Art or Indulgence?

[doversoul1]

The Glass Sculptures at Kew

Objects in-and-out-of-context, human made
yet
forms of
Interplanetary grace

They look like they came from outer space
The Artificial in
The Natural Place

As if Aliens came
Sharing Gifts of Plants -

A sculpture out of
Their Horticulture
To set among
Our nurtured nature

Poor man
...he wants his work "to appear like it came from nature, so that if someone found it on a beach or in the forest, they might think it belonged there.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-47910451

[doversoul1]

Spring at Kew is tempting of itself and doesn’t need other attractions.

Hear hear

[french frank]

https://www.henry-moore.org/visit/he...tudios-gardens

Interesting. Although I'm not an enthusiast for Henry Moore's art, I find this work sympathetic: noticeable but not, in context, obtrusive (not out of scale and colour).

[MrGongGong]

As for the fox, I’m sure you were told but this fox is a messenger of a Shinto deity. It always sits in this pose wearing a red ‘scarf’ which is the sing of its status. These stone foxes are rather like the statues of Mary in Catholic countries. I’m still not sure what this has got to do with this thread.

"Imitation" foxes
just like "imitation" plants



Do you really think that La Mer is "imitation sea" ?

Do you know who paid for the work? (I don't)

To me (and i'm not a huge fan but know folks who are) they are very much in the long tradition of botanical illustration. To take your argument even further, why have ANY artwork that references "nature" at all as it is "distracting" from the "real" thing?

[french frank]

why have ANY artwork that references "nature" at all as it is "distracting" from the "real" thing?

[Argumenti causa ] How, if it's not set in the middle of/among the real thing (without quotes).

As I said, I think scale and colour are of some importance. If the artworks are bigger than or more colourful than the natural objects they cry out "Look at me". No reason why they shouldn't, from the artist's point of view, but that does tend to make them "distracting".

Just read a review of Roberto Devereux which I saw last night, which re the production struck me as relevant:

"Here is the constant challenge of design for performance – to support and enhance but not to distract from the drama being enacted."

[Richard Barrett]

Here is an interesting hypothesis concerning "idealised landscapes" which some of you might have come across before:

... the biologist Gordon H Orians has described the ideal landscape that human beings would find intrinsically pleasurable. In his formulation, this landscape has much in common with the savannahs and woodlands where hominids split off from chimpanzee lineages and where much of early human evolution was played out; hence, it is called "the Savannah Hypothesis". In brief, this landscape type includes these elements:
- open spaces of low (or mown) grasses interspersed with thickets of bushes and groupings of trees;
- presence of water directly in view, or evidence of water nearby or in the distance;
- an opening-up in at least one direction to an unimpeded vantage on the horizon;
- evidence of animal and bird life; and
- diversity of greenery, including flowering and fruiting plants.
These innate preferences turn out to be more than just vague, generalised attractions towards generic scenes: they are notably specific. African savannahs are not only the probable scene of a significant portion of human evolution, they are to an extent the habitat meat-eating hominids evolved for - savannahs contain more protein per square kilometre than any other landscape type. Moreover, savannahs offer food at or close to ground level, unlike rainforests, which are more easily navigable by tree-dwelling apes.

(from a 2009 article in the New Statesman)

I think people in general accept obvious human interventions in the landscape when they look old, like ruined castles and so on. That couldn't be said about the structures under discussion, giving rise to the feeling of incongruity which (I think) is being expressed here. Thinking about it, on the whole I prefer my "idealised landscape" not to be interrupted by such things, but clearly they do lead to thoughts about what is artificial and what is natural and what those things mean, and to interesting discussions on those subjects, which is one of the functions of art after all. Remember also that we're all here at this forum because of a shared enthusiasm for music, which could be said to be the most "artificial" of all the arts, not being concerned with the depiction of real-life events or phenomena except in the most abstract/associative way. Music, it could also be said, is in our nature as human beings; maybe this is also a useful way to think about sculptures in gardens. (Hence my quote above.)

[eighthobstruction]

....perhaps if these colourful glass sculptures were put infront of/between/around the Moores/ Hepworths/Nashs/Caros etc....they would be seen as out of context....and a complete pain in the loci....

[french frank]

Here is an interesting hypothesis concerning "idealised landscapes" which some of you might have come across before:

I didn't know that but it's interesting to read a biologist's view, including the concept of 'ideal landscape' and linked with 'intrinsically pleasurable'. With artificial creations one can think of 'the art that conceals art' and contrast a Capability Brown 'English landscape garden' with the (particularly) French formal garden. (Also pleasing but somehow 'in a different way'?)

As to Gongers question of whether 'La Mer is "imitation sea?", he has his regular answer in Magritte's Trahison des Images: Is it a pipe? 'Non ce n'est qu'une représentation'. Not an imitation but a representation - with all that that can imply.

[jayne lee wilson]

Poor man
...he wants his work "to appear like it came from nature, so that if someone found it on a beach or in the forest, they might think it belonged there.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-47910451

Yes, I saw that and was surprised by it.... hence my verse.... but once the Art is Out There it has its own life in every imagination's eye... I'd like to imagine he'd be responsive to very different responses....they wouldn't suit my wild garden (and yet - when the brilliant flowering shrubs bloom red&yellow&blue&purple....we're not far from here, flowers wildly different from the leaves), but the more cultivated the garden, the better they look... and I do like them very much in themselves... some of them make me think of an organic otherworldly variant on Naum Gabo and the Russian 1920s Constructivists...

Sometimes a garden is invaded by "aliens".... not just Japanese Knotweed, but huge stands of Buddleia or in my own patch, sudden rearing up of bullrush and wild rose, come from nowhere, on the wind, with a bird...they look out of place at first; then they take over and the garden shapes itself around them; some of them drown when the roots are flooded in wet winters.... but I love the chance and arbitrariness of them.

