Tyler Green, Washington's first art BLOGger, has an excellent idea for the Whitney Biennial. Read it here first.

His idea to send the Whitney Biennial on the road is an interesting idea that deserves a hard look by the new Whitney director Adam Weinberg.

The idea of traveling art shows is nothing new, but the idea of America's best known group show hitting the road is a novel way not only to expose what the leading lights of today's curating cadre see as the "state of the arts" in America, but also to get a reaction about what the "rest of us" outside New York City think about their choices.

Is there art (and opinions) outside of NYC, LA, SF and DC? Let's find out!

I disagree that the Biennial would become stronger by culling it to a dozen artists. True that a Biennial of 108 artists spans a wider range of art, artists and visual offerings - but that's precisely the great challenge of a good group show! It doesn't dilute it - it just offers more to see, discuss and form an opinion about.

This is even more important since today's Biennials - especially this one - are the 19th century's salons with a new name.

The name has changed, but the gist is the same... a select a chosen few – back then the academicians, and now the "hot" curators - pick who and what they feel represents the best of what is "good" in art. But the more the better, maybe not for the Biennial, but for art itself.

Today’s Biennial is supposed to take a "pulse" of the art state of the nation, our nation, and then the complaining begins. Not everyone is happy with a group show, any group show (I’ve curated many, many of them). But especially if it's one with the power and pull of what the Whitney has managed to accomplish all of these years.

And a lot of times (back in the 19th century and also now) the curators are wrong, off-base, out of tune, nearsighted and not in touch with the front battle lines of art. And sometimes they are dead on! But wouldn't it be fun, and good for American art, to find out what Seattle thinks about the show, as opposed to what San Diego thinks?

A salon, I mean Biennial, with 15 or 20 different cities in the schedule, and those cities' regional critics giving their opinions, and making people interested in art again, and maybe making true art stars of a local boy picked for the show.... but wait, Mmmm... Not too many artists outside of New York, or LA, or SF, or wherever the curator is from, are seldom included in this "pulse of American art" of a show.

Hey! That could be another benefit of a traveling Biennial!

Imagine curators, or critics, or artists, or dealers from Columbus, or Boise, or Phoenix or Detroit adding to the mix by bringing forth "their" local artists, who may have never otherwise come to the attention of a Whitney curator.

Then the Whitney Biennial may truly, one day become an American salon, I mean Biennial. And perhaps finally accomplish what it has been failing to do all these years: Survey New American art and perhaps upset a whole nation instead of a few high brow critics in a few cities – and this would all be good for art!