1972).Google Scholar
21 James Adams, “Michelangelo-Inspired Pieces Find New Home,” The Globe and Mail, 1 June 2015, L3.
22 Supra note 2, 20, 27–28.
23 Supra note 2, 32.
24 Ibid.
25 Supra note 2, 51.
26 Supra note 8.
27 Supra note 2, 57.
28 Alexander Nagel, “Beyond the Relic Cult of Art,” The Brooklyn Rail: Critical Perspectives on Arts, Politics, and Culture July/August 2014, 26, 27.
29 Tom Flynn, “Negotiating Authenticity: Contrasting Value Systems and Associated Risk in the Global Art Market,” in Risk and Uncertainty In The Art World, ed. Anna M. Dempster (London: Bloomsbury, 2014), 110.
30 Michael Power, Organized Uncertainty: Designing a World of Risk Management (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007).
31 Steve Satchell and Nandini Srivastava, “Microeconomics of Art: Art, Luxury Goods and Risk” in Risk and Uncertainty in the Art World, ed. Anna M. Dempster (London: Bloomsbury, 2014), 187.
32 See e.g. Olav Velthuis, Talking Prices: Symbolic Meanings of Prices on the Market for Contemporary Art (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2005); Joel Podolny, Status Signals: A Sociological Study of Market Competition (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2005).
33 Pierre Bourdieu, The Field of Cultural Production: Essays on Art and Literature (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1993).
34 R v Centre Datson Ltd. [1975] OH 2705, 29 CCC (2d) 78 at 16.
35 Ulrich Beck, Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity (London: Sage, 1992).
36 Jehane Ragai, “The Scientific Detection of Forgery in Paintings,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 157, no. 2 (2013): 174.
37 Georges Braque, “The Power of Mystery” (12 January 1957), as quoted in John Golding, Braque: The Late Works (London: Royal Academy of Arts, 1997), 10.
38 Anthony Giddens, Modernity and Self-Identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1991).
39 Bratsch Holding Inc. v. Zen, 1996 2992 (BC CA).
40 RSC 1985, c. 1 (5th Suppl.).
41 RSC 1985, c. C-51.
42 Andrew Salem, Private Choices and Public Funding: Financing Cultural Property Transactions Through Tax Expenditures (Master of Laws, Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, 1999) [unpublished], 2.
43 The C.P.E.I.A. defines “tax certification” and the role of the Canadian Cultural Property Export Review Board. The Board issues a “Cultural Property Income Tax Certificate” to “designated organizations on behalf of identified donors or sellers of cultural property” that it believed to be of “outstanding significance, due to its close association with Canadian history, its close association with national life, its aesthetic qualities, its value in the study of the arts, or its value in the study of the sciences; and the object is of such national importance that its loss to Canada would significantly diminish the national heritage.”
44 Courtney Doagoo, “The Contentious World of Art Appraisal” (16 March 2013), Center for Art Law (blog), http://itsartlaw.com.
45 CBCNews, “‘Michelangelo Models’ Cost Canada Millions in Tax Credits” (20 Feb 2013), www.cbc.ca.
46 Supra note 22.
47 Sotheby’s, “Important Old Master Paintings and Sculpture: 354,” www.sothebys.com.
48 Orley Ashenfelter and Kathryn Graddy, “Art Auctions,” in Handbook of the Economics of Art and Culture, ed. Victor A. Ginsburgh and David Throsby (Oxford: North-Holland, 2006), 933.
49 Alex Geisinger, “Nothing but Fear Itself: A Social-Psychological Model of Stigma Harm and Its Legal Implications,” Nebraska Law Review 76, no. 3 (1997): 453.
50 Supra note 45.
51 David Baines, “Blockbuster Donation of ‘Michelangelo’ Sculptures Turns Into Multi-Million-Dollar Bust,” Vancouver Sun, 26 January 2013, www.vancouversun.com.
52 See e.g., Gregory Day, “Explaining the Art Market’s Thefts, Frauds, and Forgeries (And Why the Art Market Does Not Seem to Care),” Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law 16, no. 3 (2014): 457; Raûl Jáuregui, “Rembrandt Portraits: Economic Negligence in Art Attribution,” UCLA Law Review 44 (1997): 1947.
