Ugliest famous art

[sorgoth]

In my opinion, the very worst art of all time has been produced by Kandinsky and Klein. One is a jumbled mess, the other is up to three black lines.

[Ove]

Guernica??????:rolleyes:

[Peter Jenkins]

There's lots of ugly art. Much of modern art has no aesthetic value, other than to shock.

Anything by Tracey Emin

Peter

[BillyTK]

I've got to say I like Kandinsky and Klein and Picasso's Guernica, but then I don't have a problem with "ugliness" in art. One of my favourite artists is a guy called Egon Schiele (http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/schiele/) (nudity warning), an Austrian Expressionist whose paintings show both a fascination of and revulsion to the human body. I find Mark Rothko's work both ugly and disturbing—his Seagram commissions look like abbatoir walls imo, which has a certain sense of irony considering they were commissioned for a restaurant—but that's not a bad thing.

But if we're talking ugly as in bad, then I've got to agree with Peter about Tracey Ermin, and that Damien Hirst guy as well; it's way too self-indulgent and self-referential and only has anything to say about the egoism of the artist and the current state of relations between art and business.

[RCNelson]

How about Blood and Semen II by Andres Serrano?

From ARC Articles - When Art Becomes Inhuman - Karl Zinsmeister (http://www.artrenewal.org/articles/2002/Art_Inhuman/inhuman1.asp)

Lacking skills which allow some photographers to turn the everyday into art, Serrano has instead been forced to rely on extreme subject matter to gain attention. When I heard him speak he was just finishing a particularly hideous series of photos of dead bodies stored in an undisclosed morgue. One was a closeup of a female shotgun suicide. Another series was of a man who had been hacked to death by his wife. There was a shot of an eight-year-old dead from meningitis, a gruesomely decomposed drowning victim, and a decapitated woman. It was disturbing to see this gruesome inhumanity neatly captured in artsy slides, calmly narrated by Serrano’s jaded voice. “I’ve done body fluids, the Ku Klux Klan, sexual freaks, and death,” he concluded his lecture. “I don’t know where to go after this.”

Admittedly, Serrano stands on the front edge of artistic decadence. But he is a highly celebrated and in many ways representative member of today’s art establishment. As I write, a major one-man retrospective of 60 of his photographs is being featured at London’s Barbican, one of the world’s most prominent art museums.

[Bluegill]

“I’ve done body fluids, the Ku Klux Klan, sexual freaks, and death,” he concluded his lecture. “I don’t know where to go after this.”

Perhaps he could explore the theme of unflushed toilets. Or people giving him the finger.

[Ove]

How about Blood and Semen II by Andres Serrano?

Sorry but it really sounds to me like that guy needs help urgent. He is quite clearly morbid and deranged and to pose work like that as "art" is an insult. He really should be locked away.

One of my favourite artists is a guy called Egon Schiele (nudity warning), an Austrian Expressionist whose paintings show both a fascination of and revulsion to the human body.

Looks like he is inspired by Touluose Lautrec who also had a habit of painting "ugly" people. The difference compared to Picasso IMHO is that they CAN/COULD paint whereas Picasso really look like childrens drawings. Fascinating to look at if it is your son/daughter but utterly boring if it is anybody else and downright embaressing if it is a grown-up.

[Ove]

From ARC Articles - When Art Becomes Inhuman - Karl Zinsmeister

Just finished the article, WONDERFUL i agree 110% with the writer. Thank you for digging up this treasure i thought all sense had left the art world (including the Danish off course. The artist with the Goldfish in the blenders had previously exibited glass coffins with rotting pigs and stuffed pups, yes real dog pups)

[BillyTK]

Originally posted by Ove
Looks like he is inspired by Touluose Lautrec who also had a habit of painting "ugly" people.
I suspect Schiele and Lautrec had slightly different interests in this respect; Schiele's thing wasn't "ugly people" per se, but what he saw as the inherently ugly qualities of the body, which he was simulataneously attracted to and repulsed by.

The difference compared to Picasso IMHO is that they CAN/COULD paint whereas Picasso really look like childrens drawings. Fascinating to look at if it is your son/daughter but utterly boring if it is anybody else and downright embaressing if it is a grown-up.
Picasso couldn't draw you say? Check out his more chocolate box—I mean—figurative work from his Blue period (http://www.boston.com/mfa/picasso/blue.htm) and Rose period (http://www.boston.com/mfa/picasso/rose.htm) and see if you're still willing to hold that opinion :)

Picasso's Cubist work has got to be understood in terms of a fundamental question which more or less affected all artists at the time; basically, what is the point of representational art when photography could do exactly the same faster, cheaper and more effectively?

[roger]

Originally posted by BillyTK
Picasso couldn't draw you say? Check out his more chocolate box—I mean—figurative work from his Blue period (http://www.boston.com/mfa/picasso/blue.htm) and Rose period (http://www.boston.com/mfa/picasso/rose.htm) and see if you're still willing to hold that opinion :)

I'll second that.

[Segnosaur]

Originally posted by Bluegill


Perhaps he could explore the theme of unflushed toilets.

Its already been done (in a matter of speaking: http://www.pulse24.com/Showbiz/Top_Story/20030613-002/page.asp


And now, out of Ottawa, comes the natural brown hues and distinct aromas of the Bowel Movement. That’s right, employees at the Saw Gallery in Ottawa are putting the final apprehensive touches on their latest exhibition honouring of all things, fecal matter.

[Mercutio]

Originally posted by RCNelson
How about Blood and Semen II by Andres Serrano?

From ARC Articles - When Art Becomes Inhuman - Karl Zinsmeister (http://www.artrenewal.org/articles/2002/Art_Inhuman/inhuman1.asp)

There was a thread here earlier ("bad art"? I can't find it via search, and it predates the purge, so...) that discussed Serrano, along with a few others. I wrote then that I think Serrano's work is very worthwhile, sometimes beautiful while being disturbing. The juxtaposition of (sometimes) beautiful visual images with (usually) disgusting materials or labels was a wonderful way to explore what art is...what beauty is...if a form was beautiful until you found out it was composed of the artist's own semen, why is it no longer aesthetically compelling? Why do we link aesthetic form with other aspects? Must we?

[Bluegill]

Originally posted by Segnosaur


Its already been done (in a matter of speaking: http://www.pulse24.com/Showbiz/Top_Story/20030613-002/page.asp



For the love of Ed, Segnosaur, some things should really go unGoogled, unlinked, unresearched...sigh. Serves me right for even involving myself in this thread.

[Solitaire]

Click Here To See An Execution (http://www.grandarts.com/art/chalmers1.jpg) :eek:

[Mocker Wall]

I consider anything by Andy Warhol to be pretty damn ugly.

[Ove]

Picasso couldn't draw you say? Check out his more chocolate box—I mean—figurative work from his Blue period and Rose period and see if you're still willing to hold that opinion

No i agree, he COULD. Only thing is he didn't, in most of his famous pieces, i mean my kids could have made "Guernica" when thay was roughly 5-8 years old (i know it is an age old argument).

I'm not saying that artists should be painting with photograpical acuratesse my personal favourites are the impressionists, but i do like to be able to see some sort of "craftmanship" in a painting not just splashes on a canvas or infantile scriblings.;)

[BillyTK]

Originally posted by Ove
i mean my kids could have made "Guernica" when thay was roughly 5-8 years old (i know it is an age old argument).

I like Picasso's Guernica. Your children must be very gifted indeed. ;) :)

[Ove]

I like Picasso's Guernica. Your children must be very gifted indeed.

Off course, would i say anything else.?;) :wink: