Jed Perl
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Jed Perl (born 1951) is an American art critic and author in
New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
. He was a longtime staff of ''
The New Republic ''The New Republic'' is an American magazine of commentary on politics, contemporary culture, and the arts. Founded in 1914 by several leaders of the progressive movement, it attempted to find a balance between "a liberalism centered in hu ...
''.


Career

Jed Perl initially trained as a painter. He holds a
Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four year ...
from Columbia College and also studied at the
Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture The Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture is an artists residency located in Madison, Maine, just outside of Skowhegan. Every year, the program accepts online applications from emerging artists from November through January, and selects 65 ...
. He decided to devote himself fully to criticism in the mid-1980s. "In my twenties I was very involved in making art as well as writing about art," he said an interview, "but in the early 80s I came to what I guess I would describe as a fork in the road, and around 1985 I just decided to stop painting. A lot of people were not that surprised, they felt that’s where I was going." Perl became one of the art critics at ''
The New Criterion ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...
'' soon after its founding in 1982. From there he went on to editorial appointments at ''
Art and Antiques ''Art & Antiques'' is an American arts magazine. History 1984 launch ''Art & Antiques'' launched its premier issue in March 1984. While the magazine disclaimed any connection to a previous publication of the same name, the company had in fact b ...
'', '' Salamagundi'', ''
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'', and ''
Modern Painters ''Modern Painters'' (1843–1860) is a five-volume work by the Victorian art critic, John Ruskin, begun when he was 24 years old based on material collected in Switzerland in 1842. Ruskin argues that recent painters emerging from the tradition of ...
'' before joining ''The New Republic'' in 1994. His essays have appeared there regularly since then. Perl is the former Chairman of the Board of the Heliker-LaHotan Foundation, which is dedicated to the preservation and study of the art of John Heliker and Robert LaHotan and the maintenance of their former home on
Great Cranberry Island Great Cranberry Island is an island located in Maine. It is the largest of the five islands of the Town of Cranberry Isles, Maine. It is roughly long and wide. Great Cranberry Island is a favorite vacation spot for many. Access to the island i ...
, Maine as an artist residency. He was a friend of Heliker's and wrote the foreword for the catalogue of the exhibition "John Heliker: Drawing on the New Deal, 1932-1948" which originated at Stephen F. Austin State University in 2011. Perl teaches at the New School for Social Research. His two-volume biography of
Alexander Calder Alexander Calder (; July 22, 1898 – November 11, 1976) was an American sculptor known both for his innovative mobiles (kinetic sculptures powered by motors or air currents) that embrace chance in their aesthetic, his static "stabiles", and hi ...
was published in 2017 and 2020.


"Laissez-faire aesthetics"

Perl is a longtime critic of what he sees as financially driven compromise of artistic standards among artists, collectors, galleries, and museums. He coined the phrase ''
laissez-faire ''Laissez-faire'' ( ; from french: laissez faire , ) is an economic system in which transactions between private groups of people are free from any form of economic interventionism (such as subsidies) deriving from special interest groups ...
aesthetics Aesthetics, or esthetics, is a branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of beauty and taste, as well as the philosophy of art (its own area of philosophy that comes out of aesthetics). It examines aesthetic values, often expressed t ...
'' to describe this phenomenon in a 2007 essay for ''The New Republic'' that became the introduction for his 2012 book ''Magicians and Charlatans''. Edward M. Gomez, reviewing ''Magicians and Charlatans'' for Hyperallergic in 2014, wrote, "even if Perl had published only this new book’s introduction ('Laissez-faire Aesthetics') as a pamphlet, it still could have served as something of a manifesto calling for a drastic reconsideration of the art world’s current methods and mores. It’s something of a ''cri de coeur'' from a well-informed observer who is deeply disappointed that dollar-value concerns have trumped aesthetic considerations of so much of what comes up for consumption in galleries and venerable museums."


Personal life

His father was
Martin Lewis Perl Martin Lewis Perl (June 24, 1927 – September 30, 2014) was an American chemical engineer and physicist who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1995 for his discovery of the tau lepton. Life and career Perl was born in New York City, New York. Hi ...
, who won the
Nobel Prize in Physics ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , alt = A golden medallion with an embossed image of a bearded man facing left in profile. To the left of the man is the text "ALFR•" then "NOBEL", and on the right, the text (smaller) "NAT•" then " ...
in 1995 for his
discovery Discovery may refer to: * Discovery (observation), observing or finding something unknown * Discovery (fiction), a character's learning something unknown * Discovery (law), a process in courts of law relating to evidence Discovery, The Discover ...
of the
tau lepton The tau (), also called the tau lepton, tau particle, tauon or tau electron, is an elementary particle similar to the electron, with negative electric charge and a spin of . Like the electron, the muon, and the three neutrinos, the tau is a l ...
.


Bibliography


Books

* * * * * * * * *


Essays and reporting

* * * * * *


Book reviews


Awards

* * * * * Perl is also the recipient of a Renate, Hans and Maria Hofmann Trust Award from the New York Foundation for the Arts and awards from the Ingram Merrill Foundation.


Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Perl, Jed Living people 1951 births American art critics Columbia College (New York) alumni The New York Review of Books people