Amusing incident proves that modern perception of "Art" is crap

[General Ludd]

What's hard to understand is how you can generalize artists as being unable to speak without using jargon, despite having never actually talking to an artist about their work.

You're simply creating an excuse out of thin air in order to not engage in discussion about art.

[Tuberski]

Originally posted by General Ludd
What's hard to understand is how you can generalize artists as being unable to speak without using jargon, despite having never actually talking to an artist about their work.

You're simply creating an excuse out of thin air in order to not engage in discussion about art.

I didn't say they were unable, I said they are unwilling. You are a perfect example, I told you I didn't understand what Oncle Boris said, but did you even try to explain it?

No, you try to make this my fault, saying I'm using it as an excuse.

Until you, or anyone else, does you can not change my, admittedly, stereotypical beliefs regarding artists.

ACK!

[General Ludd]

Why should I explain what oncle boris said?

Why would you use his post, on an internet forum, as an excuse to dismiss the entire art world?


That's ridiculous. It's as if you expect every artist to come to your door and personally explain the work he's doing in order for it to be justified.

[Tuberski]

Originally posted by General Ludd
Why should I explain what oncle boris said?

Why would you use his post, on an internet forum, as an excuse to dismiss the entire art world?


That's ridiculous. It's as if you expect every artist to come to your door and personally explain the work he's doing in order for it to be justified.

I didn't use his post as an excuse, I used it as an example.

No, I don't expect any artist to come to my door and explain their work.

If I like the work, I like it, no matter why hecreated the work.

I may like it for an entirely different reason.

If you give me an unsolicited opinion with that artistic jargon that I don't understand, you better be willing to expalin it.

The only excuse I've heard for the use of jargon, is that it would be too difficult to explain it in plain word.

That is a very weak excuse.

ACK!

[Traianvs]

Originally posted by Arrian
I'm with Tubes on Jargon.

I love History. My best friend is currently working on his PhD in History at Brown. He occasionally shows me stuff he's reading (and writing, for that matter), and honestly, many of these academics really do go out of their way to use words that 99% of the population has never even seen before (or invent new ones) when normal words would work as well, or even better! It *is* pretentious. There really isn't any other explanation for it. I can't give you a specific example right now, so if you don't want to take my word for it, fine. But IMO, some people would rather try to show how smart they are by displaying their vocabulary, than actually discussing the topic.

-Arrian

God yes, it happens frequently that I don't understand too well what an author in another history/archaeology book is trying to say. And when I do find out, several pages later, I realize that the author has just written 3 pages of babble that could easily be explained in a single paragraph. No wonder some of these guys can publish this crap by the zillions. All you need is some creative use of language

EDIT: that and I might be too stupid to comprehend... of course

[Fake Boris]

Originally posted by Tuberski


The point is, it's still tedious. Because, again, using that slang with the layman, you are going to get either disinterest, because he finds what you say tedious, or you are going to have to explain things in simpler and, for you, more tedious terms anyway.

As far as "intellectual effort", I don't really think I need to learn a specialized vocabulary to enjoy a piece of art.

Art to me is more visceral, than intellectual. If an art piece doesn't move me emotionally, all the specialized jargon in the world isn't going to make me appriciate it more.

ACK!

Dude you are missing the point. I don't care what your personal tastes are. What I know for sure is that there are different levels of discourse on art, and that the fact some works are more hermetic and require a more informed interpretation does not mean it's not art.

Whether I am being tedious or not does not matter here, it's not the point being discussed.

[Tuberski]

Originally posted by Oncle Boris


Dude you are missing the point. I don't care what your personal tastes are. What I know for sure is that there are different levels of discourse on art, and that the fact some works are more hermetic and require a more informed interpretation does not mean it's not art.

Whether I am being tedious or not does not matter here, it's not the point being discussed.

I disagree with....somewhat. To me, if it requires a more"informed interpretation", then it is exclusionary. Art should be for the masses, not for a select few.

Whether or not you were being tedious does matter here. It is, in fact, the heart of the matter.

