Is this art?

[Virgil]

I'll put this in the general lit forum because I don't think this is quite chat. But a photo artist has taken portraits of people just prior to their deat and just after and juxtaposed them. Read here and click site to see some of the photos:



Art that faces up to death
By DAVID LOWE

A HEART-STOPPING new exhibition gives visitors the chance to literally stare death in the face.

Life Before Death is a collection of images by Walter Schels, who photographed each of his terminally ill subjects shortly before and after they’d passed away. [SNIP]
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/woman/real_life/article1060968.ece

I don't know what to think about this. It has a shock value, and shock value to me does not lend itself to good art, but it does capture a certain pathos. On one hand it's like a afternoon TV Oprah-esk expression and on the other hand the photos hav a quality to them. What are people's thoughts? Help me make up my mind whether I should think this good art or pop crap.

[vheissu]

Well, it's definitely interesting...but I don't know if I would call it art. I have a different perception of what I consider art and this just isn't it. It's not rubbish, just slightly unnerving.

I'm a bit confused: why is there a whole year in between the two photographs (alive and then deceased)?

Lately, I've been seeing different portrayals of art which I don't particularly agree on.
One example is the dog that was supposedly left to die from starvation as an exhibition. I don't know to what extent this is true, because I've found a few accounts which said that the dog was fed and left unleashed, except in the 3 hour long exhibition. Even so, the meaning of it completely eludes me and I disagree with the whole thing.

Second example, and for this I cannot remember who the artist was or where this exhibition was (though I want to say UK), since I read it a couple of years ago. Anyway, the artist had collected hundreds of glass/plastic balls of all colours and sizes and placed them in a room. Gave a nice kick to them, the balls just went everywhere and he won some fancy prize worth thousands.
And the only thing that came to mind was: I could do that!

To each their own I guess....but I have to wonder sometimes...;)

[Virgil]

vheissu, I was able to add the poll. So if you could vote it would be nice.

I heard about the starving dog exhibit and it infuriated me. Was that for real?

[Sweets America]

Interesting thread. :) For my part, the only answer I can give is that no one can say if this is art or not, I'm not sure this can ever be judged objectively. Does art exist without a viewer? It can be art for someone and crap for someone else, but is it anything in itself? That reminds me of what I say about "no one can judge if this or that is good poetry because it depends on everyone", but I don't know, there might be rules to define what is art? But I dislike the idea because it takes away the freedom of art.

I find the images intersting, the before and the after, and death in between. That reminds me of a woman who had cancer and lost her hair and chose to paint a lot of things on her head to make art out of the illness, it was very intelligent.

Also, what do you think of Gunther Von Hagens? Do you know the guy? He invented 'plastination', which consists of keeping dead bodies and he made art out of it. If you google his name, you can see pics. This was very controversial because some people accused him of stealing dead bodies to turn them into artworks.

[vheissu]

I'm sure you've seen all the news articles describing in excrutiating detail how that poor dog was left to die in front of thousands of visitors. And how none of them even dared to free it.
It's definitely infuriating, what museum would actually let an artist do that?
But, apparently, it might have all been a hoax:


http://thepetextraordinarium.blogspot.com/2008/03/starving-dog-exhibit-reported-as-hoax.html

This is from a blog, but there are others who have reported it. And it's interesting to see that yes, it has indeed made a lot of people angry, but somehow very few people actually questioned the validity of it and immediately jumped to the conclusion that was presented to them.

I voted the second option, though I'm not sure I would use the term art.

[Sweets America]

I had not heard about this dog thing, yes this is indeed scary if that is true. Art should not be an excuse for doing things like that.

[Virgil]

Thanks Vheissu. I thought I did see after that it was a hoax.

Sweets I've never heard of that fellow. I'll look him up.

[Sweets America]

Sweets I've never heard of that fellow. I'll look him up.

Ok. He plastinated people but also fetuses and such. It can be shocking but I somehow find those images fascinating. The guy was strange, if I remember well he always wore a hat and hid microphones in it to record all his conversations with people, he was kind of suspiscious. :p I also remember there was a 'giant' guy who died and Von Hagens tried all he could to obtain his body cause he wanted to plastinate it.

[vheissu]

Also, what do you think of Gunther Von Hagens? Do you know the guy? He invented 'plastination', which consists of keeping dead bodies and he made art out of it. If you google his name, you can see pics. This was very controversial because some people accused him of stealing dead bodies to turn them into artworks.

I wanted to go and see the his exhibition but was very expensive and at the time I was rather broke. Still, I don't see much difference between using bodies for medicine and allowing the general public (since we don't all go to med school), who are interested and curious?
If you don't want to see it, then don't.

