Reith lectures 2013: Grayson Perry

[teamsaint]

The RFH organ is being tuned and voiced
and the launch fest is in March with some cracking stuff
including several new commissions ........and the Olivier Latry / Shin-Young Lee Rite of Spring transcription

Reading aesthetics takes rather a lot of your life so I seem to remember from being a student

so what are they going to us in " Manfred" tomorrow night?
hope its something decent !!

Yes the launch stuff should be interesting......

[jean]

...are you not saying really that DH is pretty much "just" a post modernist?

He's a conceptual artist. It's the originality of the ideas that's valuable. When the concepts aren't even original, that pretty much invalidates the art IMHO.

I noticed that Nicholas Serota was careful to say that he bought DH because DH represented a certain moment in British art.

Not sure where post modernism might fit in musical theory, history or understanding...

I'm even less sure where conceptualism would fit in.

[MrGongGong]

Actually I don't really think he is a "conceptual" artist
he makes objects ......... not ideas and many of them are very expertly executed
(of course whether they are any "good" or not is another matter all together)

I'm even less sure where conceptualism would fit in.

La Monte Youngs fluxus pieces ? and

This book would be a great place to start (though only some are "conceptual")

http://cmr.bathspa.ac.uk/projects/

[jean]

Actually I don't really think he is a "conceptual" artist
he makes objects ......... not ideas...

But objects of the sort that he makes are nothing without the concepts that give rise to them (especially when he doesn't actually make them, anyway).

[MrGongGong]

But objects of the sort that he makes are nothing without the concepts that give rise to them (especially when he doesn't actually make them, anyway).

You mean like the Sistine chapel ceiling ?

(nothing without the concept and not all painted by the "artist" )

Actually I think the shark and the sheep are very beautiful and traditional things to make into sculptures
or do you mean the "craft" of making them ?

Does it matter who physically makes them ?
Henry Moore didn't physically make the statues that he is rightly (IMV) famous for ?
The famous Matisse "Snail" wasn't made by his hands .......and so on to Strad fiddles etc etc

[jean]

You mean like the Sistine chapel ceiling ?

It's part of any definition I've ever seen of conceptual art that the idea/concept behind it is of more importance than the realisation (this may help)

So no, I don't mean like the Sistine Chapel ceiling.

Actually I think the shark and the sheep are very beautiful and traditional things to make into sculptures...

But he didn't make them into sculptures - he had the idea that the things themselves (possibly after being cut in half) might be considered sculptures because he said so. I don't find them beautiful as it happens (I'd rather have them alive) but I'd have more respect for the idea behind them if he'd been the first to have it.

...or do you mean the "craft" of making them ?

Does it matter who physically makes them ?

I'm not a professional artist, which is probably why I don't like the downgrading of "craft". I do think the Italian sculptor who made the marble statue of Alison Lapper for the fourth plinth deserves as much recognition as Marc Quinn, whose idea it was.

Henry Moore didn't physically make the statues that he is rightly (IMV) famous for ?
The famous Matisse "Snail" wasn't made by his hands ...

Henry Moore did make his own maquettes though. Ghirlandaio (we think) painted his faces himself. The case of Matisse is different, as it was ill-health that forced him to work as he did.

(Not sure where the violins fit into the argument.)

[MrGongGong]

It's part of any definition I've ever seen of conceptual art that the idea/concept behind it is of more importance than the realisation (this may help)

So no, I don't mean like the Sistine Chapel ceiling.

Well if one is going by Sol Lewitt's definition then Damien Hirst isn't really a "conceptual" artist.
I would say that the realisation of the Shark is more significant than writing a list of instructions of what an artwork consisting of of preserved shark might be.
La Monte Youngs Fluxus pieces are a good comparison IMV
Composing a piece that asks you to feed a bale of hay to a piano is done whether you actually do it or not (or even, as the score says, whether the piano decides to eat or not )

Christo and Jeanne-claude are also interesting as a reflection. It's a very simple idea (and the kind of thing that art students are good at !) to say that you want to create a work of art by wrapping up the Reichstag , its another thing all together to have the tenacity and skills to actually work out how to do it (with all the negotiations with the folk who don't want you to mess about with their building etc ) ...... the WHOLE thing is part of the artwork IMV but without the actualisation of the final thing only (only ?) a clever idea.