53 Brian D. Tobin, “The Virtue of Common Law Theories and Disclosure Requirements in the Market For Fine Art,” Seton Hall Journal of Sports & Entertainment Law 21 (2011): 345.
54 Rijksmuseum, “Search the Collection: Nine Models of Parts of the Body,” www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/search/objecten?q=Van+der+Schardt+&p=1&ps=12&ii=4#/BK-2013-9-5,4.
55 Nelson Goodman, Languages of Art: An Approach to a Theory of Symbols, 2nd ed. (Indianopolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1976), 99–102.
56 Sándor Radnóti, The Fake: Forgery and its Place in Art (Lanham, MD: Rowen & Littlefield Publishers, 1999), 51.
57 Svetlana Alpers, Rembrandt’s Enterprise: The Studio and the Market (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1988), 3.
58 See e.g., Richard Shone and John-Paul Stonard, ed., The Books That Shaped Art History: From Gombrich and Greenberg to Alpers and Krauss (London: Thames & Hudson, 2013); Nick Zangwill, The Metaphysics of Beauty (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2001).
59 Theodor W. Adorno, Aesthetic Theory (London: Bloomsbury, 1997), 232.
60 Jessica Silbey, The Eureka Myth: Creators, Innovators, and Everyday Intellectual Property (Redwood City, CA: Stanford University Press, 2014).
61 Mario Biagioli, “Genius Against Copyright: Revisiting Fiechte’s Proof of the Illegality of Reprinting” Notre Dame Law Review 86, no. 5 (2011): 1848.
62 Patty Gerstenblith, “Getting Real: Cultural, Aesthetic and Legal Perspectives on the Meaning of Authenticity of Art Works,” Colum Journal of Law & Arts 35, no. 3 (2012): 330. See also Martha Woodmasee and Peter Jaszi, ed., The Construction of Authorship: Textual Appropriation in Law and Literature (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1994); Jessica Litman, “The Public Domain” Emory Law Journal 39, no. 4 (1990): 965.
63 17 USC § 101.
64 RSC 1985, c.C-42.
65 (1990), 30 CPR (3d) 534 (FCTD).
66 Elizabeth F. Judge, “Crown Copyright and Copyright Reform in Canada,” in In the Public Interest: The Future of Canadian Copyright Law, ed. Michael Geist (Toronto: Irwin Law, 2005), 556.
67 Supra note 66 at 71.
68 Françoise Benhamou and Victor Ginsburgh, “Copies of Artworks: The Case of Paintings and Prints,” in Handbook of the Economics of Art and Culture, ed. Victor Ginsburgh and David Throsby (Amsterdam: Elsevier, 2006), 256.
69 Gilbert Bagnani, “On Fakes and Forgeries,” Phoenix 14, no. 4 (1960): 228.
70 SC 1992, c33.
71 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Judgment, trans. J. H. Bernard (London: Macmillan & Co, 1914).
72 [2004] 1 SCR 339 at para 25.
73 Ibid at para 12.
74 Ezra Pound, Make It New: Essays (London: Faber & Faber, 1934).
75 See e.g., Richard Nisbett, The Geography of Thought (New York: Free Press, 2003); Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis, “The Inheritance of Inequality,” Journal of Economic Perspectives 16, no. 3 (2002): 3.
76 Online:AUSTLII<www.autilii.edu.au>.
77 Marie Hadley, “Lack of Political Will Or Academic Inertia?” Alternative Law Journal 34, no. 3 (2009): 152.
78 Ibid.
79 [1982], 70 CPR (2d) 105 at 1.
80 Mark Denhez, “Kinds of Legislation For Intangible Heritage,” (Paper delivered at the International Conference on Legal Protection of the Expressions of Indigenous Cultures, Noumea New Caledonia, February 1999) [unpublished].
81 Rosemary Coombe, The Cultural Life of Intellectual Properties: Authorship, Appropriation, and the Law (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1998), 229. See also Kathy Bowrey, “Economic Rights, Culture Claims and a Culture of Piracy in the Indigenous Art Market: What Should We Expect From the Western Legal System?” Australian Indigenous Law Review 13 (2009): 35; Annette Van Den Bosch and Ruth Rentschler, “Authorship, Authenticity, and Intellectual Property in Australian Aboriginal Art,” Journal of Arts Management, Law, and Society 39, no. 2 (2009): 117.
