Dear Readers,

It's official now: The art world is experiencing a recession. Even The New York Times reported it after Holland Cotter picked up the latest Artforum and noticed it had gone from 500 to 200 pages. Good news: We don't have to fake it anymore. Bad news: The party is over.

The word on the street is that it's good for the art world — our economy going to hell, that is. It's good for the art. No more bad art. No more fuckin' around. It's back to basics. But what does that mean exactly? We're going to see more ceramics and driftwood sculptures? Will there be fewer artists? Does that mean less bad art?

The thought of a sea change in the art world is a welcome notion to me. Art SHOULD be changing all the time, reflecting the world in which we live. What's happening now should effect what kind of contemporary art is being made, no matter what. I see a lot of art, and a lot of it is good. I see it in galleries and museums, on the Internet, in books, magazines, newspaper calendar sections, art announcement cards. Maybe being so inundated visually, it just all blends together and nothing seems to stand out.

One thing we can say for sure, the recent boom of art schools churning out artists has been phenomenal. And that's bound to change. What will all the potential art stars do now? Get jobs? Only a generation ago, the idea of being an artist was a calling, not a career choice. As we took our painting and sculpture classes, it was suggested that we major in something more practical. Being an art major was about as sensible as majoring in philosophy.

I'm reminded of a time back in the early '90s when I saw a piece by Mike Kelley at a Westside gallery group show. It stopped me in my tracks. It was a cardboard construction with old rags in it. Two boxes stacked on top of each other. There was a dirty, empty plastic dog bowl beside the "sculpture." I wasn't sure if it was supposed to be in the show, that perhaps it was left there by mistake. Then I saw the title tag, it said, "Pet Duplex." I laughed out loud. I thought it was sheer genius. "Pet Duplex." It's a piece I would never want to buy (mainly because my pets would want to move in), but it's a piece I can't forget. That was a seminal moment for me. It was transcendent. This artist had created art. You really could get and feel when that artist said, yes, this is art. It might have had a price tag, but it wasn't about commerce.

Mike Kelley's name came up more than once during my interview with John Waters. We were discussing art today and what it means. Waters made art seem so easy to define. So we have two artists in this issue I really look up to for showing the world of art and film what is possible, and maybe each even responsible for starting movements in their fields. Mike Kelley is our Guest Lecture. Mary Woronov explains why Andy Warhol never dies, and Nadia Lili ponders that very same question of Mickey Rourke. Recession? What recession? Bring it on!

—Tulsa Kinney