I want to destroy all art

[Tim Cornelis]

In high school I had 'art' as class in my curriculum, and I hated it. The obnoxious, pompous, snobbish art forms worth millions bothered me, and -- like my classmates -- angered me. Modern art is bullshit. A bunch of smudges, or just a plain red canvas qualifies as art.
One art movement kinda appealed to me though, futurism. Its call to destroy libraries and museums and such appealed to the inner-hipster in me, I suppose. When forced to go on a museum trip with school some years ago I was daydreaming about a few all-blacked dressed people coming in and just destroying the shit art, to me that's artistic. The temporariness of shit art, and its destruction to make way for something else. By art I mean in the 'classical' sense, paintings, busts, statutes -- not music, etc. The destruction of some supposedly important paintings by thieves from some Dutch museum was liberating.

http://dailyplateofcrazy.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/barnett-newman-whos-afraid-of-red-yellow-and-blue2.jpg
Fuck this piece of shit^

I want to destroy all expressions of art, as art.

[G4b3n]

I think the struggle against art is pretty low on the list to be honest, mainly because it is simply and expression of the things we struggle against.
If you hate contemporary art so much perhaps you should attempt to create some art from a working class perspective?
Surely destroying things that are expressions of institutions that will continue to exist is a fruitless venture.

[Consistent.Surprise]

Please explain how Futurism is so vastly superior & worthy of survival, where other movements fall short. Also, please elaborate on how Futurists were anti-library.

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

I think the struggle against art is pretty low on the list to be honest, mainly because it is simply and expression of the things we struggle against.

See, the thing is, that's reductionist as all hell. Art is, fundamentally, production, and, like all production, it's not simply the object that is produced, but the subject. The production of art produces the artist, as surely as work produces the worker. In the case of the vast majority of art it a particular petit-bourgeois type of relation (design might have a more proletarian character, but I'll come back to that). Point being, it's not simply an "expression", because the relationship between expression and expressed is dialectical: the struggle against art can't be separated from the struggle against the totality of capital of which it is an aspect.


If you hate contemporary art so much perhaps you should attempt to create some art from a working class perspective?

There's no point, insofar as art can be "working class" only in the positive sense of affirming the working class as-class-within-capital: a "negative art", an "art" of the class-for-itself which abolishes capitalist relations is impossible insofar as in abolishing capitalist relations the proletariat abolishes art.
Under present conditions, art is reformist.


Surely destroying things that are expressions of institutions that will continue to exist is a fruitless venture.EXACTLY!
Or, almost exactly, in that I think calling art "an expression" is akin to calling "commodity production" generally "an expression" - when in reality it's more fundamental than that.

[#FF0000]

destroy culture

I remember listening to a podcast awhile back featuring Eric Hobsbawm and a curator from some museum in London where they discussed the "decline and fall of the Avant Garde" that was pretty interesting.

I actually just found it on youtube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdMrh09zmW4

[Goblin]

That Barnett Newman painting appears to have something to do with the cold war.

But yeah, i agree, most modern art is shit.

[Rurkel]

I was daydreaming about a few all-blacked dressed people coming in and just destroying the shit art, to me that's artistic. The temporariness of shit art, and its destruction to make way for something else. By art I mean in the 'classical' sense, paintings, busts, statutes -- not music, etc.
Why not music, though? Most of what was said in this thread is surely applicable to it.

Also, I have the impression that all this "art" you deride in the OP is exactly an attempt to destroy and negate all previous types of art - though a failed attempt none the less. (Would "who's afraid of Red, Yellow and Blue" will gain in value, if painted over a Rembrandt? Discuss).


destroy culture
cultural revolution nao... smash all running dogs of Imperialists :mad:

[Skyhilist]

Haha I see where you're coming from on this one, art museums bore the living hell out of me.

On the other hand if this type of art somehow manages to inspire to people to do great things then I suppose it can justify its existence.

[Tenka]

Utilitarian views of art disturb me. Lately I've become one of those "art for art's sake" sorts of people. Art is a mode of individual expression. Is 'abstract expressionism' really art, though? It doesn't seem to express anything at all, and technically most small children are able to create visually comparable works. Maybe they can tell us what all is meant by the seemingly random lines and squares and splashes of colour (to speak only of paintings).

[Art Vandelay]

Why the fuck would anyone ever want to destroy art? You don't like it, then don't look at it. Pfh that was fucking simple, your problems solved.

[Os Cangaceiros]

One art movement kinda appealed to me though, futurism. Its call to destroy libraries and museums and such appealed to the inner-hipster in me, I suppose.

Didn't noted Futurists also yearn for the mass extermination of the lesser peoples in the "cleansing fire" of WW1, too?

Yes, what art is sold for is completely ridiculous. Yes, there are many things which I do not consider to be "art" (even though what is and isn't "art" as the word is commonly understood is a highly debatable topic, to say the least). But seriously, who gives a shit. I enjoy looking at pieces of artwork in museums & reading about their histories, especially religious pieces from several centuries ago, as well as some pop art (Lichtenstein, Rosenquist, etc) Even some art that was created specifically to sell a product is cool, like some of Alphonse Mucha's stuff.

As far as modern art goes, I don't like much of that stuff myself, but I get suspicious of people who rail against it too hard...reminds me too much of other heroes in the fight against degenerate art, like Hitler, Ayn Rand & Stalin :rolleyes:

The Dada movement was pretty cool though

[Rafiq]

I've always been fond of classical Roman art. Romantic art too. But I feel genuinely favorable towards socialist realism, especially in architecture and many sculpted works.

