Poll: Why, Modern Art? Why?

[Copter400]

You can start a new art movement, become a huge figure in popular culture and be remembered as a genius, but you can make just as much money pissing on a canvas. - Me, just now.

 

[Lord Krunk]

It depends. A lot of people are Picasso/Pollock imitators, but they fail miserably for one reason,

Meaning.

Art is supposed to have meaning, a hidden subtext that states the motive of creating the picture/whatever.

If you look hard enough, there is a lot of great modern art out there. But using a paintball gun on canvas does not count.

However, I personally prefer the classics.

"The Banquet of Cleopatra" is a great example. Just put "PWN3D!!!" over the picture and it would be damn fine Modern Art.

EDIT: Here it is. I'll post the story behind it if you want, but I will mention this: Mark Antony has EPIC FAIL vibes beaming out of him.

 

[Ruffythepirate]

I think modern art is art, because I like to think that should I ever come in guilt with some gangsters or something, I can just shit in a can and sell it.

 

[The Wooster]

You know I'd love to say modern art is misundertstood and only the most outrageous and worthless crap floats to the top like scum on a particularly filthy river but I'd be lying. It's all dogshit.

On an unrelated note. You can donate sperm for the following modern art project.

WHY [http://www.spermcube.org/]

 

[HuCast]

Modern art to me is nothing but a mess. When a urinal sells for 30k you know someone is out there easily manipulating the masses. A URINAL! How can that be 'art'?

What ever happened to landscapes and self portraits? Is there something wrong with them? Or does the modern in modern art really mean, a lazier generation?

Landscapes and self-portraits died with the invention of the camera!
Back in the old days,portraits were just some kind of "remittance work" and not seen as "art" at all. Asking artists to paint landscapes and portraits in the year 2008 is like asking George Lucas to produce black&White movies to reach the art-level of 'metropolis'.

 

[The Iron Ninja]

Modern art to me is nothing but a mess. When a urinal sells for 30k you know someone is out there easily manipulating the masses. A URINAL! How can that be 'art'?

What ever happened to landscapes and self portraits? Is there something wrong with them? Or does the modern in modern art really mean, a lazier generation?

Landscapes and self-portraits died with the invention of the camera!
Back in the old days,portraits were just some kind of "remittance work" and not seen as "art" at all. Asking artists to paint landscapes and portraits in the year 2008 is like asking George Lucas to produce black&White movies to reach the art-level of 'metropolis'.

So basically... Modern Art=Art without the challenge.

And I would watch that movie.

 

[Hey Joe]

I'm sensing that people are pissed off because modern art goes for so much money. Don't blame the artists, the vast, vast majority of modern artists (the ones you've probably never heard of) aren't doing it for the money. If someone evaluates it at 30k and then it sells at 30k, that's the fault of the consumer, not the artist.

Also, who the hell called modern artists lazy? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperrealism_(painting) Hyper-realists face the biggest challenge practically that any predecessors have had to face.

 

[OurGloriousLeader]

Of course it's art. Remember, 90% of everything is shit. The vast majority of modern art can be very easily mocked, as most of it is does by rich dicks who think they are saying something. But hey, guess what - it's the same for all art! There are plenty examples of modern art that are fantastic, either purely aesthetically or with deeper meaning. There are also plenty of films of a ballet dancer jumping up and down anked, in slow motion.

By your same example, films are not art. Most of them are just cheap, silly nonsense or pretentious wank. Most poems are crap. Most prose is rubbish. And yes, most art in the classical style is rubbish, or perhaps more damning, really really boring.

So, yes.

 

[Uncompetative]

As a general rule I have no patience for modern art.
If it's not a picture of something I can recognise, like say... A cow. Then I have no interest in it.

Here is some Modern Art you may like by Jean Debuffet:

I think everyone here needs to distinguish between Modern Art (i.e. post 1900) and Modern Conceptual Art.

Artist's still paint and sculpt representational works today, but unfortunately the Modern Art market seems to be obsessed with Conceptualism and very little else gets much media attention. Then, publicly funded institutions such as Tate Modern are run by Curators who also share this narrow taste, when they should be making purchases for the National collection that aren't merely today's hot fashion.

Don't forget Van Gogh didn't sell a painting in his lifetime. So, one of the most famous of artists that now attracts huge numbers to Museums wouldn't have been deemed suitable material to collect at the time he was around. Of course, this means that National Collections both in the UK and US are finding it increasingly difficult to buy a part of the historical cultural record of our times. So, this might help to explain why most of the work the OP saw in Tate Modern was crap.

Now, as a former student of Fine Art, I feel qualified to talk about this - but feel free to ignore my opinion as all art is subjective by nature.

