If you’ve ever walked into a modern art gallery, stared at a giant, blank metal box, and thought, "This is just a thing in a room," you’re actually in very prestigious company. You’re basically agreeing with Michael Fried art critic, the man who, in 1967, launched a verbal hand grenade at the art world that is still exploding today.
Fried is the ultimate "love him or hate him" figure in art history. To his fans, he’s the defender of high art’s soul. To his enemies—and there are plenty—he’s the rigid gatekeeper who tried to stop the future and failed. But honestly? Even if you think he was wrong about everything, you can't talk about how we look at art today without dealing with his shadow.
The Essay That Started a War
It all came down to a single, dense, and incredibly aggressive essay called Art and Objecthood.
Fried didn't just dislike Minimalism; he thought it was a moral failing. He called it "literalism." To him, artists like Donald Judd and Robert Morris weren't making art at all. They were making "objects."
What’s the difference?
Think about a painting. When you look at a masterpiece, you’re supposed to get lost in it. The frame disappears. The wall disappears. You are in a state of what Fried called absorption. But Minimalism? Minimalism wanted you to be aware of your own body. It wanted you to notice the floor, the lighting, and how small you felt next to a giant steel cube.
Fried had a word for this: theatricality.
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And in his world, "theatrical" was the nastiest slur you could hurl at a piece of plastic or metal. He famously wrote, "theatre is now the negation of art." It’s a heavy line. He felt that if art needs a viewer to "complete" it—like an actor needs an audience—it loses its purity. It becomes a prop.
Why He Obsessed Over Absorption
Fried wasn't just some cranky guy shouting at boxes. He was a brilliant historian who looked back at 18th-century French painting to prove his point. He loved the work of Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin and the theories of Denis Diderot.
In these old paintings, the subjects are always busy. They’re reading a letter, playing with a toy, or staring into space. They are so "absorbed" in what they’re doing that they seem totally unaware that we, the viewers, even exist.
That was Fried's gold standard.
He believed that "presentness is grace." A great work of art should feel like it exists in a single, eternal moment. You don't "experience" it over time like a movie; you encounter it all at once, and it blows your hair back. Minimalism, by contrast, was "durational." You had to walk around it. You had to spend time with it. To Fried, that was just... mundane. It was like waiting for a bus.
The Great Rivalry: Fried vs. The Minimalists
The 60s were wild for art theory. Fried was the protégé of Clement Greenberg, the king of formalist criticism. They believed art should be about "medium specificity." A painting should be about paint. A sculpture should be about its own internal logic.
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Then came the Minimalists. They didn't care about "art" with a capital A. They cared about "specific objects."
- Donald Judd famously said, "If someone says it's art, it's art."
- Robert Morris leaned into the theatricality Fried hated, making work that changed based on where you stood.
- Michael Fried stood his ground, championing painters like Frank Stella (early on) and Kenneth Noland.
The weird thing? Fried actually described the Minimalist experience better than almost anyone else. He perfectly captured that "creepy" feeling of being in a room with a large, silent object that seems to be watching you back. He just happened to think that feeling was the death of culture.
What People Get Wrong About Him
Most people think Fried was just a conservative holding onto the past. That’s not quite it. He was actually trying to protect the idea that art can be something more than just a physical thing.
If art is just an object, then everything is art. If everything is art, then nothing is special.
He was worried about the "spectacle"—the idea that art would become just another form of entertainment, like a theme park or a movie. Looking at the "Instagrammable" art of 2026, you kinda have to wonder if he was right. We spend more time taking selfies with the art than being "absorbed" by it. Fried saw that coming sixty years ago.
Why You Should Care Now
You might think 1960s art beef is irrelevant, but Fried’s ideas are everywhere.
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When you go to a museum and feel annoyed because everyone is talking and taking photos instead of looking at the work, you're feeling Fried’s "anti-theatricality." You want that moment of absorption. You want the grace.
Fried eventually moved away from contemporary criticism to focus on art history and even photography. His book Why Photography Matters as Art as Never Before (2008) argued that photographers like Jeff Wall and Thomas Struth were the true heirs to the tradition of absorption. They were making "tableaux"—large-scale images that demand the same kind of deep, silent attention as a Renaissance painting.
Actionable Insights for Your Next Gallery Visit
Next time you find yourself standing in front of a piece of contemporary art, try "Fried-ing" it.
- Check for "Theatricality": Is the work trying too hard to grab your attention? Does it feel like it's "performing" for you? If it feels like a gimmick, Fried would say it's failing as art.
- Look for "Absorption": Find a piece where the subjects (if there are any) or the forms seem totally self-contained. See if you can lose track of the room around you.
- Identify the "Objecthood": Ask yourself: "Is this interesting because of what it is, or just because it's there?"
Michael Fried taught us that how we look is just as important as what we look at. He might have been an elitist, and he was definitely a bit of a snob, but he fought for the idea that art should be an encounter with something transcendent, not just a physical obstacle in a white room.
To really get a feel for his impact, look up Frank Stella’s Black Paintings versus a Donald Judd Stack. One tries to be a "painting" (for Fried, at least initially); the other insists on being an "object." Deciding which one you prefer is basically choosing a side in the greatest art war of the 20th century.
Next Steps for the Art Enthusiast:
- Read the Source: Pick up the collection Art and Objecthood: Essays and Reviews. It’s dense, but the first few pages will change how you see sculpture forever.
- Visit a "Minimalist" Site: Go to Dia Beacon in New York or the Chinati Foundation in Marfa. See if you feel the "theatricality" Fried complained about—or if you find a different kind of grace in the objects.
- Compare Photography: Look at the work of Jeff Wall. See if you can spot the "anti-theatrical" staging Fried admired so much.