Music Visual Art Critique

I am not an artist or involved very much in the art world. I have been to the Louvre in Paris last year, and also the Musee Granet in Aix-En-Provence two years ago while in southern France studying photography. I am opinioned when it comes to art however. I do not believe that “anything is art”. I agree that people can use materials and make something to express themselves, but in order for something to be canonical in my book, it must be something that is completely original that nobody else could or would think of doing. I am not particularly a fan of modern art for that reason. I think a lot of the paintings where color seems to be simply splashed on to the canvas aren’t art. It may be appealing, but if I could do that exact same thing, I don’t see it worthwhile. “The Creative Impulse” would describe that kind of work as the post-WWII style, “abstract expressionism. (that was defined by) nontraditional brushwork and nonrepresentational subject matter” (Sporre 256). (Attached I have links of photographs I took of the visual art I saw today in order to more clearly describe to you what I took away from the work)

When I first walked in, I immediately was drawn to “pins” by Erica Duffy. http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h44/princessallie716/Music1.jpg

I first saw the obvious, how the woman photographed appeared to be wearing a necklace of some sort made of pins. This wasn’t what I found interesting in the art; it was the picture of the woman without the art on her neck. The photograph was clearly taken right after the artwork had been removed from her neck, and there are visible red marks on her skin from the pins. I responded to the art as if it was trying to send a message about women and their views of beauty. How we, as women, will do things to ourselves, change the way we look, all to appeal to others. Because we are destroying the natural beauty of the human body, we are hurting ourselves. Should this work be canonical? I don’t think so, but I do know that this work stayed with me and I vividly remembered it more than any other piece.

The second piece of work I saw that struck me was April Wood’s “hearing implements”.

http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h44/princessallie716/music2.jpg

I had my own opinion of the piece before I read the artists description. I thought the photograph looked like a fungus growing from a person’s mouth. That’s what drew me into the piece. I love fungus, the idea that something so interesting looking, and beautiful can grow from something dead. I interpreted that the piece was trying to say how even after we die, our voice can still be heard though art we create. Although the artist will be dead and gone, the art will live on, just as the fungus would. (but that’s not at all apparently what the artist had in mind after reading her description)

The next work I felt worth talking about was Courtney Starrett’s “Photograph of the Body Bubble”.

http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h44/princessallie716/music3.jpg

This kind of work doesn’t appeal to me. I would however agree that it is visually catching. I disliked this piece because I found it to be extremely unoriginal and also very flat. I feel like the artist who crated this piece is one of those “wanna-be-artist” who’s trying to be artistic, but just doesn’t quite have it. Anyone can take an immediate message from the work- rebirth, trapped, escaping innocence, etc. This work did not make me think, and I’ve seen many pieces that almost mimic it. I do not at all think this work is canonical.

On to gallery II. Like I said, I usually don’t like modern artwork. But Tommy Fitzpatrick’s painting, “Dematerializing” jumped right off the canvas.

http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h44/princessallie716/music4.jpg

I do not “like” the artwork particularly, but it was confusing to me. I had to walk right up to the painting to see if it was more than one canvas or if part of it was embossed. I found the illusion that this painting created for my eyes was wonderful. For that, I applaud the artist-good job Tommy. Is the work canonical? No, but I think it was interesting and worth being in the gallery.

The last work I wanted to throw in was another of Tommy Fitzpatrick’s paintings, this one called “Upside Down”.

http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h44/princessallie716/music5.jpg

I didn’t like this as much as his other painting, but it reminded me of Spiderman right away…and I like Spiderman.

Works Cited:

Sporre, Dennis. The Creative Impulse An Introduction to the Arts. A Custom Edition for Texas State University taken from the 8^th edition. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey, Pearson Education,Inc.,Pretice Hall 2009