[Art Vandelay]

See, the thing is, that's reductionist as all hell. Art is, fundamentally, production, and, like all production, it's not simply the object that is produced, but the subject. The production of art produces the artist, as surely as work produces the worker. In the case of the vast majority of art it a particular petit-bourgeois type of relation (design might have a more proletarian character, but I'll come back to that). Point being, it's not simply an "expression", because the relationship between expression and expressed is dialectical: the struggle against art can't be separated from the struggle against the totality of capital of which it is an aspect.

Art isn't inherent to capital. If you want to talk about destroying the ways in which capital has wrapped its dirty little tentacles on 'art,' and used it to further its interests, that's one thing. But to decry the totality of art as an aspect of capital is foolish.

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

Why the fuck would anyone ever want to destroy art? You don't like it, then don't look at it. Pfh that was fucking simple, your problems solved.

The point isn't the objects themselves any more than it is when we talk about commodities. That's not to say it isn't about the objects, but it's also about their production, and their relation to the reproduction of capital. You're putting forward a line akin to, "If you don't like capitalism, stop buying things!" Art isn't art because it's pretty - I'm fucking beautiful - art is art because of its relationship to the artist and vice-versa. It's about expressions of petit-bourgeois consciousness in relation to capital as a whole . . . and it needs to be smashed.

[Art Vandelay]

The point isn't the objects themselves any more than it is when we talk about commodities. That's not to say it isn't about the objects, but it's also about their production, and their relation to the reproduction of capital. You're putting forward a line akin to, "If you don't like capitalism, stop buying things!" Art isn't art because it's pretty - I'm fucking beautiful - art is art because of its relationship to the artist and vice-versa. It's about expressions of petit-bourgeois consciousness in relation to capital as a whole . . . and it needs to be smashed.

I can't help but find this laughable. And once again, this fails to take into account the fact that art is in no way inherent to capital. Its existed since our pre-homosapien ancestors drew shit on cave walls.

[Os Cangaceiros]

TGDU, what the hell are you talking about?

[Trap Queen Voxxy]

Wot U got gainst abstractionism m8? U mad?

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

I can't help but find this laughable. And once again, this fails to take into account the fact that art is in no way inherent to capital. Its existed since our pre-homosapien ancestors drew shit on cave walls.

That's a wild anachronism, insofar as "art" can only be understood in its contemporary context. Sure, painting, writing, dance, music, sandwich making, architecture, pissing in snowbanks, etc. all precede capitalism . . . but art-as-it-now-exists has to be understood specifically. For wildly imperfect analogies, consider race (dark skinned people precede "blacks"), class (wage labour precedes capitalism), or sexuality (men fucking men precedes gayness).

Point being, we need to look at art as part of the capitalist totality, and not in an idealized form (that is, in the way it is conceived of by the petit-bourgeois consciousness which it both shapes and expresses).

Which means, yes, it's still OK to draw a pastel sunset and stick it to your fridge with a magnet. In fact, I recommend it.


TGDU, what the hell are you talking about?

This is what happens when you give your life to punk, and punk gives you back nothing but lingering addictions and the feeling you've been cheated.

[Os Cangaceiros]

A lot of your posts sounds like they were typed by Karl Marx, after he was forcibly abducted & subjected to intense brainwashing by a group of critical theory grad students

[Flying Purple People Eater]

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_vMlEcfTBzvs/S_22VOfKPRI/AAAAAAAAAXU/CJ50VyWB59Y/s400/129187736090215133.png

Here's a sample of beautiful modern art. Rather than drawing just another conformist old painting, this diligent artist who thinks outside the box instead decided to draw nothing at all! The pinnacle of human creativity!

http://hackedoffdaily.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/modern_art.jpg

[Consistent.Surprise]

A few pieces from the artists who wished to glorify war & objectification of women.

http://collegecritic.files.wordpress.com/2010/06/movements-futurism-boccioni-scupture.jpg

http://uploads6.wikipaintings.org/images/giacomo-balla/vortex-space-form-1914.jpg!Blog.jpg

And the manifesto of the Futurists:

http://vserver1.cscs.lsa.umich.edu/~crshalizi/T4PM/futurist-manifesto.html

I suggest you read the main points. 9 & 10 are a little more important IMO.

Now, the Dada. A fun group who shunned themselves as artists. Their manifesto (warning PDF):

http://www.mariabuszek.com/kcai/DadaSurrealism/DadaSurrReadings/TzaraD1.pdf

I have an art history degree. I have had to settle learning the fact that aesthetics vary. The strongest modern art in Detroit is currently:

https://m.facebook.com/GRCCDETROIT?id=100439420100523&refsrc=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F&_rdr

Street art is modern art. Modern art was named that because the avant garde were never going to give it up.

Art & taste are subjective but should always be free to exist. If you don't like a painting, walk the fuck away or click past it.

[bcbm]

i used to be all 'rahh fuck art' and love the dadaists and black mask/up against the wall motherfuckers and other anti-art avant garde groups but not so much any more. i still appreciate their art (oh cruel fate) and aesthetics but i have a much more general appreciation of art now than i used to. i really enjoy art museums and visited one recently where i saw the '30 americans (http://www2.corcoran.org/30americans/artists)' exhibit, which i encourage everyone here to check out.

i generally like most art these days or at least enjoy viewing it. i think even boring paintings of rich fucks from the 16th century can be admired for the detail in the work or what they unintentionally say about that society. i can appreciate the impressionists and their enemies from the state sanctioned arts at the same time.


Modern art is bullshit. A bunch of smudges, or just a plain red canvas qualifies as art.

this is a really, really, really, really narrow view of what modern art is. and even in 'smudges or a plain red canvas' there can be beauty or interesting ideas. or not, but there is plenty of other shit out there.

