[Flipside]

My main problem with art is semi-plagiarism that seems to be knocking about these days. Warhol used the Campbells tin in something fresh and original at the time, but people are still knocking out variations on the same theme, taking something that was created by someone else and then placing it in their own work, often without as much originality as the original Warhol piece, and that original piece was created 50 years ago.

Art is sort of in a rut at the moment, people are looking further and further for something to give a 'message' and forgetting that Art is sometimes just about creating something that looks nice. Hence, we get lots of artists who use Sinks, Urinals and bags of rubbish to produce art, when we need more artists who can use the contents of a rubbish bag to create imagery, but wouldn't just sit the bag on the floor and say 'This is Art'. We need more Tony Harts and Rolf Harris's.

[aldo_14]

My main problem with art is semi-plagiarism that seems to be knocking about these days. Warhol used the Campbells tin in something fresh and original at the time, but people are still knocking out variations on the same theme, taking something that was created by someone else and then placing it in their own work, often without as much originality as the original Warhol piece, and that original piece was created 50 years ago.

Art is sort of in a rut at the moment, people are looking further and further for something to give a 'message' and forgetting that Art is sometimes just about creating something that looks nice. Hence, we get lots of artists who use Sinks, Urinals and bags of rubbish to produce art, when we need more artists who can use the contents of a rubbish bag to create imagery, but wouldn't just sit the bag on the floor and say 'This is Art'. We need more Tony Harts and Rolf Harris's.

no, we need more Morph.

[Ford Prefect]

If people are trying ot say something, than they should say it in a way that everyone can understand..
I understand hte concept of art, but if you're making things that only you and a select few nutjobs on the planet can understand or appreciate, then you're better of doing nothing.

It doesn't work that way. You can't fully appreciate Debussy unless you learn about classical mythology. You can't understand Moby Dick unless you understand the transcendentalists. All art comes from other art, and it demands that you be willing to learn enough to understand the context. Artists go where their own thoughts and feelings take them. If other people want to appreciate their work, they have to shed their notions of obscurity and open their minds to the possibility that just because something is not widely known doesn't make anyone a "nutjob".

[Goober5000]

It was not an attack on Catholicism. Chris Ofili is of Nigerian descent and spent a lot of time studying traditional art in Zimbabwe, and he frequently uses the same material that he employed for that piece in many of his other works. He was sincerely creating a work intended to express reverence for the Virgin Mary through the use of techniques that he found appealing, and had studied at great length. Obscurity is no excuse for laziness; nobody dismisses James Joyce because you need an encyclopedia to read Finnegan's Wake. If you just make a cursory examination of a work of art, whether it's literature, film, visual art or anything, and then decide that you're offended, all you've done is to put words in the artist's mouth. Art is the external manifestation of people's largest, most complex thoughts, and there is no way on Earth that you're going to hear what they're really trying to say if you don't do them the courtesy of actually studying their work. With real art, that usually requires learning a thing or two beyond the piece itself. If you've done that, you can feel however you want about it.

There is a huge difference between complexity and offensiveness.  A cursory examination of James Joyce may be confusing, but it's not offensive.  A casual listening to Debussy may be superficial, but it's not shrill.  But a mere glance at the painting by any American, particularly those who are Catholic (his target audience, don't forget) causes a deep-seated reaction of revulsion.  It is the artist's job to communicate something in his art, so how effective do you think he was if his art produced the exact opposite reaction?

Whether you art in depth or simply accept it at face value is your choice, but you can appreciate that something is well done even if you don't care to examine it closely.  Likewise you can see that something is offensive whether you examine it closely or not.

[aldo_14]

There is a huge difference between complexity and offensiveness.  A cursory examination of James Joyce may be confusing, but it's not offensive.  A casual listening to Debussy may be superficial, but it's not shrill.  But a mere glance at the painting by any American, particularly those who are Catholic (his target audience, don't forget) causes a deep-seated reaction of revulsion.  It is the artist's job to communicate something in his art, so how effective do you think he was if his art produced the exact opposite reaction?

Whether you art in depth or simply accept it at face value is your choice, but you can appreciate that something is well done even if you don't care to examine it closely.  Likewise you can see that something is offensive whether you examine it closely or not.

Isn't the fact that it's a 'mere glance' the core of the problem?  That people aren't trying to understand or analyze it in any way beyond the way that's easiest for them - the way that requires least thought?  Because if the art is based upon traditional african techniques, isn't that revulsion not at the art but at an entire foreign culture?

[Cyker]

You have a point, but then again you can't expect EVERYONE to perform deep analysis  on EVERYTHING they come across.

Life's too short...

If we were all Hippies, we wouldn't have these problems. Go Chemical Nirvana, yeah!