Yet again, people immediately thought he actually stole the bodies for his own work. Which is rather ridicoulous: can you imagine the guy going from one morgue to the next, stealing bodies? Did anyone think that at least some of them might have families that had prepared a funeral and would find it just a bit odd that the body had gone missing?

[Sweets America]

I wanted to go and see the his exhibition but was very expensive and at the time I was rather broke. Still, I don't see much difference between using bodies for medicine and allowing the general public (since we don't all go to med school), who are interested and curious?
If you don't want to see it, then don't.

Yet again, people immediately thought he actually stole the bodies for his own work. Which is rather ridicoulous: can you imagine the guy going from one morgue to the next, stealing bodies? Did anyone think that at least some of them might have families that had prepared a funeral and would find it just a bit odd that the body had gone missing?

Huh, you are talking as if I were against Von Hagens, but I am not. :) I said I found it fascinating and if I could have gone to see the exposition, I would have done so. I think most of the bodies he had were those of people who wanted him to plastinate them so that they would be 'eternal' in this way. But I was only mentionning the questions that had been raised about his stealing bodies, I don't know if that's true or not, but I had seen a very interesting documentary about him, that was very exciting. So I'm merely reporting the questions they raised. I think they said he paid poor people to have the bodies of their dead family members.

[vheissu]

Huh, you are talking as if I were against Von Hagens, but I am not. :) I said I found it fascinating and if I could have gone to see the exposition, I would have done so. I think most of the bodies he had were those of people who wanted him to plastinate them so that they would be 'eternal' in this way. But I was only mentionning the questions that had been raised about his stealing bodies, I don't know if that's true or not, but I had seen a very interesting documentary about him, that was very exciting. So I'm merely reporting the questions they raised. I think they said he paid poor people to have the bodies of their dead family members.

No, no!! I didn't mean you! Just that you'd mentioned that it was a controversial exhibition for quite a few people and had accused him of stealing bodies.

Though I want to see one his exhibitions, I might decline to watch an actual live autopsy. He's done it once or twice and I think it was on TV as well. Maybe I could watch it on TV....but actually be there...hmmm...

From Wiki:


In 2002 von Hagens performed the first public autopsy in the UK for 170 years, to a sell-out audience of 500 people in a London theatre. Prior to performing the autopsy, von Hagens had received a letter from Her Majesty's Inspector of Anatomy, the British government official responsible for regulating the educational use of cadavers. The letter warned von Hagens that performing a public autopsy would be a criminal act under section 11 of the Anatomy Act 1984.

[Metanoia]

The definition of art these days is so broad. There is alot of so called "art work" out there that I just don't see as art. For example, a metal box, to me, is just A METAL BOX. I don't see anything deeply profound about it. Call me old fashioned or unimagintive, I just don't consider alot of the new ideas of "art" to be art at all. I think art should be creative and reflect what the artist was feeling or thinking.

Taking pics of dying and dead people I don't really see as art, although it may produce a emotional affect on people. Watching people get killed on the six o' clock news produces an emotional affect on most people, but that doesn't make it art, it makes it a fact of life. I think we all have a fasination with death, because we don't really understand it, and we don't know what happens after we shut our eyes for the last time.

I was just reading about an "artist" in some other country, that went out and found a stray dog, tied him up inside a art exhibit, and starved him to death. This dog was his "art", people actually came to see this poor animal as it was dying. Of course it created an emotional impact on those that saw it, but that certainly doesn't make it art, it makes it a depreved act of a heartless individual.

[papayahed]

I think I'm voting interesting art, neither great or crap. To me it's just photos, not even that shocking really.

[Sweets America]

Ok Vheissu, I understand. :)

Metanoia, I see what you mean, but I guess this is why I say that art really is seen differently by different people. You say:


I think art should be creative and reflect what the artist was feeling or thinking.

but the thing is, what the artist does is not always accessible to everyone because it might depend on everyone's sensibility. Maybe you don't see what the artist was feeling or thinking while someone else will perfectly see, this is the interesting thing.

[Virgil]

Interesting thread. :) For my part, the only answer I can give is that no one can say if this is art or not, I'm not sure this can ever be judged objectively. Does art exist without a viewer? It can be art for someone and crap for someone else, but is it anything in itself? That reminds me of what I say about "no one can judge if this or that is good poetry because it depends on everyone", but I don't know, there might be rules to define what is art? But I dislike the idea because it takes away the freedom of art.

I find the images intersting, the before and the after, and death in between. That reminds me of a woman who had cancer and lost her hair and chose to paint a lot of things on her head to make art out of the illness, it was very intelligent.

Also, what do you think of Gunther Von Hagens? Do you know the guy? He invented 'plastination', which consists of keeping dead bodies and he made art out of it. If you google his name, you can see pics. This was very controversial because some people accused him of stealing dead bodies to turn them into artworks.

