But Father is right about the lack of objectivity. So much of it is deconstruction of form, even of color. How can truth shine through when one does not show things as they are, much less how they ought to be? I find a lot of truth in Turner, just as find truth in some of the realist literature, because they are really protests against degredation, not celebrations of it.
I am not defending modern art at the expense of realism; what I would like ot point out is that "things as they are" is not a straightforward concept. Turner, for example, painted light and air; I am sure his contemporaries objected to that fact that there are no discernible human figures or architectural detail in his painting. It is not unlike that in Picasso's Guernica, above: there is a picture of violence and suffering that would not be as effective with greater anatomical realism.
The Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons
J. M. W. Turner
1835
Oil on canvas
Philadelphia Museum of Art