Public Enema No. 2

And the Art Institute administration, which directs one of the most open-minded and self-analytical such institutions in the country, had a flack, rather than a dean as requested, return a call from SF Weekly.

The administration's reaction is about what one might expect, says Fried, who has thought about such quandaries before.

"The term 'avant-garde' is defined as something that's pushing limits," Fried says. "It's ironic because when you start doing that, you're always in the same position, which is, people who are interested in operating in that space are going to redefine the space. The institution's never going to be comfortable with that."

It's the same dilemma dividing the ideal from the practical that institutions and individuals face all the time.

Fried says it exists in something as basic as the founding fabric of America. "The theory behind the Second Amendment is that it was put there to make it possible to overthrow the controlling structure of the country. Have a revolution once in a while. It was thought that that's a healthy thing to be in the fabric of the Constitution," says Fried, who notes that he's not debating gun control, rather pointing out the scary nature of violent revolutions.

"But everybody's always trying to stop it because it's dangerous," he says, before moving back to the subject of hosting avant-garde art in academic institutions. "This question about whether or not you should push the edges where you can't really define the edges is an important one. If you don't do that, it becomes reactionary and stupid. If you do do that, there's the danger that it will go out of control."

Indeed.