Would You Consider This Art?

http://www.sculpture.org.uk/image/504816331403-28-size320x240

Vivien, here's a link to a goldsworthy sculpture that isn't the first one that irritated me long ago, but still brings out my gut reaction, that I love the forest itself and the sculpture is an annoyance positioned in front of it.
I'm sure if I look at more of his images I'll modify my view and find some of them beautiful works of art.


Some of my reaction has to do with my own philosophic changes regarding my own field, landscape architecture.
In school 25 years ago I was avid about inventive designs on the land, the wit and play involved in them, and yes, sometimes the reverence. Now I back off, seeing so much art ego at the same time I appreciate the land itself more and more.

So with the Soul of A Tree piece, I'd rather just see the tree.

On the other hand, when a landscape previously ravaged by man is the setting, I am more interested in what people come up with, Heizer, for example.

The red iceberg certainly is striking.

The ice berg was (to me) beautiful/repulsive....and clever

For landscapes ravaged by man, check out
Ed Burtynsky
http://www.galleryguide.org/ArtistPortfolios/cowles/burtynsky/burtynsky.asp

osso - I like it! (the link to the Goldsworthy that you don't like) - I find it infinitely more interesting and pleasing than the iceberg! Maybe i like the kind of landscape he works in and i like the way his creations gel with the environment, are of it but different, structured, considered and beautiful.

The problem I have with goldsworth (or is it evarristi?) isn't that he works in the environment - You can do beautiful/meaningful/provacative artwork with whatever medium you can get your hands on. My problem is simply that I do not like his work. As in the case of the iceberg, it screams, "I am a human with no respect for the environment who wants attention." I find this petulant approach to art annoying. I feel the same way about the poor goldfish in a blender, previously believed to only be an internet cartoon.

I totally agree about the goldfish/iceberg - but goldsworthy is a very quiet person, who does respect the environment and isn't the type to scream!

I agree, vivien. His simple, abstract-like nature alterations are pretty. They have an innocent and playful quality about them that I enjoy.

portal - i sent a pm that i don't think got through - could you pm me the url? I would love to see more of your work.

truth
BoGoWo, do you mean that all I've got to do to become a famous and valid artist is to do BIZARRE things in public? I'd rather be the "failed" artist that I am.

truth
Osso, I agree whole heartedly with your sensibility here. To me Christo, Goldsworthy and others are just TAGGERS, effacing "God's" work (pardon the metaphor). My wife used to exclaim to me, on seeing a beautiful sunset or tree, "Why don't you paint THAT?" She doesn't do it any more because she knows what my inevitable answer will be, viz. "Why should I? God's already done it."

Portal Star's comment is probably the most important statement on this thread.

Art is a nebulous term, but it involves creativity even if it is nothing but a concept, a new idea. It doesn't require craftsmanship. Craft is the skill that can be used to execute a concept, but there is plenty of art without a shred of craft. Abstract expressionism takes little or no skill, but much of it is beautiful and evocative. Jackson Pollock, Willem DeKooning, Barnett Newman, Marc Rothko, Hans Hofmann, and many others painted abstract art that took little skill. But many of these people were excellent figurative painters in the past and evolved into abstract artists.

I've stood in the Abstract room of the Menille Museum in Houston surrounded by Rothcos and Barnett Newmans completely mesmerized. I've heard people comment on abstract art saying, "My kid could do that." And I think, "Yeah, but he didn't" It's easy to copy, but it's not easy to be the first.

Now the iceberg artist in question had a concept, whatever it may have been. The concept the artist meant to convey may be different from what we receive, but it doesn’t matter. Maybe we say, "ugh, a red iceberg." But we are made more aware of the normal icebergs because of the contrast of the red icebergs.Nature is beautiful, but we can take a hike and be bored unless we see a group of colorful flowers, when in fact, all of nature is incredible if your attention is drawn to it.

Monet painted beautiful water lilies, but if you go out and see actual water lilies growing in a swamp and say, "Wow!" Is what you're seeing art? In other words, does an artist have to paint a scene on a canvas, or can he take you out and make you see the actual scene, point it out to you, put a frame around nature, so to speak, so you can appreciate it? If the artist has the power to make you look and see, does it matter if it's a picture of a tree or an actual tree?

