FHC finds you so damn “artistic”

Earlier today, someone was proudly showing to me a piece of her tacky wooden animals’ collection and felt the need to add “and if you look at the bottom, you will notice that the artist carved in his name”… I felt infuriated and mumbled “What’s his name? Ikea?”. Our generosity in awarding the name “artist” to anybody that claims it, has been contributing to the increasing numbers of pseudo-artists, the overall declining quality of Art, the disfiguration of every real estate agent or dentist’s home interior and the fact that you can only expect awful wines and the usual CVS crowd at Gallery openings nowadays. This is the result of the American Idol’s syndrome mixed with the “nouveau riche” lack of taste and over eagerness to own and recognize Art: everybody that fails to get a real job thinks it has a unique talent and that is therefore entitled to imitate art by creating ugly little things (not unlike every Frenchman on the block believes he is entitled to be a …blogger), expose them and sell it to the ignorant mass.

We clearly have been using the term “artist” very loosely out there and it has terrible consequences. Do you have any idea of the number of artists that live in my courtyard? This city if filled with part-time painters, trust fund baby sculptors, amateur photographers, apprentice mimes, awful musicians, unemployed comedians, (KMZ excluded of course), pastry chefs and casual architects who are claiming the “artist” title. Rule number one: Artists do not own SUVs and do not workout. Even Results and Safeway are improvising themselves Galleries now, can you believe that? The postman is a part time Art dealer. To me the notion of art always encompassed the notions of talent, hard work, originality and a higher purpose. Let’s be honest: dressing hedgy, having a poor academic record coupled with poor personal hygiene, smoking pot and being able to make a collage or draw a little do not make you an Artist but just a lazy bump. I have the feeling that we are constantly confusing artisans, crackheads and artists. Sure, once in a while an Artist might also be an artisan with a drug or an alcohol problem but only a few happy artisans qualify to be artists. We are confusing manual skills, imagination and talent too. Let’s just face it, most of the artifacts that you display on your walls are vulgar merchandises which lack creativity, work and insight and are imitating the style of some now mainstream movement. They merely are unconvincing decorative items and do not deserve more the title “Art” than your couch or your TV for that matter. At best they are shocking, expensive or colorful but never original or intriguing. The maker was often only preoccupied with how easily it will sell and match the 14^th street lofts configuration. I won’t plead guilty but LL will: he bought to ugly sceneries in the street in Italy and has been claiming since then that they are “paintings”.

So what defines an Artist you might ask? Well in our days and times it might very well be…. SUCCESS. Given the number of aspiring artists in any given metropolis, I believe we have no other choice than to use tremendous success or complete lack of success as the only criteria. Until your pieces sell for millions in Auction Houses or you are strictly unknown (and awfully poor), you are not an artist to me, you are just a pretentious tacky unemployed f**ck. And if you haven’t paid an extremely high price for the artifact above your chimney or got it as a gift from some struggling artist, you’d better not call it Art in front of me or I’ll snap….for Chrissake….

Comments

[LL]

I bought them from the artist in her workshop. Not on the street. You're just angry because BT has a matching set.

[Fagat]

It's funny, I was just thinking of affixing KMZ above my chimney. Is that acceptible?

[Your buddy Tristan]

Yes ... I know a great taxidermist down here !

[Kevin W]

Oh FHC, you are full of crap, really. I prefer Oscar Wilde’s take on artists:

“The only artists I have ever known who are personally delightful are bad artists. Good artists give everything to their art, and consequently are perfectly uninteresting in themselves. A great poet, a really great poet, is the most unpoetical of all creatures. But inferior poets are absolutely fascinating. The worse their rhymes are, the more picturesque they look. The mere fact of having published a book of second-rate sonnets makes a man quite irresistible. He lives the poetry that he cannot write. The others write the poetry that they re not realize.”

[LL]

Isn't this blog full enough of pretentious fags without quoting the most famous and pretentious-est fag of them all?

[Kevin W]

I just thought it would be nice to have a pretentious voice of authority for once.

[Bryan]

FHC, you are so right: let's make tacky wooden animals that explode and take their oh-so-artsy, ain't-so-bright, too-much-money owners out with them. videotape it, and i'll call THAT art.

[Your buddy Tristan]

Kevin W: Are you quoting Wilde because you happen to actually be an inferior unpublished writer? BUSTED !

[adrien]

would putting FHC and Thomas Kincaid in the same room be funnY?

[MegaDCFag]

It's amazing how angry some people are in this city....

[KMZ]

Wow. Mounted by a gay man. I never thought the day would come.