The Visual Arts: Exploring the History of "Fine Art" and Beyond

[ftil]

Originally posted by stlukesguild

I mentioned Marshenikov again in context with the concept of art that is "beautiful"... even well painted/composed... yet lacks a strong personal artist's "voice" for the simple reason that I had gone into some detail on this concept earlier using Marshenikov as an example. I might just as well cited Henk Helmantel:

You still avoid making comments about Robert Coombs' painting. The reason that I have asked your opinion about that painting is the fact that "Almost Sundown" won American National Award of Excellence. To my delight, there are painters who appreciate beauty.

Robert was also awarded the $10,000 Grand Prize at the Raymar's First Annual Fine Art Competition for "First Leaves of Autumn".

When the painting depicts beauty words are absolutely unnecessary. When painting depicts ugliness and evokes disturbing feelings and negative energy....words are necessary to convince the viewer about…… artistic merits.

It is nothing else but brainwashing because words don’t math with the paintings.

Robert Coombs, Almost Sundown

http://www.danagallery.com/opa/opa055.html

[Cioran]

Cioran, I don't think you can question ftil's idea of what is beautiful or ugly.

Sure, I can. Just look at her (I believe ftil is female) most recent post.

We know what ftil likes. Kitsch. Pretty pictures. Art that does not challenge, but rather numbs. That's fine as a matter of personal taste. I think it's unfortunate that her taste is so limited, her view of art so blinkered, but perhaps she can't change that. But, in the context of this thread, ktil goes far beyond that and presumes to pass judgement on whole bodies of art as if there were some objective truth about her blinkered, narrow view of art.

[Cioran]

You still avoid making comments about Robert Coombs' painting. The reason that I have asked your opinion about that painting is the fact that "Almost Sundown" won American National Award of Excellence.

Ftil has me on Ignore. We know why. Ftil doesn't like to be challenged by art, and she doesn't like to have her views challenged, either.

So I invite someone to ask ftil about this "American National Award of Excellence" that she deems so valuable. Who sponsors this award? And -- crucially -- what is the mission of the sponsoring group?

I supply a LOL in advance ----->

Not that there is anything wrong with a group devoted to "the preservation of representational art." But please, let's not pretend that, say, Coombs' painting was competing for a prize against modernist and post-modernist artists, or non-representational artists, and was deemed to be superior to all those other speciemens, because in fact all those other specimens were ruled out in advance for receving this "award" of "excellence."

I hope someone will point this out to ftil.

[Cioran]

About this beauty/ugliness business:

To me, in art and life, beauty is not the opposite of ugly. If ugly has an opposite, at least in the fine arts, it would be the pretty, not the beautiful.

And there's nothing necessarily wrong with pretty pictures, either, like those of Coombs. It's a surgar diet, and everyone enjoys a little sugar from time to time. Unfortunately, if all you like is sugar, your diet is ... wanting.

Picasso's Weeping Woman, which I posted earlier, has a jarring, even cataclysmic effect, upon viewing. It's not pretty. Is it ugly? Is it beautiful? Is it somehow both?

And here is where a little visual education comes in handy. The truth is, whether some people would like to admit it or not, those who have studied art, and who have created art, can see stuff in a painting that others will miss. And in fact there is great technical beauty, great mastery, in the Picasso portrait. Indeed there is a wealth of stuff inside that one painting to study and savor, just for their specifically painterly innovations.

[miyako73]

I don't use "pretty" to describe a work of art. I use "beautiful" because I can also use it in relation to the narrative the image conveys.

The most beautiful image to me that has everything in it--culture, sociology, philosophy, poetry, religion, sex or the absence of it, fantasy and illusion, and many more is this by David Nebreda:

tumblr_lze1hzSVHW1r98944o1_500.jpg

Others will find me and my selection strange. Well, you have to have the same experience I have before you can call it beautiful. Will I question your taste if you don't appreciate the image? NO.

[Cioran]

I don't use "pretty" to describe a work of art. I use "beautiful" because I can also use it in relation to the narrative the image conveys.

The most beautiful image to me that has everything in it--culture, sociology, philosophy, poetry, religion, sex or the absence of it, fantasy and illusion, and many more is this by David Nebreda:

tumblr_lze1hzSVHW1r98944o1_500.jpg

Others will find me and my selection strange. Well, you have to have the same experience I have before you can call it beautiful. Will I question your taste if you don't appreciate the image? NO.

And, as I just explicitly stated, I am NOT questioning anyone's "taste" in art. What I am questioning is ftil's apprent desire to make her personal (limited, blinkered) taste in art an objective value, a normative judgment about what art is or should be.

I've also noted in a prior post that it's perfectly possible to appreciate the value of art that one does not like. This does not seem to be something ftil is able to do. In my own case, I mentioned Renoir. I appreciate the artistic value of Renoir's work. It's just not work I like looking at, because it's not to my own taste. But one should be able to separate matters of personal taste from objective worth.

[miyako73]

Why do you belittle the works of Coombs? I find this painting very impressive. He used texture beautifully to evoke memory and melancholia.