I looked him up. Novel, but what's the point? It's not shock but I don't see what's so intersting either. I find these photos more interesting.

[higley]

As an artist I've found that the identity of art lies in the process more than the product, whether it is a progression of thought or handiwork. This, to me, is well within that, especially considering that it is photography that the artist posed, lit, and developed themselves--significantly more involved than snapping with a disposable and dropping it off at Cord Camera. ;) There's more than shock value to this exhibit.

[Virgil]

Thanks Higley. Nice to see you around. Ready for another baseball season? ;)

[higley]

Thanks Higley. Nice to see you around. Ready for another baseball season? ;)

Heya, Virgil! You bet! I hardly know what to expect. And may I say that I consider baseball one of the highest forms of art as well--there's nothing so poetic as a wicked sinker ball.

[Virgil]

Heya, Virgil! You bet! I hardly know what to expect. And may I say that I consider baseball one of the highest forms of art as well--there's nothing so poetic as a wicked sinker ball.

:) Or a running catch. Or a sweet swing of a batter. ;) Yeah baseball is high art. :D

[symphony]

Interesting.
But I cant stop thinking how it must have felt to those dying people to think that even in their last days they're being accompanied by a photographer and a journalist who've booked them after their deaths to take photos....
But it might be completely different, perhaps those people didnt mind... But i on my part cant stop thinking about it...

Anyway, whether it is an art depends of course on its spectators. And with the current world where everyday people come up with weird ideas to get their names known, its tough to decide which of them should actually be considered true art. One can always argue about what 'true art' is, though.

[Janine]

Huh, you are talking as if I were against Von Hagens, but I am not. :) I said I found it fascinating and if I could have gone to see the exposition, I would have done so. I think most of the bodies he had were those of people who wanted him to plastinate them so that they would be 'eternal' in this way. But I was only mentionning the questions that had been raised about his stealing bodies, I don't know if that's true or not, but I had seen a very interesting documentary about him, that was very exciting. So I'm merely reporting the questions they raised. I think they said he paid poor people to have the bodies of their dead family members.

Sweets America, I saw Non Hagen's exhibit in Philadelphia about two years ago with my good friend and we both were amazed by it, truly in awe. It was not shown at an art museum or gallery or as 'art'; it was presented 'scientifically' and with reverence, at the Franklin Institute. It was one of the most amazing exhibits I have ever seen, and it did not 'freak me out', since the figures were so far removed from reality. According to all we read at the exhibit and beforehand and afterward, about the actual man, he approached this quite scientifically and not as an art form. Also, he had complete permission from all of his subjects. The exhibit was quite extensive and well worth the money; if you or anyone else ever gets a chance to see it, I highly recommend it. It is a great learning experience and to be able to peer into the living body is an amazing thing. I never regretted going to it and still talk about it to my friend. We really have no true concept of what the inside of our bodies looks like or how it functions, unless we are operating doctors or nurses or researchers.

[quasimodo1]

Hey Virgil, It certainly has some elements of art; and if photography is an art form and this is good or great creative photography than I guess it is art of an speciallized sort. I have seen photographs with alot less power be declared art.

[Janine]

Interesting.
But I cant stop thinking how it must have felt to those dying people to think that even in their last days they're being accompanied by a photographer and a journalist who've booked them after their deaths to take photos....
But it might be completely different, perhaps those people didnt mind... But i on my part cant stop thinking about it...

Anyway, whether it is an art depends of course on its spectators. And with the current world where everyday people come up with weird ideas to get their names known, its tough to decide which of them should actually be considered true art. One can always argue about what 'true art' is, though.

Symphony and everyone else, I only saw the one photo and I thought it was very well done. I voted just now and choose the middle road. As photograpy I feel it does have artist merit and the idea is unique. Years ago it was quite common to photograph the dead laying in their coffin. I actually find that more repulsive than this photo I just viewed. I would probably be memerized with the complete display. I am sure the subjects had to give prior permission to the artist/photographer. In someways I think it is a realistic look into death and it does not disturb me so much as seeing photos like the pits full of bodies in Nazi Germany after the war or other atrocities. The person I viewed in death in this exhibit, had a certain calm peace about their face. I did not find it offensive, strangely enough. I feel it is art, but not great art...still it does have some merit, in my opinion.

[Janine]

Hey Virgil, It certainly has some elements of art; and if photography is an art form and this is good or great creative photography than I guess it is art of an speciallized sort. I have seen photographs with alot less power be declared art.

