# Art confessions--"I don't see what's so great about..." **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 30, 2007, 10:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026 "2007-06-30T10:00:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/21 "2007-06-30T15:36:26Z")
[QUOTE=Freezair SilverEye] Same teach who got me to love _Venice,_ incidentally. How _was_ the recently-released (well, relatively recently) movie version of that? Any good? [/QUOTE] Yep, very good. Pacino was, surprisingly to me, excellently scene chewy, and the script wasn’t mangled too much. ---
**Author:** ![Anastasaeon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/73ab20/32.png) [@Anastasaeon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anastasaeon)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/22 "2007-06-30T15:47:48Z")
[QUOTE=WhyNot] Thanks! I will keep the floodgates of my mind open and make it a point to see it (them) in person before I render final judgment. I did suspect it might be something like that. [/quote] Nothing really to add here, because art is so very subjective. Just anecdotally, I never really paid much attention to _Starry Night_ - I could take it or leave it. But in my high school art classroom, a friend of mine took it upon herself to paint that very picture on the back wall. It was _huge_, and I would stop in during lunch to watch her paint. She had such a great eye - all she needed was a small picture and she could duplicate it exactly; anything, anywhere, anytime. I don’t think I had realised how many colours, how many brush strokes, how much was _really_ going on in that painting until I watched her putting it up with great care on that back wall. When it was finished, it was larger than life, and the most amazing thing I had ever seen done with my own eyes. Now, it’s my favourite painting. But it wasn’t Van Gogh who made me love it. Thanks, Shawna! 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![Ephemera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8baadc/32.png) [@Ephemera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ephemera)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/23 "2007-06-30T15:56:20Z")
[QUOTE=WhyNot] Yep, very good. Pacino was, surprisingly to me, excellently scene chewy, and the script wasn’t mangled too much. [/QUOTE] Surprisingly? Are you unfamiliar with Pacino or just don’t care for him? He pretty much epitomizes scene-chewiness. If it’s the former, it seems we don’t agree on a lot outside Joss. \*Starry Night’\*s my most favorite painting (though I’ve never seen it in person and doubt I ever will) and Pacino’s one of my favorite actors as well. ---
**Author:** ![DaphneBlack](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/daphneblack/32/5389_2.png) [@DaphneBlack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DaphneBlack)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/24 "2007-06-30T15:58:52Z")
For me, it’s most of Monet. Some of his earlier works are pretty good (I like the ‘Gare St Lazare’) but I could not care less about the frickin’ water lilies. Ah well. For poetry, I personally really like metrical poetry, sonnets etc, but free verse does absolutely nothing for me. The whole point of poetry, to me, is to do something prose can’t do, to impose a _different_ structure, not just divide up the lines differently. I also find ‘modernist’ novels other than Joyce to be very difficult to make it through. Joyce is work, but rewarding work. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/25 "2007-06-30T16:18:46Z")
[QUOTE=Aesiron] Surprisingly? Are you unfamiliar with Pacino or just don’t care for him? He pretty much epitomizes scene-chewiness. If it’s the former, it seems we don’t agree on a lot outside Joss. \*Starry Night’\*s my most favorite painting (though I’ve never seen it in person and doubt I ever will) and Pacino’s one of my favorite actors as well. [/QUOTE] I meant surprisingly in context. I appreciate Pacino, but I didn’t think his scene chewiness was going to work in that role, or in the Shakespearian tongue. I thought it was going to be groaningly over the top. Worked fine, though. ---
**Author:** ![Rigamarole](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/77aa72/32.png) [@Rigamarole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rigamarole)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/26 "2007-06-30T16:43:57Z")
[QUOTE=Aholibah] My philistine confession – the Mona Lisa has always left me unimpressed – an ugly painting of an unattractive person. [/QUOTE] I came in here to say the same thing. Really, WTF? It’s a very plain portrait, and there are millions of others like it. **What’s the big deal already**? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Stafford\_Cripps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_stafford_cripps/32/7167_2.png) [@The\_Stafford\_Cripps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Stafford_Cripps)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/27 "2007-06-30T16:52:05Z")
I’ve seen a few Manet originals and I can’t see what’s great about him. To me they just don’t look very good. And although I completely distance myself from the people who moan about the cost, I just don’t get the Scottish Parliament building. ---
