ArtNet's Demise and TruffleHunting's Future.

For the past ten years my browser’s home page has been firmly locked on the front page of ArtNet Magazine. And so it was with shock and awe that I should encounter this notice.

My Morning Cup of Disappointment.

It is a great loss to the art world that ArtNet has ceased publication. Under the watchful stewardship of Walter Robinson, ArtNet’s magazine was a clear and diverse voice of the new and noteworthy. It was fun to read. It had international perspective.

Over the years I became a greater fan of Jerry Saltz. I often bristled at Charlie Finch’s missives but found him an invaluable wasabi-like palette cleanser. Reverend Jen’s off center narratives made me smile and sometimes sulk. And Donald Kuspit’s analytical bent brought me new and sustained appreciation for people like Roberto Matta, Otto Dix and Robert Graham. (I’ve linked each writer to but one of their outstanding pieces. Fortunately, ArtNet archives will remain open.)
These and countless other contributors enlivened the essential dialogue that makes art resonate and fosters sophistication and connoisseurship.
I am a writer about Art in no small part because of the wonderful, intellectual, conversational and current coverage I encountered there on a daily basis.

The Readership of TruffleHunting approaches capacity at Arthur Ashe Stadium in Queens, NY

Last weekend TruffleHunting garnered it’s 20,000th reader. It is with sheer delight that I share this. To think that I’m reaching the visual equivalent of Arthur Ashe Stadium’s capacity boggles my brain. This fact, coupled with ArtNet’s demise, makes me even more adamant that the need for intelligent, non-partisan artistic dialogue has never been greater. Buck-naked Emperors should be called out and the delicate whispers of visual alchemists should be championed. I’m just the one to do it and I’m doubling down.
-Mario M. Muller, Los Angeles, June 25th, 2012

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