Is this art or just plain creepy?

I love Calvin and Hobbes.

You do have a gift for cutting thru the crap, Chai.

Right. You never know when you might sleep walk in the snow!

It's art for sure. Good or bad is another question.

I never argued someone's right to call it art. Just don't let it run through my snow is all I ask.

That makes a lot of sense to me.

Why can't art be creepy or unsettling?

Why does everything that doesn't come out of a mold, and much that does have to be art?

Since Roger has done such a superb job on organizing and rectifying all that was wrong with the English language, I think he should now be put in charge of art. He can figure out what needs to be done using the same thinking skills that he applied to language.

All in favor, raise your hand.

I could call my **** stain an art but that doesn't make it so.

Art is in the eye of the beholder. I don't really see this as art.

Is it realistic and kinda cool in that creepy-dude-in-his-undies way? Yeah. Do I think it should find it's way into an art museum? Not really.

Ya know, I thought about it and maybe I do think this is art.

Art should inspire an emotion. Good, bad, gross or tender. This sure sparks an emotion in people.

I guess it is art. But it is only art to me OUTSIDE the museum because inside I think it loses it's ability to create a moment.

provoking an emotion is a cheap and easy trick. Art speaks to the soul.

Most good art tries to evoke an emotion. I don't know where you get "cheap and easy"

Do you try to evoke emotions from your cooking? Lotsa chefs do.

Hawkeye is right.

Hang a noose in a tree and you will invoke emotions. Pick your nose in public and you will too. Hold a puppy, licking your face and you will; just as you will if you hold the puppy over an operating chain saw. Art?

art isn't the only thing that evokes emotions but stirring an emotion is a desired goal that the creator of the art has.

other words include "feeling" and "passion". Lets not try to think it out too much.

But invoking emotions is "cheap and easy" and the intent to do so doesn't make the effort art.

Anyone can write poetry but everyone is not a Poet.

This issue is an extension of the post-modernist question: "Who are we to judge?"

I beg to differ. If you write a poem you are by definition a poet. A good one? Probably not. But a poet none the less.

achieving an emotion isn't an "intent" stop qualifying your statemenst to death. If you don't achieve the desired emotion, you've not scored your point and perhaps you should 'edit, repaint, start over, rewrite, or resculpt.

Edward Hoppers best works are studies in loneliness. His style and competence supports this "emotional display".

Rockwell Kent ditto
FE Church 's work is grandeur and space in which we feel several emotions as he manipulates us
Sargent's "Gassed" is a study in empathy with those in line


etc etc.

Even Stella and Baziotes give me specific feelings with each different paintimg


I listen to Ozymandias and feel contempt for the self proclaimed all powerful

Frosts "Stopping By woods..." is a study in impending warmth

My initial reaction, if I didn't know it was an inanimate object, would probably be shock and concern for the man, because the statue looks so realistic.

Knowing it's not real, I find it rather amusing, on several levels.

Statues usually represent men as heroic, or noble, or idealized, or celebrate the beauty of the body, etc., but here we have a schlumpy looking middle-aged guy in his tighty whities, who couldn't look less heroic, or noble, or impressive. I find that sort of juxtaposition amusing.

And, after thinking about the work, what I initially dismissed as being somewhat meaningless pop art, I now find is making me think about the artist's "statement", so it does have some creative power. The sleep-walking man couldn't be more vulnerable because of his lack of full consciousness, he's wandering exposed and vulnerable and impotent in public--he couldn't be much more powerless and lacking control. Is that how the artist sees the average man? Wandering through life unaware, sleepwalking through life? Is it a negative statement about men? Are men vulnerable and in need of protection? Is it on the campus of a women's college to send a message to women that they need not fear competing in the world with men, because stripped of the usual external trappings of status, men are not that powerful or in control? I was surprised to find that statue was actually making me think. My thoughts may not jive with the artist's intent, but it did make me think. It's not a work of beauty, but that doesn't mean it's not "art".

And, because of the associations I have to it, I really can't understand why the students would find it disturbing, or in any way sexually threatening. What's the big deal with the fact the figure is in his underwear? You see that in advertisements for men's underwear, and on models with much more attractive and sexy bodies then the middle-aged shlump depicted in the statue. And form-fitting swim trucks are equally revealing, The men who are competitive swimmers wear even skimpier tighter bottoms, and, by that standard, Olympic swim events should be equally shocking or disturbing to some. I really don't understand the controversy or the objections. And I don't find it creepy in any way. The man looks average, very average, and not at all creepy to me.

I think the statue has to be displayed outdoors to get its full effect. But I think it's nuts to place it near traffic where it can distract, or alarm, drivers because of its realism. That would be my only objection to it. Otherwise, I really do find it an amusing, and unexpected, sight.

Farmer the phony:
I listen to Ozymandias and feel contempt for the self proclaimed all powerful.

Yet you never lose an opportunity to apologize for them or cover for their crimes.

If you walked out in the snow in your drawers and with your eyes closed you would undoubtedly invoke emotions in someone who saw you. The only possible way such an act might be considered art is if it was your intent to invoke such emotion.

Art requires intent, otherwise it is a sunrise, a shot to the belly, a dog's excrement steaming on a winter lawn.

Still intent is not enough or virtually anything anyone did with "artistic intent" could be considered "art." Unfortunately that seems to be the way it goes these days.

"I am an artist and therefore everything and anything I do or produce is art."

I'm not fighting this inane definition of art anymore and so all this crap, if intended in any way to be art, is therefore "art."

But under this definition there is meaningful art to be valued and there is art to be ignored or perhaps event to be smiled at for a second or two.

This sculpture is the latter form of "art."

Having said this, it is a very fine example of craft. It really is very lifelike and the person who created it clearly has talent as a craftsman. Getting a reaction to his life-like creation is not what I consider "art."

BTW - Hilariously, the Feminists at the university located nearby to this piece of "art" find it horrifically offensive.

More and more the ocean that was our culture seems to be evaporating into a puddle about an eight of an inch deep.