Brit Art Fire

[steve56]

why should i care,nobody shed a tear when my stuff got nicked i know im not the only one though that had to quick sell stuff being rehoused i understand neil hamilton had to seel a lot of his stuff too.

[WillieBo]

Including his old Nazi uniforms ?

[Fastbike]

Dumping the baggage , is Neil divorcing Christine then ?

[Seymour Clearly]

I believe 3 quids worth of damage was caused...

[The Last Word]

Saatchi did create a market - that's what dealers do and have been doing for centuries. Sure it was hyped - but then what isn't?

A good overview here, if needed:

I don't think anyone can deny this whole period was the wake-up call everyone involved in British Art needed. It has also brought already established artists far more acclaim and attention. As such, Hirst's shark, Emin's Bed* and Gormley's Angel of the North (to name but three) have all become indelible. True, many have become rich, but in the art world this route had already been forged way before Saatchi and the Brit mob emerged. It is simply what happens. What was new was the level of public awareness.

A good thing too. I have met far too many people with stupidly preconceived ideas about art, and an equally restrictive, self-debasing 'us and them' mentality regarding those involved with it, than I care to mention. Sadly, no-one really places the barriers there as much as themselves. I know the press - ever eager to cretinize - can sometimes give the impression of it being only for snobs and pseuds, but that's just laziness pandering to either public misconceptions or their own dismal agenda. The only thing that matters is that it's there to be seen by as many as possible whenever possible - that will always be the whole idea. Yes, a lot of it is deeply pretentious, but, as history shows, that is how high art is often acheived.

*My Bed (1999): perhaps best seen as part of her whole body of work - though it was genuinely startling and fascinating to behold in the Tate. Its strange odourlessness being but one kickstart to the senses. Okay, I'll stop now...

[Holden MacGroyn]

> 'But I guess us lesser mortals will never fully understand the
> statement behind it as we are pedants as well as peasants.'
>
> Where've you been? The idea that art is somehow for the purely
> mythical intellectual elite is complete rubbish as most
> artists would agree. Why on earth do you think the Brit Art
> movement wanted such a high public profile in the first place?
> That's the exact attitude they're against.

Now it's you who miss my point.
That's called sarcasm.
Now riddle me this.
You have all the up-their-own-pretentious-arse brigade cooing over some Hirst or Eminesque shite and some guy comes in with a copy of the Sun in his back pocket and a love of all things chip and council estate (generalisation, but you get the idea.)
He says; "Cor int dis a load o' fakkin bollocks."
Are you telling me that the pretentious brigade are not going to think "You common peasant. It's wasted on the brainless."

Yet he has a valid point. Maybe not highly articulate, but extremely valid.
Yet he'd get slated and don't bother trying to deny it as you'll be fighting a losing battle there matey.



> 'I did go! I was dragged along by a girlfriend. I still thought
> it stunk of old bollocks.'
>
> Holden Macgroyn - my arse. You're Brian Sewell, aren't you.

Yes indeed I am. It takes many hours to perfect the accent before I leave the house.

[stripeysydney]

It's still a shitty unmade bed,can't imagine Michealangelo coming up with that one to please pope leo.ix[not sure about the number].

[jj]

My feeling too: if Art is supposed to trigger provoke thought, or some feeling of awe (rather than the cheap shots of revulsion or shock), then for 99.999% of Britain, they've failed.
Mind you, most of modern art leaves me cold, being mostly an exercise in intellectual masturbation, or more usually just plain masturbation.
If you need an instruction-book to 'understand' a piece of art (excepting tomes like Gombrich, designed to heighten rather than instal de novo et ex vacuo an 'appreciation'), then by any standards it's failed.

It's no coincidence that BritArt and Nouvelle Cuisine both arose around the same time: they were both intellectually and spiritually impoverished.

[Lizard]

I couldn,t have put it better meself!................No! really!

[The Last Word]

Judging from a lot of the initial response, a good half of your hypothetical pretentious brigade would dismiss Brit art as 'fakkin bollocks' themselves, so they and council estate/sun-reader would maybe get on famously. Some warm to it, others don't. Perhaps council estate/sun-reader might warm to it, which would please the other half of the pretentious brigade no end. Who knows?