[Trap Queen Voxxy]

http://25.media.tumblr.com/14076835a2c32cf0415b3abe424e0222/tumblr_mlgswldzf71s8bpaio1_500.jpg

[DasFapital]

It's art until proles do it on the outside of a business. Then it becomes vandalism.

[Decolonize The Left]

Wow. I'm not sure many people understand what art is.

Art doesn't have to be (and in my opinion shouldn't be) a commodity at all. Plenty of quality art is made for no sake other than to make it and is shared with some people, everyone, or no one. Art isn't what's in museums, galleries, or whatever (it is, but it's not just there). Art is everywhere and plenty of people are artists who aren't 'recognized' as such.

Furthermore, your personal tastes in art are just that, your personal tastes. Plenty of people will like what you hate and vice versa. The whole notion that just because you think a bunch of 'modern art' sucks that hence art sucks as a whole is ridiculous.

This thread is silly.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Wow. I'm not sure many people understand what art is.yeah, but I think people are speaking of art in different ways; there's creativity, art as you describe it, and then there's the Artist and the Art World as I think GDU is describing.

Art in feudalism was a skill, a craft and treated as such. Art in capitalism is like this mystical thing that supposedly exists outside of class society. Art is segregated for specific purposes and situations because creativity is stripped from all other crafts and made into interchangeable and rationalized capitalist production.

This is actually why I favor modern art over earlier capitalist art periods because I think they were actually interested in taking on these contradictions. Po-mo does too, but I think less confidently and more pessimistically and cynically.

This is short and interesting and it made me reconsider some of my views on art. 9.5 theses on Art and class: http://www.benadavis.com/documents/9.5%20theses%20on%20Art%20and%20Class%20%202011-10-25.pdf

[Rafiq]

Even when art is not directly a commodity, it still is likely to express bourgeois ideology.

[Misericordia]

So much teenage angst OP. And I don't even think you are a teenager anymore.

[Consistent.Surprise]

Even when art is not directly a commodity, it still is likely to express bourgeois ideology.

Will you explain how it is still likely to? I think one could say that about commissioned pieces but those are still not 100% bourgeois ideology

[IllumiNaughty]

Wow Are you serious? Dont freakin look at it if you dont like it or make your own! There are innumerable types of art not just the smudges and random bullshit kind. Art is an expression of being a human. You must be a sad man.

[Decolonize The Left]

Even when art is not directly a commodity, it still is likely to express bourgeois ideology.

8c_UdWo4Zek
VwcKwGS7OSQ

Bourgeois ideology?

[bcbm]

anti-establishment views are another niche market the man is happy to sell to you.

[Consistent.Surprise]

anti-establishment views are another niche market the man is happy to sell to you.

But not always the man. Or, if sold by the man, the artist may be, in fact, harshly mocking the man. Rivera's Detroit industry as an example. Paid by the son of anti union, anti Semitic, Henry Ford to depict Detroit labor by a communist. A well known communist. Selling out? Or enlightening the masses to come? Is this détournement?

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detroit_Industry_Murals

(This is the best I can do from my phone)

[synthesis]

This might not be relevant, but I'd say that the reason that some people are able to sell a blank/one-color canvas (or some other ridiculous example) for $40,000 is their ability to talk about art to other people who like to talk about art, not anything intrinsic to the work itself. An unfortunate collision of creative impulses with the culture of capital.

[Os Cangaceiros]

Even artists who hold views that I don't necessarily agree with, and voice their views obviously through their work, those people can sometimes create awesome art IMO.

One of my favorites being Fritz Eichenberg, a Catholic pacifist:


http://library.guilford.edu/files/2011/10/2000.1.1.jpg

http://designarchives.aiga.org/assets/images/000/020/480/20480_lg.jpg

[Os Cangaceiros]

Been waiting for an excuse just to turn this thread into a "what art do you like" thread

[bcbm]

But not always the man. Or, if sold by the man, the artist may be, in fact, harshly mocking the man. Rivera's Detroit industry as an example. Paid by the son of anti union, anti Semitic, Henry Ford to depict Detroit labor by a communist. A well known communist. Selling out? Or enlightening the masses to come? Is this détournement?

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detroit_Industry_Murals

(This is the best I can do from my phone)

the man is happy to be mocked, so long as there is profit to be made. and a double purpose is served for by his endorsement the man effectively neuters the content of such material

[Consistent.Surprise]

the man is happy to be mocked, so long as there is profit to be made. and a double purpose is served for by his endorsement the man effectively neuters the content of such material

No profit when in a city museum. Edsel isn't in the mural. He commissioned, not paid (my error).

Come see this piece. Four walls. All done in Rivera's style. Including Frieda's miscarriage. Come. See this piece that can't be sold.

[bcbm]

No profit when in a city museum. Edsel isn't in the mural. He commissioned, not paid (my error).

Come see this piece. Four walls. All done in Rivera's style. Including Frieda's miscarriage. Come. See this piece that can't be sold.

i've seen pictures of it, i think it is a great piece.

[Creative Destruction]

street art can be liberating. also, i enjoy art nouvea quite a bit. there were some good working class artists and movements that came out of that.

[Creative Destruction]

also, the mexican muralists are awesome.

[argeiphontes]

Art cannot be destroyed.

[Rugged Collectivist]

Please explain how Futurism is so vastly superior & worthy of survival, where other movements fall short.

Because their stuff was cool.


Also, please elaborate on how Futurists were anti-library.

"We want to demolish museums and libraries" - Futurist manifesto


Didn't noted Futurists also yearn for the mass extermination of the lesser peoples in the "cleansing fire" of WW1, too?

Yes.


