In any case, introducing a false analogy–art is not a religion–isn’t gonna get us any closer to understanding each other.
And backpedalling from where you very explicitly and directly ridicule people who value abstract art and saying that this is personal projection on my part is flat dishonest.
Nope. You didn’t make fun of anyone specfically. You made fun of great swaths of people, including everyone who’s been giving you shit in this thread. Which, in fact, is why they’ve been giving you shit. Most people don’t cotton to being called “deluded,” especially by someone who so manifestly has no idea what the fuck they’re talking about.
As for the idea that “anyone” could make a Mondrian painting. If I had the ability to paint a perfect reproduction of the basilica of St. Peters, does that mean I’m as good an artist as Michaelangelo?
Have a boo at “Why Cats Paint”. It’s a light hearted look at feline painting. Why Cats Paint
I don’t know if it is on that site, but the book “Why Cats Paint” included a section on patterns of objects( e.g. firdge magnets), arranged into patterns by cats.
Next week, a friend is flying in from a thousand miles away, then we will drive for several hours, then, weather cooperating, we will paddle for a couple of days. Why all the effort? We want to look at the beauty of parts of the north shore of Superior.
Some have made painted http://www.mcmichael.com/Revisions/asenseof/Pic%20Island%20Sketch-t.jpg , and some have photographed http://www.greatlakesheritagecoast.com/photo_details.lasso?-token.id=45, and some have written http://my.tbaytel.net/culpeper/Stardust.html .
But the true beauty is not in the mechinical process of the painters, photographers and writers, but rather in the effect of the land and water and sky on us: the effect as produced by the artists, or the effect from simple, direct experience.
With respect to major abstract painters, or young Marla, or the elephant, or numerous housecats, or the untouched land, water and sky, it really does not matter whether the artist was of great intelligence, or was a walnut brain, or whether the artist created the work or simply found it. What matters is that someone was touched.
Countless tomes have been written on what constitutes art, and what constitutes good art, but what it comes down to is that, just as for a tree falling in a forest to be heard, art requires an audience, even if that audience is only the artist himself or herself.
In the matter at hand, many people have been touched by Marla’s work, which is rare for a youngster, and Marla has enjoyed creating her work. Perhaps she will continue to grow as an artist, or perhaps she will move on to different pursuits, but the fact remains that presently she is an artist of some accomplishment. Good for her!
This was your first post.
No, people get angry when you dis their value system.
If you’d said, “I don’t like abstract art … I just don’t see the appeal.” – That’s totally cool. I might try to explain what I see in it to change your mind, but ultimately it comes down to personal taste.
But you said (in paraphrase), “Abstract art is a fraud and a scam.” Now that’s just insulting. You’re not just saying that you don’t like it, you’re insinuating that anyone who does is a deluded fool. And that’s why everyone is pissed off at you.
And what’s worse, you’re clearly talking out of your ass. You don’t seem to know much about art and you don’t seem to know much about artists. So when you start pontificating you just sound like an idiot.
Contrast your position with what Tom Wolfe did with The Painted Word in 1975. Wolfe’s book is a scathing send-up of the hot-house world of high art, but Wolfe knew what he was talking about (having observed the New York scene firsthand) so he calls bullshit it’s convincing.
Just out of curiousity – who are your own favorite artists? If you can’t stand abstract art, what do you like?
“… when he calls bullshit it’s convincing.”
I happened to be reading this book when I stumbled across a chapter that our dear misguided friend might find interesting.
Chapter five, to be precise.
“As the new century got under way, cooler heads such as Wassily Kandinsky took great interest in the power of line, shape, and color to suggest the inner state of the artist and to provoke the five senses. […] Kandinsky and his peers were searching for an art that might somehow unite the senses–and in doing so, unite the different artforms which appealed to those different senses. We call this idea synaesthetics.”
That’s from page 123.
“Expressionism and synaesthetics are distortive by their nature. If strong enough, their effects can obscure their subjects. But a lack of clarity can also foster greater participation by the reader and a sense of involvement which many writers and artists prefer.”
