[Sigia-l] Why "design" makes some of us cringe.

[Andrew Hinton]

I can't figure out if Derek's statements are purposefully absurd and meant
to bait us into argument, or if he actually believes them.

But, like the fool I am, I'll bite.

If you've ever seen a Warhol soup can in person, you'll see it's quite an
achievement. Marvelously printed with great skill, and far from a
photographic copy -- the soup can series is quite expressive, quite artful.

I can't imagine anyone seeing the series even in a museum and not thinking
of them as soup cans, however. Nobody sees them says "what amazing
noncorporeal forms!" -- everybody sees them as soup cans. You can't get away
from that. (They do, after all, say SOUP in big frickin letters.) No matter
how much craft and scale are involved. That's part of their merit: we can't
escape their referent. They're simultaneously corporeal, utilitarian,
artistic, designed, surprising and mundane. Whether you like that kind of
art or not doesn't much matter -- it's extremely successful on its own
terms.

But they're not merely ironic, cold iconography. In fact, they're a highly
personal expression of the artist (Warhol's mother kept tons of Campbell's
in the cupboards, and often fed it to her sickly son; his biographers have
seen them in some ways as an expression of his grief.) Of course, knowing
that isn't required to appreciate them on their outward merits, but the
story is part of their context as well.

Just because they're paintings of something not typically represented in
classical art, that doesn't mean the frame is the only thing making it art.
There was a time when ballet dancers tying their shoes was thought of as a
weird thing to paint too ("why aren't they painted while dancing??")

Duchamp's fountain (urinal) is entirely different -- it was part of a series
of 'readymades' that expressed pre-surrealist/dadaist sentiments,
undermining assumptions of the status quo that created the First World War.
It wasn't a recreation of a urinal in a different medium; so it's not at all
the same as the soup can series (except in its reference to a traditionally
non-artistic subject).

IMHO It was quite brilliant in its context, but doesn't hold up so well as
art...it's more interesting as propaganda of the era. But that's completely
subjective.

The distinction between art and design is as messy as language itself. In
certain contexts it's possible, but what applies in one context will most
likely fail in another. Trying to prop up these absolute definitions is
fruitless (it hasn't worked over the last millenium, so I doubt we'll make
it work here). 

Utilitarian pleasure? What is that? If I have something that is made with
the intention of giving pleasure, and it gives me pleasure, has it not
served some utility?

Or even if the artist didn't intend for the object to provide pleasure, and
yet it does...is it still not being used for pleasure, in spite of the
creator's intentions?

And I have no idea what you're getting at with the last sentence.

Look, much of what we're discussing here can be accessed in a good art
history text, or a decent course on aesthetics. So those of you on the list
who really are bored by it, please forgive. I'm learning restraint. I
promise I'm getting better.
-- 
andrew hinton  <http://www.memekitchen.com/>
andrew [at] memekitchen.com


::derek at derekrogerson.com::wrote on 7/22/02 06:35pm:

> 
>> Can we agree to the following statement?
>> "'art' is NOT equal to 'design'
> 
> 
> Design involves utilitarian pleasure, art does not.
> 
> Art involves the (non-utilitarian) pleasure of heightened experience,
> contemplation, or appreciation, etc.
> 
> In this sense, art is in no way useful.  :-)
> 
> Andy Warhol's "Soup Can"' demonstrates this wonderfully: In its normal
> state, without the artistic frame, the soup-can object is utilitarian
> (let's do lunch!). Once framed, however, the object is disembodied, and
> is no longer utilized, or thought of, corporeally.
> 
> Duchamp's "Fountain" also clearly demonstrates this simple distinction.
> Ripped from the wall of the Men's Room and displayed in a museum,
> Duchamp's urinal ceases to be a good spot to urinate.
> 
> For these reasons, and more, beauty and art are not movements (process).
>