MoDARN Art

Today I was watching the re-telecast of episode 7, Mad Men. It is the sixties-set drama about an ad agency. In this episode there is a scene where a secretary drags a few of her colleagues to Bert cooper’s (agency owner) office to show them his latest addition of ‘Abstract Art Piece’. It is by Rothko, the famous Russian Modern Artist. The painting is given below.

When the characters discuss the painting, I could see the confusion in understanding what it depicts. One talks about it being "so deep you could fall into it"; another couldn't get over the $10k price tag; the secretary dismisses it as "smudges and squares"; another one though familiar with Rothko  is unsure of the deeper meaning.

This brings us to this blog post.

The successful sale at auction recently of a work by Nat Tate, a mythical artist who never existed in real life (except as a character in William Boyd’s book), is a testimony to the most deadpan mockeries of the art world. Tate was completely made up. Proof enough that some pseudo rich wanted to exhibit his refined taste for art by buying a pseudo non-existent artist’s work. Just goes to show how much hyped is this Modern Art.

Years back while working with Mudra (the advertising agency), I had visited the Chennai Artists Village in Cholamandalam, with an Art Director.  One is free to watch the artists and sculptors at work just behind the front-office / art gallery in the open space. Both of us went to watch a painter with a huge canvas in front of him. There was some splash of colors on it and by the side of him a few ACTUAL cement pans (mind you not color palettes!) and also huge spatulas used in the construction industry. He was at least 10 feet away from the canvas and was seriously contemplating.

Initially not wanting to disturb a brooding, creative mind we waited for about 10 minutes... after which hesitantly my AD asked him as to what is the theme of the painting. Pat came the reply. “I don’t know. All I can say is something is emerging”. With that he splashed a spatula full of one color on the canvas form a distance, and again started meditating on it.

There were other people staring at this with one hand on their chins and super serious expressions. One girl was even taking notes! Sometimes I wish I possessed the requisite attention span to absorb endless amounts of totally pointless bullshit. How can a canvas with splashes of paint on it be considered art? If someone tried this back in the renaissance, they would be sent to a mental institute. And all those people with the trendy glasses drinking triple cappuccinos wearing Versace turtle-necks can say "Oh that’s simply fabulous, he's sooo brilliant!"  What a travesty! 

It is similar to the English language that has gone from the beauty of Shakespeare to a series of senseless emoticons and hashtags that we see in the social networks and SMSs. If a person wants to be taken seriously as a literary author, he better know his grammar, style, and a way with words. If a person wants to be taken seriously as a musician/composer, he better know his music theory, or be able to play an instrument. But a modern artist can demonstrate zero proof of his artistic ability in the context of established representative visual art, yet he could end up as a master of modern art?

De-evolution of art… that’s what I would call it. The most controversial thing in the current society is to be a traditionalist in anything with great talent. Nowadays, people feel anxious when they are NOT doing stuff that shocks others. People feel the new normal is to be like this little perv throwing paint on the canvas. Scandalous and controversial would be to do a Ravi Verma these days. President Truman summed up the popular view on Modern Art when he said: "If that's art, then I'm a Hottentot." 

When we walked out the gallery was filled with ready mades, crafts, and other garbage that is deemed art just because the person who made the "work" has some emotional / intellectual / metaphysical explanation for it. I may be looked on as a formalist, but I definitely feel that art should be able to stand by itself without any explanation in order for it to be appreciated as beautiful. One should not walk up to a little note stuck on the painting to try and understand better what the piece is all about.

This experience of mine is no exaggeration. I looked at a so called ‘Conceptual Art’ which was titled ‘Mother and Son’ in that gallery. In spite of a careful scrutiny I couldn’t find a ‘mother’ figure and I asked my AD whether he could spot the lady. He jokingly said that she has gone out. I queried about the SON, because I couldn’t locate him in the painting as well. My AD quipped that he has gone to play and the mother has gone out to look for him!

That being said, I dream of the day I will be able to make my granddaughter Sargam, who is just 2 years, to scribble something and then sell it for a fancy sum.

I think this topic requires yet another posting and I will quote a few more experiences of mine. Till then bye!