"Truthfully, art is not so subjective, except for "modern art," which is not what Kincaid does. Realism is very much a craft which has actual standards."
Depends on what era you are talking about - early art, before the Renaissance, were clumsy and lacked a little thing called "perspective", and their techniques and rendering were crude compared to later work - but compare to earlier eras, could be considered realistic. Is their "worth" less, because they don't hold to a "standard", which can and does change era to era?
The incredible draftmanship of the romantic period (Waterhouse, Tedema) is superior to anything I've ever seen, so does anything less have less merit?
You tread a slippery slope. What "standards" are you applying, and who decided them?
Granted, I'm not much of a fan of modern art myself, but your concept of art is hard to apply, over time. Art is ALWAYS subjective, because it's audience evolves and changes.
"IMO Kincaid has ability as a craftsman, but my feeling is that his stuff is not straightforward or honest. This seems to be born out by various news stories and anecdotes about him. "
I challenge his ability as a draftsman, I find little talent at all in his work. And yes, i am an artist who works in oil and acrylic, in the style of realism. His perspective is sloppy at best, his composition stilted and cliched, his sense of depth almost neligible, and his colors are a riot and unbalanced and annoying to the eye. He takes advantage of the fact that the eye cannot focus on that many bright colors at once, and it gets a "sparkle" effect that he calls "painting with light". His use of light, however, is the worst of the lot - it's overdone, has no semblence to realism, is badly done, and is overused to draw away from the utter lack of talent in all other areas.
His work, in my opinion, is not honest, in that we agree - he seeks to dazzle the eye away from his lack elsewhere.
"The word subjective does apply to taste, on the part of both the craftsman and the viewer."
Nonsense. Taste has everthing to do with the audiences subjectivity. How can you say that someone's point of view has nothing to do with their taste? If you were correct, Maplethorpe's "Piss Christ" would be held to worldwide acclaim, because no-one would bring their Christianity to the table when viewing it. I've never met anyone who could be completely objective when ciewing art - in fact, I would find that viewing art completely and utterly objectively to be a barren and sterile experience - it's our lives, and our viewpoint that makes us relate to a work of art.
Thats' why much of the nuance and meaning of Japanese art is lost on Westerners, because we do not have the upbringing and point of view as a Japanese to truly appreciate it.
That's also why i cannot truly appreciate much modern art - I cannot relate to it, as I don't immerse myself nor have I lived in the culture it speaks to. I have my opinion of it, and it's entirely subjective from my life as an artist and admirer of other schools of art, and a different background of politics, sexuality and ethics.
I don't like modern art. Some of it actually inspires hatred in me, for it's mocking of traditional values and the abandonment of the more dedicated side of art that values technique and study and knowledge. But I can't claim it's not art, simply because i don't like it.
And as an artist, I cannot be objective when I lift a pencil or paintbrush. Everytime I draw a line or paint a stroke, my entire life and background and training and point of view is expressed. To be disconnected from that is simply not possible - to say otherwise says to me you are not an artist, and don't understand the artistic process. It's not a criticism, but I dare say you should not say things like that if you have not toiled as an artist, and understand what happens everytime we pick up our tools and apply ourselves to the piece before us.
Well, I may be at a disadvantage in arguing with an artist of long experience, but I'll give it a try.
"Is their "worth" less (pre Renaissance), because they don't hold to a "standard", which can and does change era to era?"
If you are referring to early Christian and Byzantine art, no, I think it is not worth less. I appreciate much of it and find it beautiful...but I am quite sure they had their own standards, different from other eras, but still standards. Yes, I would think standards have to change from era to era, school to school.
I also really like Australian Aborigine art, but assume that there are standards for it as well. For instance, the cross hatching and fine lines found in some of it take considerable skill. Very considerable.
"The incredible draftmanship of the romantic period (Waterhouse, Tedema) is superior to anything I've ever seen, so does anything less have less merit?"
I love 19th century art, and sometimes think that skills like draftsmanship reached a peak during that century. I'd have a hard time saying that everything else has less merit though, since that would exclude a lot of the old masters. However, the old masters were surely masters at draftsmanship too.
"You tread a slippery slope. What "standards" are you applying, and who decided them?"
Well you are right, although I am acquainted at some level with art, I would not put myself forward as an expert in a room with real experts. I was offering my opinion based on my experience, which while less than that of many, is real enough. However, regarding standards, I mentioned the technical standards that I am aware of, draftsmanship, handling of values, color, edges, composition. While I am not really talking about something as strict and arbitrarily decided as the rules set by the Academy of Beaux Arts or whatever, I still suppose there are people, such as yourself probably, who are able to judge competency in them.
"Art is ALWAYS subjective, because it's audience evolves and changes"
I admit that only to a partial degree, how else to judge great art from bad art? Or is there no bad art? This is one problem I have with modern abstract art...how do you tell if it's any good, since you can't judge the draftsmanship, for instance? Composition and use of color? I guess so.
"I challenge his ability as a draftsman..."
Well, here you are applying actual standards to him, far as I can see. But I appreciate your analysis, you articulated some things I couldn't put my finger on.
"Taste has everthing to do with the audiences subjectivity."
That's what I was trying to say when I wrote that taste does apply to subjectivity. Awkward sentence on my part, probably.
Yes, I understand that art, at least "art with a capital A, (being sardonic)" goes beyond the objective and the technical, or at least it hopes to. I think most who practice it hope to communicate something from inside themselves, something more than a just a plain copy of something else.
"Thats' why much of the nuance and meaning of Japanese art is lost on Westerners..."
Here I can't comment, being, as you say, ignorant of the whole thing. But I have read how the people in certain isolated primitive societies could not understand what a photograph was, not having lived where anything like that existed, which would be a parallel perhaps.
As for modern art, I don't have an intrinsic dislike for it, and there is much of it that appeals to me, for whatever reason. However, I find myself without tools to figure out "how good" it is, which makes it entirely subjective, which I stated somewhere in this thread, forgot where already.
"And as an artist, I cannot be objective when I lift a pencil or paintbrush. Everytime I draw a line or paint a stroke, my entire life and background and training and point of view is expressed. To be disconnected from that is simply not possible - to say otherwise says to me you are not an artist, and don't understand the artistic process."
That is well said IMO. But I qualify that by asserting that an artist must possess skills that can be analyzed objectively (for instance, draftsmanship) to express what is subjective.
"to say otherwise says to me you are not an artist, and don't understand the artistic process."
Hey, I don't really have a reply to that one. I hope it isn't true, but I'm not going to argue it.
As for myself, I've always liked to draw, which is fairly common, and hoped I had some ability...majored in art, specialty painting, in college many years ago...but went other directions most of my life, which has been a good one, thankfully. Now, later in life in my fifties, have gotten back to art these last four or five years, have worked very hard at it, found it to be both a struggle and a joy.
