Robert Smithson - Spiral Jetty
This “sculpture” is meant to represent the inevitable change that goes hand in hand with the passing of time. Like your youthful face crumples in wrinkles and your pert, nubile young breasts begin to fall with age, this entirely useless work of art will eventually be washed away by the waves… the waves of time.
Anyone who isn’t an asshole knows that protecting the spiral jetty totally ruins the point of it.
Fool’s Gold by Jesse Chehak
Okay, I know that most modern art looks like, god, why did you take that crappy photo in a cheap motel with a point-and-shoot digital camera you bought at London Drugs for your vacation to Mexico during spring break on your last semester of college, right? But it is important to remember that this is not always the case.
For example, if you look closely at this photo, there is an image of Anna Nicole Smith on the television. This photo was clearly taken around the time that she tragically passed away. The smoke rings represent the frailty of life as they float away from the smoker’s last breath. The juxtaposition of the two rings with the television could also symbolize two large breasts, just like Anna Nic’s.
Ergo, this photo symbolizes: death, the frailty of life, smoking kills, and the female sexuality. See? Deep.
Art VS Non-Art
A good way of telling if something is “art” or “non-art” is to look to see if it is in a frame. Most art comes in a frame, like paintings or photography. Usually, if something is in a frame, it is art.
This, however, is not a firm rule to be followed, for two reasons. First, some art can’t fit into a frame, so it has to stand alone, like sculpture. Second, these men here are in a frame, however they are clearly just doing the insignificant and non-arty job of refinishing the floor of the gallery. Remember that most framed things are art, but there are always exceptions to the rule, which is why deciding what is art and what isn’t can be so difficult sometimes.
Revaluation : Jeff Otto O’Brien
This is an example of modern technology failing us. I believe that the art of photography has been destroyed by digital technology and media. This image makes me really sad because it has been pixelated, and thus, the message has been destroyed. You can barely see what the text says, but I believe it reads, “I SAW IT”. It is really a travesty that someone has allowed the fallacies of modernity to destroy what was possibly a very interesting piece.
René Magritte, Ceci n’est pas une pipe
This piece is very confusing. You see an image of a pipe, and yet the corresponding text tells you (I will translate because not many people speak French), “This is not a pipe.”
What is this supposed to mean? I think this piece is supposed to symbolize how art is not always what it seems, and also how art is very elitist. If you do not understand art the way that I do, because I am an educated person, you will not understand how a pipe is not always a pipe.
That is why I have started this blog: to help explain high art to people who maybe haven’t had the chance to have their dad pay for them to get a degree in looking at paintings instead of studying something useful, like a trade, where you can get a job installing urinals for $30 an hour, even in the recession.
