I'm not sure I completely understand Fried's arguments, so bear with me as I try to figure out exactly what he was saying. The gist of his argument seems to be that there is a connection between what he terms 'literalist' art (which he says is generally referred to as minimalism) and theatre, and that true art strives to defeat theatre. Therefore, he doesn't really like literalist art.
I'm just not sure I understand what he means by theatre, since he never really gives a firm description of it. It seems to have something to do with an interplay between subject and object (objecthood being another topic he discussed a lot that I'm not sure I really understand), something that also exists in a highly temporal manner. Why, though, is this something that art should strive to defeat? I don't really understand why this is an issue, or how it truly relates to literalist art.
I think that Fried is somehow associating literalist art (and theatre) with an attempt to break down the boundaries between mediums(?), thus placing him in the 'formalist' camp alongside Clement Greenberg, among others.
I also want to quickly touch on a quote from the Smithson piece that I found really interesting. He discusses "ruins in reverse," arguing that some buildings "rise into ruin before they are built." Given that much of Smithson's work consists of earthworks (Spiral Jetty, for instance), this idea of the building of a ruin takes on added significance. Smithson intended his earthworks to fall into 'ruin,' thus building with the intention of their future weathering and destruction. In some ways, everything is built with the knowledge of its inevitable ruin - ruin exists a priori.
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