How to understand contemporary art?

How often do I hear such words: “How to understand modern art?”, “I have not grown up to this modern art…”

Hey! This text has been translated into English using automatic Google translation. So I apologize for the inaccuracies in the text. The original in Russian can be seen here

What does not mature mean? Or maybe outgrown? Or maybe even grew up in a neighboring garden? Well, it’s funny! For some reason, a small child does not think about whether he has grown up or has not grown up enough to start walking. He just takes and tries, again and again and again. He does not think about whether it is given to him or not.

So is it different with art? When you read fiction, any book, you are able to appreciate it. Anyone can read and say I liked it or didn’t like it. Either I was bored, and I fell asleep through the line, or so interesting that I did not notice how the night passed while reading a book. Anyone is able to appreciate a book or the same movie. How are the paintings different? Nothing! That’s the point!

Where is the point?

Okay, let’s look at the issue further. They tell me that in this or that work there are a lot of ideas and philosophical thoughts… but they never specify which ones, and even more so they are not able to explain the philosophy they have invested. Or maybe she didn’t invest in the first place? Maybe this is not work, but smeared spots with a large brush or palette knife, at best. At worst, the paint is simply smeared with a finger or with the whole hand. It’s good if with a hand, otherwise there are examples where with a foot, and, excuse me, a booty…yes, with any part of the whole. And special freaks draw attention to their work, creating their “masterpieces” with the help of intimate parts of the body… (There are a lot of examples of this creativity on the Internet)

However, many will say that it doesn’t matter what is created, but what matters is what happened in the end. Perhaps I agree, how and what does not matter. Some even use their own blood or cremated body ashes instead of paint.

Many find philosophy in almost any “masterpiece” presented. The main thing is for the author to say that this is a work of high art and a new idea will be quickly found there. However, philosophy can be found in anyone, even in an empty white sheet, or even more so in the absence of this very white sheet. Yes, just in the air you can find philosophy anywhere and justify anything.

We all often look at the ceiling or walls before going to bed and create whole books of reflections about stains on the wall. You can often hear, I stood in front of this picture for half an hour and I began to see the universe with an endless cosmos. But wait, if you put a person in front of a white wall and make him look at it for two hours, then he will definitely begin to see the whole essence of the universe there, scenes from the past, future, etc. It will be the fruit of the imagination of the man himself. And it will not mean at all that this wall is uniquely painted by an unknown genius painter. This is the most ordinary wall, smeared somehow and no more.

Is the so-called “modern art”, which has been moldy for more than a century, really different from this very white wall in human perception? Not! It is no different! A person sees on the canvas what he wants to see, and not what the author shows him. There may be a brilliant masterpiece, or maybe the most ordinary daub with the left foot.

“Elite Art”

Moving on, let’s remember the so often mentioned term “Elite Art”. This is what academic art was cursed with a couple of centuries ago. The pier is too elitist and not accessible to everyone. Good! We’ve arrived! Today the most popular slogan is “Art to the masses”! Let’s take a closer look at what’s really going on.

And there is the most ordinary substitution of concepts and meanings. Now, in general, they are very fond of changing concepts and meanings in places, confusing people even more, so that they themselves would be profitable and convenient.

What did the term “elite art” mean before? A couple of centuries ago, elite was understood as the skill of the author, his level of mastery of the material. It took decades to learn how to create paintings. People spent half their lives until it became the meaning of all, in fact, life. But the works themselves were as accessible as possible for perception. Thus, the master studied for years in order to convey with a couple of brush strokes what would be elegant, beautiful and understandable to everyone, regardless of the knowledge of the viewer. Such works could be appreciated even by a beggar ragamuffin from the street.

What is invested in the concept of “elite art” now? It’s very simple, swap everything and you’ll get the answer. Today, everyone can become a master, for this it is enough to take paint, smear it on your hand, or even better, the fifth point and gracefully plop down on a sheet of paper so that our pumped-up ass remains a fat print on paper for centuries. The main thing is not to forget to kick a friend with an iPhone so that he can film all this action and post it on Instagram. Everything, the masterpiece is ready, the author became popular, the people checked out the ass. The recipe is very simple and clear. Anyone can become a master in five minutes. No need for academies and years of training in composition, color science and anatomy. After all, the most valuable works now are children’s naive drawings.

And the meaning of these masterpieces, you ask? And no…to be honest and in secret, only shhh, you can’t talk about this… In reality, if the public hasn’t come up with a meaning, then the author is so cool and brilliant that the gray mass is simply not able to understand the full scale of the idea. Descendants, after many years, perhaps, will understand.

Now it is impossible to say that the author made a daub, and that he is engaged in fraud and stupidly sells us all some kind of heresy under the guise of “elite art”. Now I must say that I have not grown up yet and do not understand.

The essence of the paradox

Here is the paradox. Art has become closer to people, accessible to create and, at the same time, very far from understanding. However, it is impossible to figure out who creates highly artistic things, and who stupidly promotes scandal or a naked body.

Art should be understood without any explanation, especially the comments of art historians. After all, they, art critics, can create a masterpiece from anything. This is me, also in secret, as a master of art history, only shhh, no one… But we are interested in the real value of this or that work. Therefore, only a name is enough for real art. In the extreme case, a description is required to explain the myth that formed the basis. Or describe the area that the author depicted. Or tell about the person who is drawn there. Although sometimes this is not necessary, the work itself is quite enough, even without a name.

And now, they paint the whole background, what the author ate the day before, what he smoked, how he spent the night, what foot he got up in the morning, what he felt when he put the first smear and what exactly touched the author in the chosen plot…well, etc. What the author felt, what he ate there and how he spent the night on the eve, what exactly excited him…we should see all this at work and understand only by looking at the picture or performance. And if more explanation is required, then why do we need work, let’s leave the text of the art historian. The text is so beautiful and brilliant in itself.

So how to be?

So how to understand and understand this intricate modern art, you ask? The question is natural, especially after everything that has been written here. Unfortunately, it is impossible to answer it in a nutshell. First you need to disassemble and consider this issue from all sides. I will try to study this topic thoroughly in several articles. And sum up at the end. And, perhaps, then I will be able to give a reasonable answer that will be clear to everyone. True to everyone who read and, together with me, tried to delve into this most difficult topic of all modern art.

P.S.

Where are the examples? You ask. Why is there only a couple of pictures attached to such a large article? The first one, on the cover, is a frame from the movie “1+1”. And the second from the mini-series “The Adventures of Prince Florizel.” The answer is simple, it is the “cry of the soul”, emotions recorded in one sitting. I don’t want to tie the dialogue to specific examples, just to speculate in general about this topic for now. And in the films it is perfectly shown how “modern art” is seen by an ordinary person, look 😉

Master of Arts Viachaslau Shainurau

To be continued…