Page 133.
Everyone in this thread should read Understanding Comics. It’s really quite interesting. And of course, reading the entire book will provide you with a greater understanding than the quotations I chose.
I did indeed. I quoted a part of it that made it clear that responding to the rest of it would be silly.
I never fired off a direct, personal insult at anyone until I had been directly, personally insulted.
Almost, yes. If you could do it without looking at the original, I’d say yes.
Yes, and I think it speaks for itself. No personal or direct insults. Says basically what everyone keeps telling me “If you’d just said x, we wouldn’t be arguing this!”
snort If expressing opinions contrary to a value system is ‘dissing’ it, then that’s just too bad.
Smart people get fooled. Smart well-educated people can be fooled. I’ve been fooled myself on occasion. I don’t think it’s a personal fault.
Hmmm. That’s a good question. I’ve found that I rather like Dali’s stuff - both the surrealistic pieces and the more traditional. It’s not an area I focus on a lot though - I tend to like things that move - Movies, Television - or things with an accompanying narrative - comic books. A plain, static image, while sometimes interesting, usually isn’t my cup of tea.
You have got to be fucking kidding me. You are into the Surrealists, but dislike Mondrian or Malevich or Kandinsky because you dislike modern art? Newsflash: Dali is abstract modern art.
So, in your value system, I take it that Gus van Sant is an equal to Alfred Hitchcock? After all, van Sant did make that shot-by-shot remake of Psycho. That must mean that they have exactly the same talent, yes?
Have you seen Elephant or My Own Private Idaho? He’s not exactly a hack, though I understand your point. 
No, it’s a declarative statement about an entire mode of expression.
If you say “I don’t find anything of value in abstract art,” then your subject is you and your particular tastes, and of course you’re the final authority on your subjective experience of the world, so there’s no room for argument there.
If you say “Abstract art is valueless,” then your subject is a broad category of art itself, and you’re making a statement which is contrary to many people’s direct experience of it. Of course people are going to argue about it, especially when they have more experience of that mode of expression, see the value in it, and have some hope that its value can be communicated to you.
I’ve had practically the same argument with a man who resolutely believes that jazz music is a similar intellectual fraud. “It all sounds the same,” he says. “They just randomly run their fingers over the frets while they slap the strings,” he says. “There’s no structure in it,” he says. “Nobody really enjoys it,” he says, “they just pretend to try to appear ‘cool.’” He’s totally intractable about it, and maintains that anyone who claims to see value in music that isn’t in 4/4 time, with lyrics, a verse/chorus structure and a solid “hook,” is just being a pretentious idiot, and is either deluding themselves, or actually faking in order to fit in with a snobby clique. No amount of argument can sway him from this.
It can be very frustrating.
Again, this hearkens back to an early quibbling point - I don’t seem to use the word ‘abstract’ properly according to the art world definition. As you’ll recall, I pointed out that I rather liked Starry Night - and wondered aloud if it was considered abstract.
You’re missing the point. Dali work is modern art. What else would it be? Victorian realism? It is also abstract. Unless in your hometown you have limp clocks hanging over everything, I think it’s safe to call his work abstract.
not representing or imitating external reality or the objects of nature; “a large abstract painting”
Works for me.
Nooo… if he had, without seeing the original Psycho, produced a film that was word-for-word, frame-by-frame identical to Hitchcock’s - yeah. As it is, I haven’t seen his remake, but I doubt it’s identical … (maybe that’s not true? maybe he digitally reconstructed all the dead actors) … and I’m almost certain he used the original as a constant reference.
Of course, two artists coming up with exactly the same thign without one influencing the other is extremely unlikely. A more likely occurence would be, say, if one came up with a similar but different movie, in the same style as the previous artist.
Of course, when it comes to Mondrian, it’s pretty easy to make a different grid and color them in different places. Kinda part of the essence of my ‘disrespect’ for the modern art scene.