As far as modern art goes, I don't like much of that stuff myself, but I get suspicious of people who rail against it too hard...reminds me too much of other heroes in the fight against degenerate art, like Hitler, Ayn Rand & Stalin :rolleyes:

Hitler said it so it must automatically be wrong.


A few pieces from the artists who wished to glorify war & objectification of women.

http://collegecritic.files.wordpress.com/2010/06/movements-futurism-boccioni-scupture.jpg

http://uploads6.wikipaintings.org/images/giacomo-balla/vortex-space-form-1914.jpg!Blog.jpg

And the manifesto of the Futurists:

http://vserver1.cscs.lsa.umich.edu/~crshalizi/T4PM/futurist-manifesto.html

I suggest you read the main points. 9 & 10 are a little more important IMO.

See above.

[Sasha]

I'm an artist, come at me bro...

Yeah, like already said, that some or maybe even most dominant art is shite doesn't mean all art is useless. Though I have to admit that my yearly visits to the graduation exhibition of the art school here plays heavily on my inner populist reactionary. Last year an "my 5 year old nephew can do that better" actually escaped me. But there are still pearls among the dirt.
Esp now people start to move away from the whole conceptual bullshittery back towards artisan skills..

[Consistent.Surprise]

OP, you do also realize they were pro-oppression of women? A need to glorify war? To be patriotic?

Their art was awesome but their manifesto speaks for what their intentions truly were as men; misogynists who wanted to drive fast cars (so in 1905, means they went, what, 30 mph?)

[Consistent.Surprise]

street art can be liberating. also, i enjoy art nouvea quite a bit. there were some good working class artists and movements that came out of that.

Come to Detroit! We have tons (not just tagging) of street art plus the world known Heidelberg project

http://www.heidelberg.org/m/

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Italian futurists were, mostly, reactionary and proto-fascistic. So was, for that matter, their Romantic arch-nemesis D'Annunzio. That doesn't simply mean that we can dismiss Futurism and its emphasis on modern life, something that is woefully absent from much of modern art. And besides, other futurist movements, the one in Russia for example, were much cleaner when it comes to politics.

[Os Cangaceiros]

Hitler said it so it must automatically be wrong.

Did Hitler possess some brilliant insights that I'm missing out on?

[Thirsty Crow]

Didn't noted Futurists also yearn for the mass extermination of the lesser peoples in the "cleansing fire" of WW1, too?

Russian and Italian futurism. Big difference, with a big commonality - to hell with art (as art).

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

Just for the record, I'm more into "shitty"/weird post-modern not-/art (dicks drawn mailboxes, this (https://hurricaneparty0.wordpress.com/2013/08/28/storming-the-breach-a-guide-to-the-2013-hurricane-season/), Miss Chief Eagle Testickle) than I am into formally "revolutionary art". Not to downplay the contribution of "revolutionary artists" to struggles, but I think their "art" is valuable in spite of its "artistic" character.
Like, let's approach art as we approach work - we understand that certain activities which are now socially work will continue in a communist society, but will cease to be work insofar as definite "work" is premised on alienated labour. So, of course we will still continue to produce "stuff", but it will be stuff-without-value, insofar as communism abolishes value-as-such (use and exchange value being, for all practical purposes, impossible to untangle concretely, even if use can be understood definitely). We need to look at art this way in order to develop a critique of it (because, c'mon, obvs. we do need a critique of art, insofar as it plays a definite social role in relation to capital). For this reason we need to back off from positing certain activities/objects as art (a mural is art, a sneaker is not; a sculpture is art, a glass of orange juice is not; art is special, everything else is banal), and . . .

Attack alienated art as we attack alienated labour!
The only hope for artists is in their self-realization and transcendence!
The historical task of artists is their realization in their abolition!

[Sasha]

http://s16.postimg.org/is0cbx1c5/uatwmf_2.jpg

[d3crypt]

The OP sounds like a Nazi. Wanting to destroy art?! :( fuck you man!

[Sasha]

what i just posted is from blackmask issue 3, januari 1967 btw, full anthology here: https://secure.pmpress.org/index.php?l=product_detail&p=255

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

The OP sounds like a Nazi. Wanting to destroy art?! :( fuck you man!

1. Augh, did you really need to bring the Nazis into this?
2. On the contrary, the Nazis were artists par excellence. If you haven't seen The Architecture Of Doom (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fnu_5zXsB7A), about the Nazi aesthetic project, I recommend it.

[Tolstoy]

I honestly think Socialist Realism was shit compared to current modern art. At least this new art expresses some idea (regardless of how hackish the form) rather than merely giving the upper class party members a blowjob

[Rafiq]

8c_UdWo4Zek
VwcKwGS7OSQ

Bourgeois ideology?

At times of intensified class struggle, or stronger proletarian power, the proletariat is given the necessary space to produce it's own art. It happens today too, but it is almost unnoticeable. All I mean is that art doesn't exist in a vacuum.

[argeiphontes]

Yeah, compare Socialist Realism to the Constructivist (IIRC) art coming out of the early Soviet Union, like Rodchenko.

[d3crypt]

1. Augh, did you really need to bring the Nazis into this?
2. On the contrary, the Nazis were artists par excellence. If you haven't seen The Architecture Of Doom (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fnu_5zXsB7A), about the Nazi aesthetic project, I recommend it.

