The Modern Art Idiocy

reply to post by ArMaP

Nothing to show, as I didn't make any claims about my abilities.

And yet you judged this little girls paintings as corny ?
I guess the religious connotations were just to much for you ?
IDK never heard that one before. But I won't hound you about it any further.
It's your opinion. So that's cool.

Originally posted by randyvs
I guess the religious connotations were just to much for you ?

You do know that historically, the greatest part of all art is religious in nature, don't you? It's hardly an abnormal theme in just about any artistic venture you care to name... music, sculpture, painting, etc.

Of course, today there might be a bit more to the arts than the worlds religions, but it still weaves a thread through pretty much everything and an interested person should really look at what is different today from those paintings done in caves by early humans. That the paintings at Lascaux, done 40,000 years ago, were related to their religion is unquestionable. They didn't do them just 'for the fun of it'.

reply to post by masqua


Not sure what you mean by the greatest part really masqua. I really love Picasso.
But then there's the Sistine Chapel and The Last Supper. Explain if you will ?

reply to post by Skyfloating


Too much fun. You know...Pablo Picasso created his cubism to mock the rich and elite. He knew these people would over analyze and over speculate the meaning of his work. His work was a major middle finger to critics of his time. Good his works were, but he got the last laugh. That's why I love Picasso! Bwahahaha.

Originally posted by randyvs
reply to post by masqua

 

Not sure what you mean by the greatest part really masqua. I really love Picasso.
But then there's the Sistine Chapel and The Last Supper. Explain if you will ?

You mention Picasso, an avowed 'Catholic atheist', as if he never approached religion in his works, which kind of makes my point:

This is the first critical examination of Pablo Picasso’s use of religious imagery and the religious import of many of his works with secular subject matter. Though Picasso was an avowed atheist, his work employs themes of spirituality—and, often, traditional religious iconography. In five engagingly written, accessible chapters, the authors address Picasso’s cryptic 1930 painting of the Crucifixion; the artist’s early life in the catholic church, trained as a religious painter; elements of transcendence in Guernica; Picasso’s fraught relationship with the church, including a commission to paint murals for the War and Peace Chapel in France in the 1950s; and the centrality of religious themes and imagery in bullfights, subject of countless Picasso drawings and paintings.
www.ucpress.edu...

The fact is, his art exuded religious themes.

When confronted with the art of any era, from those works still existing from more than 40 thousand years ago, all through the pagan pre-Christian artworks on every continent and then on to the much more recent religious works of Islam, Buddhism and Christianity, you would find it difficult NOT to find religious overtones in artwork.

reply to post by masqua


I did know of Picasso's atheism and admit to never actually seeing, any religious work by him. But even so I would never assume there weren't any. I referenced him, only because he was the only one I knew for sure, was atheist.
But I think I see what you're getting at just the same, thru my sometimes far to dense understanding.
ARmap's opinion isn't based on the girls religious concepts they 're just corny ?

Originally posted by randyvs
And yet you judged this little girls paintings as corny ?

And you judged her as a prodigy, why can't I judge her work?

I guess the religious connotations were just to much for you ?

Wrong guess, the subject doesn't matter to me when I am analysing the artistic (and, because of that, subjective) value of her work.

Technically, she is good, artistically, I don't think she is.

It's your opinion. So that's cool.

That's the truth, all of these are just opinions, as art is not something that can clearly be defined as good or bad.

Edited to add that, although not an artist, I have been exposed to art (mostly paintings) because my elder sister is a painter.

I looked at that girl's gallery (here) and I like her first paintings, specially the ones from when she was 6.

Now I think that when she was 6 she was a prodigy, but it looks like there was some kind of influence (probably a materialistic influence...) that made her change her style to a photo-like, corny (like those paintings of babies crying that some people love) style instead of her natural style.

I hope she returns to her original style, with all that she has learned these years I suppose she can be a great artist.

Edited to add that, looking at the other paintings, I think that we can see the two distinct sides of her work; the natural, that she still makes, and the one I called "corny" and that looks forced to a photo-like style that probably sells more.

reply to post by ArMaP


Alright then, I really appreciate you taking the time to
explain where you were coming from ArMaP . I even
might actually agree with a few points. Thank you.

reply to post by Skyfloating


I absolutely had to comment on your thread. David Rockefeller's grandmother founded MOMA. She was at odds with her husband over it. He hated "modern art" and thought it offensive.

I agree with him. "Modern art" is garbage.

reply to post by suz62


To dislike something is normal and to be applauded, so kudos to you for your ability to distinguish between that which is personally appealing and that which is not. There are things and ideas I feel the same way about... like snails baked in flaky pastries.

However, I don't go that extra step to call it garbage because I also understand that a great many people believe it to be a delicacy of the highest order. The same can be said of caviar and champagne, neither of which I slaver over much.

Rather than dismiss a type of art which has defined the 20th century out of hand, it might be worthwhile to look into the reasons for the dissolution of figurative art which defined previous eras. Why was it that artists around the world decided, almost unanimously, to venture into the imaginative realm rather than continuing preceding trends towards objective reality?

Did it have something to do with the First World War, quickly followed by the Second? Art may imitate life as well as the other way around. As the violence of the century commenced, how would artists view that bloody reality? How would it be reflected in their works?