I know from your post that you probably know what you are talking about, mostly because I have no idea what you are talking about.

But this isn't an artist forum, where every one understands what you are saying. This is a gaming forum.

My point is that your post is more intimidating than it is informative.

ACK!

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Tuberski
I didn't say they were unable, I said they are unwilling. You are a perfect example, I told you I didn't understand what Oncle Boris said, but did you even try to explain it?

Clearly, all Finns are haughty. They don't even bother to translate their suomithreadis in English, even though the common man can't understand a word in them.

[Tuberski]

I didn't know he was a Finn. that explains it I guess.

ACK!

[Spiffor]

Err, he isn't

I just mean that Ludd should feel obligated to translate what Oncle Boris wrote. Just like no Finn should feel obligated to translate what's written in the Suomithreadis.

Also, not every professional will translate jargon words in layman terms. I have encountered quite a few specialists who were keen to impress me with big words. Laymanizing words is a matter of personality, not profession.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Tuberski


To explain it to me? An art simpleton? I rather doubt it.

Of course, in your example, I was in the Navy and we did have our own slang as you suggest. But I wouldn't use that slang with a civilian because I would want to be understood by the person I'm speaking to.

ACK!

But not all art critics use jargon or attempt to stay inside an art clique when they discuss art, whether it's contemporary art or the Old Masters or Modernism.

We're fortunate over here to have an occasional series on Channel 5 presented by an excellent critic called Tim Marlow. I'd say he's done a superb job of educating and popularizing art and artists, and his series occasionally ties in with exhibitions at the Tates Modern and Britain and the National Gallery and Royal Academy.

Incidentally, the Tate Modern always has young people (including schoolchildren) in it along with the Old Fogies like me, so it must be doing something right.

Tim Marlow is a writer, broadcaster, art historian and Director of Exhibitions at White Cube in London.

In 1993 he founded Tate: The Art Magazine. From 1991 to 1998 he presented Radio 4's arts programme Kaleidoscope, for which he won a Sony Award, and is currently a presenter of the World Service arts programme The Ticket.

As well as numerous arts programmes for Five, he presented a documentary on JMW Turner for BBC ONE . Other television work included presenting the now notorious Is Painting Dead? Debate for Channel Four in which artist, Tracy Emin, swore and shouted her way into British television history.

Tim Marlow is the author of various books including monographs of the French sculptor Auguste Rodin and the Austrian expressionist Egon Schiele as well as a survey of great artists published by Faber. He has written extensively on art and culture in the British press including the Times, the Guardian, the Independent on Sunday and Arena, Art Monthly and Blueprint magazines.

He is visiting lecturer at Winchester School of Art and an examiner on the Sculpture MA and former Creative Director of Sculpture at Goodwood.

http://www.sculpture.wsa.soton.ac.uk/tm.htm

It's as irrational and erroneous to say all art critics use jargon as it is to condemn with a broad brush all 'modern' art on the basis of one work.


As much as I enjoy modern art, I too distrust jargon and what appears to be deliberate obfuscation- in all fields of endeavour.

Private languages are sometimes just a way to keep the uninitiated or uninvited 'outside' (as in the Armed Forces) but are also occasionally a screen for those with nothing to show or say.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by molly bloom

But people had trouble with Schoenberg, Richard Strauss, Zemlinsky, Stravinsky....


Even now, I suspect most people prefer something pleasant and melodic to something atonal or chromatic.

Yeah, and theres abstract art thats "pleasant and melodic" and abstract art thats "atonal and chromatic", so to speak. The abstract/narrative distinction is different, I think from the accessible/difficult distinction. I mean really, whats more melodic and pleasant, a Calder mobile, or a work by Lucian Freud? In the same way that an abstract Mozart symphony is more "pleasant" and directly accessible, than, say, a Wagner opera that has plenty of non-musical reference. Even philistines can recognize that Mozart is accessible without being "about" something, om a way that Schoenberg is not, while they tend to group the most playful abstract works, say a Calder or Mondrian, with the most moody abstract expressionism.


