Question:
Why is it that the above painting, John Young Snaps a Salute in Mid-Air, by his fellow moonwalker Alan Bean is so much more relevant and interesting than 90% of the art that is being made today?
Answer:
Because it relates to something that actually happened, that was real and beautiful to the artist. Because it represents real action, not imaginary intellectualism. It’s O.K. to make work that’s honest.
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Marshall, I’m currently reading a book about Gericault’s Raft of the Medusa, so I would agree (for the most part) with your opinion of art that relates to something that actually happened and was real, though I would have to take exception to the beautiful part. In one passage, a visitor describes the rotting cadaver parts Gericault painted from, and how the artist slipped on a “sticky head that rats had gnawed loose from a man’s trunk.”
I’m not sure what you mean by “imaginary intellectualism.” Would elements of the current show at Angel’s Gate qualify?
I personally would find it more ‘relevant and interesting’ look at a painting representing the more immediate present, instead of a 40 year-old event like the moon landing. Fo me, Bean’s painting is akin to seeing some artist paint the Wright Brothers’ first attempts at flight during the post-atomic heyday of Abstract Expressionism. Then again, my tastes are probably more suited to the upcoming Fake Iraq show.
What’s the book? I love that painting (and what I know of the lore surrounding it) so much.
I wouldn’t consider beauty any kind of requirement for good art, but I find the moon exploration images beautiful. I do think that successful (or at least successful outside of the creator’s perspective) art does need to have an aesthetic crux that captures the viewer, such as “beauty”, “grotesqueness” or “narrative”. Personally my interest as a curator and artist is primarily narrative – I have to be able to find that in an object to be successfully engaged with it.
What we currently have on view is definitely non-representational, but both of the shows consist of artists primarily concerned with aesthetics. I like much of the work in the shows because they are accessible outside of elitist art theory.
By “imaginary intellectualism” I’m referring to the obvious and desperate justification that I see in “statement based” works, usually those that seem to come up short in the craftsmanship area. I think that “intellectualism” is a facade that too often hides the truth that an artist’s body of work is simply not successful, but that they wish to make it successful by telling you that it is so, and leveraging their social status, connections or pedigree to make their argument.
While up to the minute representational work is fabulous, and there isn’t enough of it being made these days, I think Bean’s work is special because he’s not just “some artist” he was directly involved in the events that he want’s to translate to canvas. That intimate involvement attracts me to the work, because I’m specifically interested in Bean’s perspective, given his direct experience.
How often do you get a painting of people on the moon by a person who was ONE THE MOON. It is based on something that actually happened, but there’s also something about what happened that was so crazy and –literally– out of this world. 40 years out, the walk on the moon has become banal – but there is something about this painting that reminds me, at least, of just how amazing and human an event it was.