Recent art that you liked

[Artyczar]

Very nice Ovids!

 

[brianvds]

Assistants, Brian.

So it's not just Hirst, then? Are there any famous artists left who do their own work?

 

[Artyczar]

I'm not famous, but when I was able to afford it (or when I had an intern), I had them do non-art-related stuff or prep work that I was physically not able to do myself. I don't think there's anything wrong with that, but actual paint to canvas doesn't seem right if you're signing your name to it--although, I don't know if primer counts? I've almost never did that myself on bigger canvases when I could afford it, or if I couldn't physically deal with it (I have some disabilities that make it hard, and at times impossible).

Once I had an assistant punch some sew holes for me in a canvas, but they didn't do it right and it felt weird, so I had them stop. That was partially on one canvas--once. It bugged me. Meanwhile, other artists around me finish out their work faster than slinging pancakes. This was when I was working 10-12 hours in the studio everyday! That bugged me too. I don't know how they do it. They are not famous, but they are my peers. Some have money for assistants and seem to be able get their work out there very quickly. I feel like this kind of "competition" eventually resigned me to stop bothering to work all the time. Now I don't work everyday anymore. It was useless to try so hard. Now I feel like a deadbeat. Ha ha.

 

[stlukesguild]

A good number of the old masters employed assistants and apprentices. From what I've read, Michelangelo would have assistants mix his colors, prepare the plaster surfaces for his frescoes and transfer his drawings ("cartoons") onto the wet plaster using the poncing method. He would then restate the contours using paint and do the painting himself. It is always possible that he might have employed the more skillful apprentices or assistants to paint areas of flat color such as the sky or parts of the architectural elements... but from what I've gleaned over the years it seems he wasn't fond of having assistants working on his actual paintings. Raphael seems to have employed assistants in his later frescoes (not in the School of Athens). Rubens ran the most successful workshop of the Baroque era. Apprentices and lesser assistants frequently worked on less important details while he employed some of the finest specialists of the time including Frans Snyders, Jan Breughel, and Anthony Van Dyck to paint elements such as animals, plants and flowers, and secondary figures. I came across one of his bills, once. He would price the paintings based upon how much work was from his hand. The most expensive works were those realized solely by his hand. In most instances, we can recognize his hand from those of his assistants and the most valued paintings remain those that are wholly by him or nearly so.

Works of architecture and other art forms are frequently the result of a group of assistants and specialists. It seems to me that the judgment as to the merits of a work of art produced by a group of assistants must be based upon the merits of the work itself. I'm not overly fond of Jeff Koons... but he tends to employ well-paid skillful craftsmen. The end products tend to be quite well crafted... unlike most of the works of Damien Hirst. Looking at the painting you posted, I can't say I'm overly impressed by the actual painting. It is similar to 50s and 60s illustration and some works of Pop Art.

 

[Artyczar]

The painting reminded me of a design for a cereal box.

 

[brianvds]

Works of architecture and other art forms are frequently the result of a group of assistants and specialists. It seems to me that the judgment as to the merits of a work of art produced by a group of assistants must be based upon the merits of the work itself. I'm not overly fond of Jeff Koons... but he tends to employ well-paid skillful craftsmen. The end products tend to be quite well crafted... unlike most of the works of Damien Hirst. Looking at the painting you posted, I can't say I'm overly impressed by the actual painting. It is similar to 50s and 60s illustration and some works of Pop Art.

My problem isn't with an artist employing assistants or apprentices as such. As we all know, there is ample precedent in previous eras. Indeed, I think Hirst and Koons etc. like to think of themselves in precisely that light: masters of art studios producing work under their leadership.

But here's the difference: Michelangelo was actually the master. If an apprentice or assistant struggled drawing an eye or something, Michelangelo could show him how, or take over. The head of a Renaissance art studio trained his apprentices in art. Can Hirst or Koons train their assistants? Teach them anything about drawing or paint mixing? They apparently appoint artists who are actually better than themselves, then pass themselves off as the masters. A pretty neat little racket.

It is of course true that in the end, the work itself matters - I have yet to see anything coming from their studios that blows my socks off.

 

[Desforges]

More by Paula Rego.

 

[Artyczar]

Do we know for sure that these artists are hiring apprentice artists that are better than themselves? Just wondering how we know this.

