The continuing quest for quality......

Don Thompson, who teaches marketing and economics in Toronto, London and Boston wrote an excellent book about the branding and economics of contemporary Art  - "The 25 million dollar Shark" He writes that  even so called experts in the field of contemporary art think 85 percent of it is crap - they just argue over which 85 percent and the vast majority, (some 90%) of contemporary galleries go out of business after a few years. This seem to indicate the transient nature of the market and the ephemeral nature of contemporary art -  so much contemporary art is not going to last the decade let alone the centuary - most of the  art bought from these local dealers will never resell for as much as the original purchase price. It's all hype and flavour of the month.

"In the overwhelming majors of cases, contemporary art is not a good investment . the sale of art at one of the big auction houses is no indication of quality."

Less than half the modern and contemporary artists in the major auction houses in their catalogues from 25 years ago  are still offered at any major auction, says Thompson. So what does this tell us? well what it suggests is that the monetary value of a work of art or the status of any modern Artist is not an indication of quality; the quality is as transient as the art.

Its all about the brand name and as is well known -  with branding it's not about the quality , it's about the fog of association and the illusion  of value. Just as even experts will rate a bland wine as superior according to nothing more the label; and blind tests of coke or Pepsi will always favour Pepsi ………unless you reveal  the brand name.  So it is in the Art world.

For the fame brokers it's all an opportunistic shot in the dark. Having selected from a pool of contenders one or two will be branded and marketed backed by a bulldozer of hype, advertising and assurances to an insecure bunch of rich but tasteless collectors.   Modern Art is about the brand name if you get to the "top" it means you got noticed not that your work is any good. Modern Artists are feted and  groomed  by a select coterie of collectors, dealers, auction houses  and vested interests to manufacture their  " selected " Artists into a "Damien Hirst" to be  sought after by scores of affluent purchasers. Hirst is an "artist' without any technical ability.

Hirst has always needed assistants and produces art in a factory process he has stated that  he often had nothing to do with the creation of some of his pieces.  Leading art critic Robert Hughes says of Hirst his work proved that financial value was now the only meaning that remains for art.

"Never underestimate how insecure buyers are about contemporary art," a former Sotheby's specialist who now works for Bonham's told Thompson.

It is premature to decide which artists will prove to worthy of universal praise but today's art  relies more on economics, business practices, advertising techniques and human psychology than it does on aesthetics and quality. This is perhaps  true for all Art because the problem is that we see with our mind not our eyes. If you look at a work of Art by Roy Lichtenstein it's often inferior to the comic cover or panel  he copied it from. Art by Hirst, Pollock and Rothko depends not on what you see but on knowledge that you are looking at a very expensive piece of American Abstract Expressionism or Brit Art. But Damien Hirst can't paint for toffee and gets other artists to make his art,  Lichtenstein copied all his art dot by dot from other artists.

Hirst has tried to paint using nothing but his own ability. In October 2009, Hirst revealed that he had been painting with his own hand in a style influenced by Francis Bacon for several years. No Love Lost, his show of these paintings at the Wallace Collection in London received "one of the most unanimously negative responses to any exhibition in living memory". Critics called Hirst's work derivative, weak and boring: "Hirst, as a painter, is at about the level of a not-very-promising, first-year art student."."it was "shockingly bad".


The aesthetic in most expressionism and works by modern artists like Hirst is, if not non existent then vastly inferior to most classical art. We know this because  studies like the one conducted by a British tabloid of visitors to Tate Britain to determine what kind of art people wanted to look at -- classical or contemporary found overwhelmingly in favour of one; four 18th and 19th century paintings and four works by young British artists - revealed – Surprise, surprise that the classics won hands down.

At Tracey Emin's Monument Valley (One of the selected pieces), most people didn't stop and those who did averaged 5 seconds before it. The longest time spent was two minutes. Rachel Whiteread fared little better, though Damien Hirst's animal sculptures did seem to appeal to views…… but not his spot paintings.

