Two drawings that are important to me stand on surfaces in my home. One of them is a field of blue, purple, and pink flowers against a landscape of a blue horizon with a golden sun and some unfathomable dark blob. The other presents Uga, the University of Georgia’s dog symbol, with the sport program’s two new national championship trophies flanking him.
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As much as I love these drawings, I do not combine these two drawings with great skill; nobody else would for that matter. My oldest daughter, Kenzie, painted the first one as a holiday provide for me when she was three, so it has visible sentimental value. I bought the next one from Michael Davenport, a crippled actor who paints in Athens, Ga. , but it connects me both to my school community and his encouraging history.
The question of “ What is art? ” is an immortal conversation. It’s a cop-out to state that art is in the attention of the spectator since everyone has his or her unique taste. At the same time, it ’s easy to see why certain works of art have value or value, yet if they’re never to one’s style.
For instance, I find Andres Serrano’s “P*** Christ” blasphemous, but I can see why craft enthusiasts find it rebellious and thus valuable. I prefer more traditional and ordered types of painting to more contemporary art, but I understand the importance of both models.
These days, almost everything goes in the arts world. One bizarre story out of the Netherlands demonstrates how simple it can be to deceive contemporary arts with something more commonplace.
The LAM exhibition in Lisse, the Netherlands, not just features unusual works of art but displays them in unexpected ways. It’s a way of cultivating an environment of question for visitors.
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“We try to shock the customer all the time, ” Froukje Budding, a gallery director, told The Guardian.
“Our craft encourages readers to see everyday items in a new light, ” said Sietske van Zanten, the museum’s producer. “By displaying sculptures in surprising places, we amplify this practice and keep guests on their feet. ”
One of those special pieces was “All the Great Times We Spent Jointly” by French designer Alexandre Lavet. Lavet describes the piece as “a tribute to Brussels streets, artists ’ studios, friends ’ flats, parties, exhibition openings at galleries and artist-run spaces, and to this common and familiar object who brings people and friends together. ”
“All the Good Times We Spent Together ” looks like two empty beer cans, one standing upright and the other on its side and dented. You could easily forgive anyone for thinking that the two bottles are garbage, but Lavet really handcrafted and hand-painted them.
LAM displayed the painting in an airplane, and an innocent engineer saw them and tossed them in a garbage would. When LAM’s librarian came again to the gallery from a tear, she noticed that the bottles were gone. She desperately searched for them before finding them in a garbage bag that someone was getting ready to throw out.
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Budding said that there are no hard feelings toward the engineer who was “just doing his work, ” but she pointed out that “We have then put the job in a more conventional place on a pedestal so it can relax after its journey. ”
The Guardian points out that this is n’t the first time someone has “ruined ” unusual artwork. In 2011, a caretaker at a German gallery rapidly cleaned what she thought was a dirty artwork, ruining a piece of art fair hundreds of thousands of dollars. Last month, a benefactor at a North Korean exhibition ate a fruit that was part of an artwork assembly. I would put that artwork restoration has often destroyed valuable pieces as well.
This narrative goes to show that one man’s garbage is another man’s wealth. Alternatively, maybe we should turn it around and say that one man’s wealth is another man’s debris.