So all one needs to do is look and behave in a manner that makes one seem autistic and be able to bullshit people with a straight face.
Abstract art is right up there with religion in the 'too many people don't dare to admit that it's silly bacause of peer pressure'.
We laugh at koreans fake crying for the great leader but this is just as asinine.
Some shit I saw in a thread yesterday... I honestly had no idea how to respond without sounding like a viking. Fortunately another gaffer responded with "fancy gaf" and now I'm in their debt.
I almost feel sorry for people that can't appreciate abstract art.
Its like they lack a basic understanding of form, color and proportion. Their only criteria for judging a pice of art seems to be how close it matches reality or technically difficult it was to make.
I almost feel sorry for people that can't appreciate abstract art.
Its like they lack a basic understanding of form, color and proportion. Their only criteria for judging a pice of art seems to be how close it matches reality or technically difficult it was to make.
I still don't understand how most art gets valued. Who is setting these outrageous prices? Unless it has some major historical significance relevant to more than just the art community, how can they be valued at more than 5 or 6 figures?
I still don't understand how most art gets valued. Who is setting these outrageous prices? Unless it has some major historical significance relevant to more than just the art community, how can they be valued at more than 5 or 6 figures?
Yes but the guy did not set out to create a 30 million dollar painting. Somebody else decided thats what someone else is willing to pay. Why does nobody seem to understand this!?
Some nerd will pay $60,000 (or was it 30) for a golden NES cart that I could deem totally worthless. That does not make it so.
Ofcourse the mona lisa is worth £750 million, its irreplaceable, One of kind,world famous and the creator is LONG since dead.
Just such an ignorant way of thinking along the same lines of LOL video games are for kids mentality People dont know any better so its easier to lash out in ignorance.
semi related but My gf did a fine art degree and was told to never sell her work for under £500 as you under value yourself. Her tutor is some well known sculputer dude thats sold bronze stuff for upwards of £30,000..
Yes but the guy did not set out to create a 30 million dollar painting. Somebody else decided thats what someone else is willing to pay. Why does nobody seem to understand this!?
Some nerd will pay $60,000 (or was it 30) for a golden NES cart that I could deem totally worthless. That does not make it so.
Ofcourse the mona lisa is worth £750 million, its irreplaceable, One of kind,world famous and the creator is LONG since dead.
Just such an ignorant way of thinking along the same lines of LOL video games are for kids mentality People dont know any better so its easier to lash out in ignorance.
semi related but My gf did a fine art degree and was told to never sell her work for under £500 as you under value yourself. Her tutor is some well known sculputer dude thats sold bronze stuff for upwards of £30,000..
Well, kind of. I wouldn't pay a cent over $50 to put it in my house unless I could resell it for mountains of cash. And I'd trade it for a stamp-sized thumbnail sketch by Leonardo in a heartbeat.
The modern definition of art has become so vague and meaningless that everything can be called art. Put something, anything on a pedestal and it becomes an object of interest, a statement, a provocation, the start of a discussion. If it looks badly made, the work of an amateur, it can be called honest and simple. If it looks banal or silly, it's an ironic statement on whatever is wrong with society. Criticism can be easily defended ("you simply don't get it, you idiot").
Art has become meaningless so why shouldn't a video game be called art. Or why shouldn't all videogames be deemed art when that word has lost all vestiges of its original importance in the post-modern age?
Actually, this is what the painter was trying to convey. That layers of color were torn away, revealing other colors beneath. You just accidentally "got it."
Well, considering it was in the NY Museum of Modern Art, I doubt it. And why should it be forgotten? As I relayed the story, it had a HUGE impact on the art world.
Haha, your dad's friends are the reason something like this is worth $30m. Please tell me you can remember the painting. Imagining that scene is hilarious. People fleeing the room because a painting was so intense. I'm laughing here.
I can't remember what it was, no. Like I said, it didn't make a huge impression on me. The trouble with art these days is so much has already been done, but there was a time when a thing as simple as perspective was mind-blowing. We're all pretty jaded.
to those who defend this piece as art, what exactly do you like about it? at least, what message or feeling does it convey to you?
i don't see any evident technical merit whatsoever, but for those who do, what separates this painting from something i could do with my eyes closed? (and don't say "this guy did it first")
Why don't you see any technical merit to it? Could you really do it with your eyes closed? Painting is hard, actually. It's a really unforgiving medium. You don't "erase" paint.
