You sound as if you've been there JW...I dont doubt it's hard work and a laudable effort. I just cant reconcile the effort with the impact. But thanks for giving me much to mull over. I guess I'll leave it to my ancestors to sort out.
You sound as if you've been there JW...I dont doubt it's hard work and a laudable effort. I just cant reconcile the effort with the impact. But thanks for giving me much to mull over. I guess I'll leave it to my ancestors to sort out.
You IQ 30 people think you're SOOO superior to us 25s... don't you???!!!Originally Posted by Chris Strobel
It really is hanging there along with one that literally looks like someone threw a bucket of paint on the canvas and called it a day.I don't get it.But then I only have an IQ of 30
(bastard!)
I can tell you this...
The actual image is so different from the internet image that there is no point in evaluating the image on the basis of what you see on the internet.
As far as I can tell, from a quick scan, the four pages of discussion in this thread do not include a single post from someone who says that he has seen a Jeff Wall photograph.
I noticed this statement in particular:
Yeah well, those geniouses come once in a blue moon, I really doubt this guy is one of them, or ahead of his time. Look at the work of Burtinsky et al..... same kind of thing with different themes.
Last week, I saw MoMA's show of Jeff Wall's work. About three years ago, I saw the National Gallery of Canada's show of Burtynsky's work. A high school kid who said that they are the "same kind of thing with different themes" would deservedly get an F. Let me go further. The quoted statement is not just ridiculous, it demonstrates ignorance on the most elemental level.
To answer your question... If you want to understand the concept behind one of Jeff Wall's photographs, go and see the photograph. Because trying to understand his work, or evaluate it, without seeing it, up close and personal, is a waste of time.
I'd also like to add that the Jeff Wall exhibit at MoMA is really busy, and that when I was there, there were people from all over the world who were spending a lot of time with the photographs. Draw from that what you will.
I haven't decided yet what I think of his work. Indeed, I'll be going to the show to have another look in late May.
The only thing that I am sure of is that I am learning a lot more from looking at Wall's photographs than from reading posts in this thread from people who get their kicks from trashing him, but who have never seen his work.
"(let's look at Tchaikovsky, for example - people used to RIOT at his concerts because they thought it was so bad!)."
Wrong composer. Tchaikovsky was immensely popular in his time and if there were any riots at his concerts I've never read of them (not that I've read everything ever written about him so I could have missed something but I've read a fair amount). My guess is you're confusing Tchaikovsky with Stravinsky and the riots at the premiere of "Le Sacre du Pintemps"
But more to the point - since you've criticized those of us who see little merit in this work, why don't you tell us the artistic merit that you see in it? That was, after all, the question asked by the OP. I don't ask this to be argumentative, while I think it's pretty worthless I'm open to being educated and pursuaded otherwise by someone with the knowledge and taste to appreciate it, as you apparently do.
Brian Ellis
Before you criticize someone, walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you do criticize them you'll be
a mile away and you'll have their shoes.
r.e, I can only respond that I liked Goya's work before I traveled to the Prado to see it. Wall's work doesn't make me curious enough to seek it out. I freely admit I may be shortsighted but I live a 'fur piece' from MoMA and would like more evidence than popularity before I hitch up the mule. But this is where these types of discussions start to implode and I'll say goodnight now.
Colin,
I don't hold a brief for Wall. I am simply saying that it is not possible to evaluate the work that is at this show without seeing it. That may be inconvenient, but it is a fact. The gulf between the images at the exhibit and what one sees on the internet is enormous.
I say that as someone who has seen Wall's images on the net and in books and has wondered what it is all about.
When I got to MoMA, I found out that what I was seeing on the museum walls and what I have seen on the internet and in books is just not the same thing.
I'm still trying to figure out what I think of his work. Which is why I am going back for a second look later this month. And I'm not doing that because I have a lot of spare time on my hands.
By the way, I've seen a lot of Goyas. If that is what you expect from Wall, don't waste your time. On the other hand, I don't think that I'd like to evaluate Goya on the basis of a 3"x4" .jpeg on the net, which is pretty much what the net offers as reproductions of Wall's work, and which is qualitatively not the same thing as seeing a connected series of backlit transparencies on the order of 15'x20'. The only thing missing from the internet reproductions of his work, apart from the fact that backlit transparencies and internet .jpeg images are just not the same thing, is the content. In the 3"x4" .jpegs, the content isn't there. And that is a big problem if one chooses to evalute his work based on a tiny image on a computer screen.
Last week, I saw MoMA's show of Jeff Wall's work. About three years ago, I saw the National Gallery of Canada's show of Burtynsky's work. A high school kid who said that they are the "same kind of thing with different themes" would deservedly get an F. Let me go further. The quoted statement is not just ridiculous, it demonstrates ignorance on the most elemental level.
LOL....let me guess, an art school graduate or teacher. You do not need to see Weston's pepper #30 in person to realize the genius of the guy, or an early Caponigro print, yet it seems in your erudite and intellectual way (And BTW I always thought of intellectuals as people who have been educated beyond their intelligence) you are telling me I have to see the photograph backlit to judge it's merit and content?
If the exhibition at MoMA was busy, perhaps it was because people were asking "WTF?!?".....
You might be correct and the high school student might get an F from an art teacher, he probably would get an A from a science teacher who does not suffer fools gladly...or the BS that gushes from the art world.
There you go - making fun of the educated, again, Jorge. Anything you want to tell us?
Well - it was the guy that wrote the nutcracker... I sure thought it was Tchaikovsky. Clearly it's enough of an inappropriate comparison to get me in trouble though!
His work doesn't really light my candle enough to bother defending it. I'm not interested in defending his work, or sing it's praises any more than I already have. I just DON'T have enough energy for it - and I'm sure I'd mess it up enough to do it a real disservice. But I AM interested in defending the right of people to do work they want without being attacked unfairly. That's all.
I'll have to find something on this composer for you -for reference.
Brian - after doing a little bit of googling.. I'm thinking it must have been stravinsky I was thinking of. Regardless. Now popular artists once reviled.
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