(Analysis: This Is A Joke. You Tard. )

[Ford Prefect]

Isn't the fact that it's a 'mere glance' the core of the problem?  That people aren't trying to understand or analyze it in any way beyond the way that's easiest for them - the way that requires least thought?  Because if the art is based upon traditional african techniques, isn't that revulsion not at the art but at an entire foreign culture?

Precisely. The outrage over Chris Ofili's piece is a perfect showcase of why superficial examination of art is so meaningless. When you fail to give something its due attention, you don't just get less out of it than you could-- you very often get an entirely wrong idea about it. In this case, the wrong idea was, as aldo says, a dismissal of an entire culture based on discursively produced ideas of obscenity.

[kode]

My main problem with art is semi-plagiarism that seems to be knocking about these days. Warhol used the Campbells tin in something fresh and original at the time, but people are still knocking out variations on the same theme, taking something that was created by someone else and then placing it in their own work, often without as much originality as the original Warhol piece, and that original piece was created 50 years ago.

Art is sort of in a rut at the moment, people are looking further and further for something to give a 'message' and forgetting that Art is sometimes just about creating something that looks nice. Hence, we get lots of artists who use Sinks, Urinals and bags of rubbish to produce art, when we need more artists who can use the contents of a rubbish bag to create imagery, but wouldn't just sit the bag on the floor and say 'This is Art'. We need more Tony Harts and Rolf Harris's.

actually, I kinda like mashups.

[vyper]

actually, I kinda like mashups.

* vyper beats kode with a turnip

[Ford Prefect]

Ah, I see vyper is an enthusiast of Dadaist performance art.

[Janos]

Ah, I see vyper is an enthusiast of Dadaist performance art.

You don't write dadaistic poems.

You draw them.

With feet.

[Ford Prefect]

What do poems have to do with it? He obviously hit someone with a turnip to express revulsion with the absurdity of human constructs.

[Janos]

My main problem with art is semi-plagiarism that seems to be knocking about these days. Warhol used the Campbells tin in something fresh and original at the time, but people are still knocking out variations on the same theme, taking something that was created by someone else and then placing it in their own work, often without as much originality as the original Warhol piece, and that original piece was created 50 years ago.

But you sure as hell can enjoy them?

Art is sort of in a rut at the moment, people are looking further and further for something to give a 'message' and forgetting that Art is sometimes just about creating something that looks nice. Hence, we get lots of artists who use Sinks, Urinals and bags of rubbish to produce art, when we need more artists who can use the contents of a rubbish bag to create imagery, but wouldn't just sit the bag on the floor and say 'This is Art'. We need more Tony Harts and Rolf Harris's.

Sometimes it is and sometimes it isn't. If you react to something then it works. Crude, nice, offensive, serene, relaxing, aggressive - what's really the difference?
I can paint nice paintings of blue ducks on a green summer pasture but that doesn't mean they're worth anything more than a paper they're painted on.

[Flipside]

Thing is, Art isn't only about something that promotes discussion, that's the whole point. Constable or DaVinci's most famous peices were not politcally minded, they were studies in the technique of art, of how to get something looking as realistic as possible etc. Photography killed that skill to a certain degree.

I'm fine with art that promotes discussion in it's own way, but if you push something too far down the 'something to promote debate' road, then how is that any better than pushing it too far down the 'Something nice to look at' road?

The fact is, I don't enjoy modern art any more, it's boring, overdone and, for something that is 'modern', getting somewhat long in the tooth. Unmade beds, a piece of blue canvas, a screwed up ball of paper. Minimalism gone mad really.

[Ford Prefect]

Thing is, Art isn't only about something that promotes discussion, that's the whole point. Constable or DaVinci's most famous peices were not politcally minded, they were studies in the technique of art, of how to get something looking as realistic as possible etc. Photography killed that skill to a certain degree.

I'm fine with art that promotes discussion in it's own way, but if you push something too far down the 'something to promote debate' road, then how is that any better than pushing it too far down the 'Something nice to look at' road?

The fact is, I don't enjoy modern art any more, it's boring, overdone and, for something that is 'modern', getting somewhat long in the tooth. Unmade beds, a piece of blue canvas, a screwed up ball of paper. Minimalism gone mad really.

It's not just about politics and promotion. It's about ideas in general, about making people think, whether the question is ontological, ethical, emotional, logical, humorous, reverent, or anything at all under the sun. There is always a seed idea, (or several), that sparks a creation, and very often the artist isn't even fully aware of what ideas he or she is incorporating into a work. A work of art with no ideas in it is called a Thomas Kincaid painting.

As for modern art, I don't know that much about the visual arts, but I do know that the most recent trend in poetry has been back towards formalistic verse. (Although free verse poetry hardly corresponds to a bag of trash on the floor.)

[NGTM-1R]

and very often the artist isn't even fully aware of what ideas he or she is incorporating into a work.

To quote Sean Connery in "Finding Forrester": "I just wrote a story. And then all these damn idiots came up with all this bull**** about 'what I was really trying to say.' "