Do I like this piece? Not particularly, although there are a few of his works I find interesting. I'm sure they are much more impressive in life, not in Google Images.
I've seen a dude bent over stretching his gaping asshole. If making people uneasy to the point of having to leave the room is what makes art worth $30 million then I'm going to submit goatse to the Louvre
I don't give a shit how edgy a particular work of art was back in its day; such is not what art is about, in the long-term. A Doll's House was an edgy work in its time, but it's STILL a great play to this day. The painting in the OP, and most of AbEx more generally, is bad in a rather apparent way.
Edit: And this is about AbEx specifically, not abstract art more generally. Abstract art is fine, if the artist makes a good and interesting work. The "WELL IF IT'S SO EASY WHY DON'T YOU GO AND DO IT" crowd annoy me; the entire point of people speaking out against these types of works is that they're mediocrities that became popular due to dart-tossing and guesswork, not on the basis of any particular skill on the part of the artist. A person might find fame doing such, but the VAST majority will languish in obscurity, despite their works being qualitatively on par with the so-called "greats." I respect that certain AbEx works - say, Kandinsky - required technical skill to create, but there's nothing in them to keep a viewer coming back. If your work has basically infinite multiplicity, then it's basically meaningless, as well.
Double Edit: Comparing AbEx to the Rite of Spring is dumb. The Rite of Spring is rightly recognized as a great composition today, whereas 50 years later, AbEx is still a widely-ridiculed art form. And it's not because people are a bunch of unwashed philistines; it's because, in this case, the emperor really IS butt-naked.
Triple Edit: And the story itself has little to comment on; I appreciate the symbolism of the act, but barring legitimate political protest, you should never vandalize somebody else's property.
[I had a comment in here about films, but I doubt I could "win" any points from you in that regard.]
You're bagging on Kandinsky, really? And where is Abstract Expressionism widely ridiculed? And why do people keep thinking she did this as some kind of protest? She sounds like a sloppy drunk to me.
The reason abstract art became so valued is pretty much solely because art dealers convinced art critics, who were looking for ways to seem ground breaking, of the merits of the art so that they could sell the paintings at higher prices. That's the long and short of the history of the valuation of art.
I don't like Appel (heh), but why isn't he a real artist? Because his work isn't photorealistic? I doubt there's many artists, even abstract, who can't draw realistically.
I almost feel sorry for people that can't appreciate abstract art.
Its like they lack a basic understanding of form, color and proportion. Their only criteria for judging a pice of art seems to be how close it matches reality or technically difficult it was to make.
How about this argument? Why aren't all you "art critics" great and famous photographers? You all have cameras, I'm sure. All you are doing is pointing a camera and pushing your finger. Why don't we see your pictures in museums? Why aren't you charging thousands of dollars for prints?
adamsappel, MY entire point is that art isn't easy and that it devalues it when you can just slap paint on a canvas in any old pattern and have it called great. The whole point is that not just anybody CAN pick up a paint brush or a camera and be great at it, but the vast majority of AbEx takes no vision and minimal skill to create. I bag on Kandinsky because he was a skilled painter who wasted his time painting works that require relatively thought or inspiration to create. As for where AbEx is widely ridiculed? Look in this thread, or speak to the majority of people who walk through an AbEX exhibit. I said in my post exactly what I meant: that people generally have a dismissive response to AbEx and that this is one of those cases where such really is because the emperor is naked, and jerking it. All art exists in a conversation, but greatness is also hermetic and self-contained; if you require tedious and long-winded explanations about the history of art or the artist's intent to justify why a work is good, then there's a 99.9% chance that it's bad. It may have historical import - a different thing altogether from quality - but it's probably not good.
Edit: And as I say, I appreciate abstraction in art just fine. Indeed, ALL art is abstracted from reality. It's the idea of so-called "non-representational" art - which is almost always the random placement of blotches or shapes, covered up under a lot of highfalutin justifications that ultimately never address the initial complaints. One can like AbEx all one wants - in fact, contrary to what you might think, I DO like AbEx! - but art is not good nor great "just because."
That picture of the museum room which the painting is displayed shows to me that abstract paintings make better room decorations than stand alone pieces.
That picture of the museum room which the painting is displayed shows to me that abstract paintings make better room decorations than stand alone pieces.