The Nazis are infamous for destroying art. I'm sorry for doing ad hitlerum reducto. But thats what it feels like to me. I love art, so when people talk about destroying art i get really pissed off. It sounds like reactionary bullshit to me. Thanks for recommending that video. I will get around to watching it

[Sea]

In high school I had 'art' as class in my curriculum, and I hated it. The obnoxious, pompous, snobbish art forms worth millions bothered me, and -- like my classmates -- angered me. Modern art is bullshit. A bunch of smudges, or just a plain red canvas qualifies as art.
One art movement kinda appealed to me though, futurism. Its call to destroy libraries and museums and such appealed to the inner-hipster in me, I suppose. When forced to go on a museum trip with school some years ago I was daydreaming about a few all-blacked dressed people coming in and just destroying the shit art, to me that's artistic. The temporariness of shit art, and its destruction to make way for something else. By art I mean in the 'classical' sense, paintings, busts, statutes -- not music, etc. The destruction of some supposedly important paintings by thieves from some Dutch museum was liberating.

Fuck this piece of shit^

I want to destroy all expressions of art, as art.I think you're trying to hate the mystic fetishization and accidentally you end up hating art.

Oh well, easy mistake to make.

[Ocean Seal]

Nonsense if you are against the expressions of wealth of the bourgeoisie you must realize that every section of consumerism has some ridiculously overpriced bourgeois niche.
IE: Designer Clothes
High Art
Luxury Cars
Old Wine
etc.

[TaylorS]

I pretty much despise most "abstract" art as pretentious crap made for the adoration of a narrow clique of cultural mandarins.

Give me a nice Impressionist painting, please.

[TaylorS]

anti-establishment views are another niche market the man is happy to sell to you.

Like Che t-shirts and "hippie" stuff.

[TaylorS]

Yeah, compare Socialist Realism to the Constructivist (IIRC) art coming out of the early Soviet Union, like Rodchenko.

Soviet art before Stalin stifled it was incredible. It is as if the revolution unleashed huge creative energies.

[Ceallach_the_Witch]

I pretty much despise most "abstract" art as pretentious crap made for the adoration of a narrow clique of cultural mandarins.



Thanks for that, "Cultural Mandarin" will look good on my CV. Do I get a fancy uniform?

[Kalinych]

This is what happens when you give your life to punk, and punk gives you back nothing but lingering addictions and the feeling you've been cheated.
This is the best thing I've read all day and also the most accurate description of Punk I've ever read. Mind if I quote you in my sig?

[heylelshalem]

whatever the medium of art i dont mind it..IF i feel my soul has been enriched in the long run. Good art is food for the soul, bad art is like horrible junk food laden with GMO's and wierd fake chemicals. :lol:

[TruProl]

There is an inherent tendency to destruction that surrounds this way of thinking that I think is damaging because people cannot control themselves. Of course abstract art is crap but then what's to stop these same people start saying that Van Gough's Starry Night is a piece of shit because it's not realistic.

A more moderate position is to take these piece of shit artworks, stick them back in the artists homes to do what they like with them and then get some decent works up that the common person can enjoy rather than start torching down art galleries.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

There are I feel two things people forget when they rail against art for it's perceived "snobbishness" (in the case of "high art") or "meaninglessness" (in the case of modernist or abstract art).

The first is that "high art" that manages to survive the centuries is an enduring material link to the past that we all share. The Mona Lisa, to give a classic example, is a genuine product of its time, and that fact is embodied within it. Destroy that and you're pretty much literally destroying history. I am of the opinion that those who want to efface and/or destroy history wish to do so for reasons that are ultimately mendacious, even if while doing so they claim to be uplifting humanity.

The second, which is especially relevant to modernist or abstract art, is that someone who views a piece of art or who listens to a work of music is just as much an active participant in the artistic process as the painter or composer. That which might look like a bunch of random scribblings, are a canvas upon which one paints one's own preconceptions and view of the world. What one sees (or claims to see) tells us just as much about the subject as it does the object. By not dictating to the viewer exactly what they see by merely providing a photo-realistic production, a space is opened up for the viewer to bring their own interpretation to the work in question.

I too am a believer in "art for art's sake", because creative expression is an integral part of humanity; stifle that, and we are all dehumanised in various ways.

[argeiphontes]

The second, which is especially relevant to modernist or abstract art, is that someone who views a piece of art or who listens to a work of music is just as much an active participant in the artistic process as the painter or composer.

This is a good insight. To back to the beginning of the thread, I had no comprehension of Barnett Newman until I saw Vir Heroicus Sublimus in real life. I don't remember what the insight was anymore ;) but it was there--that's what he wanted you to do, stand in front of it and participate in it.

"Those who danced were thought to be quite insane by those who could not hear the music.”

[bcbm]

I pretty much despise most "abstract" art as pretentious crap made for the adoration of a narrow clique of cultural mandarins.

Give me a nice Impressionist painting, please.

i think this comment is pretty funny because in their day the impressionists (a slur, originally) were often derided for their abstraction and almost universally scorned. now they are pretty pedestrian as far as art goes.


Of course abstract art is crap

well this is a rather broad statement that casts many important artists to the dustbin. 'of course?' hardly. abstraction has always been a feature of human artwork and its prominence in 20th century art was an interesting and stimulating development that has produced some of the greatest works of that century.

http://weareugn.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/picasso-guernica.jpg
'crap'

[Tenka]

The second, which is especially relevant to modernist or abstract art, is that someone who views a piece of art or who listens to a work of music is just as much an active participant in the artistic process as the painter or composer. That which might look like a bunch of random scribblings, are a canvas upon which one paints one's own preconceptions and view of the world. What one sees (or claims to see) tells us just as much about the subject as it does the object. By not dictating to the viewer exactly what they see by merely providing a photo-realistic production, a space is opened up for the viewer to bring their own interpretation to the work in question.

This directly contradicts what Oscar Wilde insinuates of art and therefore I disagree. How is it expression if the viewer is expected to interpret it from the chaos of its form? If you see a face in the smoke does that make the smoke art? I don't think so.

Music without lyrics can be nice to listen to, and it's art because someone produced it as a mode of expression that can please the listener--not because it means anything in particular to the listener. I don't know who finds people speaking in tongues pleasing to listen to, except Christian loonies; likewise I don't know who finds random shapes and colours and squiggles on a canvas pleasing to look at, except proud mothers and... I don't know what to call those others.

[argeiphontes]

likewise I don't know who finds random shapes and colours and squiggles on a canvas pleasing to look at, except proud mothers and... I don't know what to call those others.

Well, my not understanding something doesn't mean it's not saying anything interesting or important. A lot of these works are self-referential, they're either about art, its perception, or even the materials themselves. Nobody is forcing anybody else into the museum ;)

[bcbm]

likewise I don't know who finds random shapes and colours and squiggles on a canvas pleasing to look at, except proud mothers and... I don't know what to call those others.

'art lovers'

[Kush Brannigan]

Yes, modern art is absolute shit. But, you want to destroy libraries and stuff like that? I am a little confused. Was this just a mindless rant, or...?

I do agree about destroying modern art though, so if you were ONLY talking about modern art, I'd agree.

[bcbm]

where is the line drawn on 'modern art?' anything after 1900? 1950? the past ten years?

[bcbm]

http://www.deitch.com/files/artists/wiley_work_feat.jpg
'absolute shit'

[Tenka]

where is the line drawn on 'modern art?' anything after 1900? 1950? the past ten years?

According to Wikipedia, "Modern Art" is far too broad for me to hate. There are some pretty competent oil paintings that fall within the scope ("1860s to 1970s").

I just really detest Abstract Expressionism.

[bcbm]

According to Wikipedia, "Modern Art" is far too broad for me to hate. There are some pretty competent oil paintings that fall within the scope ("1860s to 1970s").

I just really detest Abstract Expressionism.

i can get down with it. and even if you don't like it that is no reason to destroy in it. i don't really care whether people appreciate 'this or that,' beyond when they make overly broad statements that are stupid, but destroying it seems absurd.

[Thirsty Crow]

I just really detest Abstract Expressionism.
That would be a very narrow scope indeed (and mostly an American, post WW2 phenomenon I think).

I dig what is called figurative expressionism (obviously as a kind of counter-point to abstract expressionism; though, it's hard to see what's abstract about Jackson Pollock, it's aleatorics; it's also very different from the likes of Kandinsky)


i can get down with it. and even if you don't like it that is no reason to destroy in it. i don't really care whether people appreciate 'this or that,' beyond when they make overly broad statements that are stupid, but destroying it seems absurd.
The notion of the destruction of art comes from the historical avant-garde movements and groups, mostly from their manifestos, especially in relation to Italian and Russian futurism. It's not meant as a literal call for the destruction of cultural artifacts, but as a provocative statement which aims at the abolition of tradition as an active force (think of Joyce's Stephen Dedalus and the idea of history as a nightmare from which it is impossible to wake) which hampers and stifles living creativity.

In its more developed forms it is almost literally tied to the bourgeois world, meaning that the program of the avant-garde becomes the eradication of art as an autonomous, useless sphere of social life, and its reintegration into a new kind of life praxis.

[argeiphontes]

What about an argument from efficiency? MGD64 is crap but it's not worth the effort to spill it all into the gutter. Anybody who wants to catch a mediocre buzz on an entire case of beer is welcome to it. ;)

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

This directly contradicts what Oscar Wilde insinuates of art and therefore I disagree.

And what does Oscar Wilde insinuate?


How is it expression if the viewer is expected to interpret it from the chaos of its form? If you see a face in the smoke does that make the smoke art? I don't think so.

If the smoke was created deliberately, then it could very well be. Just because there is artistic expression going on doesn't mean that the nature of that expression has to be immediately obvious to the viewer. Indeed, it would be rather boring if all artworks were so blatant about the intentions of their creator. I think a certain degree of mystery in that respect can have an artistic purpose.

Even photo-realistic productions are subject to some interpretation on the part of the viewer, as they might not fully understand the meaning or significance of the scene thus depicted. If you don't know who King Louis XIV (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Louis_XIV_of_France.jpg) is, then his portrait is just some picture of a long-dead foreign nob with a questionable taste in fashion.


Music without lyrics can be nice to listen to, and it's art because someone produced it as a mode of expression that can please the listener--not because it means anything in particular to the listener.

Well here's where the importance of subjective interpretation comes into play, because music without lyrics does have a meaning to me; such music calls up different images into my mind depending on what kind it is. Certain tunes are associated with certain memories. Dark music heralds dark thoughts, and uplifting music send my spirit soaring. Music can be meaningful without having to spell it out in anything so crass as actual words.


I don't know who finds people speaking in tongues pleasing to listen to, except Christian loonies; likewise I don't know who finds random shapes and colours and squiggles on a canvas pleasing to look at, except proud mothers and... I don't know what to call those others.

Christians speaking in tongues do not, as far as I am aware, do so for the purposes of artistic expression. It's supposed purpose is to show that the speaker is somehow touched by the divine or something like that. If I thought that a collection of random shapes and colours and squiggles was good-looking enough, or I thought I could see something interesting in there, I'd hang it up on my wall. Not all artistic expression has to be freighted with meaning; it can be purely decorative as well.