I once had the idea of setting down large model dinosaurs in my garden, T Rex and Triceratops made of resin, about a meter long. You see life-size ones in other park settings...
Would they be more acceptable to the alien-plant-rejectors here than these spun-glass-fantastical?

(And you can put a scarf round the dinos' necks if you want...)

[gradus]

Yes, I saw that and was surprised by it.... hence my verse.... but once the Art is Out There it has its own life in every imagination's eye... I'd like to imagine he'd be responsive to very different responses....they wouldn't suit my wild garden (and yet - when the brilliant flowering shrubs bloom red&yellow&blue&purple....we're not far from here, flowers wildly different from the leaves), but the more cultivated the garden, the better they look... and I do like them very much in themselves... some of them make me think of an organic otherworldly variant on Naum Gabo and the Russian 1920s Constructivists...

Sometimes a garden is invaded by "aliens".... not just Japanese Knotweed, but huge stands of Buddleia or in my own patch, sudden rearing up of bullrush and wild rose, come from nowhere, on the wind, with a bird...they look out of place at first; then they take over and the garden shapes itself around them; some of them drown when the roots are flooded in wet winters.... but I love the chance and arbitrariness of them.

I once had the idea of setting down large model dinosaurs in my garden, T Rex and Triceratops made of resin, about a meter long. You see life-size ones in other park settings...
Would they be more acceptable to the alien-plant-rejectors here than these spun-glass-fantastical?

(And you can put a scarf round the dinos' necks if you want...)

Dinos at Kew? No, Crystal Palace Gardens got there first otherwise yes.

[doversoul1]

"Imitation" foxes
just like "imitation" plants



Do you really think that La Mer is "imitation sea" ?

Do you know who paid for the work? (I don't)

To me (and i'm not a huge fan but know folks who are) they are very much in the long tradition of botanical illustration. To take your argument even further, why have ANY artwork that references "nature" at all as it is "distracting" from the "real" thing?

I am talking about this particular work in this particular CONTEXT. I see no point in talking about 'ANY artwork' as such.

The fox is irrelevant to this argument because it is not a creation or an artistic expression of an individual (it may have been originally) but it’s a standard figure associated with shrines, rather like the signs of London Underground or British Rail. For all I know, they are probably made in factories these days. It is known to be a fox and that all that matters.

ff has a better response to the sea and the pipe.

I have no idea who paid but the cost must be the same. Oh, maybe the artist paid it himself?

Richard Barrett #51

... is in our nature as human beings

I thought you were suspicious of such an idea (re: grouping music) Never mind

[oddoneout]

Having looked at the BBC link one thing that strikes me is that some of these will look very different in a couple of months time as the plants around develop. For instance, at the moment the orange flames and the pink cherry blossom are not to my eyes a happy combination, but once the foliage is out the contrast will be more successful, and come autumn if the cherries colour up they will complement rather than contrast. I do wonder how the grass will be dealt with once the tulips die down and mowing would normally start - perhaps it will be left to grow.
There will always be tensions where people have a view of how a well-known or loved site should look or be, and where the demands of being a visitor attraction and generating income have to be reconciled with a more serious purpose. I work at a site that also has these conflicting demands to meet, albeit on a very very much smaller scale, and it isn't easy pleasing everyone!
A personal opinion, but it could have been worse? https://www.houghtonhall.com/art-and.../damien-hirst/.

[Serial_Apologist]

Having looked at the BBC link one thing that strikes me is that some of these will look very different in a couple of months time as the plants around develop. For instance, at the moment the orange flames and the pink cherry blossom are not to my eyes a happy combination, but once the foliage is out the contrast will be more successful, and come autumn if the cherries colour up they will complement rather than contrast. I do wonder how the grass will be dealt with once the tulips die down and mowing would normally start - perhaps it will be left to grow.

The usual "trick" for the flowering or foliating season is to insert suitably matched plants in pots or tubs, which can then be removed as and when. Much cheaper as well as more naturalistically inviting and "in keeping" than those sculptures with their obvious hard wearing characteristics, I would have thought.

[Richard Barrett]

I thought you were suspicious of such an idea (re: grouping music) Never mind

Well, I studied genetics at university and I would hope that this experience gave me a certain amount of insight into the limits of arguing from evolution to psychology, but it seems to me firstly that the similarities mentioned between constructed landscapes like parks on the one hand, and the environment in which humans first evolved on the other, are sufficiently close not to be coincidental, and secondly that the ubiquity of music in all known human societies past and present would indicate that there's something inherent about it.

[doversoul1]

Well, I studied genetics at university and I would hope that this experience gave me a certain amount of insight into the limits of arguing from evolution to psychology, but it seems to me firstly that the similarities mentioned between constructed landscapes like parks on the one hand, and the environment in which humans first evolved on the other, are sufficiently close not to be coincidental, and secondly that the ubiquity of music in all known human societies past and present would indicate that there's something inherent about it.

Besides which I always get a bit suspicious of appeals to "basic human nature"

.

http://www.for3.org/forums/showthread.php?18836-School-Music-Fighting-the-cuts/page13

Take no notice. I am being a silly old so&so

As for gardens, I think Japanese gardens stand for something very different from the idea of English gardens. I can’t say exactly what it is but it seems to me that they are ultimately detached from life/living things. Come to that, there is no equivalent to the English word ‘garden’ in Japanese. I think those objects in Kew Gardens will go down a storm in city parks (not in temple gardens) in Japan. Nature is not really appreciated unless there is something explicitly artificial in it, and those objects are magnificently artificial.