But he didn't make them into sculptures - he had the idea that the things themselves (possibly after being cut in half) might be considered sculptures because he said so. I don't find them beautiful as it happens (I'd rather have them alive) but I'd have more respect for the idea behind them if he'd been the first to have it.

This is maybe a question of what you mean by "make"
actually there's more "making" than in Duchamp's Urinal , he did actually inject the shark with preserving fluid etc

Henry Moore did make his own maquettes though. Ghirlandaio (we think) painted his faces himself. The case of Matisse is different, as it was ill-health that forced him to work as he did.

How is making a model of something different from making a description ?
I sometimes use computer software that will create music from a description (in code) that is still "composing" as much as if I was writing on manuscript with a fountain pen.

(Not sure where the violins fit into the argument.)

I don't think (and i'm not an expert in old fiddles !) that Stradivarius actually "made" all his instruments , from start to finish......

[eighthobstruction]

You've said lots of interesting things there GG....your view on Christo and process is I think accurate....with many of conceptual pieces - it's all about DISCOURSE....

....I do think the Stradivarius theme is a complete red herring in this discussion....

[MrGongGong]

You've said lots of interesting things there GG....your view on Christo and process is I think accurate....with many of conceptual pieces - it's all about DISCOURSE....

....I do think the Stradivarius theme is a complete red herring in this discussion....

Only 2 sentences ?

The Strad comparison was only there to show how most things in the world aren't the result of a single person's work. So it's somehow "wrong" for a contemporary artist (and i'm not really a great enthusiast of Hirsts work BTW) to use assistants as its somehow "cheating" BUT ok for this to have happened in the past

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

...........and experience comes where in this pantheon? i may know or realise it took a lot of effort to negotiate the wrap ... but surely witnessing the wrapped Reichstag is the point?

[Stephen Whitaker]

Missed first five minutes of lecture....but I'm not so stupid that I didn't 'GET' his intentions ref theme....I was asking or wondering was the exact phrase 'Emperors clothe's used....that's all ....

Being an artist and having given talks like this myself (not as good as GP)....there is the road that you go on....cliché wise....(things which in everyday speak are not clichés but in artist speak very much so)....like Urinal Marcel Du Champ....Tracy Emin/ D Hirst.... or the Impressionists....like taking a statement of pretentious art speak and reading it out....Nicholas Serota and Tate Modern are a cliché....there was nothing in the lecture that was new to me.....the Questions from the floor were predictable (and the answers to then short)....THAT IS not to say that i didn't find it well done....I said it was entertaining fun....I don't think Grayson would have thought he was saying anything original, but he will know he presented in a humourous and possibly thought provoking way....which he did....

There is indeed a road that many subsequent contributors to this thread have gone on....cliché wise,
which Grayson for the most part avoided.

[eighthobstruction]

Yes DH use of using his little art factory to turn out those nebulous banal Dot paintings is particularly galling....sold for a LOT of big£$, yet of no more signicance than some of the mass produced art works in IKEA....nice little earner....BUT of course this is all part of DH strategy....i.e. showing just what a load of brainless pathetic twits the rich are (on many levels)and the investment aspect of art (the Serota model)....his diamond encrusted skull "For the Love of God" being the most outlandish of this experiment....

....and indeed the Dot painting were a stolen idea in the first place....

[MrGongGong]

Yes DH use of using his little art factory to turn out those nebulous banal Dot paintings is particularly galling....sold for a LOT of big£$, yet of no more signicance than some of the mass produced art works in IKEA....nice little earner....BUT of course this is all part of DH strategy....i.e. showing just what a load of brainless pathetic twits the rich are (on many levels)and the investment aspect of art (the Serota model)....his diamond encrusted skull "For the Love of God" being the most outlandish of this experiment....

....and indeed the Dot painting were a stolen idea in the first place....

Thats a bit perilously close to the whole "conspiracy" theory ENC etc ..........

[eighthobstruction]

ENC = External Node Classifiers??

[jean]

There is indeed a road that many subsequent contributors to this thread have gone on....cliché wise...

I am sure your own cliché-free observatons would greatly enhance the thread. Is it fair to keep them to yourself?