[bcbm]

The notion of the destruction of art comes from the historical avant-garde movements and groups, mostly from their manifestos, especially in relation to Italian and Russian futurism. It's not meant as a literal call for the destruction of cultural artifacts, but as a provocative statement which aims at the abolition of tradition as an active force (think of Joyce's Stephen Dedalus and the idea of history as a nightmare from which it is impossible to wake) which hampers and stifles living creativity.

like i said earlier i come from a very dadaist view of 'art' and appreciation of the 'destruction of art' as such but the sad truth is that the futurist, dadaist, surrealist, etc 'revolt against art' is now considered another chapter in the history of 'art' and not much of a destruction as such. which is fine by me, i like the dadaists and i like all the art they were raging against. i just have an issue with those who take their call to an iconoclastic extremism. maybe you think 'modern/abstract art' is crap, but that doesn't justify its destruction or deny its historical significance.


In its more developed forms it is almost literally tied to the bourgeois world, meaning that the program of the avant-garde becomes the eradication of art as an autonomous, useless sphere of social life, and its reintegration into a new kind of life praxis.

a project that should always be pushed forward but that does not deny the stillbirths along the way

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

You know, I was really started to enjoy this forum... But then I saw this thread.

Thanks for ruining it!

There have been various different opinions expressed in this thread, so what exactly do you mean by this?

[The Feral Underclass]

I haven't read all of this thread, so apologies if I'm repeating what others have already said:


Modern art is bullshit.

You mean modern art that challenged bourgeois conceptions of acceptability, morality and social and economic inequality? The modern art that championed communism, was anti-war, pro-feminist and anti-fascist?


One art movement kinda appealed to me though, futurism.

The movement most associated with fascism and the oppression of women?


A bunch of smudges, or just a plain red canvas qualifies as art.

There are a few problems with this kind of criticism. Firstly, it's just lazy and really what it comes down to is taste. You just don't like art that doesn't confirm to a certain set of standards. This is not a new criticism. Most traditionalists were making these criticisms when the art was first created and modernism first took its stride into the world.

Secondly, this criticism is void of history. You might not like something that is just a bunch of red smudges, but what do those red smudges actually mean in the context of human history? When art was predominately about academia and precision; where art conformed to a set of rigid expectations and standards, getting a large canvas and putting red smudges on it would be an incredibly radical thing to do. Duchamp's Fountain, for example, was seen as being incredibly scandalous and obscene. You can't just attach a urinal to a wall and call it art!!! Now, of course, it's just a Fountain on a wall, what's the big deal? At the time it was a direct assault on art itself, rejecting all assumptions and preconceptions about what art is and should be and should look like . It challenged the establishment and proposed a new way of understanding -- was that bullshit? Are we to follow your argument to its conclusion, which to me seems to indicate that art should just stay where it is -- In that case we should just go back to drawing stick figures in caves.

Thirdly, the art that you are referring to is only really modern art by a decade at the most. Modernism spanned almost a 100 years of art (the piece of art you linked was made 4 years before modernism was over, so it seems pretty narrow-minded to reject an entire century old movement based on something produced in its dying years): What about the impressionists, arguably the first modernists, who were just as scandalous and obscene as Duchamp for suggesting that art was transient -- that the canvas was something that could be used to capture ephemeral moments rather than structured, pre-defined forms. Monet's attempts to capture ever changing light by continuously painting the same thing over and over again through a single day was a revelation, it was crude and improper. That might seem like bullshit now, but at the time it changed the face of art forever.

Every assumption about art that you have now, every freedom and principle and idea that people have about art in this contemporary setting is because of modernists and their courage at painting red smudges. We should show them a little more respect.

[The Feral Underclass]

Also, what constitutes smudges? Why is this [futurist piece of art] any less smudgy than something else?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/12/GBallaArt.jpg

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

I like Futurism, or at least the Futurist aesthetic. Streamlined vehicles, shiny modern buildings, a world of chrome and steel and concrete where unalloyed function produces starkly beautiful form. I'm a bit of a sucker for that kind of artifice.

[robbo203]

In high school I had 'art' as class in my curriculum, and I hated it. The obnoxious, pompous, snobbish art forms worth millions bothered me, and -- like my classmates -- angered me. Modern art is bullshit. A bunch of smudges, or just a plain red canvas qualifies as art.
One art movement kinda appealed to me though, futurism. Its call to destroy libraries and museums and such appealed to the inner-hipster in me, I suppose. When forced to go on a museum trip with school some years ago I was daydreaming about a few all-blacked dressed people coming in and just destroying the shit art, to me that's artistic. The temporariness of shit art, and its destruction to make way for something else. By art I mean in the 'classical' sense, paintings, busts, statutes -- not music, etc. The destruction of some supposedly important paintings by thieves from some Dutch museum was liberating.
I want to destroy all expressions of art, as art.

I sympathise with these sentiments to a great extent. However, there is art and then there is "art". I'm surprised no one has mentioned anything (unless I missed it) about that great 19th century socialist. William Morris, who had very strong views on the subject of art. There is a pamphlet of his called "Art, Labour & Socialism" which was long ago publiushed by the SPGB along with a modern assessment. The link is here

http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/pamphlets/art-labour-and-socialism


Morris railed against the commercialisation and festishisation of art. His view was very much the artisan's view of art as craft labour or as he put it “Art is man’s expression of his joy in labour."

This is what art should be about and what makes it so important in our lives - not the poncy pretentiousness of so much (but not all!) modern art which is really just an elaborate piss take. It is more about social positioning and name dropping as a way of clamouring up the greasy pole of illusory artistic merit in pursuit of the big bucks.

It does not lead to the enrichment of our lives but it certainly enriches some and in a fashion that bears remarkable similarities with a sort of ponzi scheme to hoodwink the general public

[Comrade Jacob]

Calm down Rand, you want to destroy all art? Just because some (most) of it is talentless cliché bullshit? Now I agree that art should never be worth millions, it should be worth the amount of time it took to make. So that line you showed would be worth 1 minute. (I know I'm talking in pure communism here). Some abstract art is good and some art is good. If you want to destroy all art you'll have to destroy all music, all literature, all filmography etc. Let's not go mental.

[Paul Pott]

Common sense would seem to imply art is like anything else. In bourgeois society it generally comes to serve bourgeois ends.


Also:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Brassau

[Tim Cornelis]

I haven't read all of this thread, so apologies if I'm repeating what others have already said:



You mean modern art that challenged bourgeois conceptions of acceptability, morality and social and economic inequality? The modern art that championed communism, was anti-war, pro-feminist and anti-fascist?



The movement most associated with fascism and the oppression of women?



There are a few problems with this kind of criticism. Firstly, it's just lazy and really what it comes down to is taste. You just don't like art that doesn't confirm to a certain set of standards. This is not a new criticism. Most traditionalists were making these criticisms when the art was first created and modernism first took its stride into the world.

Secondly, this criticism is void of history. You might not like something that is just a bunch of red smudges, but what do those red smudges actually mean in the context of human history? When art was predominately about academia and precision; where art conformed to a set of rigid expectations and standards, getting a large canvas and putting red smudges on it would be an incredibly radical thing to do. Duchamp's Fountain, for example, was seen as being incredibly scandalous and obscene. You can't just attach a urinal to a wall and call it art!!! Now, of course, it's just a Fountain on a wall, what's the big deal? At the time it was a direct assault on art itself, rejecting all assumptions and preconceptions about what art is and should be and should look like . It challenged the establishment and proposed a new way of understanding -- was that bullshit? Are we to follow your argument to its conclusion, which to me seems to indicate that art should just stay where it is -- In that case we should just go back to drawing stick figures in caves.

Thirdly, the art that you are referring to is only really modern art by a decade at the most. Modernism spanned almost a 100 years of art (the piece of art you linked was made 4 years before modernism was over, so it seems pretty narrow-minded to reject an entire century old movement based on something produced in its dying years): What about the impressionists, arguably the first modernists, who were just as scandalous and obscene as Duchamp for suggesting that art was transient -- that the canvas was something that could be used to capture ephemeral moments rather than structured, pre-defined forms. Monet's attempts to capture ever changing light by continuously painting the same thing over and over again through a single day was a revelation, it was crude and improper. That might seem like bullshit now, but at the time it changed the face of art forever.

Every assumption about art that you have now, every freedom and principle and idea that people have about art in this contemporary setting is because of modernists and their courage at painting red smudges. We should show them a little more respect.

You know, I realise all this and I choose to ignore it. For once, I don't want to legitimise and justify, and 'intellectualise' everything and just want to say fuck it, I want to destroy art as an expression of art.


Also, what constitutes smudges? Why is this [futurist piece of art] any less smudgy than something else?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/12/GBallaArt.jpg

I vote for it to be destroyed. For the record, I'm not interested in futurism per se, but rather the element of destructivism expressed by it to give way for something else.

Also for the record, I don't want to destroy art because I dislike it or hate it, but because I think there's something artsy about destroying it which I can't really put to words. Perhaps even to stimulate art, to destroy all art and give way for new art, so art doesn't become an object of immense value, but remains accessible for the time of its existence and is destroyed before it can be assigned an exorbitant price, before it can be institutionalised. Then again why do I especially (not specifically) want to destroy art that sucks (abstract art). I don't know, I haven't put much thought into it.

Perhaps it's like 'permanent revolution' in art...

And then:

Every assumption about art that you have now, every freedom and principle and idea that people have about art in this contemporary setting is because of modernists and their courage at painting red smudges. We should show them a little more respect.

This becomes like a progressive force becoming a reactionary force over time, needing to be overthrown to give way to new progressive art.... Dialectics bruv.


Common sense would seem to imply art is like anything else. In bourgeois society it generally comes to serve bourgeois ends.


Also:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Brassau

Ha, that one critic that said it was like that of an ape must have been so proud for having such insight.

[bcbm]

what you're talking about is dadaism and it was already done right after the first world war and, indeed, did give way for new art. good thought though.

[Tim Cornelis]

what you're talking about is dadaism and it was already done right after the first world war and, indeed, did give way for new art. good thought though.

But then it's become institutionalised so we have this like-minded fellow:


"A vandal is a fool," says French artist Pierre Pinoncelli, once put on trial himself for vandalism of a national treasure.

"He smashes for the pleasure of smashing, stupidly. My act of destruction was an act of creation. I've always loved destruction, it's inside humans just like creation is," he adds.

Mr Pinoncelli was put on trial for smashing a urinal in Paris' Pompidou Centre.

Not in the gents, but in the gallery.

The urinal was a copy of the original called Fountain and put on display in 1917 by Marcel Duchamp to make the point that anything could be art.

Mr Pinoncelli was so annoyed at how a once radical work of art had become institutionalised, that he attacked it.

"I made it fresh and new, I created something new of which Duchamp would have approved, he'd have said 'Bravo!'"

Mr Pinoncelli narrowly avoided three months in jail and a fine of 400,000 euros (£368,566). Not, he says, for being a vandal, but for causing a scandal.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/8325665.stm

But really I'm juggling ideas with no coherence. Destruction as art, or a means to give way to new art, destruction of art in general, or just shitty/abstract art, etc.

[bcbm]

'abstract' is not the same as 'shitty,' and who would judge that?

don't 'destroy art.' its passe

[The Feral Underclass]

I want to destroy art as an expression of art.

And you would not be able to have this position if it were not for modernism, you modernist!