Ten Most Overrated Artists in Art History

If you can admire a well engineered bridge or hear the music of the spheres, you should be able to enjoy a Piet Mondrian painting, and a lot of other art. Art adds beauty and meaning to a coldly scientific world. And sometimes the lines are blurred.
We just watched a documentary, available on Netflix, "Between the Folds," about origami. It may sound funny, but mathmaticians are studying the patterns origami artists have made, and making scientific discoveries through it.
If you study art, you may find one area that appeals to your intellectual curiosity, it could be painting, sculpture, modern art, resin designs...open your mind to the world around you. It can be a beautiful place.
 
I can't say I know "art," but I know "artists" or "artistes" as they like to be known by. (I didn't learn this in a book or a class.)

PAY ATTENTION HERE, IT WILL SAVE YOU TIME in figuring out why stupid art is "acclaimed." I give you the truth for free.

Artists are--most of them--part of a sick negative subculture that exalts rebellion, deconstructionalism, existentialism, and anger toward all social structures. This is primarily because they feel rejected by and in rejection of society as they see it. They see art as their secret language that says to each other, "life sucks, people suck, everything they told us was true and valuable is a lie, my family sucks, no one understands us, etc."

I learned from being around artists that being an artiste was not connected to your art (as in what you make or paint or whatever) so much as your belief system. Ironically, one of their beliefs is that if your art is popular, or makes money, then it is by definition not real art, but a sell out.

The only exception can be that if your art is popular for the very reason that it is shocking (in content or in medium, or even in lack of content) or if it is weird or innovative in some way that would not be criticized by the flock of artist sheep as a sell out. So, crosses in urine or splashes of paint or whatever can qualify.

People who like this, what I will call stupid art, that has obviously no skill displayed or insight or beauty (okay, that's subjective), usually are either (1) pumped up politically by the "message," the message being rebellion against what is necessary or practical (i.e., the engineer's well-planned bridges, etc., mentioned above); or (2) people who for some reason want to be accepted into the secret mysterious world of artists. Usually--almost always--it goes with what you would call a liberal political mindset.

It's also ironic that this bad philosophy that infects the artist community and makes them unhappy, dependent, unproductive, and usually chemically dependent, and which rejects successful participation in the economy, then turns around and has as its central theme that there should be more "support" for the arts, which means that the government should prop up the price of art that has been made to be unpleasant on purpose. And, how unfair it is that artists are not given the recognition in society that engineers are, etc.

So, it's not just a random set of preferences of your eye versus my eye. It's very tied into a political worldview.

(This does not apply to honest differences of opinion in comparing various artists who have mastered control of a brush or color, or sculpture, or monologues, or etching, or mobiles or whatever their art is; I'm responding to why "stupid art" gets pushed forward.)
 
i get your point accurate, but look at that "artwork" by basuiat that somebody posted earlier. theres no math involved there, it's almost as if he had a deadline to deliver a new painting, woke up the morning it was due, throw some **** down on a page and said voila. Then you look at something done by MC Escher, that is something I can appreciate.

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I don't like some engineering feats, should I bash all engineers because some bridges collapsed? Enjoy the art you enjoy, let others enjoy what they enjoy.
 
I get that. But, what differentiates the world of art and engineering is that poorly engineered objects will be replaced and trashed. In the world of art, poorly done art will be called "modern" and you have a masterpiece. It would appear that engineering leaves no room for error or failure, yet art welcomes it. Although, in art's defense, even it refused to accept Hitler's work, although if it had maybe he never would have become interested in politics.


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Assuming that the "non-insightful" label is thrown my way, I said I don't know art--obviously nowhere near what you seem to know, Buckhorn (and I'm not being sarcastic). But I have known artists. I have known artists like Basquiat; I have known heroin addicts; I have known suicidals; I am not giving you "insight," but I am telling you how most artists are. No big surprise that Basquiat OD'd at a young age, and no surprise that the art community decided to glorify a former graffiti artist with little training who pushed subversive themes.

BTW, I think Basquiat's art is perfectly valid for someone to like (not what I called "stupid art"). His career just illustrates how the system works, and why it sometimes leads to the silly results of what I do call stupid art.

Also, I think that lots of people who are sad suicidal downward spiraling drug addicts do create the most interesting and best art. I happen to like Nick Drake, for instance. Van Gogh.

The issue I was addressing is why there is often a high market price for some art that is obviously reflective of no talent. Anytime you discuss market value, by definition you have to look at generalizations and the reasons why so many people act in the same way so as to create the generalization.
 
Seems to me you are all arguing in part about where commerce and art intersect. Most people will agree that the integrity of art is compromised when commercial considerations enter into the creative process (no longer purely an expression of human feeling through a medium, but now aiming to appeal to specific tastes in order to achieve financial gain.) The problem is a lot of the kingmakers in all art forms are more about turning a buck than they are about the artists' expression. When your primary goal is making money you are very willing to compromise which art you put out to the public and this is true of all mediums. This means we end up with lots of bad films, paintings, books, and music.

The burden is on the "consumer" to be able to judge the integrity of any artistic offering. How much of what I'm taking in is an expression of the artist's human feeling and how much of it is there because somebody thinks that's what I want from the mere commodity that art is to them?
 
Well, namewithheld, someone left a set of four Dogs Playing Poker prints at my shop, anonymously. I tried to bring them home to increase the artistic presence of our wallspace, but encountered heavy spousal resistance. I just can't understand it. Some people just don't appreciate fine art.
 
good post, Hammer.

The movie "Exit Through The Giftshop" addresses this issue of art, promotion, hype, and commerce rather deftly.

In that regard, i am torn with my feelings on Warhol as an "artist" - that word alone is another debate in itself. Warhol's impact was meaningful, for sure, but was he more great promoter and cultural arbiter than a great artist, and/or does that even really matter? Or is it futile to even try to define. Was Warhol's work a true expression of himself or was it toward the end just a commodity he produced to sustain a particular lifestyle?

Now, I don't think there is anything particularly wrong with that, but i know for many in the "art world", people struggle with Warhol. Sure, It could be jealousy, but it could come from a very pure place as well.
 
The burden is on the "consumer" to be able to judge the integrity of any artistic offering.

Largely an impossible, and completely unrealistic and misguided, task imo. Measuring the "integrity" (what even is that in art?) in art is a subjective quest. What is art to you, what has integrity to you, may not to another.

There is no burden on the consumer. Just buy what you like. Study art to find out what other people's opinions are if you want. I'm not saying to go Meyer Schapiro on anybody's ***, but a few Robert Hughes' essays probably wouldn't hurt.
 
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