bloggin' you down

This morning I checked once again to see if the blog that initially inspired me to start a detroit-based art blog had been updated. It had been since May 23 that Caryn Coleman, owner/director of Sixspace in LA and art enthusiast/writer, last signed on to what is one of the most popular LA art blogs. I connected with Coleman in many ways: she came from the midwest (chicago), where she started the gallery and then moved to LA to give it a go. She still is pretty young considering dealer standards and also very nice. It isn't often that you walk into a gallery and the director takes time out to talk about the scene and give helpful advice of places to check out. Coleman blogged almost everyday for years, so when she stopped posting without any explanation I wondered at first if something had happened to her. After a couple months of checking on the blog and seeing no updates, I wondered if she too was getting burned out.
Today Coleman finally posted her frustration, which I can relate to completely. (Don't worry, Detroitartsblog isn't stopping either.) Between running a successful gallery that just relocated to Culver this year and a personal life, she was finding it hard to keep up a blog that started from her pure love of the arts. More people started soliciting her to post show info (even the Getty called her for posts!) and artists inquiries and all other sorts of people wanting her comments on things. Success can be two-fold because she (and I) have found that with more attention and a presence in a scene it is harder to speak your mind, something that may have been much easier before being put under a microscope for everyone to comment or complain. Coleman found that running a gallery and having a very high-profile voice in the community became a conflict of interest. Gladly, she has decided not to stop her blog but to change up the format in the fall and have more interviews and writers on board.
Another NY art/culture/personal blog that I follow (less now), Get Your Show on the Road, Dennis Christie of DCKT Gallery also has had a month hiatus and notes that he doesn't miss it either.
This brings me to a recent speculation that I have been thinking about which is the longevity of blogging. I wonder if the first real wave of bloggers to jump on board are reaching either a point of having to be too careful of what they say based on the blog's success or just pure exhaustion. At the same time as some bloggers sign off, there are dozens more jumping in the pool so I am sure that we won't ever become a bloggless culture. It is, however, important to recognize those who paved the way and devoted their time and energy even before blogging had a name.