Thursday, June 16, 2011
Art - what is it?
I have been thinking about art today......and ended up wondering just what I know about the subject.
Like most people, I know what I like.
I had been musing on how best create a photograph album with my pictures. There are far too many to print all of them.
Bill creates an album which records our doings - and many of the photographs are good; the photographs have something to say - they tell a story or look at places and life in an interesting way.
I wanted a different sort of album and I decided that I would like far fewer of my photos printed for posterity - the ones that maybe I deemed to be art, or at least have some artistic merit.
This morning I went through the hundreds of photographs that have been taken this year and picked 81 that I was really pleased with.
Gradually I will work through them and print them for my new album.
Art has also been in my mind for other reasons. A contact of mine, who sells her paintings, invited me to join a facebook group called Photographs for Art.
My first thought was of how much I treasured my own creations - they are my babies. Perhaps I didn't want other people, not known to me, to see them and even possibly use them as a basis for their own paintings.
But one's babes have to grow and find their own way in the world; and if some of mine inspire another, then they have done well.
I put just a few pictures on the site from our West Hoathly trip and they seem to have been appreciated.
I certainly appreciate seeing other people's photographic creations.
This evening we saw a programme about the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition.
Suddenly my understanding of art was lost in confusion and chaos!
Guests talked of the wonderful art to be seen and then derided profusely some of the pictures displayed, as being completely rubbish. These would be the landscapes and such like - the ones that show places and life in an interesting way, that tell a story of the bond between the artist, the viewer and the subject matter.
Suddenly any art in my photography had no value at all - "rubbish" would be the comment of the art experts.
But art experts are in the minority - very few of us could rave, wax lyrical and create so many meaningless sentences about the items short listed for the Best in Show prize.
The winner of the best exhibit in the entire show was a sculpture - not one achieved with sculpting tools and skill.
It was a large circle of foam rubber, with a circle of copper, strategically placed on the foam and a black ball in the centre of the copper disc. The whole contraption was left to lean against the wall.
Is that art? It just made me think of The Emperor's New Clothes.
If the person next to you is a known art expert, then how to to stand up and be counted as one who thinks he is talking garbage!
And so the garbage grows and multiplies until it becomes believable.
Like most people, I know what I like.
I had been musing on how best create a photograph album with my pictures. There are far too many to print all of them.
Bill creates an album which records our doings - and many of the photographs are good; the photographs have something to say - they tell a story or look at places and life in an interesting way.
I wanted a different sort of album and I decided that I would like far fewer of my photos printed for posterity - the ones that maybe I deemed to be art, or at least have some artistic merit.
This morning I went through the hundreds of photographs that have been taken this year and picked 81 that I was really pleased with.
Gradually I will work through them and print them for my new album.
Art has also been in my mind for other reasons. A contact of mine, who sells her paintings, invited me to join a facebook group called Photographs for Art.
My first thought was of how much I treasured my own creations - they are my babies. Perhaps I didn't want other people, not known to me, to see them and even possibly use them as a basis for their own paintings.
But one's babes have to grow and find their own way in the world; and if some of mine inspire another, then they have done well.
I put just a few pictures on the site from our West Hoathly trip and they seem to have been appreciated.
I certainly appreciate seeing other people's photographic creations.
This evening we saw a programme about the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition.
Suddenly my understanding of art was lost in confusion and chaos!
Guests talked of the wonderful art to be seen and then derided profusely some of the pictures displayed, as being completely rubbish. These would be the landscapes and such like - the ones that show places and life in an interesting way, that tell a story of the bond between the artist, the viewer and the subject matter.
Suddenly any art in my photography had no value at all - "rubbish" would be the comment of the art experts.
But art experts are in the minority - very few of us could rave, wax lyrical and create so many meaningless sentences about the items short listed for the Best in Show prize.
The winner of the best exhibit in the entire show was a sculpture - not one achieved with sculpting tools and skill.
It was a large circle of foam rubber, with a circle of copper, strategically placed on the foam and a black ball in the centre of the copper disc. The whole contraption was left to lean against the wall.
Is that art? It just made me think of The Emperor's New Clothes.
If the person next to you is a known art expert, then how to to stand up and be counted as one who thinks he is talking garbage!
And so the garbage grows and multiplies until it becomes believable.