This is true, quasimodo. The photo I viewed did a have a certain power in it and I felt 'moved' somehow. I guess it all depends on how one views death. To me death is an extension of life. It happens to everyone, so it is part of the equation. I did not get freaked out by the photo; on the contrary, I felt more freaked out at the prospect of looking at it, than actually seeing it. It was quite nice, the way it was portrayed. Rather 'beautiful 'death can appear, if we only can view it that way. We might think, this was a life that was well lived and has come to an end, which is only appropriate, as all things in nature die, rest eternally.

[stlukesguild]

Virgil-I don't know what to think about this. It has a shock value, and shock value to me does not lend itself to good art, but it does capture a certain pathos.

Virgil... I would suggest that you might need to rephrase that to say "shock value does not always lend itself to good art" because there is a hell of a lot of great art that most certainly is or was shocking: Bosch, Bronzino's Allegory of Time- http://witcombe.sbc.edu/davincicode/bronzino-allegory.html
Caravaggio, Michelangelo's Last Judgment (all those naked bodies), Francis Bacon, etc... Surely you would ask how Lolita, or Blood Meridian, or As I Lay Dying could be literature? It all comes down to what he individual does with the material at hand. The two photos I saw certainly had something going for them. To judge how good I would need to see more and prefer to see the work in person where elements such as scale, quality of the print, etc... would come into play.

vheissu-the only thing that came to mind was: I could do that!

"The Emperor's New Clothes", eh? Why do you assume that all great art requires a level of craftsmanship that is beyond the abilities of the masses? Is there any word... any turn of phrase... any idea in Shelley's Ozymandias (for example) that the average literate person could not have done? The point is that neither you, nor I nor anyone but Shelley did it. There are magnificent works of visual art that I know I could do easily (granted I am a working artist... but still...:p). There are brilliant works of art that are far less than demanding of any great craft skills on the part of the artist... and there are some immaculately well crafted works that are simply dead... cold exercises in academia.

[firefangled]

This reminds me of the Human Bodies exhibit. It was interesting but hardly worth it. And thent to hear how the bodies were procured made me feel guilty for seeing them.

I would call the photographs photo journalism more than anything. It has verying degrees of artistic value depending on who is doing the photos. These tell us no more about people in general or the subjects that Diane Arbus did in a more informative way. She provided context and perspective in her strange photos that made them less strange. That is art.

You have to create a change to make art. Either the subject changs or the way we perceive it changes. I suppose if I sat long enough and stared at them my perception of death would change.

I always tought the study where bodies were weighed before and after death to see how much the soul weighed by the differential after the soul left the body. They are of course assuming the soul has weght at all.

[Sweets America]

These tell us no more about people in general or the subjects that Diane Arbus did in a more informative way. She provided context and perspective in her strange photos that made them less strange. That is art.

Oh, I had forgotten about Diane Arbus, I really like her photographies!

[Virgil]

[COLOR="DarkRed"]Virgil... I would suggest that you might need to rephrase that to say "shock value does not always lend itself to good art" because there is a hell of a lot of great art that most certainly is or was shocking: Bosch, Bronzino's Allegory of Time- http://witcombe.sbc.edu/davincicode/bronzino-allegory.html
Caravaggio, Michelangelo's Last Judgment (all those naked bodies), Francis Bacon, etc... Surely you would ask how Lolita, or Blood Meridian, or As I Lay Dying could be literature? It all comes down to what he individual does with the material at hand. The two photos I saw certainly had something going for them. To judge how good I would need to see more and prefer to see the work in person where elements such as scale, quality of the print, etc... would come into play.


OK, I'm persuaded. Just because it has shock value does not automatically make it bad.

[Virgil]

Symphony and everyone else, I only saw the one photo and I thought it was very well done. I voted just now and choose the middle road.

If you click the hyperlink "Click Here For Slide Show" in that article it will take you to several pictures.

Does anyone think it's morbid?

[quasimodo1]

Somehow, morbid is an word that wouldn't apply for me. The concept has infinite potential as a form of photographic art but also is just a modern form of the ancient skill of making a "deathmask".

[Virgil]

Somehow, morbid is an word that wouldn't apply for me. The concept has infinite potential as a form of photographic art but also is just a modern form of the ancient skill of making a "deathmask".

I can't make up my mind yet Quasi. But you seem to be the biggest advocate for this . You should vote in the poll.

[quasimodo1]

Well, Virgil, I voted the middle ground though I was tending higher. There wasn't enough material for me to go to the "high art" level. The possibilities are there but also I can't help but be reminded of the photographer that made alot of press with semi-pornographic, non-heterosexual stuff a while back if you know who I mean. Not a good comparison perhaps; this concept and the few realizations would at least not be controversial. The old horse comes to mind..."Everybody has the face they deserve by the time they're fifty."

[vheissu]

vheissu-the only thing that came to mind was: I could do that!

