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Modern Art. Is it all toss?


  • Total voters
    35

MK Shrimper

Striker
Joined
Aug 6, 2005
Messages
52,643
Me and Mrs MK took a trip into the big smoke today and decided we'd pop into the Tate Modern for a browse.

Now I have never seen such a collection of utter worthless toss in my entire life - pictures (if you can call it that) that a 5 year old could have done with a sugar rush and let loose at the paint box.

Photographs of people doing things to their bodies that would make your eyes water. A whole room showing films of;

1) A naked boxer in a mask punching himself.
2) A woman rubbing tomato sauce over her hairy parts.
3) A man (I think) rubbing what I think was porridge over his body.
4) A man trying to force his own soldier up his own "alleyway".

Now I don't believe I'm a heathen - I like a good book and alternative music but I really cannot see the worth in 99.9% of the stuff in the Tate Modern.

So my question is, should the Tate Modern burn down tomorrow with all of this "art" in it (obviously with every human being safely ensconced in a nearby pub supping G&T's) would the world really be a sadder place?
 
I don't understand what it's for. Unless of course Its to get people talking in which case it's worked.
 
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I don't understand what it's for. Unless of course IRS to get people talking in which case it's worked.

And would me doing a big poo in the middle of MK Dons pitch while wearing a mask of Drewe Broughton but it wouldn't be art.
 
It won't happen though. I bet you don't have a Drewe mask.
 
So you saw some Zoners down there as well?

1. Ricey
2. OBL
3. Cricko
4....Could be a whole host of Zoners!!!!
 
I think some 'modern' art is quite interesting although not sure about the 4 you have mentioned. At the museum in Wellington, NZ there was one piece which was a cardboard box, on the ground, with two eye holes cut out. Behind it was a dvd video which two eyes moving while the words to Mad World was being said. Art? Not so sure but was interesting none the less.

and that Tracey Emin! She could pitch up my tent anyday!

;):unsure:
 
I'm a big admirer of Picasso's work so modern art in the painting form I have no problem with what I dislike are these "display" forms of art, remember the switching the light on and off one a few years back? Completely pointless.
 
Seriously......would you stand and stair at a blank canvas if it was called modern art?

I bet i know a few people on here that would!!

art1.jpg
 
Hmmm strange poll, isn't it like asking:

Do you like modern music? or
Do you like modern cinema?

There are areas of modern art I really like Cornelia Parker's 'explosion' installations and Rachel Whitereads new stuff but some of it is very hard to justify.

An ex girlfriend of mine was an artist and she did her Masters at the Royal College of Art. It seems to me that the most important aspect of art is the creative process/thinking behind a piece of work as opposed to the end product which is obviously what is shown in the gallery.

I always try to remember this when viewing work and try to understand what the artists thought process was to arrive at their end product.
 
But if I want a nice picture hanging above my fireplace, I couldn't give a fig about the creative process or what the artist was thinking!

There's soooo much pretentious nonsense spoken about modern "art" that I'm sure that critics and purveyors of this rubbish speak just to sound clever when in reality, they think the same as the rest of us!
 
Defiler is spot on. Just because something is modern, it doesn't automatically mean that it is poo. Unless it is poo (e.g. Chris Ofili, Gilbert & George).

Plenty of "modern art" is actually very thought-provoking (although whether or not it is art, as such, might be a more pertinent question - e.g. Doris Salzedo's Shibboleth, which was at the Tate Modern). Some "modern art" occupies that middle-ground between art and architecture - e.g. Angel of the North, which is certainly modern and has art-related overtones, and is a superb piece of work.

Some modern art is fun & quirky - e.g. Tim Head's "Cow Mutations" up at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool.

And some - such as a video installation of some bloke doing strange things with his tadger - is just plain nonsense (although, again, is it art - or simply a very public form of catharsis / therapy for that bloke, and something about which the overwhelming majority of us shouldn't give a t*ss?).

But it's certainly not all poo... you just have to search a bit harder to find the gems, that's all.
 
Go along with what MtS and Defiler are saying, and art in any form, is very subjective anyway. To go back to the poll options, Picasso, the man was a genius

guernica.jpg
 
Yes some Modern Art is Toss. Some Modern Art is Great. Art is subjective, and which is great and which is toss is up to the viewer.

Personally I can't stand Tracey Emin or Gilbert & George.

But I love the work of Damien Hirst, Jackson Pollock and plenty of others.

There are always plenty of levels to view art from. Many of the old masters might my pretty to look at but have hidden messages, it's up to you what you want to see.
 
Gone for the first option, but I guess this is more because I don't 'get it'.

Been to the Tate Modern a number of times and can not see the attraction. Most of it is way over my head, but maybe I'm just a philistine!
 
I admire anyone that can convince gullible rich fools to part with large sums of money without resorting to fraud or violence.

What I don't understand is why you cannot be taken seriously as an artist unless you have attended the right colleges.
 
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