On the other hand, visitors spent on average two minutes, 15 seconds looking at William Hogarth's The Roast Beef of Old England; 59 seconds looking at John Singer Sargent's Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose; 1 minute, 57 seconds viewing  Millais's Ophelia ( one fan spent a half hour studying it) and 2 minutes, 5 seconds looking at Whistler's Nocturne.

This is corroborated  by  Komar & Melamid who sought to find what kind of Art people liked. The study found "the most wanted painting in the United States."  It's a landscape of course and firmly in the classical tradition. An artifact created by Komar and Melamid which can be seen on their web site. The same kind of aesthetic seems to be held in esteem no matter where in the world surveys were conducted ( except Holland ! ) the most disliked art was universally abstract.

So in the absence of propaganda and hype we are disposed to like classical art probably for biological reasons. This doesn't make it good but suggests that an appeal to the aesthetics to defend modern art especially abstract expressionism is untenable. You can like modern Art for any reasons you like but don't pretend any of them have anything to do with technical ability or aesthetics.

Why does anyone like a piece of art anyway why prefer classical to modern. Figurative to abstract? You like it because of how you respond, - what it evokes in you, which depends not just on what you see but what you know, and who you are…….. and just as importantly, how you want to be perceived. This is after all what it means to buy a branded product for most people.

In the absence of any knowledge about the Artist, the  history of  art or the context of a work of Art  your evaluation is made purely on  the skill and artistry that is perceived by you.

In the absence of technical skill the response is to other aspects of the work. All of which depend not on the aesthetics but primarily on the branding. The brand name, the price, the status, the popularity, the rarity, the visibility in a jungle of other brands, the effectiveness of the advertising campaign the prestige of those endorsing the product. The work itself is almost irrelevant lost in a sea of dogma. Its about the hype not the artistry, the artist not the art.


Buying into a brand is superficial, it's about how you wish to be seen rather than any considered opinion about the work, the safe option  is to follow the sheep. The problem is that  this probably holds true today as much with with Da Vinci as with De Kooning, however if you showed the Mona Lisa alongside de Koonings "Woman I"  to anyone without a white stick They would place them at the opposite extremes  of any technical criteria. The same for Hirst's spot paintings painted by others sold for hundreds of thousands.

If ever proof was required that modern Art is a visual rendering of the emperors new clothes it's discovered by looking at de Kooning, the biggest pile of crap ever thrown at a canvas.  Hyped only by those who deem elitist knowledge superior to all other qualities.

I have no problem with those people  belief that de Kooning is great and his Art is wonderful my opinion (and its just that) is the polar opposite. I have a problem if it's obligatory to accept he is any good or to agree with the pseudo intellectual muck about how wonderful he is. He is not, his paintings are less aesthetic than vomit.

Da Vinci on the other hand even if you consider la Giaconda to be boring and washed out by repeated exposure on a million bookmarkers and biscuit tins at least shows talent and technical ability.

What you like, this self branding  is as more about who you and how you want others to see you. This holds true for Art. Almost any search of greatest artists will throw up the same names. Why?  because if you only know one or two Artists you don't have much choice. and if you know nothing you pick what every one else says is good.

If you were to look at the most favoured artists on a site like artistaday.com the  art is visually and mentally far more engaging than  anything by Pollock or de Kooning or Rothko but most individuals who consider themselves knowledgeable about art would fall about laughing at such an assertion simply because their art  has made it onto the walls of MoMA and is now sacred. To ridicule it is deemed ignorant almost blasphemy,  When an artist is elevated to a level of institutional worship his  art is as more about what you believe it to be not what it is aesthetically or technically - its not what's visible.   Criticizing Sainted brands like Pollock or de Kooning or Rothko Hirst or Warhol  is almost sacrilegious.

But I would argue that  anybody who can draw and has some knowledge of an area of art has as much right to their opinion as anyone else. The curators of the church of modern art should beware the untidy ranks of the atheist artists who can think for themselves. You can believe in Pollock if you like but thousands don't. It's not about Art it's not objective it's a   belief system based on indoctrination and dogma. Kill it before it gets too big to pull down.

Shout it out........ the emperor, is naked.