I answered the Poll: Yes - slightly. This is because I accept that there is a lot of what I call novelty art that is abusing the loophole opened up by Marcel Duchamp (which, incidentally he didn't have the guts to sign with his own name when it was first exhibited). I've never like his re-contextualized 'readymade' (i.e. The Urinal) and would instead point everyone to this example of conceptual art which I believe to be not only better, but wittier and the final statement on the whole topic; rendering all 'me-too' artworks riding on the same conceptual 'coat-tails' unoriginal recapitulations of little cultural worth. After all, how many definitive cultural statements do you need?

Artist's Shit 1961 by Piero Manzoni
Merda d'artista

Here is some background on the artwork as well as some pictures of some of the proud owners of this work (one of which is wearing a white curators glove to preserve the value of his 'treasure') in 'Tate etc.' magazine (see: http://www.tate.org.uk/tateetc/issue10/excrementalvalue.htm ).

For those too lazy to click the link here is an executive summary:

"Your work is shit" - the Italian artist Piero Manzoni was allegedly told by his father. In response to this slur, he came up with the idea of canning his own excrement as a work of art...It was sold in cans by weight at gold's daily market price (becoming literally worth its weight in gold).

Despite my general distaste for conceptual art (it is it just is it generally isn't any good and there is far too much of it) I would quite like to own a can.

The most recent can to be auctioned, #19, sold on 26th February 2007 in the USA for $80,000.

"It is a joke, a parody of the art market, and a critique of consumerism and the waste it generates." (thanks to the Wikipedia)

 

[falcontwin]

Modern art seems to be a case of "I make a random object" then "I make up a really good story as to why my random object is art" arty types go oh yeah thats deep, non arty types go it's a fucking urinal. Arty types go "you just dont get it (even though they dont get it either)" therefore its art.

Art is subjective, but like most of modern culture it's been reduced to a point where it's just taking the piss and no one wants to admit that the joke isn't funny anymore.

So yeah an unmade bed is art, if you have a bullshit story to go with it.

 

[Trogd0r]

I can respect people's opinion on liking modern art, but I don't share them.

To me, art is something that took a long time to make, and is made with a lot of skill and creative vision.
I went to a modern art exposition a few months ago and I hated it.
12 separate tiny 10x10 paintings with nothing on them, just a tiny blob of paint.

It was worth thousands and thousands of euros, and at that point I just said: "fuck this shit".
I guess I just like my artists to have actual skill to be recognised as an artist.

 

[searanox]

What makes something art is intention, not always whether there is "beauty", "skill" and other qualities in the execution.

Oh.

Modern Art is actually an ongoing medium of dialogue between artists. What I mean is that usually artists are referencing a previous artist and responding or expressing their notion further. Without context or education of previous artistic movements don't expect to "get" modern art.

For example, Rothko's work just looks like simplistically colored walls, but when you understand the lineology of his work and how his placement of color fields is a further abstraction of Mondrian's work then you begin to understand his perspective.

And to anyone that thinks I am over reading into modern art and giving the artists too much benefit of the doubt (my father inlaw thought that was the case), go to any modern art museum and look at the order and placement of each subsequent section of work. Typically, each hall will be followed be a corresponding or responding art movement.

It's art, not drawings and if you don't educate yourself about it then expect to always be on the outside of the ever growing dialogue.

He already said it better. Yaay.

 

[Copter400]

On an unrelated note. You can donate sperm for the following modern art project.

And to think, it used to be a sign of the end of times when a baby was born with an extra finger.

 

[Johnn Johnston]

Ok, just to address an issue that has come up a few times in this thread - I have no problem with modern art if it has a meaning behind it, but that meaning shouldn't require you to find out how the artist was feeling at the time for it to be able to be enjoyed or for it to make any sense.

 

[BallPtPenTheif]

I think it's so comically ironic that such a massive portion of the Western population think they are clever, unique, and original for blasting modern art even though they don't (or can't) understand modern art.

Tell me about it...

It's like highschool allover again where the jocks shit on the smart kids turning real social value over on its own head.

I don't know how people think that they understand something better by not being educated about it or its context. That's the way most people are though, they empower their own ignorance to feel less ignorant.

 

[BallPtPenTheif]

Ok, just to address an issue that has come up a few times in this thread - I have no problem with modern art if it has a meaning behind it, but that meaning shouldn't require you to find out how the artist was feeling at the time for it to be able to be enjoyed or for it to make any sense.

Most modern aren't doesn't require you to be able to read the contents of the artist's brain. Context and cronology though, that's a different story. It's not like people are going out of their way to research this stuff just to "get it". In truth, it's the other way around. There are a group of people with this contextual information in their heads as general knowledge and the artist (being of similar mind) is appealing to himself and them.

I have only taken two art appreciation classes. Historical art in Highschool and Modern Art in College and I understand enough background behind most modern art. It doesn't take a PHD.

 

[Rankao]

It really depends, because a lot of it in order to understand it you must understand what the artist is trying to go for. Art is simply something made by man.