By Leslie D.
Soule
So
what is “art”, exactly? Some would argue that it is the product of a person’s
creativity and self-expression, shown in a visual format of some kind. Good
art, it is said, is controversial. Art is meant to challenge you on a personal
level. Recently in Sacramento, there has been a series of paintings that has
created quite a stir in the local news. The artist, Maren Conrad, has created a
series of paintings in a show called “Politically Vulnerable”. The paintings
feature ex-wives and ex-lovers of politicians. A local lobbyist, Donne
Brownsey, demanded that the paintings be taken down immediately, and the owner
of the local nightclub did just that.
One
cannot help but wonder what Brownsey’s motivation was. It is as though she
believes, perhaps subconsciously, that when an artist sets about to create a
piece of work, the subject matter is highly revered – in this case, infidelity.
I can certainly see where she may have come to this conclusion. However,
following the same train of thought, one would conclude that Picasso must have
seen the bombing of the town of Guernica with reverence. However, this was most
definitely not the case.
“Guernica”
is arguably Picasso’s greatest work, and according to Wikipedia, “It was created
in response to the bombing of Guernica, a Basque Country village in northern
Spain by German and Italian warplanes at the behest of the Spanish Nationalist
forces, on 26 April 1937, during the Spanish Civil War.” It portrays images of
people screaming in agony, falling over themselves and broken, with light
diffused into shards. Picasso uses art to show the horror of warfare, and the
tragedy of the bombing. This is a great example of a controversial piece of
work, and the moral that we can draw from it, which is, “Art (except, of
course, as used in advertisements) does not equal endorsement”.
If
one looks at a painting merely as endorsing the image it portrays, this is not
altogether wrong, but it is certainly a shallow interpretation of a piece of
work which is probably worthy of a deeper interpretation. An example of when an
artist pokes fun at this idea is with the painting titled “The Treachery of
Images” by French artist Rene’ Magritte. I am a fan of Magritte’s surrealistic
work, which features scenes of altered realities. In this particular painting,
we see a pipe, and underneath the pipe, in French, the words “Ceci n’est pas
une pipe”. Translated into English, this phrase reads, “This is not a pipe.”
Taken altogether, the painting suggests that there is more to its existence
than what meets the eye.
Henry
David Thoreau wrote that, “It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what
you see.” So when you look at an artistic piece, what is it that you’re really
seeing? Is it only the subject matter or the surface material, or something
more?
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