Sunday, February 26, 2012

Romulus (feb 2012)

Romulus, brother of Remus, who founded the Great Rome. According to the legend, the baby boys were raised by a she-wolf, who found them abandoned in a basket. However, “she-wolf” was (and still is in some parts of Italy) the nickname for a prostitute. The woman was hiding in the forests along Via Appia and howling like a she-wolf in heat, to let the clients know where she was. See also La Dolce Vita, the scene where Anita Ekberg howls like a she-wolf. 
Romulus

Saturday, February 18, 2012

Wheres the Beaux from the Arts?

Why does a large number of present day artists think art is just about themselves? Or about having a cute idea, while the rest doesnt matter?
 I remember one of my film school teachers saying "when you have an idea, think of which medium that idea is calling for. If you can give it the best life in writing, dont make a movie, write a novel."

 Most of today's art is full of jokes/ideas that need not take a visual form (or not belong to the arts in the first place). We also get the visual art that is a collection of stuff, because the artist needs to "expresses himself/herself". Why should I be interested in the inside of the artist? Im interested to see how an artistic person sees the same world I see, hopefully in a different way, which will enrich my experience of life.

 I think this practice of "call it art" started with the re-discovery of Duchamp's act of bringing an urinal in the museum. Unfortunately, few understood what he meant (I did understand, simply because he explained that in an interview): he was mocking the decline of art (quality) and was saying that anything that the museum presents is unfortunately called art. This idea was recycled and probably used to his own personal benefit, by people such as Mr Saatchi. He's a commercial advertiser, stressing the word commercial and his talent in manipulating the credulous public. He's a self declared artoholic and just as any -holic, quantity suffocates the sense of quality. It's an obsession, following a goal, no matter why or how. And people like Hirst and Tracey Emin (to quote just some known names) brought their trash into the museum, promoted by guys like Saatchi.
Some critics, the court jesters, can only agree that this kind of art is challenging and if you dont get it or appreciated, youre a douchebag.
 I have not met yet the person who feels the need to go back to the museum to see a pickled shark, again and again, because he becomes a better person. I dont claim the purpose of art is to make people better (I do think that but I wont declare it as definition). But I for one, long for an art, contemporary that will make me feel human, tell me things about the world, about myself.
The artist with ideas and no artistic calling may be better off writing a column in a social magazine.

 In case one imagines I "dont get Pollock", I have some news for you: how many Pollocks and Rothkos are there? Just because one thinks "oh, I could do that" , that doesnt qualify one as artist. And just because an artoholic or a number of his friends write good reviews about you, it doesnt mean that you should occupy the museum space with your production.

 Im almost done. You may think I am enraged, as the tone of my writing grew. Im actually not, I dont care about what Saatchi's doing. If you like his artists, go ahead, buy them, enjoy them. There's place under the sun for everyone and Im not trying to show my work in a Gogosian Gallery.
I just dont like how these guys have changed the nature of the art school. Students these days go to art schools and learn to make shit that it's trendy to make, and hopefully, they will manage to sell. And the Beaux Arts as it is, lost continuity, a natural continuity that came to us in progression, from cave art to the time when art was thrown out of contemporary art museums.
It's sad to discourage students who have a gift for visual arts and channel them into the money making, ass-licking racket. Even so, I think a true artist will prevail, van Gogh did. But why should the young artist today have to pay the same price as van Gogh?

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 for UltraBananaBuddy, a talented art student

Thursday, February 2, 2012

Nostalgia (feb 1st, 2012)

not so much a nostalgia for Kennedy himself (there's one Obama, he could do something) but a nostalgia for a time when people had guts and stood up for themselves. A president is a man with the people.
Drawn on the birthday of my Father (1923-2001)