"The Emperor's New Clothes", eh? Why do you assume that all great art requires a level of craftsmanship that is beyond the abilities of the masses? Is there any word... any turn of phrase... any idea in Shelley's Ozymandias (for example) that the average literate person could not have done? The point is that neither you, nor I nor anyone but Shelley did it. There are magnificent works of visual art that I know I could do easily (granted I am a working artist... but still...:p). There are brilliant works of art that are far less than demanding of any great craft skills on the part of the artist... and there are some immaculately well crafted works that are simply dead... cold exercises in academia.

I don't quite agree with you and I'm not assuming anything: I was commenting on that one particular exhibition (which unfortunately I can't find anywhere on the web at the moment).

My criticism on that specific exhibition was that it had attracted attention mainly because the artist had gained a rather large sum of money for something which I can't see the reason or the meaning for. To me, there are so many other exhibitions or single pieces of art which for the most part go hardly unnoticed or are not as renowed as that one.

I know that many forms of art do not require any level of craftsmanship while other do, and both can be admired or rejected. It's our choice to form an opinion about it and it doesn't necessarily have to conform with what some famous and well respected art critic has said.

Also, why did you mention The Emperor's new clothes? I haven't read it in years, so I don't see the relation to what you're saying.

[tractatus]

'What is art' is quite complicated question for today's world. Nearly everything is art. Even I doubt my self, I dont know the answer if someone s tell me "You are an art." We are waiting for a mathematician like Godel to solve this "definition" problem.

Anyway, only some questions i produce, when see photos.
- If the header was "photos of people shortly before eating a peach, and after?" still an art?
- what if "photos of people shortly before winter, and after winter?

So, the word "death" is ineffective word?

I should agree, is a kind of art. But not strong, for me. I ve seen, i judge.

[Virgil]

- If the header was "photos of people shortly before eating a peach, and after?" still an art?
- what if "photos of people shortly before winter, and after winter?

So, the word "death" is ineffective word?

I should agree, is a kind of art. But not strong, for me. I ve seen, i judge.

Some very good questions Tractatus. You made a very good point.

[stlukesguild]

You have to create a change to make art.

Of course the question would be just what degree of "change" is necessary to have a work qualify as ART? What of the paintings of early Flemish masters (Van Eyck) renown for their "realism"? What of "Trompe-l'œil" painters such as William Harnett and John Peto? What of Photo-realists such as Chuck Close? Indeed... where do most photographers fall if we demand that they change the image to a greater extent than that seen here?

[stlukesguild]

vheissu... I quite understand that I cannot comment upon the specific exhibition you witnessed without having seen it myself. From your description it is more than likely that I would agree with assessment of its worth as art. However, I'm always a bit wary of any criticism using one of those popular clichés: "I could have done it," "Even a child could do that," or a comparison with the Emperor's New Clothes. The last analogy is quite popular because it not only rejects the art work at hand, but it suggests that the only reason for such an artist's success is that there is an "elite" who are either blind... or avoid expressing their honest opinions for fear of seeming less-than-sophisticated in art matters. It also suggests a chummy atmosphere of us (honest, down to earth folk) vs them (snotty elitists): "we don't fall for that crap. We know crap when we see it and aren't afraid to say so, nudge, nudge, wink, wink." The art world certainly does have its excess of excess and its excess of pretentious crap and those who are afraid to say it's so. Still... as I noted... I am just overly wary about an art criticism that is aimed at convincing me of a point of view but resorts to a comment that is itself a highly overused clichés.:)

[djy78usa]

This thread reminded me of a comedy blog I read recently about the "6 Best Shenanigans Passed Off as 'Art' "

http://www.cracked.com/article_16107_6-best-shenanigans-passed-off-as-art.html

[stlukesguild]

All art is an abstraction... a symbol... a language, of sorts. As with any language one needs a degree of prior knowledge to understand it. Some demands a greater degree of such, some less. Shakespeare, Milton, Dante all demand a deal of prior knowledge. So do Rothko, Klee, even Monet... that is if one is to have a greater understanding of the works than a mere appreciation of the pretty colors, etc... It is certainly easy to dismiss some of the more demanding works of visual art... but the same might be said of James Joyce, Ezra Pound, Mallarme, etc... Again, this is not to suggest that some... even a lot... of the more "esoteric" art is not quite bad... even ridiculous... but then I have always been of the opinion that 90+% of all art is mediocre at best.

[RJbibliophil]

This has potential to be true art- something that captures the beauty of life and the peacefulness of death. But it could also be twisted into something horrible.

[kratsayra]

Does anyone think it's morbid?

Yes, I do. ;) I actually am not going to vote because I'm too disturbed by the idea to even look at the photos. Really. It could have artistic value, it could show beauty, that death is a part of life, whatever it is . . . but the whole idea freaks me out too much. Perhaps that sounds extreme, but I just don't want to look at them. At least not right now.

