Turner Prize

Where did someone say this? Also, I remember previously you telling us the background to the Turners (and talking in this post about a lot of background info your average scrote won't know) and saying that knowing all this is certainly part of the interpretation of art. Therefore interpreting art is something you DON'T do yourself if you're going on someones information? I certainly don't have a problem interpreting art for myself, it's when I find that the artist stamps "oh it's actually about the falklands" all over it that I have more issues DAMN YOU NICK HEYWARD!

As for the cowboys, "pure Tom of Finland" they were not - the lean fashionista looks of the actors would have been anathema to muscle- freak ToF!

I think I said this a year ago, but as we know, things get truer with repetition: using the Turner as a guide to contemporary art is like using the Mercury Music prize as your primer for modern music.

That said there really is a terrible flaw in the presentation of the video pieces at the Turner exhibition which didn't give them a fair stab.

Also, Soane of course made his money from architecture, i.e. Immortal High Art (you're the board's staunchest defender of proper payments for artists aren't you Suzy?). If Julien wants us to conflicted about beautiful things coming from badness then there are *tons* of much better places, aren't there?

And you're STILL talking about "the general public" in snobbish terms. Fair enough, they don't know about the Soanes (?) or read any art books - oh hey, hang on, does this mean I am general public as well and should just go and look at a pretty print of some sunflowers in a vase? I believe the Turner could have a lot more potential but as it is it's a dull injoke which generates a lot of smug backpatting which doesn't actually get any good modern art out there at all. Of course I'm talking out of my arse there as this was the first time I heard of Rachel Whiteread'n'that. The Creed thing though was in no way fantastic. Just mediocre, which in turn depresses and angers me, from whence cometh my reaction. And people who say it's great cos they can argue with the "thickies" who don't like, get it, are surely missing some kind of point and using art as a Me Better Than You tool.

EVERYTHING on this board = ART, separately and collectively.

Also so is this: ":P to m.creed and :P to his detractors"

Skill is a TRAP. Theory is a TRAP. Prizes are TRAPS. PunXoR is a TRAP. Ditto freedom, history, the West, the ppl, blair and ART ART ART ART ART ART ART.

The problem seems to be that if Creed's piece is meant to make us think about art it's doing a very bad job of it - as someone said upthread it's making people on both sides reheat fairly typical prejudices. Dull mediocrity encouraging mediocre thinking perhaps? This tempers my earlier happiness a bit - is Creed's installation too near non-art for more exciting conversations about it to happen?

Isabel by the way thought Creed's was easily the best on entirely aesthetic grounds - the regular dimming-to-off and then flooding of the lights have her the nearest of all four to the kind of gut- reaction talked about upthread.

Sure his documentary work shows a film-maker capable of stringing together a vague coherent argument, but his video/film pieces pretty much since YSR are - from a cinematic point of view - rather uninspiring (those I have seen). Perhaps it is only in the field of art that some of the more obvious things he is trying to explore are actually interesting and radical. All too often it is much more informed by Julien the person, for which we can read his sexuality and ethnicity. Once this is known it is very easy to read both surface and depth into his pieces - which would not be there without this knowledge. Being taken seriously by collectors - as you well know - means absolutely nothing.

I'd certainly love to sit down and talk to him about films, but then I could bore the hind leg off a donkey on that subject.

I also think that Sarah's position on this is more than defendable, and for all the excellent presentation of Matthew Collinge, the program did little to dispell this.

It seems to play heavy on your mind that someone, somewhere might condesend to you as a member of the general public. Or it's the anxiety that the people making decisions, awarding prizes, setting cultural agendas might not actually give a shit about the people they're representing or educating or setting up culture intended for everyone to enjoy or to serve as a conversation point. I know people in these positions can be jaded or have entitlement issues, but the vast majority do want something nice to happen as a result of their work. ESPECIALLY artists.

I said upthread that Martin Creed's art is all about equations; it is. There's probably a damned good reason that the light stays off for, say, 4.3 seconds instead of 10. Nobody told me that: I worked it out for myself based on my own reaction to the work I've seen. Bottom-line I don't really care about the predictable traditionalist mouth-frothing at Turner time, it's more expected than most people's rubbish arguments about modern art. Anyway, conceptual artists are not always about the hard-sell, the best ones - like Creed - say very little about the work; you have to take clues from it and interpret it based on what you know. And when I don't know something, instead of grumbling that someone's trying to make an arse of me because I'm just a stupid punter, I make an effort to learn to fill in my gaps. Or you have to accept that jokes are okay in art if it's to be a real mirror for life, and just laugh.

people who get paid for jokes are called comedians, not artists.

Now come on Suzy, this is nonsense. You may well be right that there is a reason 4.3 seconds is used - but it doesn't take a genius to think that there may be a reason behind anything being done in such a deliberate manner. There may be a reason why he did not black out the skylight, there may be a reason why the light flickers on rather than being discrete. But - and this is equally important - there may not. And frankly the four or five sentences put above are about as interesting as the discussion around the Creed piece gets.

Sarah also appreciates there may be a reason - its just it literally does not interest her (sorry Sarah for word mouth implanting). Which is her perogative, when to be fair those books, music, films and TV which you reference are both accessible and more interesting.

Hey! It's No.9 in an occasional series of 'top passive-aggressive statements'

Having thought for myself I pronounce blu-tack on wall = shit, light being turned on and off = shit. It doesn't reach me. I also don't believe that a requirement to research the motivation behind a piece of art = justification for the art per se. If they need to prove themselves through means other than the artwork, then it could be seen, at best, as a visual piece of commentary on the subject, but not art.

I wouldn't for a moment criticise any of you who like these pieces because they emotionally effect you in some way. Only you know whether this is the case or you're faking it, so no criticism would be necessary anyway.

suzy: tell us a BAD piece of art that's been in the turner recently (or is good/bad a trap too?)

originality is a trap: i forgot that one

sarah's and tim's reactions/styles-of-reception to art are the opposites of their attitudes to music: discuss

if I insulted you about the Pixies, I'm sorry: I only recall telling you how and why I thought they were rubbish. That's surely a different thing from your saying the *only* reason contemporary art exists is as a function of scenesterism and snobbery: that necessarily implies that anyone who does happen to enjoy contemporary art is in it for those reasons (champagne, opportunity to patronise others). I really don't think I trail around little galleries in London for that reason, and I also don't go to openings, precisely to avoid what you're talking about.

Scenesterism exists for sure, but is easily avoided. There is a whole lot more to contemporary art than that. Honestly.

Now I don't count myself among the ranks of the Turner Prize haters, but can anyone think of a more pointless gesture at inclusivity than this? As if the tine panel is going to se a nomination and go "oh yes, XXX's show of YYY at the ZZZ gallery, hadn't thought of that one, stick it on the list!"

If the TP is good for anything it's good for being the stony face of the unelected art elite.

And Mark S's going to the Tate Modern to see the Turner Prize last year.

Still think princess / pea thing is a great idea, though not perhaps quite as great as the urban myths plan.

also bah talitha just phoned to say let's meet for lunch except i was at another desk and didn't get her message till too late = hat trick of turners but the third is tinged with sadness

Miss P, on the other hand...

<3

"Turner Prize nominees form a collective so they all win"

https://www.itsnicethat.com/news/turner-prize-winner-2019-art-041219

the prize is only £25,000?

25k for the winner, 5k for other 3. so they split the 40k total 4 equal ways.