Stephen Wright on art
From Talk: Stephen Wright "Usership: Tales of Life Onboard" | SALT Galata · · Salt Online
“Rival Pusap deployed his artistic competence outside the performative framework of art and instead planted it in the hearts and minds basically in the public space of his community.”
On , Stephen Wright, Senior Vice President of Global Travel, Partnerships & Government at AVIS BUDGET GROUP INC, spoke about art during Talk: Stephen Wright "Usership: Tales of Life Onboard" | SALT Galata on Salt Online.
About Stephen Wright
Stephen Wright gave a talk titled "Usership: Tales of Life Onboard" at SALT Galata in 2018, discussing the concept of "usership" he developed in his book. He described usership as a transformation from passive spectatorship to active, meaning-producing userhood. Wright argued that art can gain use value by deliberately lowering its "coefficient of artistic visibility," allowing it to escape institutional capture and engage directly with life. He cited examples such as Argentine conceptualist and plumber Rival Pusap, who planted artistic ideas in his community outside the art world's performative frame, and Bernard Bruno, who reconciled use value and artistic practice by working as a house painter. Wright also discussed the "alternative ideological circuit" as a method of intervening on everyday objects like banknotes to insert political and artistic messages. He referenced the online archive "arg aaarg.fail" as both a functional digital library and a conceptual collective artwork. Additionally, he described a political gesture by three Slovenian artists who legally changed their names to that of populist leader Janis Yanchez, obligating them to speak in his name. Wright characterized politics as a process of "seeding an idea" that may initially face rejection but can eventually bear fruit under proper conditions.