Suppose, for a moment, that we consider the film industry as the single reflection of how art defines our age? Would the recent spate of disaster movies indicate our collective consciousness? We watch world ending drama after drama, sprinkled lightly with global epidemics and hordes of groaning zombies intent on eating the living.

And we love it! What does that say about us as a new generation of artists and art viewers?

reply to post by masqua


You say "we". Include me out.

Originally posted by SLAYER69
reply to post by Skyfloating

 

Couldn't agree more...

Take for example this garbage from this Picasso character. It's Obvious the man has no talent and probably wont go anywhere with his doodling and scratchings Sheeeesh!
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/dcf972b9b2a9.jpg[/atsimg]
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/e6b885f49bb2.jpg[/atsimg]

I know what I like.
It's not always whats popular or perceived as "cultured"

I'm not a big fan of most Modern Art, Picasso included, but at least he has something there to look at rather than paint samples that you could see at the mecca of modern art Home Depot that some "artists" do.

Originally posted by suz62
reply to post by masqua

 

You say "we". Include me out.

'We' refers to the culture prevalent in North America. I don't care for it myself, but I don't personally fill movie theatres either... there's not enough 'me's'.

M's movie reference prompted me to post.
When and if I ever decide to make art for the market place; I can and will. But for now my muse guides the way.

The passion to create what my soul tells me; knows no compromise. I'd rather starve than "sell out"!!

Currently I'm working in experimental film. Big change from 2D!

Originally posted by olaru12

The passion to create what my soul tells me; knows no compromise. I'd rather starve than "sell out"!!

Well said. It is the sentiment of an artist. It is also true that those of us who would strive for wealth and fame seldom find it until after they are long dead and gone. That's the way of the art world and has been so for a very long time.

But you touch upon an important point with that view. This is exactly what the imaginative artists that created Pointillism, Fauvism, Cubism and all the other 'isms' wound up in the cloth called 'Modern Art' thought. They too felt that they had departed from the established norm, ignoring the cries from an indignant public and, even in some cases, governments. They didn't care what anyone thought of their works. They did what they wanted to do, regardless of the heat they encountered.

Currently I'm working in experimental film. Big change from 2D!]

Best of luck to you.

A Letter from Mark Rothko and Adolph Gottlieb to the Art Editor of the New York Times

Dear Mr. Jewell:
To the artist, the workings of the critical mind is one of life’s mysteries. That is why, we suppose, the artist’s complaint that he is misunderstood, especially by the critic, has become a noisy commonplace. It is therefore, an event when the worm turns and the critic of the TIMES quietly yet publicly confesses his “befuddlement”, that he is “non-plussed” before our pictures at the Federation Show. We salute this honest, we might say cordial reaction towards our “obscure” paintings, for in other critical quarters we seem to have created a bedlam of hysteria. And we appreciate the gracious opportunity that is being offered us to present our views.

We do not intend to defend our pictures. They make their own defense. We consider them clear statements. Your failure to dismiss or disparage them is prima facie evidence that they carry some communicative power...

I saw a Rothko exhibit at the museum yesterday Sky...naturally, I thought of you

they was mighty purty - made me well right up - just like magic

:-)

I'd like to revive this conversation/debate about the value of modern art by following the work David Hockney has done investigating the paintings produced by 'European Masters' such as Jan van Eyck.

In the following documentary he produced in conjunction with the BBC, it certainly seems the old masters used technology to enable them to do such marvellously accurate work. In a way, they used a camera of sorts.

(full length, so, if you want to see it, you'll need to set 45 minutes aside)



After viewing the above, what does that say about the most admired works in 'recent' history (after AD 1400)? Does it cheapen the work? Does it make it less valuable? Is it cheating?

Personally, I value the paintings done by those who work from the imagination more than that realism which is produced by tracing lines from what amounts to little more than a type of photograph, but I will grant the masters their abilities in mixing proper colour and their almost impossible attention to the detailed application of it, but the forms and perspective themselves are simply reproduction with the use of lenses, not a 'good eye'.

When I was young, I enjoyed the use of colour slides and a projector too. I would trace the image presented on blank paper and it all came out looking so very professional and realistic. I stopped doing that when I was a teenager, though, because I felt like I was cheating and didn't consider it to be the result of my own artistic abilities at all.

Tracing was too damned easy.

There is also things like this,

Germany did it, but still put it here an in Texas of all places?!?!?!



Prada Nowhereda

TEXAS, as big as it is, does not have a Prada store. It does have Neiman Marcus, which carries plenty of Prada merchandise, but the state cannot boast a free-standing store dedicated to Miuccia Prada's expensive shoes and oddly shaped bags.

But come Saturday it will look as if a tornado had picked up a Prada store and dropped it on a desolate strip of U.S. 90 in West Texas. That is where Prada Marfa, a permanent sculpture by the Berlin artists Michael Elmgreen and Ingar Dragset will be installed. (Actually it will go up in Valentine, Tex., about 26 miles outside Marfa, a town of 2,400 that has become a magnet for artists and art lovers.)

reply to post by Tranceopticalinclined


Installation art... all the rage right now, it seems.

Covering landscapes in coloured cloth or knitting a sweater on a statue, it's all in good fun.

Thanks for reminding me of that Prada store in Texas.