Jessica Gross riffs on Matteo Pericoli for the LARB, where she stands in support of the cosmopolitan. Her essay ruminates on place in art, foreign inspiration, and the mystique underlying location:
The obvious motive — to discover how artists work, as if we might successfully copy their routines — is only part of our fascination; we’re also driven by fear. Art holds sway over us in ways that we don’t understand. This is what gives it power, of course. But the urge to deconstruct it, to decipher not only its meaning but also the conditions in which it was created, is a way for us to wrest some control — or to imagine that it’s possible to do so. We want to know how the trick is done.
