This reminds me (since disco is being discussed on the Idol thread) to ask whether anyone could come up with lyrics about cash fans to the tune of Donna Summer's "Last Dance."
@James Tiberius Quirk: All great art is nothing more than sleight of hand articulated with a little technique. The three people you mentioned have done their job well: They've held up a mirror and shown us what fools we are.
I really didn't *get* Murakami and during the Brooklyn Museum exhibit I basically had a bitchfit about his work while my friends shook their heads at me.
I felt his work was juvenile and slightly mysogynistic. Mechanical planes that transform into naked women with shaved vadges? Really?
Then again what do I know about art?
And the whole fact that he was able to get such a visceral reaction from someone which then spurred discourse pretty much *is* the definition of "art".
Question for Gawkers and fashionistas: do straight me wear YSL belts, the really colorful ones with the white background and multicolored logos? Because i've been trying to suss out this one checker at the supermarket who makes my gaydar ping and he wears a belt like that.
@Hydroceph: Who the fuck knows what straight men wear these days. But best of luck in your pursuit of this fashion-forward young man. How could he not find you absolutely irresistible?
I think LV bags are the ugliest things ever and just prove that complete assholes will buy crap no matter how hideous if it makes a statement about how foolishly they spend their money. Or something.
They're more expensive because of the size of the edition (assuming there are far more than 500 handbgs available for purchase), and it's "art" because the artist designated it as such. Sure, that doesn't make any sense, but expecting the art market to base prices on anything even remotely resembling a realistic definiteion of art is hopelessly naive. For example, this work by Piero Manzoni is considered a priceless masterpiece of conceptual art:
@Nic Fit: Years ago I had a silkscreen instructor in college who had made prints for Warhol. She told a story of her first job for him. He gave her a collage that was a bunch of cut up pieces of contruction paper taped together and told her to make a silksreen out of it. When she got back to her studio, some of the pieces had come undone and she didn't know where they were meant to go. She gathered the courage to call up Warhol and tell him that some pieces fell off of his collage and she didn't know how to put them back in the right place. He told her it didn't matter, put them whereever she likes, and hung up. And that's art folks.
@Mary Mouse: Jeff Koons invented the tiered membership program that museums and charities use to lure donations. He figured people would like to be grouped and terraced into a hiarchy with increasingly cool names based on how much you donate. Its a fucking genius grift. If he hadn't done that, he wouldn't be able to employ people to make plaster castes of him fucking porn stars and then put his name on it. The only creativity left in the world is in the field of con artistry.
@iheartapocalypse: Sure. That makes perfect sense. It's like the presidential campaign thing in your tax return. When midwestern tourists come to the Met, they ask them if they'd also like to contribute to the "Jeff Koons Fucks His Porn Star Wife (While Michael Jackson, a Monkey and a Puppy Watch) Plaster Caste(sic) Fund." That's totally how art works.
@iheartapocalypse: Ha, sorry. I am incredibly cranky today. I was just about to email my friend who works in development at the Met and get some facts from her to refute your Jeff Koons story :)
Given that aforementioned handbags sell for three and a half brazillion dollars, I'd say the print was a downright bargain. My suggestion - take it down to a capable tailor, get him or her to fashion it into a clutch... et voila! A collector's piece.
Moral of the story - don't ever expect the art market to function rationally. That went out the window sometime in the late 1800s.
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This reminds me (since disco is being discussed on the Idol thread) to ask whether anyone could come up with lyrics about cash fans to the tune of Donna Summer's "Last Dance."
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I felt his work was juvenile and slightly mysogynistic. Mechanical planes that transform into naked women with shaved vadges? Really?
Then again what do I know about art?
And the whole fact that he was able to get such a visceral reaction from someone which then spurred discourse pretty much *is* the definition of "art".
I still hate his shit though.
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And other than the Mrs. Smitros vs. Mr. Hydroceph thing, i'm really starting to worry that you're me, and i just don't know it.
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That's why we're on opposite coasts, so as to prevent confusion, I think.
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Class action!
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Back in the day, Cynthia Plaster Caster did this for love (of something or other) and not for commerce.
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Moral of the story - don't ever expect the art market to function rationally. That went out the window sometime in the late 1800s.