[Virgil]

Well, I vote, and voted for the interesting but neither great nor crap. It is morbid, and has a sensationalist quality to it. But as St. Lukes has pointed out, that in itself does not automatically rule out art. But as I look at the photos I wonder, what's the point? So he juxtaposes a photo from before and after. I don't see the significance.

[motherhubbard]

I'm not going to vote because I'm not going to look at the link. I'm afraid that it will give me bad dreams. I have to be really careful with myself. It may be interesting, but I don't think I would call it art- but I think art is a hard word, really. It's kind of like love. One little word that is supposed to mean so many different things.

[blp]

Second example, and for this I cannot remember who the artist was or where this exhibition was (though I want to say UK), since I read it a couple of years ago. Anyway, the artist had collected hundreds of glass/plastic balls of all colours and sizes and placed them in a room. Gave a nice kick to them, the balls just went everywhere and he won some fancy prize worth thousands.
And the only thing that came to mind was: I could do that!


vheissu, I can't find it either, but I'm fairly sure the work you're talking about was by Martin Creed (http://www.martincreed.com/works/index.html). As it happens, I saw it when it was shown at Hauser and Wirth in London and thought it was one of the better things I saw that year, though I'm not usually a big fan of Creed's. It consisted of thousands of toy balls of every size and description in a fairly large, old fashioned wood paneled room. You could pick up the balls and throw them around. The impression was of a multicoloured, moving mass. I don't know about Creed winning a prize for this. He did win the Turner Prize, the UK's most prestigious art prize, a year or two before.

There's a tendency, and I suppose it's likely to be particularly marked on a site like this, to look for meaning or depth in a work like this, as if it's supposed to function in a symbolic/literary way. It doesn't work in this way, but that doesn't mean it doesn't work. It's an approach to form. Its meaning, to the extent that it has one, is as part of history of approaches to form in art, from the impressionists breaking down imagery into blobs of colour to fifties US painters treating the canvas as a colour field, to minimalists creating site specific installations of modular units. In a way, Creed created a large, three-dimensional moving abstract painting, one that the art audience could interact with. As such, it was like a combination of a sixties happening and a painting.

There's a very traditional sculptors response to the question of what their work means: it doesn't mean anything; It's three dimensional; you have to walk around it and experience it. The same applies here. This work was exciting in a giddy way that a description of it can't convey. You say you could have done it, vheissu, but would you have thought to do it? Would you have been able to work out that it would have the effect it did? I don't mean to be rude, but since you can't, apparently, imagine that a work like this could have any point, it seems unlikely that you could have.

Re the starving dog (http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/news/story/0,,2269320,00.html) thing: it was faked. The artist gave a very clear explanation of the work, which was in the link you posted, vheissu: a starving dog in a gallery illicited a lot of attention and outrage, but on the street it is ignored. But of course, rather than read the link or do any more research themselves, most people here preferred to stick with the enjoyable sensation of being self-righteously indignant, which is, in a wider sense, the way most people seem to prefer to engage with contemporary art in general.

[blp]

To get this back on topic and close the circle between the dog and the photos of the dying and dead it seems artist Gregor Schneider is now looking for a dying person to exhibit (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2008/04/22/baschneider122.xml).

Schneider echoes Damian Hirst in suggesting that the extreme morbidity of his work has a moral dimension in reconnecting us (presumably some version of western or westernised, modernised society), cathartically, with death.

Are the photos art? I don't know, but I find their artfulness a problem. I've looked at them and read the captions and I found the whole did have a powerful effect. It was the texts that affected me most. They did need to be illustrated, but I don't think they needed such tastefully lit, carefully framed sfumato illustrations. There's an odd double-coding about the power of the image here, as if the author wants to believe that simply showing a person before and after death can have a profound effect on the viewer, but doesn't have quite enough faith in the process to let it stand without adding a tasteful photographic sheen. The photographs end up bellowing their purported profundity at us. Perhaps they're like this precisely because the photographer was anxious that they wouldn't be seen as art.

[Sweets America]

Blp, wow, this Gregor Schneider's art seems so interesting and intriguing. I've read about the houses that people can visit, I'm not sure I understood everything but I would love to see that! Maybe I'm just morbid.

[blp]

Blp, wow, this Gregor Schneider's art seems so interesting and intriguing. I've read about the houses that people can visit, I'm not sure I understood everything but I would love to see that! Maybe I'm just morbid.

lol. I imagine we all are a little, Sweets.

