There are 42 comments.

1. Member
   Steven Seward

   @StevenSeward

   8:30 AM EDT ⋅ Jun 17, 2021

   Percival (View Comment):

   Michael S. Malone (View Comment):

   Rothko’s paintings didn’t do much for me . . . until I stood in front of one.

   As for all the new stuff: garbage. A triumph of marketing and theory (manifestos) over actual artistic creation.

   btw: I’m married to a painter with works in collections around the world. She despises the new stuff — and only studies Old Masters these days

   I’d have an overwhelming desire to wait until no one is watching, then hang it upside down. Just to see if anyone would notice.

   There have been several notable cases where abstract paintings were mistakenly displayed upside-down..  Here is a famous example of a Matisse painting mistakenly hung upside-down for 47 days at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.  The artist’s own son, who was an art dealer,  did not even notice.

   https://news.artnet.com/art-world/moma-hangs-matisse-upside-down-683900

2. Inactive
   CuriousKevmo

   @CuriousKevmo

   2:57 PM EDT ⋅ Jun 17, 2021

   Percival (View Comment):
   I’d have an overwhelming desire to wait until no one is watching, then hang it upside down. Just to see if anyone would notice.

   My kids and I just watched that documentary on the big fraud perpetuated on the NY art scene with the fake Rothko’s and Pollack’s.  With one of the fakes that was apparently a topic of lively debate, which way was up.

   I saw nothing in those paintings any better or different than the work of the kids in the “teen lounge” at the hospital I used to volunteer at.

   JosePluma, Local Man of Mystery @JosePluma 7:53 AM PDT ⋅ Jun 16, 2021

   Most art, like most fashion, architecture, modern classical music and other elite pursuits, is mainly a scam to extract money from rich people.

   Yup.

3. Member
   Steven Seward

   @StevenSeward

   8:06 PM EDT ⋅ Jun 17, 2021

   CuriousKevmo (View Comment):

   JosePluma, Local Man of Mystery @ JosePluma 7:53 AM PDT ⋅ Jun 16, 2021

   Most art, like most fashion, architecture, modern classical music and other elite pursuits, is mainly a scam to extract money from rich people.

   Yup.

   Speaking only about Art, I know it seems like most of it is a scam, but that is an illusion of our modern media.  The vast amount of art that is sold and looked at in museums, is of the “beautiful” variety, whether or not it is representational or abstract.  The reason that the crap art seems so pervasive is because it gets all the attention from news media.  If a website wants to get more clicks on an Internet story, which of these titles do they display? “Happy Couple hangs Lovely Flower Painting in their Kitchen” or “Tin Can of Artist’s Poop Sells for $300,000.00”?

   I’ve been to thousands of art shows and museums and I see what people buy and look at.  I am happy to report that good old-fashioned beautiful art has never disappeared.  It just doesn’t get any news coverage, so unless you are actually looking for it, you won’t notice.  To be sure, the Modern Art World has some of the most hideous and offensive scams that drain money out of people who are either easily fooled or are just playing games with their superfluous lucre, but these are definitely in the minority.

   One of my favorite stories in the book “The $12 Million stuffed Shark: The Curious Economics of Contemporary Art,” is about a husband and wife sitting at a Sotheby’s art auction in New York City.  The gavel slams down for nearly one-million dollars on a revolting painting.  The wife laughs and whispers to her husband “Who is the imbecile that spent a million dollars on that ugly piece of crap?”  The husband sheepishly mutters “Um…..that was me.”  (He was making silent bids)

4. Member
   Doctor Robert

   @DoctorRobert

   9:18 PM EDT ⋅ Jun 17, 2021

   Caryn (View Comment):

   Doctor Robert (View Comment):

   I like the Rothko shown. It’s assertive, it’s violent. It says something.

   I don’t like all of his paintings I have seen. Which shows that they involved me.

   My great-aunt Louise Ewing was a minor artist, had a studio, sold paintings in big city galleries. Her husband Raymond taught art at Smith College in the 1950s and, besides painting, was an illustrator for a card company, maybe Hallmark. They made a very good living in art and were able to acquire 16 acres in Deer Island ME, where they lived their last 25 years, painting and clamming and raising hogs.

   Late in her long life Louise, my first wife and I sat down one night over clams and corn (which she had collected and grown, respectively) and talked about Art, with a capital A, and how it differed from simple painting. I learned that night, by her patient questioning, that the viewer has to immerse himself much more deeply in abstract art to understand the message, than in a work which is merely illustrative.

   Please don’t protest that Great Masters show what things really look like and abstract art doesn’t. There’s plenty of really awful representational art out there. https://www.christianbook.com/painter-of-light-thank-you-cards/pd/51855X

   Your Great Masters don’t show what things really look like, they always put their own stamps on reality. One of the Ricochetti who is a nurse has a husband who does FABulous portrait paintings; it’s good art that is representational, it’s not good art because it’s representational.