82 Robert K. Paterson and Dennis J. Karjala, “Looking Beyond Intellectual Property in Resolving Protection of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Indigenous Peoples,” Cardoza Journal of International and Company Law 11 (2003): 634–35.
83 (1987), 18 CPR (3d) 538 at 11.
84 Ibid at 12.
85 Gerald McMaster, “Inuit Modern: An Introduction,” in Inuit Modern: The Samuel and Esther Sarick Collection, ed. Gerald McMaster (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre, 2010), 2–3.
86 RSC 1970, c C-40
87 Institute for Development Education Through the Arts v Canada (Deputy Minister of National Revenue for Customs & Excise) (1985), 10 CER 109, 10 TBR 234 (Can. TB).
88 Ibid at 12.
89 Ibid.
90 RS, 1985, c. N-18.
91 In 2016, it was announced that the Igloo trademark was “being transferred from Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada, to the Inuit Art Foundation” (IAF) to “ensure that Inuit take full control of this important tool.” See Indigenous and North Affairs, Media Release, “Statement by Minister Carolyn Bennett and Parliamentary Secretary and Member of Parliament for Labrador, Yvonne Jones, on International Inuit Day” (7 November 2016), www.newswire.ca/news-releases/statement-by-minister-carolyn-bennett-and-parliamentary-secretary-and-member-of-parliament-for-labrador-yvonne-jones-on-international-inuit-day-600304021.html. On 7 July 2017, the IAF announced that the transfer was complete and that “[f]or the first time, the trademark is now led by Inuit, for Inuit.” See Inuit Art Foundation, “The Igloo Tag Trademark” (7 July 2017), iaq.inuitartfoundation.org/inuit-art-foundation-igloo-tag/
92 Gregg Young-Ing, Intellectual Property Rights, Legislated Protection, Sui Generis Models and Ethical Access in the Transformation of Indigenous Traditional Knowledge (PhD Thesis, University of British Columbia, 2006), 39.
93 Richard Crandell, Inuit Art: A History (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, 2000), 132.
94 Guy Brett, “Unofficial Visions,” in The Myth of Primitivism: Perspectives on Art, ed. Susan Hiller (New York: Routledge, 1991), 122.
95 Rosemary J. Coombe, “The Properties of Culture and the Politics of Possessing Identity: Native Claims in the Cultural Appropriation Controversy,” Canadian Journal of Law and Jurisprudence 6, no. 2 (1993): 258
96 Tom Hill, “Indian Art in Canada: An Historical Perspective,” in Norval Morrisseau and the Emergence of the Image Makers, ed. Elizabeth McLuhan and Tom Hill (Toronto: Methuen, 1984), 19.
97 Leanne S. Pupchek, “True North: Inuit Art and the Canadian Imagination,” American Review of Canadian Studies 31, no. 1/2 (2001): 206.
98 Ibid, 202.
99 Pauline Wakeham, Taxidermic Signs: Reconstructing Aboriginality (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2008).
100 William Kingfisher, Constructing Locality in Contemporary Canadian Aboriginal Art (Masters Thesis, Carleton University, 2004), 23.
101 Lionel Trilling, Sincerity and Authenticity (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1972).
102 Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, Looking Forward, Looking Back, vol. 3, Gathering Strength (Ottawa: Supply and Services Canada, 1996), 557.
103 Open Parliament.ca, “Statements in the House: Nancy Karetak-Lindell” (27 October 1997), openparliament.ca/politicians/149/?page=33.
104 [1983] B.C. J. No. 1937, 47 BCLR 306, 21 A.C.W.S. (2d) 365.
105 Ch. 748, § 2, 49 Stat. 891.
106 Gail K. Sheffield, The Arbitrary Indian: The Indian Arts and Crafts Act of 1990 (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1997).
107 Deborah Everett, “Introduction,” in Encyclopedia of Native American Artists, ed. Deborah Everett and Elayne Zorn (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2008), xvi.
108 Ibid, xvii.
109 Pub L No 101–644, 104 Stat. 4662 (1990).
110 Pub L No 206-497, 114 Stat 2219 (2000).
111 Pub L No 111-2111,124 Stat 2258 (2010).
112 U.S. Department of the Interior, Indian Arts and Crafts Board, “The Indian Arts and Crafts Act of 1990,” emphasis added, www.iacb.doi.gov/act.html.
