The Disney-fication of Bill Walton

My congratulations to Lauren McCarty on her thoughtful, original, and accurate examination of Bill Walton’s Studio in her review. To my knowledge, no one other than Lauren and myself dared question the strategy employed by the ICA in building a simulacrum of Walton’s studio in their gallery. Bill Walton and I were friends for over thirty years. Knowing Bill as well as I did, I am certain that he would have been horrified by the Disney-fication of his studio space. Walton was quite vocal in his objection to the inauthentic in art and the system that surrounds it. As I point out in my brief essay (http://historywillabsolvemike.blogspot.com/search?q=bill+walton%27s+studio), the transported studio was reproduced backwards; when one entered the studio the loft was on the left hand side, not the right. Unfortunately, the positioning of the entrance was not the only thing that ICA got backwards in their approach to honoring one of the most important and influential Philadelphia artists of his generation.

 

Michael Macfeat