What can be deemed worse? The Spector of Phil Spector above your mantel... or Phil Spector himself?
Is everything better in Black Velvet? Black Light? Black Panther TV Lamps?
Certainly the subject matter can influence one's like or dislike of such art in question. Technique aside, it's hard to turn blind when the beauty is in the oh-so-certain eye of the beholder.
Of course there is good art; that is not what this article is about. Good art is everywhere, as well as it should be. Average art is everywhere, which is unfortunate. Especially for those that have to insure and/or dust it.
But bad art, bad taste, as John Waters has so maniacally taught us over the years needs to be really, really bad. Otherwise, it's truly worthless-- Monetarily, aesthetically void of value. Average art shouldn't even bother getting up in the morning. Seriously. If you're bad art, just call in sick-- Trust me, no one will miss you.
There is a motto in the antique business: "UGLY SELLS!" Why? Because mediocre doesn't. Average doesn't impress. Boring should be asked to leave the party. And who invited him anyway? He doesn't even bring along his date... Abstinence. As if she'd ever put out something relevantly shocking. Yawn.
Kitsch is that cutting edge between cool and crap. It's a fine, ever wiggling line, but it's there for the argument, dividing spouses and guests alike... and spending the night on your sofa... or in your bed if it finds someone particularly distasteful amongst your friends and/or frenemies.
The lost art of the portraiture echoes these sentiments best (or worse). The National Portrait Gallery in DC is a museum dedicated strictly to the portrait as art form... and save for a handful of later 20th century artist, Warhol, David LaChapelle, etc., it is as outdated as a tintype in our 21st century world of digital photography. Though actual film isn't completely dead, Kodak (and their ilk) pretty much fell in that openly developing grave of obsolescence. Can you still find real film? Yes. Online. But it has gone underground and is produced like it's an illegal substance of some sort.
Why was portrait art replaced by the camera? Just as yesteryear's Photobooths disappeared into the snapshot of lost Americana, so too did our patience. We want our photo taken and we want it now.
"I can't hold my tongue out forever!" as Einstein once complained before returning to his quest for a Unified Theory of Time, Space & Chicago Parking Meter usage.
I know there are those of you who would argue these issues, but let me add another vintage point to this lost brushoff.
I have been in 100's of homes over the years-- cleaning out houses, helping people sort through their possessions and those of their deceased relatives. I have seen COUNTLESS painted portraits of the lifeless homeowners in question.
In the 1950's and 1960's you had to have your portrait painted. Like an edict from a priest, you did not question. If the neighbor got his driveway paved, you had your driveway re-paved, whether it needed it or not. In that same bulging vein, portrait painters found work from house to house; sometimes it was done at home; other times, you went for a sitting... or two.. or three. Maybe just of you, looking like a dower insurance salesman... or the pretty lady of the house. Maybe you and the family, a group portrait. "Make that dog sit still in Sally's lap before I slap her..." Sally, not the dog.
Yes, I have seen so many of these one stroke (victim) painted portraits, it's now become a blur to me: One big, boring, framed... blur.
"That thing always gave me the creeps!" one relative said to me.
"But isn't this your Aunt Sophie? The one who raised you after your mother than off with the Orkin Man during that water bug infestation of 1967?"
"Happened all over Skokie" the woman spit back. "Something about those crisp exterminator uniforms just drove women crazy. Thankfully that didn't happen with the Roto-Rooter guys."
Story after story, it was all the same. Boring, lame, sad, dull painted portraits of the past... tossed into the trash. Now and then you'll find them thrifting, marked down. Even resale doesn't want them... and when they do sell, it's for the wooden frame.
But the few, the scary, the disturbing... repeat after me... the UGLY, those are the one's cherished today. They grace swank South Loop Towhomes, Logan Square Lofts, Ravenswood Bungalows, Lake Shore Drive Condos & Hyde Park Co-ops. They are treasured by their adoptive owners like a beloved family pet that always misses the newspaper... just like your late Uncle Herb.
But on a good night, very late into the darkness, they'll watch you cross the room in your faux bunny slippers like some dead & disfigured night watchman of the past, just happy to be re-hung.
AliasDanny@Rocketmail.com
www.WhenDannyMetSally.com
Copyright WDMS 2012
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