   Representational art versus abstract, to me, is like song versus symphony.

   My husband is an extraordinary portrait painter, but you can’t be talking about us because I’m damned sure not a nurse.

   Yes, I do mean you and your husband.  I apologize for forgetting your profession, Caryn.

5. Member
   Steven Seward

   @StevenSeward

   9:37 PM EDT ⋅ Jun 17, 2021

   Doctor Robert (View Comment):

   Caryn (View Comment):

   Doctor Robert (View Comment):

   I like the Rothko shown. It’s assertive, it’s violent. It says something.

   I don’t like all of his paintings I have seen. Which shows that they involved me.

   My great-aunt Louise Ewing was a minor artist, had a studio, sold paintings in big city galleries. Her husband Raymond taught art at Smith College in the 1950s and, besides painting, was an illustrator for a card company, maybe Hallmark. They made a very good living in art and were able to acquire 16 acres in Deer Island ME, where they lived their last 25 years, painting and clamming and raising hogs.

   Late in her long life Louise, my first wife and I sat down one night over clams and corn (which she had collected and grown, respectively) and talked about Art, with a capital A, and how it differed from simple painting. I learned that night, by her patient questioning, that the viewer has to immerse himself much more deeply in abstract art to understand the message, than in a work which is merely illustrative.

   Please don’t protest that Great Masters show what things really look like and abstract art doesn’t. There’s plenty of really awful representational art out there. https://www.christianbook.com/painter-of-light-thank-you-cards/pd/51855X

   Your Great Masters don’t show what things really look like, they always put their own stamps on reality. One of the Ricochetti who is a nurse has a husband who does FABulous portrait paintings; it’s good art that is representational, it’s not good art because it’s representational.

   Representational art versus abstract, to me, is like song versus symphony.

   My husband is an extraordinary portrait painter, but you can’t be talking about us because I’m damned sure not a nurse.

   Yes, I do mean you and your husband. I apologize for forgetting your profession, Caryn.

   My lovely wife has a profession that is hard to define in one word.  She asked me not to clarify, but since you brought it up – she is a lab researcher, epidemiologist, statistician, and author of scientific papers on microbiology, but has done work associated with nursing such as drawing blood, emergency room work, helped in surgeries, even pulled teeth! (She’s also a wonderful cook!)

6. Thatcher
   Caryn

   @Caryn

   

   8:49 AM EDT ⋅ Jun 18, 2021

   Steven Seward (View Comment):

   Doctor Robert (View Comment):

   Caryn (View Comment):

   Doctor Robert (View Comment):

   I like the Rothko shown. It’s assertive, it’s violent. It says something.

   I don’t like all of his paintings I have seen. Which shows that they involved me.

   My great-aunt Louise Ewing was a minor artist, had a studio, sold paintings in big city galleries. Her husband Raymond taught art at Smith College in the 1950s and, besides painting, was an illustrator for a card company, maybe Hallmark. They made a very good living in art and were able to acquire 16 acres in Deer Island ME, where they lived their last 25 years, painting and clamming and raising hogs.

   Late in her long life Louise, my first wife and I sat down one night over clams and corn (which she had collected and grown, respectively) and talked about Art, with a capital A, and how it differed from simple painting. I learned that night, by her patient questioning, that the viewer has to immerse himself much more deeply in abstract art to understand the message, than in a work which is merely illustrative.

   Please don’t protest that Great Masters show what things really look like and abstract art doesn’t. There’s plenty of really awful representational art out there. https://www.christianbook.com/painter-of-light-thank-you-cards/pd/51855X

   Your Great Masters don’t show what things really look like, they always put their own stamps on reality. One of the Ricochetti who is a nurse has a husband who does FABulous portrait paintings; it’s good art that is representational, it’s not good art because it’s representational.

   Representational art versus abstract, to me, is like song versus symphony.

   My husband is an extraordinary portrait painter, but you can’t be talking about us because I’m damned sure not a nurse.

   Yes, I do mean you and your husband. I apologize for forgetting your profession, Caryn.

   My lovely wife has a profession that is hard to define in one word. She asked me not to clarify, but since you brought it up – she is a lab researcher, epidemiologist, statistician, and author of scientific papers on microbiology, but has done work associated with nursing such as drawing blood, emergency room work, helped in surgeries, even pulled teeth! (She’s also a wonderful cook!)

   He forgot the Air Force medic part.  That’s where I got the aversion to being called “nurse.”  I shouldn’t be so sensitive about it.  Now I’m going to go take my husband to task for associating my ER work with nursing!  Nurses (of the RN/BSN variety) don’t examine, diagnose, and prescribe treatment and certainly don’t DO minor surgeries, all of which military medics do routinely.  Yes, nurses assist in the OR, as do some military medics, but I generally didn’t; also, nurses are officers and run the inpatient wards, while medics are enlisted and run the ED and outpatient clinics.  There is also a thing about being trained at the PhD level and when mentioning being employed by an academic medical center being asked, “Oh, are you a nurse?”  Why is that the presumption?  Is it because I’m female?  Yeah, it’s an issue.  Sorry to slap at you, though; that just wasn’t nice, especially when you were complimenting my husband’s work.  He is pretty darned impressive and you very kind to notice.

