PressPausePlay from House of Radon on Vimeo.
A powerful movie asking important questions about the digitization and democratization of art.
Engaging Culture with Culture Through Acts of Creative Excellence
The Hidden Legacy of Helen Frankenthaler
“The artist’s central dogma was beauty, and beauty is protean.”
The painter Helen Frankenthaler died December 27, 2011, in Darien, Connecticut. Obituaries by The New York Times and The Washington Post construe Frankenthaler’s importance as the inventor of a “revolutionary” soak-stain technique in which poured paint unites with the canvas; a method which made possible the Color Field movement. Continue reading “The Hidden Legacy of Helen Frankenthaler” »
What Is Art? An Overview of the Discussion on “Exit Through the Gift Shop”
So, what is art? It’s one of those questions that, try as we might, there is not a definitive answer. There are many roads we can go down to search for the truth, and it may lead us to a variety of conclusions (even revelations), but can there be a point where we spearhead exactly what defines art? In order to even try to get to the top of this hill, one must find different avenues of art to explore, and I was fortunate enough to be involved in a discussion of the documentary feature Exit Through the Gift Shop, directed by a “street artist” named Banksy. Here is a movie that rips the lid off the question that started all this, and tackles it by exposing us to a type of art not typically discussed.
One of the biggest questions surrounding Exit Through the Gift Shop is whether the movie is fact or fiction. Did Banksy stage the whole affair to make a statement about the commercialization of street art, or is the monster born out of Thierry Guetta real? It makes sense to let the movie have its cake and eat it too, because whether it is real or not, both sides of the argument make for compelling discussion. The fact that Thierry never truly understood the meaning behind what street artists (or any artists for that matter) are doing speaks volumes for either side of the coin.
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What is Art & Why Do You Want to Know?
“I would suggest that we take all of these perspectives on art and consider how they apply to our own Christian life…No work of art is more important than the Christian’s own life, and every Christian is cared upon to be an artist in this sense. He may have no gift of writing, no gift of composing or singing, but each man has the gift of creativity in terms of the way he lives his life. In this sense, the Christian’s life is to be an art work. The Christian’s life is to be a thing of truth and also a thing of beauty in the midst of a lost and despairing world.”
—Art and the Bible, Francis A. Scaeffer
Dropbox Poetry
The poets of the Continuum have just started what amounts to a perpetual poetry workshop, which utilizes the online storage server Dropbox to facilitate sharing and critique. The “workshop” is hosted by published poets Cindy Beebe, Jim Allman and Gardner Mounce and is open to anyone who wishes nurturing criticism of their work, but most especially local, Memphis poets.
5 Must Read Books on Art and Aesthetics
Several blogs I follow are issuing the perfunctory end of/first of the year lists: best movies, books, poems, albums, &tc. consumed or distributed over the course of 2010. I’ve for some time wanted to build a library on aesthetics (at least recommendations for one) for our readership; here’s a start. Though for the sake of disclosure, they were not all read over the past year…
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Why Beauty Matters
The following video is the first part of 6 in a BBC special hosted by philosopher Roger Scruton on Beauty, the contemporary world’s apparent rejection of it, and the imminent need for its return. Personally, I am not completely convinced of all his points, but the general arc is salient and thought provoking. I certainly believe capital “B” Beauty is necessary, but Scruton’s Kantian and Neo-Platonism are limiting; these under gird a beauty that exists only in its idealism. To my understanding, the idealistic in beauty (though surely not to be excluded only eschewed as the only end) resulted in the 20th Century’s rejection of that capital “B” Beauty which he vehemently shuns. We often forget that capital “B” Beauty can be found in “ashes and dust, blood and bodies” as well as broken bread and a creation that includes its brokenness. After all, as believers, are we not to find the ultimate Beauty as Christ’s most ghastly sacrifice: macabre, despairing, and gruesome (not in spite of it but because of it)? Still, the essay will stir us to think and there exists plenty in it that speaks to truth and is worth fighting for.
Poetry as Play: Kay Ryan’s Elephant Rocks
In talking about poetry with people, inevitably I hear, “I don’t get it.” For sure, poetry can be resistant to immediate interpretation, but isn’t this true of all art? T. S. Eliot once wrote, “If I understand a play the very first time, then I know that it isn’t a very good play.” Is this because art is elitist? No, but understanding cannot be bought with a credit card; it must be purchased with hard work. And haven’t we all performed activities with our bodies that demonstrated the presence (and ache) of heretofore unknown muscles? Such is the case with engaging art; it utilizes portions of one’s being that maybe were not known to exist: especially the often atrophied muscles of imagination. But I digress, for this article is about one specific artist, poet Kay Ryan—the current poet laureate—and her book Elephant Rocks, and the one simple reason why her poetry should entreat a first then closer look—it is fun.
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Critique – Homes of My Past
Homes of My Past is part of the Homesick exhibit at the Art Gallery inside LifeLink Church (1015 S Cooper St, Memphis, TN 38104); it is on display through November 4th 2009.
The first thing noticeable about Rachel Lockridge’s paintings is the extreme vertical orientation of the pieces. They are in the most elementary critique simple, architectural paintings, and as such a horizontal direction seems far more a propos—assuming that the buildings are the subjects. These are not skyscrapers piercing the clouds; they are residential buildings gathered close to the ground, towered over by the local flora, and dwarfed by the vertical: the endless blue sky, the billowy clouds and the infinite regress beyond.