ARTISTS (not ART)

Does anyone think that Artists have become more and more important than the work they create ?
For example , why would some one like damien hirst or tracey emmins ,to name the most famous, become more important than the so called art that nobody knows the titles of their work (sic),
artworks these days are being valued at auction house prices /sales as opposed to the actual skill /delft factor , I f hirst and his crew of talentless morons stuck a tenner on a board , one of their agents would sell it and defy the laws of inflation ,

I saw a trailer for a tv programme on this sort of subject. I think its on sunday called the curse of the mona lisa or something?

xx

THe curse of the mona lisa , saw it the other day , excelent programme , it certainly showed these fraudsters up for what they are ,

I'm of very much the same opinion as you Ed with regard to their 'work' - I found it hugely amusing when Tracey Emins tent went up in flames at the art storage depot - but on the flipside it was sad to hear of the legitimate works of art that also went up in the fire.

Also, I hate to admit this but I find Tracey Emins very funny and quite endearing - I like her offbeat personality (but I wouldn't buy any of her 'art' even if I did have the cash).

I agree with you pip , in that she is amusing ,in a kind of crackpot way , she claims it is autobiographical art ?, she had a tent with the names of all the people she slept with pinned on the inside , (that probably gave her the idea for her unmade bed ),
The fact that she was even considered for the tuner prize would have made old william mallard spin like a top in his grave.

What do you think about Grayson Perry since we're talking about the Turner Prize (I believe he won it with one of his 'pots' a couple of years ago)?

Probably as with Tracey Emins I find him, the artist/potter, interesting and enigmatic (not to mention brave and downright hilarious with his Shirley Temple cross-dressing stylie) but I'd not want to own one of his works.

I think he should be locked up , in a home for the bewildered , the art prog on chan 4 right now looks intersting .

big ed wrote:I think he should be locked up , in a home for the bewildered , the art prog on chan 4 right now looks intersting .

(can't watch the Art prog unfortunately, Her Maj is watching X-Factor before bed....)

I'm probably going to be shot down in flames, but I actually respect (and occasionally like) 'modern' art. Although it's not really terribly modern - after all, Marcel Duchamp's 'Fountain' dates to 1917.

Whether good or bad in its technical execution, it can't be denied that modern art provokes both thought and debate - even amongst people who wouldn't usually think about art - which is what, I feel, art should be about. Amazingly rendered landscapes and portraits, to some extent, can be just extensions of wallpaper and picture windows... pretty and decorative devices for filling blank walls.

Don't get me wrong - I admire pretty and decorative, and would much rather have it in my home than a big pickled shark... but the big pickled shark says much more about the meaning and role of art - to me - than, say, a bog-standard, pre-blindness, Turner landscape.

Incidentally, I really like the vase that won Grayson Perry the Turner - I'd definitely find room for it on my sideboard.

Of course you wouldn't be shot down in flames Nic! You put across some good arguments however I have a much simpler way of looking at art - if it's something I could do easily (i.e. chainsaw a cow in half, place a pile of bricks tidily in a pile or mess up a bed) then I find it extremely difficult to think of the creator as having a discernible artistic talent. For art to be worthy in my eyes, I really need to be impressed with a talent for something other than self-promotion and self-belief. Having said all that however I do find the current crop of modern artists very interesting and charismatic individuals.

Gilbert & George on the other hand I love. I went to an exhibition of their work in the early 1980s in Switzerland - at the time they were at the beginning of a new technique they'd pioneered which enabled them to use a lot of bright colours and they'd started individually framing each 'cell'. I was far from impressed at the time, it was all too bright and brash and the imagery was slightly disturbing to my inexperienced young mind however now I can look at their work with an entirely different perspective and although I'm still not very fond of the work they produced during that particular period there are periods where I consider their output to be outstanding.

And my previous statement applies - I'd not be able to easily reproduce their work and I can see an obvious talent!

Maybe the artistic talent is in conveying a message through the chosen medium. I believe that artistic talent is quite seperate from artistic craftsmanship.

A Chippendale table contains breathtaking craftsmanship, but conveys no message or emotion other than admiration for the skill that went into it, and for its aesthetic appeal. But it's not 'art' - it's 'craft'. This is how I tend to view all portraits, still lifes and landscapes that present amazing imagery with no substance.

Gilbert & George I'm in two minds about - whilst I often like their individual works, when taken as a whole it does seem very much like they've been churning out 'variations on a theme of Gilbert & George' for the last three or four decades. There was a documentary on them some time last year (or possibly the year before) and their art process has been streamlined into a digital process. They pretty much just load photos into Adobe and run them through pre-set filters that create their art more or less for them.

I think art is personal to the artist and also personal to each person who views art.
Someone can paint a rough picture that has no sign of skill or talent but it can still represent exactly how the person feels.
To say what is or isn't art can only be arrogance. IMHO

Then all critics of art are therefore arrogant.

only if they condemn the piece as not being art.
I think it's fair to say a piece was painted in a naive style or without formal training,or even that it has no commercial value.