Monday, June 08, 2009

How to create art by ruining it in nine easy steps

A sequence revealing my insight into the nature of art.

Step one: Find a sculpture at Princeton University that looks like a Henry Moore, though you can't be entirely sure about it. Be entirely too lazy to look around for a placard. Okay, so I see you've got that. Good.



Step two: Do not be intimidated by the fact that Moore is one of the two greatest sculptors of the 20th century. No, completely disregard the artist's intent. By no means try to take a picture of the sculpture as others see it--or as the artist would have you see it--but peer into it, finding its flaws and weaknesses, its disrepair. Or reflections of eyeballs. Then when you find the beautiful disrepair, take a photo of just these parts, making sure that nothing of the original meaning of the sculpture remains. This step is essential, and you see the result here.



Step three: Now that you've ruined the image of the sculpture, begin to ruin your own image by cropping it further. This is not essential, but it is quite fun. Make sure to overcrop, leaving most of the good stuff out. Make sure you save your bad editing so that it's impossible to go back and fix it. I'd give myself a "D-" for this job, as seen below. Just not enough cropping.



Step four: Okay, now look for weird things in the photo. Do you vaguely see a face? Sure you do. Good, you're on to something. Do what you need to amplify the faceness of the face by digitally manipulating it. For example, here you probably want to punch up the colors (punch out the face?) and convert the photo into its negative. And what you have is a creepy photo of a face.

That only you will see.

Much to your frustration.



Step five: do all that you can to convince other that, drat it all, there IS a face in there. Why can't you see it??!!

Step six: Discourage others from treating your own photos (as seen above) in the manner that you treated Moores' art.

Step seven: Pretend not to be hurt when they promise that they wouldn't have thought to have done that and you actually do believe them.

Step eight: Make sure you don't fall asleep but instead worry why you can't take photos worthy of being destroyed by others.

Step nine: After a lousy night of sleep, you're nice and full of angst--which is perfect conditions for starting it all over with step one.

4 comments:

Andy D. said...

I do have several questions for you. We appreciate your brutal honesty on this one.

1. Is that really a Moore, or not?

2. If so, putting aside your photographic deconstruction of it, did he intend for us, the gentle viewer, to climb inside of it and/or put our cameras in the inner ring to view it "on closer inspection"?

3. Either way, is Moore generally reknowned for putting Easter Eggs like "the face" in his works? I hadn't heard that, but I confess I'm not the expert... Or were you perhaps taking a flyer on this one?

4. Putting aside any public/social conventions about how humans typically view art in full daylight of public places, where was Timekeeper during this session, and how ardently was she requesting a more standard viewing?

5. At what point, and for how many seconds, were you upside down on the sculpture, hanging by your knees -- and relatedly, did your head get stuck in the inner circle at any point, and if so, who freed you and how much vasoline was needed?

These are just my thoughts as I read this post...

AMD

timekeeper said...

Andy,

I'm laughing so hard that I'm crying. (That is a compliment...but I'm also really tired).

And to answer #4--that was the day I was sick in bed with the flu. Does that explain the rest?

Andy D. said...

Thought you might smile at this one! :) Just demonstrates the importance of you remaining healthy!

Joyf said...

my favorite is #8

how you bear the torture and keep at it, i'll never know