
Hal Foster speaking with Artforum editor-in-chief David Velasco
In Artforum's September 2023 issue, Hal Foster reflects on all that's changed in the forty years since The Anti-Aesthetic: Essays on Postmodern Culture (Bay Press, 1983) was published. Artforum editor-in-chief David Velasco interviewed Foster at his home, where they discussed the volume’s successes and shortcomings and the future of art criticism.
"I think it's actually really important these days to insist on the utopian dimension of art, the utopian dimension of criticism... to think other, to think alternatively, to think into an open space. In part because everything else is so dark," said Foster in response to the question "Are you pessimistic about the role of the critic today?"
"I'm not pessimistic about criticism, or about art," he added.