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The greatest?
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Message
Posted
There is an article in the Guardian today by Jonathan Jones (him again!) about an American abstract artist called Sean Scully, who I had never heard of. This is some of his work:
Apparently he is the greatest living abstract artist and the greatest since Rothko - although that's such a low bar a limbo dancer would have trouble getting under it!
I know I shouldn't care, but....all he has done is paint some rectangles. They don't mean anything, they are just rectangles. They are not even well painted.
Am I missing something? Should I start painting rectangles too in the hope that Jonathan Jones will think I'm a genius? I could have at least three pictures finished by tea time.
Apparently he is the greatest living abstract artist and the greatest since Rothko - although that's such a low bar a limbo dancer would have trouble getting under it!
I know I shouldn't care, but....all he has done is paint some rectangles. They don't mean anything, they are just rectangles. They are not even well painted.
Am I missing something? Should I start painting rectangles too in the hope that Jonathan Jones will think I'm a genius? I could have at least three pictures finished by tea time.
Edited
by Peter Smith
Posted
Pointillism is a load of dots until you stand back and then it becomes a picture, a very clever one. It doesn't matter where you stand to look, this is just a canvas full of rectangles. In what possible way is that great art?
It's not just that I don't like it, I don't understand it.
Edited
by Peter Smith
Posted
Well yes, if we don’t understand something it doesn’t necessarily mean other people feel the same. There can be ideas behind what seem simple shapes - look at Mondrian’s later work. What, for instance, do you think about Malevich’s Black Square? What I’m trying to say Peter is that it’s very easy to dismiss something as rubbish, liking or disliking something is different as is understanding .
Re pointillism being just a load of dots….there were certainly people in Seurat’s time who would have dismissed the idea as rubbish.
Edited
by Marjorie Firth
Posted
I'm not dismissing it as rubbish Marjorie, I'm dismissing it as what it is, a canvas full of rectangles. I'm sorry but that's all I can see and yet Jonathan Jones is saying this chap is the greatest abstract painter on the planet. It is just rectangles, there is nothing else there. To me it's meaningless.
If I painted in that style I think I'd be pretty hacked off about him being called the greatest. Personally I don't think any artist should be called the best or the greatest, it's not what art is about.
If I'm missing something in these pictures can someone please tell me what it is! I'll be very interested to hear what others think.
Words fail me. I suppose the cracks in the paint make it more interesting.
Posted
I forgot to press my reply button and Jenny got in first. Briefly, I referred to art movements and whether one is interested in why changes occur. Malevich certainly has his place in Art History and the reasons why he painted his Black Square, which, in turn, led on to great changes in art. There have always been changes - the Renaissance, the Impressionists, the Expressionists, the Cubists and many many more. Art shouldn’t stand still…
Posted
Marjorie, it's a black square! B&Q sell them to use on floors! If painting a black square is the way to move art forward I'm going to take up knitting.
Jenny, I'm sorry but it's still just a load of damn rectangles!!
I'm not trying to offend anyone but I really, truly do not understand. I know what I can see, I understand what I can see but that's as far as it goes.
Posted
Wow! Likes and dislikes. It goes back to this I feel. Sir Ernst Gombrich (Art historian professor said in his book Story of Art. “There really is no such thing as art. There is only artist.” Like it or not that is what we see. May I add that what we see is not out there whats out there is our conscious awareness. In other words we see what we think.👀
Ps please understand what I have just written here is not ment to offend anyone.