Does this make any sense at all? I don't know, myself. I'll read it tomorrow and see. It's probably all crap, but even crap is useful. I saw a dung beetle the other day pushing a big ball of dung backwards across a road. I picked it up with its prize and put it on the other side of the road so it wouldn't get run over. I set it down, and it immediately burrowed in the leaf litter. In a few minutes the ball of dung was pulled down the burrow and disappeared. Now the dung beetle is in the Scarab beetle family. The ancient Egyptians thought the dung beetle was sacred and carved little scarabs out of stones and gems. These scarabs are now artifacts in museums, and people pay money to see them.

There's a lot of sense in what you say, Colubber. Pueo's question, after all, was not "Do you consider this good art?" or "Do you like this?" It was simply, do you consider this art. (I don't, as per my post above, but that's neither here nor there. I could easily change my mind at some point.)

There is much 'art' on the market -- and, yes, in museums -- that I dislike. But that doesn't mean it's not art. In some cases it doesn't even mean it's not 'good' art, wharever that is. It means simply that I am not responding to whatever the artist wanted to convey. It could be my shortcoming or it could be the artist didn't manage to get his/her point across. And there even times when I see something that I realize is quite good but still don't like. It simply does not appeal to my personal aesthetic sense.

But I do think that good craftsmanship is an important facet of 'good' art. I have often run into works that I absolutely despised and yet could admire the skill that went into creating them. Conversely, I have seen works that I have liked for senimental reasons while being acutely aware that the artist was not a particularly skilled craftsman. VanGogh is a prime example of this latter point. His handling of human anatomy and of perspective is sometimes so awkward, it's embarrasing. And you just know he didn't render that hand, say, so clumsily on purpose. And yet the image jumps out at you, the colors dazzle and mesmerize.

So, did I just contradict myself? I think I did. Maybe craftsmanship isn't all that important.

Well, hell, at least this discussion has made me think.

I think painting, even the most representational painting, is still very different from the actual object. Take Monet's waterlillies - you see his essence of water lillies - how he feels about them, how he choses to depict them, the stroke of the brush, the color choices. The story of the painting of a flower is always different than the story of a flower.

Also throw in the fact that you are translating something three dimentional into something two dimensional (unless you work from photographs - one reason that in my opinion working from photographs can make your work boring.) Your brain and hands are having to translate this.

So even if the intent of the artist is to represent something, that something is no longer just an allusion to the original something. It is the history of a process of translation and transcription through someone's brain and hands.

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Van Gogh was very skilled at drawing. And he was skilled at markmaking. These qualities are what I think make his paintings come alive - he was basically drawing with paint. Can you imagine a Van Gogh without stroke, without texture? It would be a completely different animal. The formal drawing conventions are irrelevant - he conveyed his power.

truth
Portal Star, After reading your statement that in producing even the most representational painting one is making something very different from the actual object, I realize I must qualify my statement above that I do not feel artistically gratified by "copying" a natural scene. I do think that a really effective still life or landscape painter does not merely mimic his object; he is creating something new, perhaps the poetic feeling the object evokes in him. In other words representational art must always be a creation, never a copy. What is being actually represented is the artist's poetic feelings and aesthetic sensibilities not the objective image before him. When I draw people, I never use models. I've drawn enough models in the past to have a sense of how the body is organized, so now I just construct a figure or figures with the intent of dramatizing some aspect of human life. I do not care in the least if the figure is realistic, only if it works aesthetically and if it conveys my dramatic message.

Have always loved Christo. I liked the Red Ice environmental piece. Startles, makes you think, pleasing to the eye, and even political.

I like the iceberg. It reminds me of Duchamp's readymades.

Sorta.

I agree with Portal and I would disagree about the statement that Rothko's work needed no craftsmanship - the glazing of colour and subtly layers changing and varying colour, making it float or vibrate is extremely skilled.

Monet, in his late work, abstracted a great deal. The late water lilies are shimmering fields of colour and have moved a million miles from copying what is there.

I do agree with you, Vivien. There is much craftsmanship in much of Rothki's work.

And I, who am presently irritated by Goldsworthy's work, do now respond to Christo's, it is so beautiful my general, developed over time, sensibility of much landscape art either attempting to gild lilies or detracting from them is overridden.

Agree of course with those who distinguish art from craft by the creativity, and think craft is not mandatory for art to be art, that craft often exists without art. I suppose we should get closer on what creativity is. Back on that later.

I like the Iceburg. Its interesting and different.

Do ya think he was trying to make some sort of environmentalist statment? Like, the red iceburg was natures way of sending us a warning, that the ice 'bleeding' was symbolistic of us humans have ravaged the environment?

Or did he just feel like painting an iceburg red?