Cultural exchange: understanding the other side

[Dr. Anthony J. Toole]

In these difficult times, we need to reach across the aisle to understand what's wrong with them. One way to do that is through modern art. Today I want us to try to get to know Lubaina Himid, who the newspapers refer to as The artist who skewers white privilege. Let's dive in.

Painter Lubaina Himid says her work is not about making something pretty. "I don't expect you to attend a show of mine and go: 'It's very beautiful'. That's not what it is," she tells BBC Culture over a video call.

I agree. That's not what it is at all. Good start - let's look deeper.

"I made a series of paintings around a French ship called the Rodeur, which sailed with captured Africans from west Africa to the Caribbean.Rather than paint hundreds of people in great distress and dying, I wanted to create something that conveyed a sense of absolute inability to understand what was happening."

Well I think she skewered it. I have absolutely no idea what is happening in the picture. So let's hear from the Tate exhibition's co-curator Michael Wellen:

"[The bird-like woman] rests her hand on the shoulder of a seated man, who seems lost in thought – yet her presence is not necessarily reassuring or protective. Her alert yellow eyes look at us. The detail of the eye makes me want to back away, but it's too late, I'm already in the scene, sensing the tension between the figures and wondering about my own relation to them."

Exactly my thoughts too. Echoes of Rittenhouse: who do these people think they are, back away before it's too late, I'm on the scene. Let's agree this was a valuable exchange and we learnt a lot about what makes the other side crazy.

[Johny Joe Hold]

Re: Cultural exchange: understanding the other side

That's deep, Dr. Tooley. Thank you for opening a worthy discussion.

One thing I caught in the piece is that the woman with the duck head has no legs or feet. She has grown out of the man's back. Now, I suppose the artist could just have forgotten to put them in the painting.

But, if her intention was to grow the duck headed woman out of the man's back that puts a lot of meaning into the Rittenhouse incident. If he saw the potential in others of growing half a person with a duck's head out of a person's back, why could not the person grow fangs or claws that kill others. Those who could grow fangs and claws need to be taken out and that's what Mr. Rittenhouse did.

[Basilissa]

Re: Cultural exchange: understanding the other side

I think it's very simple. If it's not glorifying Jesus, then it's not art. There is no clear Biblical message in that painting. Therefore, it is not art.

[Dennis Lukes]

Re: Cultural exchange: understanding the other side

A more accurate interpretation of the slave trade would be a painting of thousands of sinful Nigro souls tumbling over a cliff into the fires below, but a glorious White Man reaches out and catches one of them, and he has a Bible in his other hand. A ray of sunshine arcs across the canvas to emphasize this scene and contrast the ugly darkness surrounding them. It's a lot more true (in a metaphorical sense) than a troop of bestial jigs passing around drugs inside a lighthouse.

absolute inability to understand what was happening.

See, now if one of us described the sheer, utter ignorance of the African race in such terms, they'd call us racist.

[Dr. Anthony J. Toole]

Re: Cultural exchange: understanding the other side

Today we're looking at something by Günther Förg. He strikes me as being very angry. Does anyone else see that? An angry unhappy man with his life choices and painting ability. Overall very low quality. Honestly, I don't know why we even bother except for that we're supposed to be making an attempt to "understand" the full spectrum of liberal idiocy, like they asked us to. Well here it is.

[Dennis Lukes]

Re: Cultural exchange: understanding the other side

spectrum

Well that explains it, he's an autist not an artist. Very pretty picture Gunther. Did you use the finger paints? You should show your mommy so she can hang it on the fridge.

[MitzaLizalor]

Re: Cultural exchange: understanding the other side

Very pretty picture Gunther. Did you use the finger paints?

He'd have to have funny shaped fingers.

Is the artwork the thing he's in front of, or is it the whole photograph, a collage i.e. man's head superimposed over the palette daubed on a wall behind? Sort of like this man wearing bowler hat except Magritte could actually paint a hat.

[Dr. Anthony J. Toole]

Re: Cultural exchange: understanding the other side

Is the artwork the thing he's in front of, or is it the whole photograph, a collage i.e. man's head superimposed over the palette daubed on a wall behind?

I believe he is crossing the boundary between what art really means. Plus he made you think, which was his main goal. Ha ha, made you think!

Sort of like this man wearing bowler hat except Magritte could actually paint a hat.

It looks like the kind of art people get as a tattoo when they change boyfriends and need to redesign the picture they got of the old one on their br**sts.

[MitzaLizalor]

Re: Cultural exchange: understanding the other side

Oh! Yes, I see what you mean. I was thinking more "avian B.O. inspector" but now I'm wondering who he was before the bird.

Is that supposed to be a slave boat? Why is she gouging out their right eyes? They come in the window, wait, get restrained by the triple-amputee bird woman, eye gouged, the tall man still can't believe what happened – is that the ocean out the window? I thought slave ships were less spacious than depicted. Sort of like convict ships but with more incentive for the cargo to arrive alive?

