Decrepit Old Fool

What does this look like to you?  More importantly, would you pay two hundred grand for it? Read on for a visual suggestion…

Suppose you’re walking down the sidewalk and you see the following object in your path.  You would say…

1) “I wish those dog owners would pick up after their mutts!”

2) [It is] “a rippling curve that seems to spew out of the earth and curl up like a wave. It suggests not only water, but also clouds and vegetation and human limbs.”

If you answered 2), then you are an art critic for the New York Times.  You understand that art need not represent any object or concept, or even meet with the approval of the people who pay for it.  You are above all that.

I admit I was being dishonest by Photoshopping the first image to appear to be laying on a sidewalk (and in black & white to remove color cues.)  When you look at the original context, the object is clearly a work of public art. 

Instead of a little turd on the sidewalk, it becomes a majestic, enormous green turd that towers over the sidewalk.  The actual thing was located at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, CA and was commissioned of sculptor William Tucker in 1987 for $200,000.

You can just imagine the scene when this 4-ton bronze gem was unveiled.  People see lots of different things in the sculpture, none of them complimentary.  A diseased liver, a diseased male organ, a pile of… well, you know…

Finally the Scripps institute paid $40,000 to have it moved out of sight.  The artist, showing astonishing contempt for the disapproving public, said…

“the chasm of incomprehension between public art and its intended audience remains as wide as ever.”

“In these circumstances, there is a certain pressure on the sculptor to design socially useful work for public commission; failing that, if the artist insists on producing a functionless object or structure, there is the expectation that this intrusive presence be explained in terms of its meaning or symbolism…Over the years, I have developed the belief that the power of sculpture depends on its capacity to suggest many things, without literally embodying a single image.”

And then he added a bit of self-congratulation for his masterpiece:

“[Many readings of the piece] are possible, but they neither exhaust nor explain the sculpture’s energy.”

I have nothing against non-representational art but sometimes it seems like the artist is just dumping a big load of… well, you know… on the paying public.  Will our buildings always be afflicted by the sculpture of public contempt?  Isn’t a nice building a good enough statement by itself?  Aren’t landscaping and architecture themselves art forms?

Scripps very entertaining slide show about the piece

Story of the move to, uh, less-visible location

Hilarious review, “Art can be a moving experience”

Very good picture on Elsadesign.com

A humorous review of the entire facility on improbable.com

Time magazine called it Tucker’s masterpiece, and said, “It packs three layers of imagery into its mass without the slightest strain or theatricality.”

Sorry about that second picture.  I know it looks gross.  Both composite photo illustrations are based on an image from the Scripps site.  Also, many thanks to one of my wonderful co-workers for sending me the links – you really made my day!

Do we need any more proof that there’s a whole class of pretentious people with lots of money but no taste?  Ok, here’s some:  a 4-year-old girl named Marla Olmstead does abstract paintings, which sell for $15,000.

Her mother is an artist, so naturally the child wanted to play with brushes.  Take a look at her gallery and see what you think. 

It’s pretty obvious who’s the driving force here… BBC News Online reports that her family says they see “elements of Jackson Pollack in her work.”  Do they, now?  Hey, I think my kids are pretty great, too. 

But to tell the truth, I never got Pollack, and I can’t believe a 4-year old named her paintings, “Fire Already,” “Ode to Pollack,” “Triptonic,” or “Asian Sun.”  More believable are the ones named “dinosaur,” “Face,” and “Monster.”

I actually like some of her paintings.  If one of my kids had done them, I’d be pretty happy about it, too.  But I don’t know the right people (or have sufficiently exploitive instincts) to push my 4-year-old kid onto the international stage just because I could.

“Despite prompting from her father, a giggling Marla refused to talk to BBC News Online about her work.”

The artists Jeanne-Claude and Christo have graced Central Park in NYC with a 22-mile long array of colorful steel and plastic arches with hanging banners in them.  The work is called, “The Gates.”

You may remember Christo as the guy who wrapped the Reichstag in Germany, or who put a huge yellow curtain along a highway in California.  Oh, well, I guess his works are kind of pretty, and most important, he raises his own funds ($21m in this case.)  It all seems kind of silly, except that…

“The Gates” is expected to bring $80m worth of tourism.

Now, that’s art I can appreciate.  It’s beautiful and magical, and they’re not out to “challenge” anyone’s faith or sensibilities by throwing elephant dung on a crucifix or whatever…

…And to top it all off, the work is an economic gift to the community.  The more I thought about it, the more I liked it.

Oh, I am such a philistine.  I have to admit I just don’t get the shark in formaldehyde.

What’s that about a shark, you say?  In 1991 a (con-?) artist named Damien Hirst paid to have a large shark caught, and he put it in a tank of formaldehyde, giving it the pretentious title of “The physical impossibility of death in the mind of someone living.”

Eventually Hirst’s shark was purchased by an American Billionaire (for $12m) and brought here to the US.  Unfortunately Hirst had no knowledge of proper preservation of large animals, and the thing is visibly misshapen and deteriorating.  Conservationists are trying to figure out how to restore and preserve the horrid thing.

Incidentally, Hirst wasn’t the first one to think of displaying a shark in a tank on public view.  That honor goes to an electrical supply house owner named Eddie Saunders.  He had it skillfully preserved and apparently put a lot more thought into how it should be displayed.  But it isn’t “art,” you see, because he was not an “artist.”  He was just a guy displaying his hobby, which was deep-sea fishing.

Apparently “art” is something an artist does.  And shelling out $12m for a badly-preserved dead shark, is something a rich idiot does.

Here’s a model for displaying public art, on Christo & Jeanne-Claude’s website:

To all visitors of The Gates:
There are no official opening events.
There are no invitations.
There are no tickets.

This work of art is FREE for all to enjoy,
the same as all our previous projects.

If anyone tries to sell you a ticket,
do not buy it.  This would be an act of
fraud because no tickets are needed.

Central Park is public space, open and
free to all people.  The work of art will be
completed on February 12, weather permitting.
- Christo and Jeanne-Claude

Update: I just found this 2002 article on BBC, Hirst art heads for space, in which a tiny painting by Hirst is affixed to a mars probe as a calibration instrument.

Is there no end of idiocy?  The article says “it is the first art designed to be sent into space.”  Apparently they forgot about this or this.