Posted on 10/09/2007 5:48:51 AM PDT by Schnucki
Vandals have broken into the Musée d'Orsay and punched a hole in Claude Monet's "Le Pont d'Argenteuil", in the latest in a series of attacks on artwork in France.
A surveillance camera caught a group of four to five apparently drunk people entering the Paris museum early yesterday morning.
An alarm sounded and the group fled, but not before putting a four-inch tear in the painting, Christine Albanel, the French culture minister, said. No arrests have been made so far.
After attempting to force open other doors, the intruders managed to get in through a back door, "even though it had big bolts," Ms Albanel said. The painting was hanging on the ground floor with other Impressionist masterpieces.
The painting has been left with a horizontal tear that exposes threads of canvas. It was visibly punched in, perhaps with a fist. The minister said the painting can be restored, but said she deplored the damage.
"It's always a heartbreak when an art object that is our memory, our heritage, that we love and that we are proud of, is victim of a purely criminal act," she said.
"We know there were four or five people, likely four boys and a girl, who entered around midnight to am, broke a door that was, perhaps, fragile."
Alarms went off, museum officials arrived and the group fled, the minister said.
"Le Pont d'Argenteuil" shows a view of the Seine at a rural bend, featuring a bridge and boats.
The break-in occurred as Paris held White Night, an annual all-night festival, which draws thousands into the streets for music, exhibitions and revelry.
The festive mood was particularly high on Saturday night after France advanced to the semi-finals of the Rugby World Cup after beating New Zealand.
The attack was the latest in a series of acts of art vandalism.
This week Sam Rindy goes on trial for damaging a work of art after kissing an immaculate white painting by American artist Cy Twombly while wearing glossy red lipstick. The work had been on display in the Museum of Contemporary Art in Avignon.
In September thieves stole plates and chalices from a cathedral in the southern French city of Perpignan.
In August Monet's "Cliffs near Dieppe" was among four paintings stolen from a fine arts museum in Nice.
In February a court upheld a suspended prison term for a vandal who used a hammer early last year to attack Marcel Duchamp's "Fountain" - a urinal - at the Pompidou Centre in Paris.
They were just doing the jobs that the Romans didn't want to do.
I had a professor once who was describing Dadaism. He said pretty much what you did. "It's really just a collection of stuff. Unless you can get somebody to pay for it .... and once somebody pays for it .... ahhhh .... then, it's Art!"
Just freepmail me, we have a special running now, buy one get one free! Deal of a lifetime!
Refreshing finally to see someone debunking the mania for chocolate-box impressionism. Bravo.
Art ping to you.
I don’t think I will ever understand why some people think it’s ok to destroy other people’s property.
LOL! SOOOOO right!!
I mean, look at it. After the Impressionists came the Modernists, Cubists, Chagall and Picasso then every type of paint splatter on a canvas rag was deemed art. From ancient Greece to the late 1800’s art was universally recognizable as, well, ART! Any person, regardless of age or educational level could immediately say of a sculpture or painting that it was in fact art. But then came all this stuff that to a thinking rational person was either a pile of rusty metal or a cleaning rag in a frame and the critics called it art. You may think me a boor and a uneducated lout, but art should try as man’s best attempt to do so, capture in paint or solid form, the beauty of what is God’s creation, and not a reasonable facsimile of a universe through the distorted end of a wine glass................
A match and a can of gasoline WOULD do justice to them.............
I agree with you. I’ve been fortunate to see a fair number of Impressionist paintings in several museums and the way they capture light amazes me. If I could capture light like that in my paintings, I would be happy indeed.
“You may think me a boor or an uneducated lout ...”
The Impressionists paintings I have seen *in person* capture quite well “ ... the beauty of what is God’s creation.” The colors and light change in a subtle way with the angle from which the paintings are viewed, as in “real life.” Perhaps you are confusing Monet with some of the less distinguished Post-Impressionists or, worse, Modernists.
“I’m an illustrator by trade, and the subject matter of most of my paintings is also largely mundane, but I don’t claim that it’s more than what it is.”
I’m an illustrator too, I’ve been working as a professional for 20 years. I feel sorry for you, that you see your work as a “trade”, and “mudane” - sounds to me like it’s not the right career for you, there are plenty of illustrators who would love to take your place and would have a little more respect for their “trade”, and work. In today’s modern world the Illustrator is losing ground every year to digital work, and anyone still working and surviving in the field really should be more grateful that they can - or move aside for those who love it and have a passion for it.
“No. My point is that the painting is greatly over-rated because it’s part of a greatly over-rated movement. If the painting wasn’t Impressionist, but Realist, it would be rightly regarded as mundane.”
This reveals your ignorance, and your utter failure at understanding what impressionism was about - and it’s just as offensive as the “if it’s not abstract it’s not art” bs that you find in art schools these days.
If impressionism followed the tenets and spirit of realism, of course it would fail - it’s a completely different way of looking at the world, a completely different focus, and a completely different technique. You are judging an orange as “bad” because it’s not an apple.
I’m not a particularly big fan of Van Gogh, though I understand and appreciate why he’s revered, for his work and his influence in the world of art. I would be saddened by an attack on his work, even though I’m not much of a fan. The painting of Monet’s that was attacked was not his best, in my opinion, but it’s a major work by a very influential artist, and that alone makes this a bad thing.
Your indifference and snarky comments on the school he started and it’s influence in art speaks volumes about you as an artist.
Your comment about burning art speaks volumes about you as a human being.
Agreed. Monet, Turner - absolutely awesome.
There can be no comparison in talent or intent between those men of genius (and their forebears) and the painful Modernist dweebs of today, who exercise their feeble, dingy and platitudinous vision in urine, dried excrement, dead bodies and fragments torn from pornographic magazines.
“The Modernists are the worst of the bunch,”
And irrelevant to the topic at hand. You obviously have an axe to grind here, so I’m bailing on this as it’s probably a waste of time, as you’re more intent on bludgeoning people with your opinion.
Your attitude is exactly the same as the nitwits who run the galleries and art schools, that if it’s not abstract, it’s crap. It’s repugnant. I don’t particularly like the abstract movement or what followed, but it doesnt give me the right to censor it.
And, in fact, if you educated yourself, you’d know that the post-modern work is dying out, and there’s a rise of realist-themed work showing up. The art world, like most else, evolves, and it too will move on from it’s dalliance in the abstract.
I never had much luck putting it together. Maybe that's one reason I never developed a taste for such stuff.
It is possible for entire school of thought to be entirely without merit. This is as true in art as it is in psychology, philosophy, political theory, or any other field. Take Freudianism and Marxism as examples. Both are simply products of their authors' imaginations, and entirely without merit.
Impressionism as a theory is largely without merit, although some of its products are pleasant enough, such as this painting by Monet. But I will laugh at you if you try to portray Monet's haystack paintings as profound works of art. Reality and art school/theory have little in common these days. One of the many reasons why I skipped art school was that I couldn't bear the idea of anyone telling me that modern art has any merit, and then downgrading me for believing anything otherwise. At least I can express my opinion freely in this forum.
When I was a summer camp counselor, my campers called arts and crafts period "farts and craps." I had to laugh, because they were right. Looking back, I hope they held onto their God-given common sense.
One of my recurring fantasies is going into a modern art "installation," attacking it with a sledgehammer, and calling my act "performance art." How could I be wrong?
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