**Author:** ![Ephemera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8baadc/32.png) [@Ephemera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ephemera)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/28 "2007-06-30T16:59:48Z")
[QUOTE=WhyNot] I meant surprisingly in context. I appreciate Pacino, but I didn’t think his scene chewiness was going to work in that role, or in the Shakespearian tongue. I thought it was going to be groaningly over the top. Worked fine, though. [/QUOTE] Ah. I’m not familiar with \*The Merchant of Venice \*but assumed he would be perfect for a Shakespearean adaptation considering his acting style, myself. ---
**Author:** ![Ogre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ecb155/32.png) [@Ogre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ogre)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/29 "2007-06-30T17:07:00Z")
[QUOTE=WhyNot] Yeah, most of poetry is lost on me, as well, I’m afraid. I love words, and I love reading them and the “poetry” of a good line of prose leaves me smiling, but indent both sides and make the lines end at random places and I’m bored now. I don’t see what’s so great about [Starry Night](http://www.scu.k12.ca.us/pomeroy/3rd/starry-night.jpg), by VanGogh. Now, this may be because I’ve never seen the real thing and there’s some awesome magic in the painting itself. I hope so. Because that reproduction makes me think of some of my son’s grade school art projects. It’s nice and all, and if my kid \*had \*done it, it would totally get framed and hung on my wall, but I don’t understand the enduring greatness or mass appeal of it. [/QUOTE] The appeal of it to me is that a lot of people see this beautiful, vibrant, surreal landscape. One online [resource](http://blogs.princeton.edu/writingart4/archives/2005/01/starry_night.html) says: > [@](#): > > Bringing these thoughts to light in Starry Night, Vincent tries to portray both hemispheres as best he can, picturing not a sky that we can see at night, but one that is visible only through the eyes of an artist. We see here that even in his darkest, loneliest hour, Vincent’s mind was at its best, abandoning realism to create one of his most vibrant scenes. I think this completely misses the point. Van Gogh was not just lonely at this point. He was _fucked up_. What I see in _Starry Night_ is pure, unadulterated paranoia and existential terror. I see a small village huddled in dread under a swirling, chaotic sky. The huge stars and moon exert their mysterious, alien dominance over the terrified village. The stark, black tree in the foreground just heightens the effect. It brings the fear and uncertainty out of the sky, and down to earth. It’s a connection between the remote, existential intimidation the artist feels from the sky and the more mundane dangers here on earth. The tree crowds, almost pinches, the village between itself and the stark hills and the forest to the right of the frame. It’s a very uncomfortable, paranoid painting. That’s why I like it. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Find\_Friends](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c37758/32.png) [@Find\_Friends](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Find_Friends)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/30 "2007-06-30T17:09:10Z")
[QUOTE=An Arky] Pink Floyd. There’s a handful of their songs that are OK, but mostly it’s plodding shite, IMHO. I reckon I’ll have to duck and run for uttering that blasphemy, but there you are. [/QUOTE] Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU! * * * True Blue Jack ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/31 "2007-06-30T17:09:28Z")
I can’t stand Kurt Vonnegut. He’s a smug, didactic bore who isn’t half as clever as he seemed to think he was. “So it goes?” Oh, just shut up already. > [@WhyNot](#): > > I meant surprisingly in context. I appreciate Pacino, but I didn’t think his scene chewiness was going to work in that role, or in the Shakespearian tongue. I thought it was going to be groaningly over the top. Worked fine, though. Have you ever seen _Looking for Richard_? It’s a documentary where Al Pacino goes around talking to other actors about _Richard III_, basically workshopping the play, and staging certain key scenes to illustrate what they’ve just been talking about. Great stuff. ---
**Author:** ![Find\_Friends](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c37758/32.png) [@Find\_Friends](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Find_Friends)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/32 "2007-06-30T17:23:00Z")
[QUOTE=Freezair SilverEye] I’ve always suspected that Pink Floyd retains its popularity not so much for the music itself but for the nostalgia and the feelings the people who listen/listened to Pink Floyd associate it with. [/QUOTE] Yes. And why **wouldn’t** folks have good feelings for past times lived through a constant drug-induced high? 😉 * * * True Blue Jack ---
