Look! Pretties!

[usernamenumber]

Just have to pass on an image freckles42 posted recently. It's of a statue by Antonio Corradini. Note that this is all in marble:



Holy crapping crap...

It reminds me of a sculpture I once saw in a gallery in DC. It's called "Ghost Clock", by Wendell Castle:



The image doesn't really do it justice, but that is not a clock with a sheet on it. The whole thing is one wooden statue, though I had to get up close and squint at the place where the "sheet" meets the "clock" to tell.

I love it when art is still as much perspiration as it is inspiration. =:)

Comments

[shadowravyn.livejournal.com]

That's insanely gorgeous. Oh my. I can't believe it's marble.

[freckles42.livejournal.com]

Isn't that nuts?? I am SO in awe (and have been for six years, when I first spotted his work at the Louvre). Pop his name into a google image search and you'll see some of his other veiled work - it is truly stupendous!

[andmydog.livejournal.com]

Wow. Those are... wow.

[juldea.livejournal.com]

VERY neat.

[freckles42.livejournal.com]

That clock is unbelievable. I now want to see it up close! So brilliant!

Once more, with a feeling

[(Anonymous)]

I would claim there are much better things from that time. Less of a display of mere skill. That veiled statue carries with it a whiff of the 19th century.

From the same time:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/50/Sonnenschein_Nahl_Auferstehung_der_M_M_Langhans.jpg
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/50/Sonnenschein_Nahl_Auferstehung_der_M_M_Langhans.jpg)

Re: Once more, with a feeling

[usernamenumber.livejournal.com]

Hmm... I rankle a bit at the notion of skill being demeaned as a "mere" thing, but that said, the piece you link to is indeed very beautiful and evocative (even disturbingly so). And yet it speaks to me on such a visceral level, so different from the appreciation of craftsmanship and aesthetic beauty the others evoke, that I almost feel like the comparison you're making is apples-to-oranges. I don't think many would argue that the Corradini piece has more to it than the Sonnenschein in terms of content, but, just comparing the level of detail and craftsmanship in the figures, for example, I at least think it does in terms of execution. But really, at this level of work I begin to wonder whether terms like "better" even mean anything. Aren't we really just talking about individual tastes?

Re: Once more, with a feeling

[(Anonymous)]

I would say that it is very well possible to be skillfull without being an artist (while not well possible to be an artist without being skillfull), and what I find so repulsive about that Rococo thing is that, clearly, it does not aim at anything beyond the creation of something pretty-pretty (the king od thing a victorian lady could, half a century later very well show off in her manor house) technically excerting and visually astounding.

Let's borrow a quote from one of the early criticisms of the Nahl Statue (and the art very much in fashion in those days): "One talks with all-too-ready enthusiasm of those things and never once considers: What did that artist do, what did he want?"

When I consider Corradini, I cannot possibly come up with anything that he WANTED from that thing, except for the things already described.
Of course, in executing that peculiar thing, the gu swings with his time. The 18th/19th Century holds veiled women galore:

http://www.neo-mfg.com/images/NG31524_vl.jpg

http://www.museum-replicas.com/images/productimages/small/veiled%20lady-c.JPG
(the one we already know)

http://www.chaos.org.uk/~eddy/img/jest/VeiledLiberty.png

http://images.google.de/imgres?imgurl=http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/speel/picl/veiled.jpg&imgrefurl=http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/speel/london/piccadilly.htm&usg=__Kf_fEMAmIpctb-7y3_itEDuAHkU=&h=425&w=250&sz=17&hl=de&start=18&tbnid=VrQ45fMw27tH2M:&tbnh=126&tbnw=74&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dveiled%2Bstatue%2B19th%2Bcentury%26gbv%3D2%26hl%3Dde%26sa%3DG

http://www.heritage.nf.ca/society/veiled_virgin.html

But what does that mean to express: "Women are remote and mysterious?/ Women are beautiful/Women are best pure and virginal" (just what comes to mind) And then, what the taste of this age does commands the artist to do is, go there, scoop up some stylistic device from a former period, and in 99 out of 100 cases do a pretty incarnation with an extra-nice touch that makes everybody go 'awww'. And because it works so well, soon everybody has done his very own veiled maiden.