5834_307004m.jpg

[stlukesguild]

I don't think you can question ftil's idea of what is beautiful or ugly. Even though I find some disgusting images beautiful, still I cannot question his way of viewing things. The totality of one's experience influences his way of seeing and thinking; thus, his interpretation of a certain painting can be unique and solely his own

What you are arguing for here is a cultural relativism: "Its all relevant. There is no such thing as good or bad art, but thinking makes it so."

Even by such a standard in which we suggest that all opinions concerning art are subjective, some opinions are better than others.

[miyako73]

You can call it whatever -ism you have. I'm okay with using logic. Watermelon to a produce vendor is a fruit, but to an African-American activist it is a symbol of racism. This shows experience framing viewing/thinking.

It can be Pavlovian too if I'll use conditioning in my argument.

[stlukesguild]

Watermelon to a produce vendor is a fruit, but to an African-American activist it is a symbol of racism.

Yet it is still a fruit.

This shows experience framing viewing/thinking.

This was Duchamp's argument: context is everything. But ultimately context only proves to be everything to art that is wholly dependent upon said context. Tracey Emin's "Bed" is only a work of art within the context of the gallery system and art public that are willing to believe that A. Emin is an artist and B. Whatever the artist makes or says is art IS art.

Michelangelo's David is still a work of art if it were placed in a parking lot.

[Cioran]

Why do you belittle the works of Coombs? I find this painting very impressive. He used texture beautifully to evoke memory and melancholia.

5834_307004m.jpg

Well, what did I actually say about Coombs? That I found his work to be "trite," which I do. Is that belittling his work? I suppose.

But you see, there is a more important issue here. So I will be happy to try to engage with you on it, or anyone else.

You ask me why I belittle the work of Coombs. But belittled relative to what? Is his work good or bad? If so, relative to what?

Suppose this painting you linked to were the only painting ever made. Then I'd be appreciative and a bit awed that for the first time in history, someone had magically used paint to create the face of another human, and gussied it up with some decoration to boot.

But, of course, it's NOT the only painting ever made, is it? Art, like everything, exists in a context -- social, artistic, political, historical.

Before continuing, let me try to frame (heh) this art discussion differently. Suppose someone were to hand another person a random copy of the Readers' Digest and ask, "why do you belittle this?"

Well, does the other person belittle it? If it were the only book ever printed in human history, far from belittling it, I imagine that the other person would treasure it.

But, of course, it's not the only book ever written. We have the Readers' Digest in this corner. In this corner we have the complete works of 'Shakespeare. Now if person A who handed to person B the Reader's Digest were to ask a different question -- how do you rate the Readers' Digest in relation, to say, the complete works of Shakespeare? -- now this IS a different question, and there is likely to be a very different answer.

Surely there is some difference between the random Reader's Digest and the complete works of shakespeare? Or is there? I mean, they're both made of words, they're both printed on paper. Can we find no difference between them then?

[ftil]

Cioran, I don't think you can question ftil's idea of what is beautiful or ugly. Even though I find some disgusting images beautiful, still I cannot question his way of viewing things. The totality of one's experience influences his way of seeing and thinking; thus, his interpretation of a certain painting can be unique and solely his own--unless he hops on the bandwagon.

I am not sure if you mentioned he referring to ftil or somebody else. Just in case if you meant me, I am a female.

I never interpret paintings. It is very different to interpret paintings and to try to sit in the artist's head and making assumptions what the painter meant than expressing opinion about the theme of the painting or feelings that the painting evokes.

I am not a painter and I don’t discuss the technique but I appreciate talent. But talent is not enough. There are many talented artist who create disturbing art. I have discussed a few of them on the art thread and my search into their personal lives was quite revealing.

Finally, not everybody is capable of experiencing beauty. It is really sad.

[miyako73]

Watermelon to a produce vendor is a fruit, but to an African-American activist it is a symbol of racism.

Yet it is still a fruit.

This shows experience framing viewing/thinking.

This was Duchamp's argument: context is everything. But ultimately context only proves to be everything to art that is wholly dependent upon said context. Tracey Emin's "Bed" is only a work of art within the context of the gallery system and art public that are willing to believe that A. Emin is an artist and B. Whatever the artist makes or says is art IS art.

Michelangelo's David is still a work of art if it were placed in a parking lot.

I saw once a replica of David that pisses water in a garden. It was a water fountain.

Yes, like any painting, a watermelon is still a fruit but it has two different interpretations with two different points of reference.

If you really want to label my thinking as far as art criticism/appreciation is concerned, I'm more interested in Jung's collective unconscious, Frazer's cultural mythology, and Bodkin's archetypal patterns which, I believe, are what we all use in viewing an object. Some may like a painting with a lot of red in it because of their affinity towards the color that is meaningful to them. Others may hate a painting with a lot of black that symbolizes death. I do think archetypal criticism should have a place in visual/art studies, which is a field teeming with symbols, signs, and patterns.

[Cioran]

Finally, not everybody is capable of experiencing beauty. It is really sad.

Such irony. You have revealed yourself to be foreclosed to veritable continents of beauty. I agree, it really is sad. For you.

[miyako73]

Finally, not everybody is capable of experiencing beauty. It is really sad.

Not everybody has the same experience and the same view about beauty, and that's great.