**Author:** ![kung\_fu\_lola](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f4b2a3/32.png) [@kung\_fu\_lola](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kung_fu_lola)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/33 "2007-06-30T17:33:14Z")
[QUOTE=Rigamarole] I came in here to say the same thing. Really, WTF? It’s a very plain portrait, and there are millions of others like it. **What’s the big deal already**? [/QUOTE] From what I understand, the focus of most of the appreciation of the painting is not the lady herself, but the background, which is surprisingly detailed upon close examination. It is also a great example of the _sfumato_ technique. ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/34 "2007-06-30T18:25:14Z")
I don’t get poetry and I don’t get Fellini, for the most part. I realize these are my shortcomings and not those of the artists. I need to make more of an effort to understand and appreciate. I just can’t work up the energy to do so at this point. ---
**Author:** ![SurrenderDorothy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/surrenderdorothy/32/1221_2.png) [@SurrenderDorothy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SurrenderDorothy)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/35 "2007-06-30T19:56:06Z")
Casablanca. Maybe I just need to see it again (I would have been… thirteen? when I saw it last) But when I saw it, I was very open to it. It’s not like I hated it because I was expecting something else or because I didn’t appreciate old movies or anything like that. My dad had explained all the background to me and I understood the plot, so… I honestly don’t think it was a matter of me being too young to get it. But… I hated it. ---
**Author:** ![Aioua](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/87869e/32.png) [@Aioua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aioua)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/36 "2007-06-30T20:15:28Z")
[QUOTE=twickster] Yeah, see it in person. It’s huge, and its magical. [/QUOTE] Huge? :dubious: 29x36 inches isn’t exactly huge for a painting. I’d put in firmly in the medium category. I’ve also seen it in person, and while I agree that it is a fantastic painting, it’s size did absolutely nothing to impress me. I don’t get anything from pre-impressionist paintings. Nada. Most photography, too, leaves me high and dry. ---
**Author:** ![stucco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e56c9b/32.png) [@stucco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stucco)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/37 "2007-06-30T20:18:22Z")
[QUOTE=G. Odoreida] And although I completely distance myself from the people who moan about the cost, I just don’t get the Scottish Parliament building. [/QUOTE] Yeah, it is strange isn’t it? I do like the way it looks with the crags behind it though. My contribution would be Cubism. I know it was really important and revolutionary, but they just look like jumble to me. Perhaps if I knew more about it, I would appreciate it more. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/38 "2007-06-30T20:38:16Z")
[QUOTE=tremorviolet] I think with a lot of famous art you have to see it in person. Van Gogh never impressed me (my opinion pretty much agreed with yours) until I saw an exhibit of his paintings in DC. His painting were mersmerizing in a way a print just can’t capture. Even his lesser works sparked. I finally understood _why_ he’s considered one of the greats. [/QUOTE] Actually, I had almost the opposite reaction. I was at the Van Gogh Museum in Holland in April and I came away thinking ‘Dude, what a fucked up guy. Good thing his sister-in-law kicked ass at the marketing angle. Otherwise no one would have ever heard of him.’ I look at a lot of Van Gogh and look work by a guy who had talent but illness and other weirdnesses kept him from living up to it all. Some of it’s good but I could live without it. And this is after spending most of a day soaking in it. ---
**Author:** ![Least\_Original\_User\_Name\_Ever](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e480ec/32.png) [@Least\_Original\_User\_Name\_Ever](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Least_Original_User_Name_Ever)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/39 "2007-06-30T21:00:09Z")
[QUOTE=Aioua] Huge? :dubious: 29x36 inches isn’t exactly huge for a painting. I’d put in firmly in the medium category. I’ve also seen it in person, and while I agree that it is a fantastic painting, it’s size did absolutely nothing to impress me. I don’t get anything from pre-impressionist paintings. Nada. Most photography, too, leaves me high and dry. [/QUOTE] Even with Vermeer? ---
**Author:** ![Aioua](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/87869e/32.png) [@Aioua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aioua)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2007, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026/40 "2007-06-30T22:21:19Z")
[QUOTE=Least Original User Name Ever] Even with Vermeer? [/QUOTE] Hmm, hadn’t really heard of him, though after looking over his wiki article I’m not too impressed, though I do like Girl with a Pearl Earring. Okay, so _most_ pre-impressionist painting. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/art-confessions-i-dont-see-whats-so-great-about/410026.md?page=3)