The thought to be pondered here:
"There is no exquisite beauty," says Bacon, Lord Verulam, speaking truly of all the forms and genera of beauty, without some strangeness in the proportion."
And there is no real art, that does not in any way transgress what has been there before, and is, in some way, STRANGE.
What Nahl does is take the traditional tombstone of the baroque age, with its vanitas motif, and literally break it in two, on the onset of an era that will discard all traditions (which is just one way of reading that statue as being related to its time, even without that relation, it has something of its own - I cannot really put it any better)

To illustrate the idea of strangeness in our first example, let me show a STRANGE veiled woman:
http://www.slowtrav.com/blog/bge/Paris_Louvre_Veiled_woman_amazing_.jpg
(from one of the above sculptors, SIC).

In this respect, one, I though, might maybe talk of 'better'.

All said. Now bed.
http://www.hellenica.de/Griechenland/Mythos/AmorUndPsycheCanova002.html


(and, just to add this, I was not at all talking about the clock, that's fun to think about.)

Re: Once more, with a feeling

[usernamenumber.livejournal.com]

See, I think I have a more... generous definition of art to begin with. To me, a thing is art if it is a manifestation of human creativity, period. So while there is plenty of room to talk about what is and is not worthwhile or of great quality within the set of things that could be deemed art, I don't think I can even accept the premise that you are beginning with, that "...it is very well possible to be skillfull (I assume you mean at creating things such as sculptures) without being an artist". (edit...though now that I think about it, it does raise an interesting question about the difference between an artist and a craftsman, which I hadn't given much thought to before...)

But setting that aside, as it may be no more than a semantic difference between us, I did enjoy this thought:

"And there is no real art, that does not in any way transgress what has been there before, and is, in some way, STRANGE."

Accepting that I still scoff a bit at attempts to define what is and is not "real" art, to me this statement still describes an important quality for art to have. Though I would make the case that this piece still qualifies in that the new thing it brings is its exceptional execution, and the quality and intensity of the "astonishing" reaction that it evokes. Put another way, to me, achievement of a new (or at least sufficiently un-populated) level of technical exertion and visual effect (perspiration) is just as valid a continuum upon which to plot a piece's quality as the novelty of its approach or message (inspiration). I find that I can enjoy anything something that exhibits an exceptional amount of one, even at the expense of the other, as much as I can one that strikes a balance between the two.

Perhaps we'll just have to disagree on that point, though I will concede that, novelty (and, to a lesser extent appreciation of technical skill) being subject to the viewer's prior experience, perhaps the piece would have been less striking to me if I was more familiar with other pieces in the genre. That said, even among the pieces you linked to, there were some (like the Strazza) that I still enjoyed much more than others (like veiled.jpg) because of what I saw as differences in the quality of execution.

In any case I appreciate you challenging me in a way that still comes across as civil and constructive, and welcome any other thoughts you'd care to share. Also, if you don't mind saying, who are you? =;)

Re: Once more, with a feeling

[(Anonymous)]

I think we can leave it at that; amicable disagreement it is.

And - who am I? Flip the coin!

(http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3441/3699150374_a81ea24c44_o.jpg)

Re: Once more, with a feeling

[(Anonymous)]

Formatting mishap - now flip the coin!
(http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3441/3699150374_a81ea24c44_o.jpg)

Re: Once more, with a feeling

[usernamenumber.livejournal.com]

Not particularly helpful, but given lmpshd's comment, I am guessing that you are perhaps the Elisabet that I have heard about (and apologies in advance for probably mis-spelling your name, even if I have the right person)? In any case, nice meeting you. =;)

And I should say that I actually found myself half-dreaming this morning, musing on this very conversation, and found myself considering craftsmanship as a thing distinct from artistry, which is not a distinction I had been making much (at least not consciously) previously. This has implications of asserting a specific "purpose" to art (being novel as opposed to "just" being beautiful) that I'm not fully comfortable with, so I'm still trying the notion on for size, as it were, but thanks again for the different perspective.

Re: Once more, with a feeling

[(Anonymous)]

Elisabeth, by the way. Pleasure is all mine. I'm afraid I forgot about introducing myself when telling l. off for messing with my incognito.

Re: Once more, with a feeling

[lmpshd.livejournal.com]

Also, if you don't mind saying, who are you?

I can't really imagine her giving you a straight answer to that question, so I figured I'd give you my own cryptic non-answer instead, in the form of this comment (which should enable you to deduce who she is).

Re: Once more, with a feeling

[(Anonymous)]

Spielverderber.

Why interfere with my ways? It was very well possible to solve that riddle...

Re: Once more, with a feeling

[lmpshd.livejournal.com]

Perhaps you can explain it to me when you have the chance. I'm stupid, you know... riddles are hard, I can only wrap my mind around things like Slavic languages and Floer homology.

Why?

[(Anonymous)]

Why, it worked in the preview...