The Art Book: New Edition

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Buren, two levels (I sentence this column to ten years in prison, for contempt of the court of aesthetics and public opinion). But ironically, the editors and the artists themselves unashamedly express the same points in a language/philosophy that's more ridiculous than any writer's satire. I copy here some of the earnest fawning quotes/blurbs from the book. Remember how this book was seen throughout the whole Friends series? First at Central Perk, then at Monica's. Now it's on my shelf, thanks to Patty :)

I've always wanted to learn more about art and art history, and this was a good sampling. It takes 500 different artists and shows one work from each of them. It was a nice introduction to artists I hadn't heard of before, and it gave a brief synopsis of the work and the artist. The captions provide adequate details both about the paintings and the artists. You will learn a detail or two about the paintings, the lives of the artists and even a few fun facts every now and then. It is somewhat sad though to read references to all sorts of other paintings done by the same artists. The format of the book dictates that we can only see one painting per artist and to see the rest, we would have to turn to other books or the internet. The perfect prescription for someone who thinks Kupka might have something to do with the continuing cup-cake craze. Reading the book, it's difficult to ignore a theme which comes up repeatedly, so many artists seem to be even more manifesto loving, social driven creatures than some stereotypes suggest. So many times, the artist is described to follow philosophy/school A, then switches to philosophy/school B, or idolizes artist/mentor C, then switches to artist/mentor D, or creates a clique E, then switches to collective F, and so it goes. I don't think you get to see that so much in other art forms (for example, with writers or even musicians), where usually, the serious artists dislike (or at least claim to dislike) the notion of genres, tribes or ideology. Anyway, art is different, it requires technical skill (well, see subsequent paragraphs on that), and comes from a tradition of manual workmanship, perhaps it makes sense that when the apprenticeship system weakened amidst the social changes of the modern age, substitute forms would take its place.What makes the book loose seriousness is the tendency of the editors to select laughable modern or conceptual art. I don't blame them, if the art world considers some artists as masters, then who am I to judge. OK, I judge. Especially since the rest of the review is more of a rant, for personal indulgence/reference, including funny/pretentious quotes from the book at the end.

See more Introduction to Italian Sculpture, Volume III: Italian High Renaissance and Baroque Sculpture I guess I'm being narrow-minded at best or philistine at worse, anyway these are old criticisms that others have expressed better. I vaguely remember many eloquent, fun lines from Tom Wolfe's "painted world" on the topic. Although in the spirit of negativity in this review, I also remember extremely repetitious blah blah, and what should have been a brief, fun, ranty article, not a "proper" book. Yet, let's find something good to quote from it from Wikiquote (and as it turns out, even the quote on its own is repetitive). Calder, lobster trap and fishtail (interesting to see the use of the word mobile in art in a pre cellphone era. "Calder was the inventor of the mobile in 1932". What is more of an abomination, comparing the older or recent creation, I can't decide). This is a portrait of Iris Clert if I say so. Robert Rauschenberg. [The telegram sent by the aforementioned artist when requested to paint a portrait, which since then is considered to be the "painting"]. A sublime bit of toilet reading for me. At two or three paintings per trip to the washroom, the enjoyment will last for the better part of a year! How nifty is that?Baumeister, mortaruru with red overhead (Willi by name, Baumeister by nature, or vice versa, just too easy, so no retitling. You'd think someone with such a fantastic three in one name would be extra self-conscious to do serious work). Boltanski, reserve of dead Swiss (your reservation has been cancelled. Is that even legal by the way, using photographs of dead people from local newspapers for the unauthorized purpose of an art installation? I'd normally laugh at the artwork's description but considering the topic, the blurb angered me instead "in previous works, Boltanski had used photographs of Jewish children. Here, by using images of the Swiss, a race associated with neutrality rather than a specific and terrible fate, Boltanski lays greater emphasis on the universality of mortality"). The selection of artists has a decidedly Western and Christian bias. There are a few Japanese and South-American artists here and there, but the overwhelming majority are from mainland Europe and English speaking countries. Also the depicted scenes (at least until the beginning of the 20th century) are from either Roman or Christian mythology or Western European aristocratic and everyday life. After a while, seeing the same scenes over and over again, even if depicted by different artists, becomes quite monotonous and boring. See more The Music of Painting: Music, Modernism and the Visual Arts from the Romantics to John Cage