If one of the roles of art is to make you ponder
… on such things as the beauty of life, the finality of death, the complexity of biology, the marvel of evolution, the morality of meat-eating …
then walking through the two halves of this artwork did it for me.
This one is interesting. As a biologist, I remember we had one of those remarkable victorian museums at university, full of preserved animals and animal parts . the largest was a pig… not quite sure what caused the zoologist to preserve the pig (it was not particularly interesting a species nor rare or extinct) but there you go. However,it was a facinating place in a morbid kind of way - same as the ‘bodyparts’ exhibitions of the early naughties seemed to attract crowds wherever ot went. I guess us humans have a strange fascination with the macabre and if the purpose of art is to stimulate the emotions, then this kind of exhibit comes under that description.
The only issue I have with Damian’s preserved animals is they are not that ‘original’ - countless victorian zoologists got there ahead of him, only perhaps not on that scale and without the Saachi boys to provide a space for them. Still interesting though, especially the way he positions the pieces as you point out…
Going back to technique and photorealism if you’re taken by the artistic process have a look at this (if it’s on show) at Tate Britain…staggering.
Henry Wallis, “Chatterton” (c. 1855–56)
Sorry LITSL, cant see the pic, but I think I knowthe picture you mean? Young man lying on bed, lots of scattered paper in a box?
Thanks for your time CR and I enjoyed the debate. You will gather that I am not a huge fan of the Ermin’s of this world but clearly they have an audience and she was given a CBE for services to the arts ( was that on the condition that she stopped? 
) I spent some time looking at more of her work last night and found much of it disturbing. She is like the 6 year old brat at school who thinks that everyone is fascinated by the contents of her knickers, including herself. To me she actually comes across as a disturbed and damaged human being who should be given help rather than treated as some genius. Again this is only my personal opinion but this to me is what irritaes me about those who seem to be given special powers to decide what is good art or not. If Charles Saatchi buys your work for example you have hit the jackpot. You say you are not qualified to really comment on Ermin’s work but you and I are both. Neither of us care for it and more people like us should say this is bollocks and give the space over to people who are producing better works. I get that she is trying to make a statement as all artists do, but some do it a lot better than others. I totally accept that Tracey Ermin is considered an artist and produces art. I just dont think that it is very good art and wish more people would voice an opinion rather than just accept that she has this elevated place as an artist because The Art World have signed up to her. Apparently she was listed as one of the 100 most powerful women in the UK by BBCs Radio 4. WTF? The trouble is that now she is completely untouchable as she has been given the Artistic seal of approaval so everything she has done, is doing and will do in the future will be treated with a reverance only given to serious proper artists. There will be no review when she passes away and a reappraisal of her work which will down grade it. She is sorted and has her place in art history when there are hundreds of aspiring and struggling artists producing better works but who will never see the likes of day simply because the Saatchis of this world have made their judgements. I am no artist myself but I have three daughters, one is doing art at Uni and the other two in 6th form college so I do get to see a lot of work when I go to the open days. I would much rather spend time looking at the works of these aspiring artists than the self indulgance of someone fixated with her own vagina and how thinks that the world at large is interested in a list of names of people she has slept with. Sadly some people agree with her though 
NO worries SOG, its a good and very interesting discussion and one that is quite common.There is no real right or wrong IMHO. But I will leave with a bit of a ‘mind fuck’ - How do you know that her work was not designed to specifically mess with your head in that way?To create anger and frustration , knowing how folks react to self obsessed images that are at times disturbing? 
If art is all about emotions, why should it always be the positive ones, why not something dark and twisted?
Thing is SOG, Art schools are all about teaching technique - Hirst, Emin will be excellent illustrators and painters in the ‘traditional sense’ - otherwise as you will know, you cant get int art school in the first place, let alone a fine art degree course at a good one… they have merely gone on to use different approaches/media to practice their…art.
As with any ‘career’ choice - there is always and element of luck involved - artists have needed a patron throughout history to help get them to the right customers or support their painting such the de Medici etc.
These patrons have always effected who and which artists prosper and which do not. Saachi is not different in that context.
It seems incredulous to us that van Gogh did not sell one painting during his lifetime - without an influential patron,a nd with a style so at odds with what was considered art, it still remains starnge that his works are now so highly prozed and considered masterpieces. Great work will always out - and stand the test of time.
