Too Much is Not Enough: Returning to Slow Art Criticism

A workshop exploring art criticism as a practice of attention and resistance to excess, combining readings, gallery visits, and writing exercises to develop precise, intimate forms of critique and refine works-in-progress.

How can art criticism survive in an age of excess - too many images, too many opinions, too much speed? This workshop frames criticism as a practice of reduction: slowing down, resisting distraction, and focusing deeply on what matters - both in encountering artworks and in the writing process.

Through reading, walking, writing, and discussion, participants will explore criticism as a form of resistance to the over-saturation of the art world. Criticism here is not only a tool for interpreting art but also a practice of intimacy and care - an ethical stance toward both art and society.

Readings will range from Ernst Bloch’s Principle of Hope to Eduoard Glissant’s Poetics of Relation, alongside contemporary reflections on attention and minimal expression. We will consider the different forms criticism can take and explore strategies for self-preservation in publishing. Sessions will combine roundtable discussions with visits to Berlin galleries and museums, where participants will experiment with new critical forms: fragments, condensed reviews, and alternative approaches to critical thinking.

The workshop will begin by establishing a shared vocabulary through key readings, then carry these ideas into direct engagement with art and public space. Guest contributions from Berlin-based critics will enrich the dialogue, while group exercises will test modes of expression that favor precision over excess. The week will culminate in a collective sharing of texts, reflecting on how criticism can cultivate intimacy, clarity, and attentiveness in the present moment.

Schedule

Day 1: Roundtable reading and discussion of Peter Schjeldahl‘s “A Dissection of the Modern Critic” (2011); Lecture and discussion led by Mitch Speed: Closeness Eats Time: What Art Criticism Can Do;

Excerpted roundtable readings from Utopia (1516) by Thomas More and The Principle of Hope (1954–1959) by Ernst Bloch

Day 2: Tour of selected Charlottenburg art galleries; Lecture and discussion led by Kate Brown: The Art World Under Pressure; Roundtable reading and discussion of Eduoard Glissant‘s “For Opacity” from the book Poetics of Relation (1990); Group writing session

Day 3: Visit to a selected Berlin museum with a curator’s tour; Guest lecture and group discussion with Berlin-based art critic; Group writing session and roundtable reading and feedback of student work

Day 4: Guest lecture and group discussion with Berlin-based art critic; Group writing session and roundtable reading and feedback of student work; Roundtable reading and discussion of an excerpt from Susan Sontag’s Against Interpretation

Day 5: Roundtable reading and discussion of the text Criticism Hurts by Jan Verwoert; Group writing session and roundtable reading and feedback of student work; Short lectures: (1) How to Pitch and Write for Magazines and (2) Some Notes on Style

Knowledge requirements

English, written English

Equipment requirements

Please bring a computer or notebook to write with.

Kate Brown is an art critic and editor, and currently the Berlin-based Senior Editor at Artnet News and host of Artnet’s ‘The Art Angle’ podcast. Since 2017, her work has chronicled dramatic shifts in contemporary art.

https://news.artnet.com/about/kate-brown-671

 

Mitch Speed is a Berlin-based writer, whose criticism has appeared in Frieze, Camera Austria, Momus, Artforum, ArtReview, Mousse, Spike, amongst other publications. In 2019 his study of Mark Leckey’s video artwork Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore (1999) was published by Afterall Books, as part of their One Work series. His recent essay collection ‘Closeness Eats Time’ was published in 2025, by Brick Press, and his next book is forthcoming from Floating Opera Press

https://www.mitch-speed.com/