[Dennis Lukes]

Re: Cultural exchange: understanding the other side

Is that supposed to be a slave boat? Why is she gouging out their right eyes?

People of certain hues are inclined by design towards vandalism, theft, and property destruction, even if said other person's property comprises their own bodies.

[Virginia Day Templeton]

Re: Cultural exchange: understanding the other side

It's absolutely retarded. A black woman turning into a duck is supposed to make us think about "white privilege"... how, exactly?

If you have to explain the joke, it isn't funny. If you have to explain what your art "means", then that meaning isn't actually found in your art. It's just some crap you made up.

I think it's very simple. If it's not glorifying Jesus, then it's not art. There is no clear Biblical message in that painting. Therefore, it is not art.

There are so many wonderful parables in the Bible that are clever yet easily understood, and which above all give glory to Almighty God instead of wallowing in the base navel-gazing of "muh identity". Why not illustrate one of those?

Listen, Latoya. Your "black body" is only here for a vanishing instant compared to the eternity of Heaven or Hell. Who gives a hoot about white privilege when your immortal soul hangs in the balance?

But that isn't the worst of it.

Above all, this painting is simply ugly and unpleasant to look at. Compare it to the work of a master:



The late Brother Kinkade lavished every inch of his work with soul-stirring beauty. He used the vast talent God granted him to inspire, to create a world his audience wanted to live in... and to show them that the world they inhabited was worth living in, too.

Ms. Humid does none of that. She paints with bitter venom and the technique of a fourth-grader who'd rather be playing video games. She even admits that her work is not "beautiful". How could it be? Wokeness is incompatible with beauty, because it's all about beating you over the head with how evil you are and what an awful, hate-filled world you and your ancestors have wrought. What beauty could possibly be found in that?

Well, we know what the opposite of beauty is. And we know where ugly things belong.

In the trash.

[WWJDnow]

Re: Cultural exchange: understanding the other side

Today we're looking at something by Günther Förg. He strikes me as being very angry. Does anyone else see that? An angry unhappy man with his life choices and painting ability. Overall very low quality. Honestly, I don't know why we even bother except for that we're supposed to be making an attempt to "understand" the full spectrum of liberal idiocy, like they asked us to. Well here it is.

Förgod's sake! That painting is Förging awful. This man's work will soon be Förgotten. Until then, we must Förge ahead.

[MitzaLizalor]

Re: Cultural exchange: understanding the other side

And ahead we must look, if only to remember what we left behind. The fusion of form and design is achieved in sculpture. Christians would not make such an image of anything real—that is, in Heaven or on Earth or in The Waters below—but can the same be said for unreal objects presumably supposed to be alive somewhere (clearly not in any of the places I've mentioned) and perhaps only in demon-addled minds? Continuing with the bird theme, the picture alone is enough here, words are unnecessary because whatever words you'd want do not exist.



Living accommodation can also express ideas of this type when combined with a bold installation piece, such as a giant robot grafted onto the side of a minimalist artist's home. I'm not sure what the robot is doing but the scale of the thing is clear from one or two different angles for perspective.

1. Evening: a barn dance. Robot "flying buttress" structure in background.


2. Daytime: showing more detail in the flying buttress design.


As I say, the living accommodation seems rather too sparse for comfort – but is probably roomy inside with the triplex + mezzanine layout. Forging ahead brings us to my final example. These things do not exist on Earth and don't look very Heavenly. I have strong doubts as to their viability in water, which raises the question of whether they'd be prohibited under Deuteronomy 5:8 and whether they'd be suitable decoration for a Christian home?

3. Viewing from three angles in this case.

[Dr. Anthony J. Toole]

Re: Cultural exchange: understanding the other side

I'm furious.

Who do these "modern artists" think they are? They dump their miserable internal experiences onto us like anyone cares. We are all trying to get by, thank you very much, without listening to made-up problems. How about following the example of the master and trying to cheer people up?

Kinkade: “I would want to argue that I’m not an antagonist to modernists. I just believe in picture-making for people. We have a grassroots movement emerging in my art and in the country, and there’s 10 million people out there that if I give the word will go out and picket any museum I want them to.”

Don't step on Kinkade, modernists.


Thomas Kinkade, Cinderella Wishes Upon a Dream, 2009.

[Johny Joe Hold]

Re: Cultural exchange: understanding the other side

I've insisted children in our Freehold Public Schools experience at least a bit of art that does not include the cross. I also want them to learn not all art is produced by leftist hippies. So, each year we charter buses and take all classes to the Terry Redlin Art Center in Watertown, SD.

Terry died a few years ago but he was a pioneer in art. I want our children to learn art can be standardized and mass produced and the producer, or artist if you will, made rich. Terry painted fast and produced countless original paintings of a cabin by a creek. Now, his musem sells them as prints.

For anyone interested in diversity in art, I'd suggest the Redlin art store.

Redlin Art Center