For politics' sake - Artists can't fathom why John Kerry lost

The World Magazine ^ | 11-19-04 | by Gene Edward Veith

[Oldeconomybuyer]

 

The prize for the most unintentionally humorous reason given by a liberal for why President Bush defeated John Kerry—in a contest with many entries—has to go to Alan Woods, an Ohio State drama professor quoted in the Chicago Tribune: "We are now reaping, in election results, the consequences of the colossal reductions in art education."

Mr. Woods was trying to figure out why Americans reelected the president even though the nation's artists told them not to.

Bruce Springsteen organized his fellow rock stars into the Vote for Change tour, with John Mellencamp, the Dave Matthews Band, Pearl Jam, R.E.M, the Dixie Chicks, James Taylor, and others staging concerts to elect Mr. Kerry. Rapper Eminem put out an anti-Bush video. P. Diddy put out "Vote or Die" T-shirts and got multitudes of rap fans to register to vote, and not for Mr. Bush.

Hollywood did its part to instruct the masses, Fahrenheit 9/11 being only one of the anti-Bush movies. Documentaries almost never make it into mainstream movie theaters, but just before the election the local multiplex was playing fare like Bush's Brain (on the president's sinister Svengali, Karl Rove), The Hunting of the President (on the vast right-wing conspiracy that tried to overthrow Bill Clinton), Outfoxed (unveiling the shocking secret that Fox News is conservative), and Going Up River (about the thrilling exploits of John Kerry).

Theatrical releases too were designed to inform the American public about the issues. The Day After Tomorrow hyped global warming and the supposed consequence of the current administration's failure to sign the Kyoto treaty. The Manchurian Candidate remade the classic about a Communist attempt to take over the country into a conspiracy theory about big business controlling the political process so it can profit from a war in Iraq. Silver City made a parody of President Bush the villain in a murder mystery.

The more serious arts establishment also mobilized to defeat President Bush. The drama scene featured The Bushie Plays and W! as well as anti-Bush ridicule written into the Broadway hits Avenue Q and Hairspray. Museums and art exhibits also did their part. Celebrities campaigned, patrons gave money to the Democrats and their 527 funds, and many arts professionals did mundane tasks such as work on the get-out-the-vote effort for Mr. Kerry.

And all to no avail! What is wrong with this country, that it doesn't listen to its artists? Mr. Woods has concluded that America just does not understand art, and that's what we get for cutting back on art education.

To be sure, there were also conservative artists glad that President Bush was reelected, not all of whom were in the field of country music. But the question remains: Aren't the arts, for good or for bad, influential? How is it that all of these artists had so little impact on the country whose culture they supposedly embody?

First of all, an artist's opinion about politics, government, or public policy is not necessarily better than anybody else's. An artist, by virtue of his art, is no authority on topics such as nuclear physics, economics, theology, or other spheres outside his calling.

An artist's sphere of expertise is his art. That may entail the ability to pretend to be someone else, the ability to play a musical instrument, the ability to make up rhymes really fast, the ability to draw pictures, or the ability to tell a story. These may be valuable gifts that can enrich our lives and contribute to the overall culture. But they do not entitle artists to be rulers.

Mr. Woods seems to think that art education, fully funded, would teach children to do what artists tell them to do. But genuine art education would teach them about art. That would include understanding what a work of art is saying, so that the child could accept or reject its message. It would also teach discernment about artistic quality. That would go against the current assumption that art is simply whatever an artist does.

Many of today's artists have swallowed uncritically the bohemian myth, that the artist is superior to lesser mortals and the source of meaning and values. The best artists, though—Shakespeare, Bach, Rembrandt—had no such pretensions. They did not see themselves as creating either their art or their culture out of their own genius. Rather, they looked outside themselves to an objective realm of order and beauty created by Someone other than themselves

[Do not dub me shapka broham]

Courbet, Manet, Rembrandt, Velasquez, Da Vinci, Michaelangelo, Caravaggio, Carraci, Van Gogh, Vermeer, Durer, Goya, Ensor, etc...