Pretty much, and this is why I actually do like them! They can be totally fun to look at. I only think that they're bad art, not that they have no place in the world.
Edit: And again, I'm differentiating between abstraction itself and AbEx. Picasso's painting had plenty of abstraction, but there's quite a bit else going on, as well.
I tried to have respect for abstract art until I started to study it in college and then realized that my initial reaction to it was correct - it's all an inside joke. What once was a purpose to ridicule oneself to show the irony of how dumb art culture has become in the early 20th century came round circle and now nobody really know who's clowning around or not and nobody really cares.
They couldn't top the idea of open-air impressionism, so they decided to tear it down. Well, it's torn down and now what? Now you got post-modernists still doing their thing while nobody pays attention anymore. Same things happening to music right now. Ok, you broke music down to literally a repeating four count and one guy talking for 5 minutes...now what? I dunno, change the "thud" sound to a "wub" sound? Ok. Whatever. Let's see how long that moment of genius lasts in music culture. What would history think of this? What could music historians possibly think of it...unless you're in on some joke or think you're in on some joke twenty years from now.
And that painting btw, is more aesthetically pleasing than most abstract pieces of art. AND it's done pretty well with finely crafted lines and stuff. 30 million? No, but some care was actually put into it, so it's above 90% of what you'd see in the category.
The modern definition of art has become so vague and meaningless that everything can be called art. Put something, anything on a pedestal and it becomes an object of interest, a statement, a provocation, the start of a discussion. If it looks badly made, the work of an amateur, it can be called honest and simple. If it looks banal or silly, it's an ironic statement on whatever is wrong with society. Criticism can be easily defended ("you simply don't get it, you idiot").
Art has become meaningless so why shouldn't a video game be called art. Or why shouldn't all videogames be deemed art when that word has lost all vestiges of its original importance in the post-modern age?
Dadaism won.
But I take a different stance. I refuse to call completely commercial products like 99% of games out there as art as some kind of hope that one day the word "art" will not be referred to everything on this planet. I know it's futile, but I try.
^ Many forms of music these days are the new dadaism. Composition? Mastery of instruments? Musical talent? Poetic lyrics? Reject it. reject it. reject it. If you can't beat the "early masters" then you just don't play their game. Break it down to the simplest of levels and then call it art. ANd just like the fine arts, they broke it down, then broke it down, then broke it down and before you know it, you have a canvas with nothing on it or a toilet in your gallery...or in musical sense, you got 4 thuds and, if you're lucky, somebody talking about how great they are at rapping while they're rapping or a song that's 5 minutes long with 10 seconds of music repeated over and over and over again. It's not a 1 to 1 comparison because it's not about elitism, it's the opposite, but it does have it's similarities.
Also Edit: Lady Gaga and Frank Zappa are probably more apt as the new abstract art cause they're aware of what they're doing. I wouldn't give that credit to a lot of musicians of other genres out there...not yet at least. Give it time, i guess.
Someone should sell that painting for 30 mil then use that money to buy an entire town and paint it all fucked up colours. Imagine how much that would sell for.
Dadaism won.
But I take a different stance. I refuse to call completely commercial products like 99% of games out there as art as some kind of hope that one day the word "art" will not be referred to everything on this planet. I know it's futile, but I try.
^ Many forms of music these days are the new dadaism. Composition? Mastery of instruments? Musical talent? Poetic lyrics? Reject it. reject it. reject it. If you can't beat the "early masters" then you just don't play their game. Break it down to the simplest of levels and then call it art. ANd just like the fine arts, they broke it down, then broke it down, then broke it down and before you know it, you have a canvas with nothing on it or a toilet in your gallery...or in musical sense, you got 4 thuds and, if you're lucky, somebody talking about how great they are at rapping while they're rapping or a song that's 5 minutes long with 10 seconds of music repeated over and over and over again. It's not a 1 to 1 comparison because it's not about elitism, it's the opposite, but it does have it's similarities.
Also Edit: Lady Gaga and Frank Zappa are probably more apt as the new abstract art cause they're aware of what they're doing. I wouldn't give that credit to a lot of musicians of other genres out there...not yet at least. Give it time, i guess.
C'mon son Duchamp is a genius and you don't like punk rock? If gaffers want to get even more annoyed and have their minds eroded or blown they should check out conceptual art