I am often asked about this critique, but to be perfectly honest, I have not yet had a chance to read it. One day I surely will. Hal Foster represents the modernist tradition and therefore it is not surprising that he dislikes my interpretation of so-called modernity. Some people seem to think that the aesthetic regime of art is a sort of a political slogan, which of course it is not. It is an exaggeration to say, as people often do, that “Rancière wants art to be political”.
Art is a work on the distribution of the sensible. Sometimes, but not very often, it rearranges the set of perception between what is visible, thinkable, and understandable, and what is not. This is the politics of art. I always try to question mainstream ideas on this subject, especially the assumption that artists’ work can have precise, intended effects. When practices of art affect the sensible, it is not simply as a result of artists’ intentions.