Pfft!

You call that "art"?

[Do not dub me shapka broham]

The Painted Word

-Tom Wolfe

[xzins]

There was a time when the media was almost totally consolidated into a few movie houses. That was extended to a few TV networks.

That media, being the only audio-visual information source available to any American, was able to create "heroic" stars who had such status that their word probably was a factor in public opinion.

When I think of the powerful figures of that era: John Wayne, Jimmy Stewart, Audrey Hepburn, Huntley/Brinkley, Walter Cronkite, Johnny Carson....it seems natural that their opinions were significant because they were part of a fairly small media elite.

Today's media includes all the above PLUS. There are DVDs, CDs, Internet, Radio, Satellite, cable, etc.

People are inundated with personalities. Stars are no longer "STARS." There are more so-called media stars, it seems, than any one person even cares to keep track of.

They are commonplace, mundane, everyday.

No more important than an actor in a toothpaste commercial.

In other words, they have no impact. But the funny thing -- quite humorous -- is that they see themselves like a bygone era saw a John Wayne. Such an un-self-critical ego is hilarious.

I just don't think that today I'll be letting Linda Ronstadt influence how I vote. Just another media bimbo.

X

[oldenuff2no]

First, nobody pays any attention to what they say. Only they think they are important enough for the world to listen to. The rest of us call it arrogance and ego.
Michael Moore is the exception to this. He still is all ate up with himself, is arrogant, and has a ego you couldn't get in a garage door. But Michael Moore has something else. He has millions of dollars given to him from the liberals of this country.
The liberals paid to see his movie that was supposed to lock up the election for Kerry. They didn't get what they paid for.
The movie ended up costing Kerry the election, and Michael Moore laughed all the way to the bank with the liberals money. Old Michael is going to make another movie. Watch the liberals all run out and give him more money for his bank account. The liberals are his "cash cow" and he is leading them around by the nose.

[finnman69]

Mr. Woods seems to think that art education, fully funded, would teach children to do what artists tell them to do. But genuine art education would teach them about art. That would include understanding what a work of art is saying, so that the child could accept or reject its message. It would also teach discernment about artistic quality. That would go against the current assumption that art is simply whatever an artist does.

After taking dozens of classes in art history, architecture as well as studio art I always understood the fundamental point of the classes was to learn how and sometimes why different messages were expressed via different mediums during respective eras. The studio classes actually taught you how to express a message or an idea. It would be the mark of a very poor art educator to push an idea as correct.

I consistently found my worst teachers to be those who pushed their own ideas as correct. The best teachers were those who encouraged self-expression and the fermentation of concept and idea from the student.

An art educator should never make the artist's message the primary focus of instruction unless the point is to show techniques of expressing a certain message.

[Utah Binger]

I do have another life besides sitting here early every morning trolling through the many opinions. In many ways all are correctly stating the arts situation as I see it.

First, since the WPA was formed during the depression, the left has always had an opinion that anybody who really wanted to could be an artist. As a result way too many talentless artists have appeared on the scene trying to find money from the government. In California alone there were over 15,000 folks calling themselves artists before 1950. Problem is, less than 1% of these so called artists are seriously traded in the marketplace.

Second,when really gifted young artists show up at these academies they are told they must "express themselves" rather than learn the basics of what art is all about. As a result we get pseudo sophisticate abstractionists who can talk a good game but make nothing but s**t.

Third, the real dealers want to sell what the public will buy. Funny how that works. As a result we have to look at 100 portfolios to find one good one.

Finally, modernism and abstraction must needs be supported by a basis of serious training. Art that performs in the market is always collectible as market is determined by open and free trading. Serious artists are welcome to come here to see what nature made before they try to make it themselves. Retreats are free.

[kidd]

This is the old "We didn't get our message out" argument.