Well me dear old Rib, my mind has certainly been fucked as I have spent the morning looking at works by Hirst! It is good that there is a huge diversity of work to enjoy (or get frustrated with) and as you say, there is no right or wrong. As you can tell I am very much a “I dont know much about art but I know what I like” bloke. Mrs SOG and I spent some time in Paris in August and visited the Musee d’Orsay for the first time. It was interesting that most of the well know works were upstairs and that is where the crowds were. Tons of very interesting stuff on the lower floors but most peeps made a b line for the famous. Same in the Louvre. Big queues for the Mona Lisa which probably isnt da Vinci’s best work let along the best in the gallery. Do artworls become iconinic because they ARE iconic or because people who know about this stuff tell us it is iconic? I think I said eralier that the kind of art I get off on it stull I couldnt ever do myself (which is mostly anything). I went through Ermin’s work last night and I would think that I or anybody I know could produce similar work, It is not extraordinary to me. Much of the Hirst stuff I looked at this morning I could replicate and again, it does little or nothing for me. I remember many years ago when I started my English Lit A level course and we would spend time pulling Yeats apart and trying tgo work out what he was saying to us through his poetry. In one season full of stags and nature one guy put his hand up and said perhaps he has just written a poem about a stag in a forest! That is what I think of a lot of this stuff. If an Artist puts a dead sheep in a case and exhibits it people will stand around and discuss its meaning. If I do it I have just produced a dead sheep for people to gawp at that would be better off served with some mint sauce. Fair play to Ermin. She clearly had some issues growing up and has made a living and a name out of them. I spent some time in The Priory in 2004 and some of the therapy sessions involved the use of artistic expression. No one is interested in my works but someone has deemed Ermin’s to have merit, and that is what frustrates me - once it has been given an Artistic Seal of Approval it is then given a higher status. I am willing to bet that if I took some of Ermin’s work and put it amongst the first year student’s work at Brighton Uni (assuming that people hadnt seen it before and knew it was Ermins) it would not stand out as any special. Even before van Gogh was famous I am willing to bet that if he work was shown with other people’s work, it would have stood out even if people said they werent keen on it. Perhaps that is Ermin’s genious, she has taken scrawling line drawings of fannies, using four letter words and an adolescent depiction of sex to a place where it is reveared as High Art, and made a few quid in the process.
I couldnt agree more. When you are up close and personal and can see the individual brush strokes, textures and colours it really makes a huge difference. We went for the first time this year and spent all day there. I didnt realise just how many amazing works there are in there, not to mentioned the awesome building itself.
I’m a bit of a “butterfly brain” in that putting me in a foreign art gallery I have the dichotomy of experiencing everything inside or going outside and photographing the surroundings.
What do you do when you have limited time in Florence…do you queue for an hour and a half to visit the Uffizi or do you sit in a street cafe and take in the sights, sounds and atmosphere of that fantastical place. I don’t think I’ll ever really do justice to a foreign gallery…no matter how great the reputation…I just get too excited by external distractions.
But then you could suggest the real world is your art!!
That’s true…but for me it presents the opportunity to create my own.
Originally posted by @areloa-grandee
Thing is SOG, Art schools are all about teaching technique - Hirst, Emin will be excellent illustrators and painters in the ‘traditional sense’ - otherwise as you will know, you cant get int art school in the first place, let alone a fine art degree course at a good one… they have merely gone on to use different approaches/media to practice their…art.
Enjoying the discussion, just not had time to get involved. But can I correct you on one thing. Art colleges, unfortunately, are definitely not about teaching technique, and unfortunately you definitely can get into art school with limited technique.
But don’t ask me about art colleges - I tend to go off on one!
Cant say the same for all schools Lou, but knowing folks who went to Glasgow they defo would not have got onto the Fine art degree course without it.
There are some that have a greater emphasis on it than others (Kingston, where I went is another example) and more colleges are moving in this direction, but it’s still low in the mix. The UK school of thought prioritises experimentation and conceptualisation over technique compared to those in Europe, and while there are many advantages of doing so (and it’s the reason uk art colleges are the most respected in the world) I don’t believe it’s enough.
Glasgow is excellent - I have friends who went there.
Originally posted by @BTripz
Caravaggio was a killer too, Bob. He did some great paintings, though. I saw this one in Malta a few months ago:
The Beheading of St John the Baptist
I didnt know this when I was writing earlier, but just read that Emin’s unmade bed sold for £2.5. Feck!
Thing is SOG, you cant blame an artist if you believe the price of a piece to be ridiculous. Like all things in life, these things are only worth what someone is willing to pay for them… no matter how stupid they are
£2.50? That’s cheap!
Going controversial… no tporn for Goatboy…although… but a famous piece from the museum in Naples… funily enough unatributed LOLs (no one wishing to claim this piece?)
BUt I have to say, I love what Banksy does, purely becaus of what he is trying to say.
…and are the images below in anyway related?
