William Deresiewicz writes eloquently, but he pushes his critiques of foodism too far. Is food the new art or the new religion or both or neither?
Still, I like this paragraph:
Art has become a kind of DIY affair that’s felt to be in anybody’s reach. Think of the number of people who fancy themselves to be writers or visual artists in these days of technologically assisted narcissism—all those would-be novelists and memoirists, those photographers and videographers. How easy it is to reach an audience now, or to think you’re reaching one. How easy to receive approval for your work, since friends will never tell you what they really believe. And in the case of the visual arts, with all the new technology, how easy to create a beautiful image. I’m reminded of something I heard a music teacher say about electric guitars: that he tries to keep his students away from them until they know how to play, because they make it too easy to produce a sound, to feel as if you’re making music. The new digital cameras are the electric guitars of the visual media; they give you the impression that this art thing really is no sweat.