I think its more than the philistines disliking difficulty. I took POTM, whose 14, to the Hirschorn not long ago, along with her 15 year old friend, and it was one long "this is cool" after another. They just looked at the stuff and decided what they liked to look, or thought must have been interesting to make. They were certainly NOT drawn to brooding or psychologically difficult works. However they had no particular preference that I can recall, for representative over abstract art.

Yet here we have people who are presumably adults, who feel a need to group all abstract art together.

I cant help but think that theres a greater emotional attachment to representation in art than in music - which I suspect has a lot to do with the role of representational art in Christianity prior to the age of mass literacy.


On readable art critics:

I would suggest Robert Hughes (he used to write for Time) "The Shock of the New" as an intro to 20th c art.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Spiffor

Clearly, all Finns are haughty. They don't even bother to translate their suomithreadis in English, even though the common man can't understand a word in them.

Huck Finn, by Mark Twain

'I told about Louis Sixteenth that got his head cut off in France long time ago; and about his little boy the dolphin, that would a been a king, but they took and shut him up in jail, and some say he died there.
"Po' little chap."
"But some says he got out and got away, and come to America."
"Dat's good! But he'll be pooty lonesome -- dey ain' no kings here, is dey, Huck?"
"No."
"Den he cain't git no situation. What he gwyne to do?"
"Well, I don't know. Some of them gets on the police, and some of them learns people how to talk French."
"Why, Huck, doan' de French people talk de same way we does?"
"No, Jim; you couldn't understand a word they said -- not a single word."
"Well, now, I be ding-busted! How do dat come?"
"I don't know; but it's so. I got some of their jabber out of a book. S'pose a man was to come to you and say Polly-voo-franzy -- what would you think?"
"I wouldn' think nuff'n; I'd take en bust him over de head -- dat is, if he warn't white. I wouldn't 'low no ****** to call me dat."
"Shucks, it ain't calling you anything. It's only saying, do you know how to talk French?"
"Well, den, why couldn't he say it?"
"Why, he is a-saying it. That's a Frenchman's way of saying it."
"Well, it's a blame ridicklous way, en I doan' want to hear no mo' 'bout it. Dey ain' no sense in it."
"Looky here, Jim; does a cat talk like we do?"
"No, a cat don't."
"Well, does a cow?"
"No, a cow don't, nuther."
"Does a cat talk like a cow, or a cow talk like a cat?"
"No, dey don't."
"It's natural and right for 'em to talk different from each other, ain't it?"
"Course."
"And ain't it natural and right for a cat and a cow to talk different from us?"
"Why, mos' sholy it is."
"Well, then, why ain't it natural and right for a Frenchman to talk different from us? You answer me that."
"Is a cat a man, Huck?"
"No."
"Well, den, dey ain't no sense in a cat talkin' like a man. Is a cow a man? -- er is a cow a cat?"
"No, she ain't either of them."
"Well, den, she ain't got no business to talk like either one er the yuther of 'em. Is a Frenchman a man?"
"Yes."
"Well, den! Dad blame it, why doan' he talk like a man? You answer me dat!" '

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by lord of the mark





On readable art critics:

I would suggest Robert Hughes (he used to write for Time) "The Shock of the New" as an intro to 20th c art.

Yes, I think he presents a very good overall view of the main movements of 20th Century art and the shakers and groovers.

I'd also heartily recommend his 'Nothing If Not Critical' and 'Culture Of Complaint'.

I still enjoy my copy of Harold Rosenberg's 'The Tradition Of The New' and Clement Greenberg's collected essays.

The British art critic Peter Fuller represents an interesting contrast to many of the more, ah, less grounded contemporary art critics. He died too young, but I do recommend 'Art And Pscyhoanalysis' by him, and anything else you can get your hands on, such as 'Beyond The Crisis In Art'.

He has had a series of memorial lectures in his name and a charitable foundation established.

[molly bloom]

Some non-modern art: