Aman619

Hell no. 2 years of that brainwashing was enough for me to switch majors to science. I was dumb enough. I just couldn't take it. My teachers were such condescending too. One guy said at least once every class period 'none of you will ever be able to draw as good as me' Bragged constantly about his crappy drawings.... At school teachers tend to be that way, they are frustrated (stereotypically) failures who must teach because the world won't pay them to create. S they find themselves surrounded by younger and weaker artists, human nature leads them to be condescending. But, oftentimes, art school students have no chance of success so early discouragement like this is beneficial. Weeds out those lacking confidence, and feeds the desire of the rest to succeed even more. Also, funny story as even then, you were faced with advice that drawing skill isn't the be all end all of art, and didn't Agree even back then.

All these artists can draw. Except maybe the can pooper. You went to art school. Every other kid could draw. Drawing skill is just one aspect of being an artists, and poor drawing skills don't disqualify artistic achievements. All of the artists we have discussed traveled on a journey from drawing.... Look at Mondrian. We haven't discussed him, but I'm sure there are many folks who say "big deal, colored rectangles!!" But look up HOW he got there, to see and paint those shapes. It wasn't in Freshman Design 101. He got there over many years, dis tilling what he liked about what his eyes were seeing in the world, the intersection of lines everywhere. He slowly and methodically eliminated them, focussing on the if relationship to the adjacent lines. And it all started with drawing landscapes. He drew like 1000s of other people, but where he TOOK his drawing was unique. And memorable.

Philip Guston?? my KID could paint like that! : )

I have great appreciation for aesthetically pleasing art. That said, nobody needs to still be painting Bible scenes, still-lifes of iPhones and computers, portraits of aristocracy, etc. in this day and age, at least not unless they're bringing something new to the table. As I mentioned in another thread, I saw the "Macbeth"-inspired play "Sleep No More" a year or two ago. It was a deconstructed, more modern version of the play where you physically went to different rooms and experienced different parts of the story. Frankly, I didn't care that much for it, but I did admire that they tried to do something different with it, something that challenged the viewer and didn't just present it or spoon-feed it to them. Similarly, a lot of Modern/Contemporary art is really, really bad. If people weren't pushing the boundaries, though, taking risks to create new, innovative and challenging art, we wouldn't get the truly inspired art that we've gotten either. I think it's terrible that there are people like yourself - trained in the arts, no less! - who seem to be dismissing decades of artistic achievement with one broad stroke. Of course not everything is going to appeal to everyone, but there is still a lot of interesting art out there to like that isn't just chocolate box art or other uninspired retreads of what has come before. I'm only dismissing the urine christs and the paint spatterers-there's lots of great modern artists otherwise. But like I said there's lots of great artists all over the place doing unique works you'll never hear about. There's never been a lack of great artists. I think we ALL agree about the crucifixes and urine extremes that have ben foisted on us. Lichtenstein is NOT working in urine and found objects to make his point.

Yep. It's easy to recognize the shape and form in Monet's painting - it's evolutionary to what came before. Pollock, on the other hand, broke completely new ground in so many areas. No one painted like him before then, and it understandably shocked and confused a lot of peoples' sensibilities, as it still does today. Now that is truly great art. I disagree Every artist had such paint spattered canvasas strewn about. oh god. there are splatters and then theres carefully intricately and PURPOSEFULLY applied WALL of splattered paint. I suppose we should Lichtenstein Pollock too, since he clearly just took other people splatter paintings and cashed in on it without giving credit!

That is silly. There is something challenging about all of it. Everyone of the art movements you speak of was radically different then whatever came before. As such they were challenging to their times. I think Gene omitted the word "anymore" at the end of the sentence. Im pretty sure Gene knows that Impressionism was laughed at in it early days too. And, for all those who still vehemently resist all that has come after it, should be considered a gateway drug for them. In time, much of this "other modern " that bugs people will be grandfathered in and palatable to them.

And in answer to your question...no, not easy to understand, and beautiful. I like this painting too. Whats surprising to me that if one can stare at it for hours on repeated viewings and gain deeper appreciation for all that is going on there when it looks at first like a fuzzy, faded painting of a church, then WHY is a Pollock, which repeated and longer viewings ALSO rewards with greater insight and appreciation of its deceptive complexity of shapes and relationships… WHY is Pollocks work just splatters and this is capable of such deeper thought? I can take a guess: its because it has a recognizable shape and a form at first glance, so its more like a "fun game" in which you get to see so much more going on in the execution that you saw at first. Theres a payoff to digging deeper into it. But Pollock looks like just a kids painting at first, so theres no comparison. No payoff cause my kid could do it etc etc .

here we go…..

oh ok. me too.

not sure you're disagreeing with me or agreeing. Im saying that we buy comic books they turn up their noses to, while they pay millions for the artworks that seem completely ridiculous to us….

thats part of the resin we see 100 million dollar formaldehyde sharks and pischrists….. TO PROVOKE A REACTION = ART. but we don't have to deal with that because we don't live in that "art world" but thats how THEY think, and they are playing the game. We collect comic books. We find each others interests equally absurd don't we?

When I was in Art School in the 70s, the common declaration was that "painting is dead" and as performance art was the new rage, testing the boundaries of "Art" Sure most of it was crapp and completely forgotten, but the concept of Art being outside of just drawing and painting well underway and established even then.

"drawing" is the layman's understanding of "art". it hasn't been the the art worlds definition for over 50 years, maybe even 150 years since photography came along and could effortlessly reproduce in photo realism.. As technology has advanced, the idea of an "artist" as someone "who can draw" is a very specialized and limited view of Art today, maybe felt strongest right here in comic books where the adherence to anatomy is crucial to an comic artists reputation.….

I don't theres such a HUUGE difference, but I understand why so many think there is. Do you realize you are being "snobbish" in your disdain for "some" artists and media. You elevate comic book pen and ink "illustration" while denigrating the very similar profession of graphic design. Both require a keen design sense that begins with a blank white page. As a matter of fact, with the separation of pencilling and inking common to comics artwork, who are you actually elevating over the other? The penciller is the graphic designer parallel, while the inker "merely traces" (as its commonly referred to derisively and sarcastically) to the best of his particular talents. The inker relies on the talent of the penciller to a great degree and is NOT the "creator" of the artwork at all… merely the typesetter, to mangle my analogy. The penciller has supplied the layout (the design) upon which the inker applies his contribution to that design. which -- ironically --- is all thats left of the pencillers efforts which get erased out of existence with only the inkers interpretation left to posterity. anyway,

what the heck . heres a copy paste of the entire piece… Who Made That Campbell’s Soup Label? By HILARY GREENBAUM MAY 9, 2011 3:25 PMMay 9, 2011 3:25 pm 2 Comments Andreas Rentz/Getty Images In 1962, Andy Warhol produced “Campbell’s Soup Cans”: 32 paintings, each representing a flavor of Campbell’s condensed soup. “With these works, Warhol took on the tradition of still-life painting, declaring a familiar household brand of packaged food a legitimate subject in the age of Post-War economic recovery,” according to Christie’s. Warhol appropriated the famous soup can and reinvented it as a work of art. He can be credited with converging the world of high art and supermarket branding, propelling the pop-art movement forward and possibly even boosting the sales of canned soup, but the label that he rode to stardom was not his design at all. Campbell's soup label from 1900.Campbell’s Soup CompanyCampbell’s soup label from 1900. Sixty-five years earlier, Dr. John T. Dorrance created the first condensed soups for the Campbell Soup Company. Originally, the label that was affixed to those first soup cans was orange and blue. The following year, in 1898, Herberton L. Williams, who subsequently became the company’s treasurer, comptroller and assistant general manager, attended a University of Pennsylvania versus Cornell football game at which Cornell first played in red and white uniforms. Williams was so impressed with the color scheme that he proposed the labels be changed to match. Regarding the other elements of the design, “We do not have specific information on who designed the label, mostly because our records indicate that it was a cooperative effort,” Campbell’s corporate archivist, Jonathan Thorn, told me in an e-mail. “Also, the small evolutions of the label in the early years help to indicate this. The Campbell -script for instance is very similar to Joseph Campbell’s own signature, which may have been used as a basis for the label -script.” The -script “was designed to appeal to the housewife of the time,” Thorn said. “It was intended to look like cursive handwriting of the day that one would find on handwritten recipes, equating to ‘Homemade.’ ” The medallion on the center of the label went through a number of different iterations from 1898 to 1900, ending with the version seen in this post, which represents the medal the Campbell Soup Company received at the Exposition Universelle de 1900 in Paris. Thorn noted: “The 1900 Paris medal was designed to replicate as accurately as possible the actual medal itself. It would be my guess that an engraver or the printing company’s engraver would have been employed to replicate the medal for printing.” That said, the first printer to produce the labels, Sinnickson Chew & Sons Company, is also credited with aiding in the design of the original label. Small adjustments to the label have been made over time, but the original concept is easily visible in all the iterations that have been conceived, making it the icon that it is, Warhol or no Warhol.

an excerpt: Regarding the other elements of the design, “We do not have specific information on who designed the label, mostly because our records indicate that it was a cooperative effort,” Campbell’s corporate archivist, Jonathan Thorn, told me in an e-mail. “Also, the small evolutions of the label in the early years help to indicate this. The Campbell -script for instance is very similar to Joseph Campbell’s own signature, which may have been used as a basis for the label -script.”

oh jeeze. The Campbells soup packaging is fine, but certainly not worth ANY special attention whatsoever when compared to other packaging on supermarket shelves. Not nearly an "award winning" design by any means. Clean and simple and professional is all. ONLY after a Warhol makes it into "something else" and foists it onto the art world in a completely different light was it even thought of as a design by anybody other than that guys boss and the Campbells Art Director/Marketing team back then. this is getting silly. I don't have reference as to the development of what became THAT particular Campbells packaging design, but Im guessing it was a slow maturation from very similar packages beginning back in the 1890s. heres what a 3 second google search turns up, from the NYTimes article in 2011. I was guessing about the year, but it was 65 years before Warhols work in 1962. Nice guess! http://6thfloor.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/05/09/who-made-that-campbells-soup-label/?_r=0

As befits this discussion, Scott Edelman has a blog about a new gallery showing of comics artists take on Lichtenstein appropriation of Comics creators panels. Dave Gibbons odd a brilliant take on Whaam.

pssst… Drew copies from swipe materials and photos. does he credit the sources? Many times from unit photography shot by guys paid by the day or the film who don't own their work any more than Heath etc ever did. Lichtenstein gets singled out because he worked in the comic book printing style, but he was far from the first or last to reuse others' works.

Why is it silly to be upset fifty years later, how do you know he wasn't upset before? Seeing your work get copied and sold without a mention is something that anybody would get angry about it doesn't matter how much time went by when that piece you worked, and taken on gets considered to be so iconic. Also its not just the money, if Lich had asked permission to use it then people would have been ok with it, because at least he acknowledged that he was using the work from another artist, and that $50 fee you said it would cost would be nothing for him. But no he didn't even do that, but hey I guess since it wasn't you he stole from its ok right? you misunderstood me as I wasn't specific. Im calling out the defenders of Heath here, not Heath. His cartoon reads whimsical to me and more as a thank you to Hero Alliance than a serious gripe against Lichtenstein. He has a good point to make, and made it well. But ask him back then, and over his career and he'd say that as hard as he worked on every job he did in comics, it was throwaway work. None of these guys felt working in comics in the fifties was all that grand. And if the "swells" in the gallery world thrilled at the reuse of one his panels, back them Im sure he was laughing at how dumb the rich were…. and not that he had created a masterpiece with panel six on page 7 of a story he drew late one night. I think he thinks it would be "nice" to have seen some of that money, but not that he is entitled to any of it, just as he's not seeking a piece of every Haunted Tank slabbed comic that resells on Heritage. Its the so many comics fans who are bent out of shape far more than the actual artists I was speaking to.

Have Flash prices been affected by the TV show yet? Any movement on key Rogues appearances that have already appeared on the show, or are upcoming? Weather Wizard, Grodd, Captain Cold, Heat Wave, etc? I know that the early Flashes were hot when considered very scarce years ago, then cooled off ... Think the TV show will boost Flash back to a hot book? Or has it already begun?

Yeah. It's just like DC with say Action 1. They got a few pennies each when they sold it, and not a dime on each resale of any of the printed copies. It was the galleries ( dealers) and investors (comics fans) who Mae the long green in each case.

; )

Nah. It was never scarce. And most of the issues are probably under 9.0. Having sat up bagged in a longbox and jostled around for 40 years.

And, just wait til gene comes home and posts on the subject!!