Museum of Fine Arts: is everyone getting stupider

[BJ_M]

For a Fine Arts Museum, they sure seem to have low expectations with their masterpieces. While the folk art exhibits (the super-old stuff) were great, I couldn't help but cast an odd look at their feature exhibit: a new series of paintings by Cy Twombly called Lepanto.

They took up a freakishly spacious gallery to display the twelve-piece series; four pictures per wall, three benches in the middle to take in the experience, museum-style. This room, specifically, shaded in blue.

Sounds like some damn good paintings Mr. Twombly did, no? I thought the same...until I actually saw them. Then, all I could think was, "What the ****?"

I checked the description by the side, praying that I'd find meaning in why he did those eyesores. Nothing. Just a description of how the paintings were made: acrylic, crayon, and graphite on canvas.

I thought, "Okay, maybe if I sit on the benches and stare at the pics, something important will pop out." Once again, just scribbles, and that's a quite a bit to say from somebody who enjoys analyzing works by people like Art Spiegelman (author of Maus: a Survivor's Tale) for hidden meaning.

Paint and crayon scribbled almost randomly onto a five-foot canvas. That's what I was looking at. The paint was just left to drip from the canvas, then. I couldn't help but think of one of Maddox's most famous rants, "I am Better than Your Kids."

The whole job of painting these drop cloths probably woulda taken Twombly, what? Maybe a couple hours? Compared to the 8+ hours it takes me to do one piece on the computer? Even my abstract-loving mother agreed: she thought these looked like children's drawings, and doesn't like when she has to be explained what a scribble means.

Honestly, why would a museum with a bunch of Monets choose to give a first impression with crap like this?

This phenomenon seems to be showing up everywhere nowadays. Paintings made by elephants (yes, elephants) are selling for millions apiece, there's a single inkblot on a white canvas in a New York museum that's worth a small fortune, and to top it all off, StrawberryClock's now famous Flash move entitled "B" (which, strangely enough, has a user rating of 3.17, or not too shabby.)

You may think I sound cynical about modern art, and I probably am. But this is one of those times my faith was restored in the old art gallery buzzphrase, "Hmph! My four-year-old son coulda done that!"

The "B" movie is HERE

[reboot]

My four-year-old son coulda done that!

Oh, wait,....nah, nevermind.

[SquirrelDip]

My four-year-old son coulda done that!

Oh, wait,....nah, nevermind.

Are you sure he didn't??? Think a couple of years back when changing his diapers... I'm sure I've seen a couple of those pics before...

(Four year old son... Me too...)

[greymalkin]

I went to a a fine arts museum a few years ago and they had a room dedicated to "dogs". They were these peices of yellow foam that had been twisted around, tied up, and spray painted. It looked like garbage..horrible, horrible garbage...and yet each peice of "art" sat on it's own pedestal encased in thick plexiglass as if it were a priceless jewel.

i took an art appreciation course last semester because i had to...and it did help with alot of concepts, but this is without excuse.

I actually have a drawing of my experience in my own fine art gallery located @ www.dlvee.com/art

[BJ_M]

I went to a a fine arts museum a few years ago and they had a room dedicated to "dogs". They were these peices of yellow foam that had been twisted around, tied up, and spray painted. It looked like garbage..horrible, horrible garbage...and yet each peice of "art" sat on it's own pedestal encased in thick plexiglass as if it were a priceless jewel.

i took an art appreciation course last semester because i had to...and it did help with alot of concepts, but this is without excuse.

I actually have a drawing of my experience in my own fine art gallery located @ www.dlvee.com/art

maybe the foam was just left over from construction and no one knew any better --- now that would be funny ...

[offline]

I feel a jackson pollack coming on

[guns1inger]

If people will buy paintings done by a chimp or an elephant and call them art . . . . .

We had a local artist come and speak many years ago at school. This guy was known for doing 'event art' - drop a dead cow carcas on the gellery steps, dental acrylic hyper real sculpture of skinned pigs heads and even a human hand. Some bright spark asked him 'what is art ?'. His response - 'if you want to get up here and take a sh*t on the desk and call it art, then that is art'

[lordsmurf]

is everyone getting stupider

That's a loaded question.

[MeDiCo_BrUjO]

Some of the pics I am seeing in this thread looks like stains I had in one of my basement walls last year before I painted them.
Now, what do you think about my following art sample in comparison with the first pictures?:


Perhaps a little more color?, maybe I can get them exposed at the same museum...


Now, take a real look at what that is:








































































Shit!, I lost money painting that wall.... I could have made a fortune selling it to some museum as "Natural Art"

[thecoalman]

This reminds me of that commercial where the
people are in the museum discussing a piece and
some workmen walks up and grabs whatever they
talking about. It was hilarious, they're
discussing it's meaning and concept
and it's some guys lunchbox or dropcloth.