Storm Warning to the Art World: Everything is going to Change! (Great Read -'bout time!)

Plenair magazine (Reprint via the Art Renewal Center) ^ | FR Post June 2005 | Paul Solderberg

[mollynme]

Great article. I have been waiting for years for someone to point out that "the emperor has no clothes".

And the Art Establishment's strategy for this game is first to offend us, then to pretend to be incensed that we're offended, smirking at our discomfort, but ready always to fly into a rage if we cheat at the game by trying to withhold our tax money from their pockets.

Wow. He nailed it.

[ByDesign]

Thanks for everyone's replys, there's a few points I'd like to address, but i'll save them for later (I have to go get PAID to create - I know, the horror of it all), but I'm really happy to be able to vent what I've been observing for a long time! I apologize for the length of what I wrote, but I could write several books on this topic.

I'm an artist. It's part of me, it's not something I chose to do, I'm compelled to do it. I hate what has happened to my craft, to my profession, to my calling. The left highjacked art on campuses and in the galleries and museums long, long ago, and it's full of the same puffed up egos and mindless idiocy that's blatant in other areas of our culture - look at PETA, or the mindless fascism of public education. NEA? Don't make me laugh - they're the enablers for a lot of what's wrong with art these days.

It makes me sad, to think that if an artist of the caliber of Michelangelo were to appear, he/she would starve and go unnoticed, while some half-wit sells a stuffed horse hanging from a ceiling.

Robert Heinlein postulated a future time, called the "Crazy Years"...we're in them. (yes, I'm outing myself as a R. A. H. fan)

[Designer]

"wasn't being "provocative" enough."

Same thing happens in architecture school, too.

[vannrox]

Some of my favorites:



William Bouguereau - Faneuse



The Excommunication of Robert the Pious



Bonnat Leon - Fountain By The Cathedral Of St Peter In Rome



Lawrence Alma-Tadema



Lawrence Alma-Tadema



William Bouguereau - Limprudente



Lawrence Alma-Tadema - The finding of Moses





Lawrence Alma-Tadema - Phidias Showing the Frieze of the Parthenon



Blaas_Eugen_von_Die_Wassertragerin



Springtime



Toulmouche Auguste - The Admiring Glance



Daniel Gerhartz - Hind's Feet (2004)



Cleopatra Testing Poisons on Condemned Prisoners 1897



Rixens - The death of Cleopata



Mariamne

[SlowBoat407]

Just... Wow.

[justshutupandtakeit]

Are you kidding? These frauds flee beauty faster than Dracula flees the sunlight. They worship Ugliness and Falsehood.

[mvpel]

I guess what the modern artists probably argue is that in the era of photography, what's the point of a painting that is nearly indistinguishable from a photograph.

Faneuse is very lovely, wonder how she kept her skin so fair working outside?

[Ditto]

About time Bump.

[retrokitten]

Thank you for this article!! Very welcome news.

[chs68]

Thanks for posting this article.

A few years ago, I went to an exhibit at the Hirshhorn Gallery (part of the Smithsonian) in Washington, DC. The exhibit was entitled "Visions", or something similar. The theme of the exhibit was the future of American Modern Art.

One thing I saw in that exhibit revealed to me how utterly vapid and barren the current notion of "art" is.

What I saw was a pile of bricks. The pile of bricks -- the sort of thing one would see at a construction site -- was, somehow, "art" -- because it was being exhibited in a Museum. If I had seen the same pile of outside the museum, it would have not been art -- the "artistic elite" had proclaimed it art, and so, according to them, it was "art".

[retrokitten]

Can you please add me to your ping list? Thanks!

[chs68]

"Most modern "art" is nothing more or less than an horrific and colossal practical joke, perpetrated by those with no talent upon those with no taste."

Perfectly stated.

Do you mind if I quote your maxim to other people?

Would you like atttribution?

[Robert A Cook PE]

Cleopatra Testing Poisons on Condemned Prisoners 1897?

Nah.

That painting was directly and shamelessly copied from Hillary's latest focus group polling at her TV offices (er, Senate Office) in her New York's presstitute's (er, dnc) offices.

[retrokitten]

There was a show on our local PBS station a few years ago about the Art Institute of Chicago. It was really neat. They gave the history of the institute. They spoke to all the curators of the different departments and they all highlighted some of the most famous pieces in each of the collections and how they came to reside at the Institute.

The funniest (in a sad way) part of the show was the modern art segment. There is a "piece" that is nothing but a big pile of candy in the corner. The curator said it had something to do with AIDS and the fleeting nature of life.

[Robert A Cook PE]

Remember, these same NY art critics were UNABLE to even criticize "art" as "painted" by an elephant holding a brush in its trunk.

IF A NAKED, UNTRAINED ANIMAL CAN BE CRITICALLY PRAISED FOR CREATING "MODERN ART," THEN NO MODERN ARTIST IS WORTH MORE THAN THAT SAME DUMB ANIMAL.

[retrokitten]

OMG. They actually have it featured on the AIC website.

From 1986 until his death in 1996, Felix Gonzalez-Torres produced a prolific body of work, transforming everyday objects—clocks, light bulbs, candy—into profound meditations on love and loss. This installation is an allegorical portrait of the artist’s partner, Ross Laycock, who died of an AIDS-related illness in 1991. The 175 pounds of candy correspond to an ideal body weight, and viewers are encouraged to take a piece. The diminishing amount of candy symbolically refers to Laycock’s body languishing from disease. The artist has made sure that the art survives, however, by instructing that the candies be continuously replaced. In the simplest of forms, and with the participation of both his audience and the museum staff, Gonzalez-Torres comments on personal pain and the endurance of art, while challenging traditional museum practices and expectations of museum visitors.

[numberonepal]

UNEXPECTED ILLUSTRATIONS OF AYN RAND’S PHILOSOPHY OF AESTHETICS
Good Essay

[Miss Marple]

My daughter graduated from a well-known art college 2 years ago with a degree in fine arts. She is an excellent painter in both oils and watercolors. She is exceptionally good at portraits.

Because her talent was in representational art, she was mocked by many of her classmates and critiqued severely by her professors. She no longer is interested in painting, because the cadre of galleries and former students she sees have convinced her that painting things that people LIKE is not really "art."

I hope she will return to painting at some point. Right now she is applying for a graduate school program in library science.

My favorite work was at a student show was a larger than life oil of a male student's genitalia, as seen when he looked down at it. (Rolling my eyes in disgust.) Now there's something one can market!

I also remember the project my daughter had in "wearable art" where she took an inordinate amount of time to make a costume that looked like a chess piece, using hula hoops and stretchable fabric. Of course, she got a lukewarm comment and a "B", while the star of the clas produced a necklace made of DEAD BABY MICE ENCASED IN RESIN. I am not making this up.

So, I have an axe to grind with the current gallery system and the pierced tongue, green-haired, black-clad no-talent sycophants who scam both the public and the government. I am glad to see this movement starting, and I will also subscribe to the magazine!

[RightWhale]

the proper role of the artist is to express art

There it is, the new mantra. What does it mean. Hmm. Oh, art is devoid of meaning. Meaning is rationality. There are informational applications of art, maps being one example , but if art is to be expressed, then what does art do? Express expression? To mean meaning? Dig out that old recursion theory book, looks like the time has come.

[Eva]

Thanks for posting this. It's good news for the art world and good news for conservatives, as well.