Modern Art? You’re having a laugh aren’t you?!
Call me a philistine, call me an uncultured oaf if you will, but in return, I will call it like it is: a mirror on the wall is just that – a mirror on the wall. It is not art!
No seriously; this is what I found in the Tate Modern in London when I visited there this summer. I kid you not, I stood agape watching the pretentious types stopping and contemplating what amounted to a bathroom cabinet stuck on the wall.
It’s actually from 1965, and is titled “The Big Picture” Untitled Painting, by Michael Baldwin and Mel Ramsden – wait? It took TWO people to come up with this?!
Apparently it turns a: ‘century-old convention upside-down by replacing the painting’s surface with a mirror. Rather than look at an image of the artist’s making, viewers are now confronted by themselves, thereby questioning a long-held notion of painting transcending reality.’
Sure enough two American tourists ardently trying to take a good picture of it – were loudly exclaiming (yeah, yeah I’m playing up the stereotypes I know, so?) to each other ‘brilliant, it’s so modernistic,’ ‘yeah, it really makes you think, doesn’t it?’
‘Think’ – really? You know what I ‘think’ now I see a mirror: ‘How much could I flog this to the National Gallery for?’
Now look, it’s not like I don’t appreciate art – well I would have gone into the Tate Modern in the first place otherwise – and I did see some genuinely inspiring and intriguing stuff like the car engine covered in copper sulphate by Roger Hiorns (made me think of man-made stuff being reclaimed by nature) and Richard Hamilton’s Hommage a Chrysler Corp from 1957 that explored the advertising cliché linking woman and cars – their forms having merged in this painting.
Okay that’s car stuff (which obviously resonates with me) but I really found the Russian Revolutionary Posters fascinating. They could only be described as Strong Art and I was particularly fascinated by one that appealed to the ‘Comrade Mussulman’ to saddle up and join the army of all oppressed and working people.
Then of course there’s the pop art like the iconic Andy Warhol and of course the comic art of Roy Lichtenstein.
Okay maybe I’m a little stuck in my ways and old skool, but when I stumbled upon what appeared to be a piece of ventilation shaft, I immediately looked up to see if the Tate Modern (formerly a power station) was falling apart and this had fallen from the ceiling. Not a bit of it. It was actually an exhibit. You’ve got to be kidding me!
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[I left this same message somewhere else on your Website, nevertheless here it is again]
I came across the same “Mirror on the Wall” at Tate Modern many a year ago [but I believe it was framed at the time]. I opened my arms with a huge smile and said to myself, “Voilà! You can’t perfect on Life! Here’s Art looking back on you my dear Life”. I mean, at best, Art can only imitate Real Life. In this case, “A Reflection on Reality”. I would describe it. “A Mirror on the Art of Reality”. After my conclusion on the piece, I thought I should read what the description had to say about it. I don’t exactly remember, but in essence, it was precisely as I imagined.
There was one other piece that caught my imagination called “Light Switch”. This was a projection from a Kodak Carousel of a light switch on a wall exactly where you expect to find it. For me, it was simple and to the point, “A Switch Enlightened by Light”. Overall, “Abstract Art” puzzles me to no effect, except, perhaps, obvious dismissal. For instance, I think the Artist Jackson Pollock is a load of “Ballocks”. Whatever it is, it’s either that, or I’m too thick.
Art should provide instant “Revelation”, or it’s no art at all, at least for me. And I’m no art critic. Of course, to excuse my ignorance regarding the “Art World”, I’m simply just too daft to know better. Someone out there should switch on the light for me to see.
If I’m wrong, someone out there, “Give me light”.
ps. if you wish to reply to my comment, please do so via email. We have a few things in common, not least, an interest in classic cars. I am a pauper, yet I managed to restore a 1973 XJ6 Series 1. It took five years to do. Sorry to be long winded. I’m long in the tooth.
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