Sorry Mr. Woods, your message was in our face for four straight years. And most of us decided that your "message" was wrong.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

That's what Skip Humphrey said when he came in third in the race for the governor's job in Minnesota a few years ago.

[mr. snrub1]

Inspiration without talent brings us modern art.

[mudblood]

"socialism is utopia"

Agreed. I walked past a car with a Kerry sticker today and a sticker reading, "less stuff=more fun". That's an anti-capitalist slogan.

[Little Pig]

Art is a reflector of culture, not a director.

[gaspar]

Wow, a Maynard Dixon freak. One of my favorite possessions is a 1930s portfolio of his work done for a travel magazine. In the 19th century an educated person (man and woman) was expected to know how to draw, use perspective, etc. Today, if one says, "I'm an artist," hold on to your wallet, you have met another mediocrity.

[Liz]

Shows how far removed the ivory tower types are from the 60 million Americans who voted for GWB.

As for the top issue that drove millions of "values voters" to the polls, looks like academia never heard of "campaign strategy." (/sarc)

[Liz]

Bruce Springsteen organized his fellow rock stars into the Vote for Change tour, with John Mellencamp, the Dave Matthews Band, Pearl Jam, R.E.M, the Dixie Chicks, James Taylor, and others staging concerts to elect Mr. Kerry. Rapper Eminem put out an anti-Bush video. P. Diddy put out "Vote or Die" T-shirts and got multitudes of rap fans to register to vote, and not for Mr. Bush.

Hollywood did its part to instruct the masses, Fahrenheit 9/11 being only one of the anti-Bush movies. Documentaries almost never make it into mainstream movie theaters, but just before the election the local multiplex was playing fare like Bush's Brain (on the president's sinister Svengali, Karl Rove), The Hunting of the President (on the vast right-wing conspiracy that tried to overthrow Bill Clinton), Outfoxed (unveiling the shocking secret that Fox News is conservative), and Going Up River (about the thrilling exploits of John Kerry).

The Moral Relativist Shock Troops have been in full battle regalia, tearing down the moral bulwark of Western Civilization, crushing religious freedom. The libertine left's claim to moral superiority is spurious. They have always been about disestablishmentarianism-----tearing down our morally-based cultural strengths. Whether its the ACLU juggernaut to remove all vestiges of Christianity from the culture, ripping prayer out of schools, promoting the killing of the unborn as a constitutional right, the left's irreligious-hating politics are calculated to destroy.

As Cicero wrote: " A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murder is less to fear. "

[xzins]

Awesome Cicero quote!

thanks

[oldbrowser]

"Artists" usually live in a make-believe world.

that is their genius and their folly.
Most of these people live very sheltered lives
and have the minds and experience of children.

[Diana in Wisconsin]

Gorgeous pix, Utah! (Thoughtful comments, too.) Is that a typical view out your window? Lucky you!

[RebelDS]

I have never considered singers or actors to be artists. I won't call them an artist and have always believed that they were just entertainers. I'm sorry, but when I think of a good artist, I think of Terry Redlin.

[Do not dub me shapka broham]

You are all right-in your own unique ways-about what makes these nitwits tick.

These people are removed from any sense of reality.

They live in what is essentially a fantasy world created to conform to their own twisted vision of what a proper society should look like. So, it's not surprising in the least that their self-deluded concept of how well they will do in any given election doesn't necessarily dovetail with the aspirations and dreams of real, flesh-and-blood voters.

Remember, these are the same value depleted idiots who believed that once their Soviet-funded war of attrition in Central America had subsided and Cold War era tensions were reduced, the puppet representatives of the USSR would be ushered into power during a wave of democratic elections in the region.

Fat chance of that happening!

These imbeciles have no firm grasp of what motivates anyone who falls outside of their own narrow, ahistoric, maladapted subset of "Dawn of the Dead" type neo-Marxist zombies.

It's just that simple.