Re: War on Criticism

Bush Asks Congress For $30 Billion To Help Fight War on Criticism
http://www.theonion.com/onion3925/bush_asks_congress.html


On Wednesday, December 31, 1969, at 07:45 PM, t.whid wrote:

> hi guys,
>
> my last thoughts on this, snipped horribly eryk.
>
> and i take full responsibility for derailing the conversation into the
> meta discussion on critique.
>
> At 2:35 -0400 7/8/03, Eryk Salvaggio wrote:
>> I'm not sure if this is at all relevant, but there is something about
>> what
>> Curt is saying that resonates with some of my own thoughts on the
>> subject of
>> criticism.
>>
>> Firstly, I am an autodidact when it comes to critique. Most of what I
>> come
>> up with is simply through reason, and frankly, I have had so many
>> arguments
>> shot down with "oh, thats a modernist idea"
>
>
> when i called Curt's view a modernist view I wasn't disparaging it,
> simply labeling it, not discounting it. I wasn't aware if he knew that
> his definitions, his mode of thought or critique, had a similar
> presence in 20th century art which might be useful to him.
>
> Eryk Salvaggio wrote:
>>> I look at a piece without training and contextualizing histories;
>>> it's
>>> usually responded to with the dismissal that I simply don't know
>>> what I am
>>> talking about. So, what I get from Curt- and correct me if I am
>>> wrong- is
>>> that art can be evaluated based on zero; art can be looked at purely
>>> in
>>> contemporary contexts and if one does not appreciate it based on
>>> thier own
>>> internal reasoning, then sure- I am uneducated, but I still don't
>>> like the
>>> piece, and the piece still failed in that regard. It is still a
>>> criticism
>>> worth looking at.
>
>
> My point is that you're always interrupting work through your own
> history and experience. So, even if you think you're measuring from 0,
> you're not. The problem is with this idea of 0. what is it? classic
> greek statuary. A sunset? Your way your cat feels on your tummy? The
> Sims?
>
> I would like to think that I measure work based solely on my own
> innate senses that are attuned to the infinite truth and humanity of
> the universe.
>
> but i don't.
>
> If one's experience with contemporary art is limited than their
> opinions might seem limited to other's whose experience is more rich
> and varied. call it snobbery, call it elitism, call it taste; call it
> whatever you want, but (allow me one of my analogies) when i need wine
> recommendations I don't ask the 18-year-old clerk at the local Piggly
> Wiggly*.
>
>
>
> ++++
> *what the hell is Piggly Wiggly? Piggly Wiggly