There's a documentary about him in the BBC's Art Safari strand and it's really interesting. He's a genuine oddball and he's turned his parents' old house, where he still lives I believe, into a sort of DIY labyrinth, full of spatial tricks (revolving floors, doors that go nowhere, sudden crawlspaces etc.). It's amazing and a little disturbing. But he did a piece in London a couple of years back, two identical next door houses with identical creepy things going on in them (right down to identical middle aged male twins doing something unmentionable in the shower, backs turned) and it really wasn't good, much more trite and obvious in depicting a rather standard, clichéd version of a site of abuse.

[Petrarch's Love]

Just came across this thread. I didn't find the concept very shocking really. What's so shocking about showing that people die? I thought the photos were well executed, and the juxtoposition was an interesting idea, but I personally didn't find it particularly moving. It felt as though it was riding more on the concept than speaking through the execution. I don't have any problem with it being called art, but from what I saw I didn't feel that it moved to that level of unusually good art.

This other project blp alluded to of him putting a dying person on display, I find much more unsettling, and also much less valid as a form of art. Then, I have a lot trouble imagining ever either agreeing to be the person who's death is used as an artist's publicity stunt or being someone who would want to come as a looky-loo to see someone dying. Don't we all witness death at some time or another among our own friends and family? Haven't we all seen dying people at hospitals and rest homes? I don't really see the point of making a dying person into an exhibit?

[Virgil]

Don't we all witness death at some time or another among our own friends and family? Haven't we all seen dying people at hospitals and rest homes? I don't really see the point of making a dying person into an exhibit?

Plus where's the creativity? Watching someone die or eating dinner or going to the bathroom is no more than a TV reality show where one just situates a camera and watches someone or a group. Art, amongst other things, has to be creative. Watching something that was not crafted is not art. At least to my way of looking at art.

[blp]

I'm fairly sceptical about this Gregor Schneider dying person piece too, but I actually think my objections to it aren't that different from some I have, but didn't quite express, to the photos of the dying/dead. In both instances, the subject matter is interesting, but so interesting that there's almost nothing left for the artist to do. The photographer adopted the strategy of making the photos very artful, but the art doesn't really add anything to the subject matter. It doesn't really integrate. So I'm ready to vote now. They're not art. They're reportage (good, interesting reportage) with a largely meaningless arty veneer.

It remains to be seen what Schneider might do with his doomed collaborator, but I don't have high expectations. Schneider is a good sculptor or installation artist. By doing something like this, he's simply using his celebrity as an artist to do something rather different from what he's really good at. It's a bit like when Hollywood actors become political activists or emissaries of peace or some such. There's a kind of immodesty about it, both a personal one and a general immodesty about art and its capacities.

At the same time, it's a kind of implicit devaluation of artistic endeavour, as if the artist throws up his hands in the face of palpable reality and says, no more metaphors, no more mimesis and no more abstraction. Let's just have the thing itself! Brilliant idea - which is, in fact, no idea at all. I also dislike it on sort of art historical grounds. The use of 'real' things as art works comes from Duchamp's idea of the readymade - simple objects (a shovel, a bottle rack, a bicycle wheel), untransformed or only lightly transformed, exhibited as artworks. But the whole point for Duchamp was to pick objects that were as devoid of meaning and aesthetic value as possible and show how merely exhibiting them in a gallery imbued them with an aura of artistic value, however spurious and perverse. Say what you like, it was a careful strategy, but it's gradually mutated, over the last seventy odd years, into a blanket license to carelessly put anything you like in a gallery. Where Duchamp deliberately used things that didn't interest him, it's now become a dumb way for artists to just point at interesting things. And somehow colonise them.

[AimusSage]

I find it rather interesting, but not to the point of excellence. Art can be debated endlessly, which is what makes it interesting. I always enjoyed the debates on what art is, and what isn't. People would come up with a plethora of definitions, and almost all would have merit. Some value technical skill of the artist above all else, others say it has to affect them on an emotional level, or it has to be a ground breaking idea.

Creativity is a spark, but it's not the end all to art. A good idea does not automatically have a good execution, and some bad ideas are executed in a way that is so excellent, that it has merit just because it is done so well. One thing that I find is important for an artist is to keep reinventing oneself. Continuously try out different things. Not necessarily techniques, but ideas. It doesn't have to be a revolutionary change, but if an artist spends his entire life doing the same thing over and over again, with just slight variations the art looses merit and instead becomes just something to look at. Something to pass the time.

[Virgil]

They're reportage (good, interesting reportage) with a largely meaningless arty veneer.


One of the things I'm struggling with is what exactly makes photography art. Wouldn't all photography, or better let's say most photography, fit the "interesting reportage" but with "a largely meaningless arty veneer" criteria?

[blp]

One of the things I'm struggling with is what exactly makes photography art. Wouldn't all photography, or better let's say most photography, fit the "interesting reportage" but with "a largely meaningless arty veneer" criteria?

I sort of struggle with this too, Virgil, but there's lots of photography that doesn't fit that description, from Man Ray's rayographs (http://cs.nga.gov.au/Detail-LRG.cfm?IRN=88112&View=LRG) back in the twenties, made without a camera (objects were simply placed on photographic paper and exposed to light), which are largely all arty veneer (and often very beautiful) to Andreas Gursky's large colour photos (http://nymag.com/arts/art/reviews/31785/) of huge things like crowds, hotel lobbies or supermarket interiors, which are incredibly crafted and interesting.

I think you can be impressed by Gursky's pictures without knowing that they're constructed, but it's interesting to hear just how crafted they are. Gursky doesn't just take a photograph and blow it up large. He takes lots and painstakingly puts together the bits he wants in a seamless whole using computers. The crowd or hotel lobby you see in the image may not even ever have existed quite as it's shown.

Even more artful approaches are taken by photographers like Jeff Wall (http://nymag.com/arts/art/reviews/28478/) or Gregory Crewdson (http://www.vam.ac.uk/images/image/29134-popup.html)who construct most of the scenes they photograph using sets and actors, even the ones that look 'natural'. And a yet more crafted approach is taken by Thomas Demand (http://www.likeyou.com/archives/atlantic_bukarest_mgkbs05.htm), whose large scenes of ordinary interiors are actually models constructed realistically out of paper and card.

A sort of reverse approach is that of Phillip Lorca Dicorcia (http://www.albrightknox.org/acquisitions/acq_2002/di_Corcia.html), who has used elaborate studio type lighting to make ordinary pedestrians passing on the street look less natural.

And one should also mention Cindy Sherman, particularly her famous Untitled Film Stills series (http://www.moma.org/collection/browse_results.php?object_id=56618) in which she depicted herself in what seemed to be various shots from old black and white movies.

There are also a whole load of artists who use photography simply to record an idea as clearly as possible, e.g. Bas Jan Ader, here seen riding his bicycle into an Amsterdam canal (http://lunettesrouges.blog.lemonde.fr/files/ader1.jpg) or David Shrigley (http://bp1.blogger.com/_mqblUbSl-VM/RxPSsWNXZII/AAAAAAAACbo/IRe-O8-pw9g/s1600-h/ignore_this_building.jpg).

[Virgil]

Thanks. :)

[blp]

Thanks. :)

No problem. :) I enjoyed looking around for this stuff, a lot of which I like.

I do agree nevertheless that there's an awful lot of photography around that has an identity problem (art? reportage? a bit of both?). The Deutsch Borse Photography Prize was on at London's Photographer's Gallery recently. Three of the photographers shot scenes from life (large landscapes, underprivileged people in India and, I think, scenes of country life in Scandanavia), but in such a way that you knew their intentions were arty. The one who won presented a slide show of colour snaps, mainly pretty raw scenes of poverty in America. He'd never set out to be a photographer and claimed no artistic merit. His work had technical flaws, problems with focus etc. Still, it seemed clear his work was the best as art.

[Dr Jekyll]

As I'm a great fan of paintings done in the Renaissance period, I personally believe that this can be in fact photographed by just about anybody, just if they get the idea, while painting a detailed masterpiece on canvas is another thing, it requires not only ideas but also talent as well. So to me, this may be art if looking from the perspective of a contemporary artist, but stepping in shoes of time-washed painters, this could be nothing more but a simple picture taken with your everyday camera.

[JackieGinger]

Dr. Jekyll do you think that photographic art and paintings are one and the same?
We do have photo artists, that are artist because they put something new into an image, which, as you said could be done by almost anyone. The thing that makes it art is the new perspective, the ideas linked to it. One has to give it an artistic air.

[DanielBenoit]

I have no idea how it could possibly have shock value. It is not grotesque in any way, what you derive from it is from the faces. This isn't conceptual art as I was expecting, which then I would vote "interesting, neiter art or crap". It is an elegant display of human faces before and after their death, nothing more nothing less. It is blatantly naturalistic and refuses to be anything but the thing itself that we see, this is great photography.

[skib]

I would tend to agree with Daniel, except on the 'great photography' platform. I didn't feel the pictures had neither shock value nor any kind of artistic value either. It's a before and after picture. People die every day, so what's so special about it?

[Dr Jekyll]

Dr. Jekyll do you think that photographic art and paintings are one and the same?

Of course not, but I am just saying that more effort and sweat is put in other forms of art, such as paintings or sculptures than in photography and therfore I value it more, but that is just my speculation, of course, everyone has their own taste, which I respect, I am only sharing mine.

[JackieGinger]

Well on that point I cannot but agree with you, and that is also the reason why we should take the photos from a photographic point of view...And I think that the photos on the Internet do not have the same effect as the real ones probably have...