7. Inactive
   DoubleDare

   @DoubleDare

   4:19 PM EDT ⋅ Jun 18, 2021

   Percival (View Comment):

   Michael S. Malone (View Comment):

   Rothko’s paintings didn’t do much for me . . . until I stood in front of one.

   As for all the new stuff: garbage. A triumph of marketing and theory (manifestos) over actual artistic creation.

   btw: I’m married to a painter with works in collections around the world. She despises the new stuff — and only studies Old Masters these days

   I’d have an overwhelming desire to wait until no one is watching, then hang it upside down. Just to see if anyone would notice.

   Too funny.  I once went to a real estate open house in San Francisco.  Late on the third day of a long weekend, so many, many people had been through.  They had a framed Rothko reprint hanging sideways at the bottom of the staircase – you couldn’t miss it.

   On the way out, I said to the hip, business-suit-wearing realtor “You know the Rothko downstairs is hanging sideways, right?”  He slowly repeated those words back to me in confusion (“the Rothko downstairs. . . “) and looked at me like I was from outer space.

8. Coolidge
   Flicker

   @Flicker

   5:00 PM EDT ⋅ Jun 18, 2021

   DoubleDare (View Comment):

   Percival (View Comment):

   Michael S. Malone (View Comment):

   Rothko’s paintings didn’t do much for me . . . until I stood in front of one.

   As for all the new stuff: garbage. A triumph of marketing and theory (manifestos) over actual artistic creation.

   btw: I’m married to a painter with works in collections around the world. She despises the new stuff — and only studies Old Masters these days

   I’d have an overwhelming desire to wait until no one is watching, then hang it upside down. Just to see if anyone would notice.

   Too funny. I once went to a real estate open house in San Francisco. Late on the third day of a long weekend, so many, many people had been through. They had a framed Rothko reprint hanging sideways at the bottom of the staircase – you couldn’t miss it.

   On the way out, I said to the hip, business-suit-wearing realtor “You know the Rothko downstairs is hanging sideways, right?” He slowly repeated those words back to me in confusion (“the Rothko downstairs. . . “) and looked at me like I was from outer space.

   I would have been that realtor.

9. Member
   The Reticulator

   @TheReticulator

   5:30 PM EDT ⋅ Jun 18, 2021

   DoubleDare (View Comment):
   and looked at me like I was from outer space.

   Well? Are you? 

10. Inactive
    DoubleDare

    @DoubleDare

    6:35 PM EDT ⋅ Jun 18, 2021

    The Reticulator (View Comment):

    DoubleDare (View Comment):
    and looked at me like I was from outer space.

    Well? Are you?

    Ok, I admit it.  I am.  But even in my galaxy, we have Art History 101.  :)

    And I should clarify – I agree that most people wouldn’t know an upside-down Rothko from a sideways one, don’t care one way or the other, and have no particular reason to care.  Fair enough.

    But this was San Francisco and a multitude of San Franciscans had already been through the house and past the Rothko – for three days.  My experience living in the Bay Area for twelve years was that residents of San Francisco, particularly, often seemed to hold themselves out as cosmopolitan sophisticates and to be snobby and unpleasant to outsiders.

    I was always a little skeptical of San Francisco-style sophistication, so I took some confirmatory glee from the situation.  But then, we do that on my planet.

11. Member
    The Reticulator

    @TheReticulator

    7:22 PM EDT ⋅ Jun 18, 2021

    DoubleDare (View Comment):

    The Reticulator (View Comment):

    DoubleDare (View Comment):
    and looked at me like I was from outer space.

    Well? Are you?

    Ok, I admit it. I am. But even in my galaxy, we have Art History 101. :)

    And I should clarify – I agree that most people wouldn’t know an upside-down Rothko from a sideways one, don’t care one way or the other, and have no particular reason to care. Fair enough.

    But this was San Francisco and a multitude of San Franciscans had already been through the house and past the Rothko – for three days. My experience living in the Bay Area for twelve years was that residents of San Francisco, particularly, often seemed to hold themselves out as cosmopolitan sophisticates and to be snobby and unpleasant to outsiders.

    I was always a little skeptical of San Francisco-style sophistication, so I took some confirmatory glee from the situation. But then, we do that on my planet.

    Welcome to our planet, just the same!  (Earth is a nice planet to visit, too, but you probably wouldn’t want to stay there.)  

12. Inactive
    Mark Alexander

    @MarkAlexander

    Post author

    9:55 PM EDT ⋅ Jun 18, 2021