 

[Iain]

Sophie Lawson.

 

[Artyczar]

Dems crazy!

 

[Iain]

I was looking up automatic drawing, and Sophie's podcast came up, which lead to her site, the art, then reading her story. And what a story! The influences of this kind of art owes little to the canon. Digital, Anime, Cosplay? There is no one Art World.

 

[john]

I think that Jeff Koons painting is great. Delicious and abstract, and those candy-like red buttons on a Disney World cereal neckless of roller coaster matchbox car slides that move around to height and depth.... with a cherry on top. Warhol would love it. Whether he painted it or not is irrelevant. If all he did was manage the creative ideas of his assistants. This is his production.

Would I want that in my living room? No. Doesn't match the shades.

 

[john]

Do we know for sure that these artists are hiring apprentice artists that are better than themselves? Just wondering how we know this.

How do we define "better"?

 

[Artyczar]

How do we define "better"?

That was basically my question for Brian.

 

[brianvds]

Do we know for sure that these artists are hiring apprentice artists that are better than themselves? Just wondering how we know this.

We don't know for sure. For all I know Hirst and Koons are photorealists who can put Chuck Close to shame. But I doubt it. I find it can often be instructive to look up an artist's early or student work, before basic skill was subsumed into individual style. That's how we know that the claim that such artists as De Kooning or Mondriaan were talentless is baseless. In the case of these two gentlemen, I have never seen any such work, so I can't say for sure what they can or can not do with a brush.

Whatever their skills, their current work doesn't do much for me

 

[Artyczar]

Does an artist's early work need to reference what is there right in front of you in order to make an impact on you either way? I wouldn't think you could know in every instance, especially in abstract or nonrepresentational works. Not knowing, does it actually matter? Maybe respect the artist might come in to play. I can see that for some people, but if they are doing good work that people love, what's the difference?

 

[john]

And what's most important, the concept or the skill in execution. I would argue that it's the concept. Thus Koons can come up with the idea and never touch a brush or piece of mylar or whatever, and it's still his work. Now this doesn't really apply to something like a landscape painting but with modern art the concept is the thing.

 

[stlukesguild]

And what's most important, the concept or the skill in execution. I would argue that it's the concept.

And you would be wrong. You can sit engaged in mental Onanism all day but until you give those ideas a physical visual form... and a form that engages an audience... your thoughts are meaningless. Morandi's bottles and Cezannes apples are based upon the most mundane of "concepts". It is how they are realized that makes them worth something. Again, I would agree with Matisse's suggestion that there is no separation between thought and the creative process in the creation of a work of art. You fail to appreciate Lipking's painting in part because you fail to appreciate the nuances of the artist's touch, the subtleties of the decisions made concerning color, line, placement, etc... Such failure, in many ways, is owed to contemporary art theory that stresses words (theory/criticism/concepts) over the visual.

Oh... and concept is in no way valued over the visual in the majority of Modern art whether we are speaking of Picasso, Matisse. Bonnard, Beckmann, Klee, Kandinsky, DeKooning, Pollock, Johns, etc... Post-Aesthetic art begins with Duchamp but doesn't take off until the 1960s. Even then, it can in no way be claimed as the dominant direction in art from then until the present. Koons and Hirst and Emin are art stars because they are embraced by a super-wealthy class of collectors who see art as a means of proving their superior or more advanced taste... but they are in no way major figures to the larger body of artists, art collectors, and art lovers.

 

[john]

The Lipking photo? I mean painting? Oh I appreciate the skill involved. Both in taking a good photo and in making it into a skillfully rendered painting.

Picasso's paintings are great because of the concept, not the execution. Yes his execution was excellent, he was famously called a "good draftsman", but is was his ideas and his concepts that made him the great artist he was, not his mechanics.

If you had a great idea for a modern "idea driven" painting but you could only tell an assistant to execute your vision, who is the artist, you or the assistant? In the case of modern conceptual art you are the artist. In the case of realism/representational the assistant is more correctly the artist. But frankly, if he's just copying a photo, he's more simply just a technician. It's just mechanical.

 

[stlukesguild]

Now this... a work made for the Conservative Political Action Conference... is so bad it's almost brilliant... unintentionally hilarious. Is that Glenda the Good Witch's magic wand? Flip-flops? Jeff Koons will likely wish he had done this.