Part of the 'return to beauty idea' if I understand it correctly has been layed out as a type of revisionism
How can we have a 'return to beauty', initiated by people with no concept of what beauty has been in the past.....how many students for instance, (or, their professors!) coming out of art school have a clue about who Titian is? Do you think even 10% of these people even know what The Flaying of Marsyas is? Or, which came first, de Koonings imperial highway paintings -or the rubenesque landscapes -and can discuss specific works in either canon? So what do they know? There is a big part of John Currin's conceit for instance -which is not unlike the argument that was being made by the same offended middle class/middlebrows in the 50's who when confronted by images coming from the rising New York School, recoiled at the 'new', looked at Norman Rockwell and thought 'now, here, is someone who can really paint'.....sound familiar?
Perhaps its time to evoke Doestoyevsky's Idiot, our own version of a somewhat quiotic Prince Myshkin, the prevailing art world Rogozhin, the reflexive pursuit of mediocrity (all, in the name of love, of course-though granted our love is a different animal -one bent upon eating what is weak...) to fully understand our own times, ourselves, and, our enemies errrrrrr....I mean, food source!
Its all fairly awful. With Currin we are supposed to take seriously the cooing coming from certain 'critical corners' that not since Rockwell has a thanksgiving turkey been so well realized, (he sure can paint!) and now with Kilimnick, we are apparently supposed to gaze at these shit painting with bars of pop fodder like 'Feelings' running through our heads, providing the imagined and unfortunately real muzak....artzak....and think 'she sure can't paint' but feel the 'feelings,' the sincerity to be found oozing forth from completely vile, rancid, (I'm giving it way, too much credit) crap. Hence, (I'm only guessing,) its profundity .......
We Sharks may collectively very well be The Idiot; but they, -'they' meaning the consensoriat/ conformists, are surely the idiots - that infest us like a plague-welling up at the all too ubiquitous art fairs/events (Basil Miami -Documenta) ...populating an art world that when considered in the context of what is actually going on in the world -from the 9th ward in New Orleans, to the Khyber Pass linking Afghanistan with Pakistan, to Darfur, aside from being an abysmally insipid failure, can only come off as venal, shallow and in desperate need of being done away with and replaced with something more serious, less concerned with 'pop culture'...less concerned with the next 'new' 'hot' thing....think, 'Titian' -think 'Goya' -think anything! Think of beauty hard won and specific, inimitable, concrete, unto itself, rather than the flattened out, career trajectory type being bandied about as something real.... as artists, lets find the character! to stop! following the 'instruction' emmanating from the institution, and think for ourselves!......sheeeeeesh!
"Artzak" --- great term. Sums up a lot, I think.
Beauty never went anywhere. Hence it cannot return. From where? The entire idea of "the return to beauty" is a faux intellectual construct and conceit.
This "issue" is the sort of notion that can only be cooked up by academics with tenure, grants, and trust funds; or perhaps more likely, all three.
well, exactly -the blind, ministering to the clueless -good to hear from you Theo-
Currin could only dream in the wettest of dreams to approach Rockwell's facility...This says more about the "experts'" lack of discernment than anything else...Seeing "The Flaying of Marsyas" in D.C. as part of the Titian show in the early Nineties was a formative experience...I thank you for reminding me of it...The trouble I keep having with Currin, Kilimnick, etal. is a suspicion that they're only employing paint to serve their half-baked ideas...The process is less than an afterthought, probably better realized through PhotoShop or sweatshop labor ala Koons...I flipped through that Art in America with Ms.Kilimnick on the cover earlier this evening, and nothing grabbed me long enough to linger any longer than the time it took to turn the page...
Thanks Wesley. A humorous, but telling aside if I may?
Recently, I was browsing in a better than average art book store. The owner stocks books and exhibition catalogs from throughout the world, both used and new, rare and not so rare, with a focus on both the art historical and the trendy.
I was the only customer in the store, being graciously ignored by the owner, browsing the stacks for close to an hour, when through the front door burst a rather large well dressed gentleman who suddenly and loudly proclaimed "I wish to know if you have any books on Norman Rockwell?!!"
The owner was visibly shaken by this raucous display, she shifted around uncomfortably and as she began to sputter and stutter her answer, he burst into laughter exclaiming even louder than the first time, "Just kidding you! Rockwell is underrated, but do you know who is an even better painter and unjustly ridiculed?!!"
She answered with hesitance and insecurity at what she might unleash, "No, no, I don't." He pointed at her and bellered "Thomas Kincade! That's who!"
This was too much for her and just as I thought she might be in need of a fainting couch and some smelling salts, he turned the tables again and began to ask her all kinds of questions about the Ashcan School and early Twentieth Century American Painting.
He rattled off the names of numerous painters from the period, inquiring if she had books or catalogs on them in her collection. I admit that I was highly amused by the spectacle of his running her ragged in her own store.
This went on for ten to fifteen minutes, until he made a fairly substantial purchase of books and left. I don't know if he was playing an elaborate practical joke or if he had meant everything he had said while in her store.
Once he was gone, she felt compelled to finally speak to me.
Fuming she said " Can you believe his audacity? That isn't how things are done here! Why, and when he mentioned that Thomas Kincade person I went into shock!"
At that moment I gazed over at her cash register display. Atop a glass case were prominently displayed expensive books and catalogs on Elizabeth Peyton, Lisa Yuskavage, Karen Kilimnik, and two large volumes in a slipcase on John Currin.
Perhaps inspired by the earlier imbroglio, I gestured towards her display and asked her what she thought the difference could possibly be between a painting by Thomas Kincade and one by Currin, Peyton, Kilimnik, or Yuskavage?
She looked at me as if I was insane, and gave me a heady answer of theory.
I politely commented that to me this wasn't a factor at all, and that all of it was bad painting, but that perhaps Thomas Kincade was at least sincere in his version of kitsch. While the others were contemptuous and disdainful.
She looked at me as though she had now had enough and was thinking of closing her shop for good. She rang up my book, I paid her and left.
I just want to see someone go apoplectic! The Shark, after a large dizzying draw from his snuffbox, falls from his horse and buggy gasping for air, due to a much too tightly fashioned cravat.
It came to my attention as a young student at SAIC that the emperor may not have any clothes... And since then it has often been confirmed. The "I'm ok-you're ok" part of my generation X has hit the art market.
I noticed your painting was prominently displayed next to Phil Ponce at the end of the Clive Barker piece on Chicago Tonight. It looked like it was cropped, though, compared to what I've seen before. It looked great on the small screen!