113 William J. Hapiuk, “Of Kitsch and Kachinas: A Critical Analysis of the Indian Arts and Crafts Act of 1990,” Stanford Law Review 53, no. 4 (2001): 1014.
114 Nancy Kremers, “Speaking with a Forked Tongue in the Global Debate on Traditional Knowledge and Genetic Resources,” Fordham Intellectual Property, Media & Entertainment Law Journal 15 (2004): 74.
115 Joanne Marie Barker, “Indian-Made”: Sovereignty and the Work of Identification (PhD Thesis, University of California, 2000), 83.
116 [2013] 2 FCR 268 at 119.
117 Natalie Coates, “Who Are the Indigenous Peoples of Canada and New Zealand?” Journal of South Pacific Law 12, no. 1 (2008): 50.
118 Elizabeth Burns Coleman, Aboriginal Art, Identity and Appropriation (Aldershot, Hants: Ashgate, 2005).
119 Ian Mulgrew, “Cigar Store Bill Reid,” Toronto Star, 23 November 2003, D15.
120 An Act to Amend the Indian Act, 1st Sess, 33rd Parl, (assented to 28 June 1985), SC 1985, c 27.
121 The Gender Equity in Indian Registration Act, 3rd Sess, 40th Parl, (assented to 15 December 2010), SC 2010, c 18.
122 Maria Tippett, Bill Reid: The Making of An Indian (Toronto: Vintage Canada, 2004).
123 Ibid, 175.
124 Gerta Moray, “Bill Reid: The Making of an Indian,” BC Studies 146 (2005): 93.
125 Jane O’Hara, “Trade Secrets,” MacLean’s 18 October 1999, 20–29.
126 Terry O’Neill, “Funny Money: The Inclusion of Bill Reid’s Controversial Art on Canada’s Newest Banknote Has Some Wondering How Much Confidence the World Will Have In Our Currency,” Western Standard, 11 October 2004, 25.
127 See e.g. Christine Dauber, “Stand Up the Real Elizabeth Durack,” in Picturing the “Primitif”: Images of Race in Daily Life, ed. Julie Marcus (Canada Bay, NSW: LhR Press, 2000), 239; Ian McLean, White Aborigines: Identity Politics in Australian Art (Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 1998); Caroline Holmstrom Hoban, “The Field of Art Production and Western Desert Acrylics,” Australian Journal of Anthropology 13 (2002): 181.
128 Fred Myers, Painting Culture: The Making of an Aboriginal High Art (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2002), 332.
129 James O. Young, “Should White Men Play the Blues?” Journal of Value Inquiry 28, no. 3 (1994): 423.
130 Perry A. Hall, “African-American Music: Dynamics of Appropriation and Innovation,” in Borrowed Power: Essays on Cultural Appropriation, ed. Bruce Ziff and Pratima V. Rao (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1997), 31.
131 Supra note 95 at 253.
132 Elizabeth Burns Coleman, Aboriginal Art, Identity and Appropriation (Aldershott, Hants: Ashgate Publishing, 2005), 32.
133 See e.g. Solen Roth, Culturally Modified Capitalism: The Native Northwest Coast Artware Industry (PhD Thesis, University of British Columbia, 2013); Jarrett Martineau and Eric Ritskes, “Fugitive Indigeneity: Reclaiming the Terrain of Decolonial Struggle Through Indigenous Art,” Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society 3, no. 1 (2014): 1; Laura Fisher, Aboriginal Art and Australian Society: Hope and Disenchantment (London: Anthem Press, 2016); Christine Alder, Duncan Chappell, and Kenneth Polk, “Frauds and Fakes in the Australian Aboriginal Art Market,” Crime, Law, and Social Change 56 (2011): 189.
134 Jennifer Kramer, Switchbacks, Art, Ownership, and Nuxalk National Identity (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2006), xiii.
135 Harold Garfinkel, “Conditions of Successful Status Degradation Ceremonies” American Journal of Sociology 61 (1956): 420.
136 Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass (Mineola, New York: Forgotten Books, 1999), 81.