Paintings of scenes from 2001--buy them now!
Darin Boville
Want a painting of a scene from 2001? A big painting--9x10 feet?
If so, head on over to the big-name Mary Boone Gallery in NYC and
check out the work of Damian Loeb. Or buy the December 2003 Art in
America and turn to page 107 if you are not in the NYC area. Damian is
into painting what appears to be verbatim scenes from famous movies
(The Shining among them, see http://www.damianloeb.com/).
No doubt he is deeply involved in a critique of modern media culture
and it never occured to him that making reproductions of famous movie
scenes would sell paintings. Another idea-less opportunist hiding
behind First Amendment protections? You be the judge.
--Darin
Darin Boville
Fine Art Photography and Video
www.darinboville.com
RufusTFirefly
da...@darinboville.com (Darin Boville) wrote:
My questions are; What is the medium and what are the tools? These look
very much like direct reproduction of film frames. I would like to know
how these images were created and reproduced, so as to distinguish them
as artistic renderings as opposed to reproductions of existing images.
There is nothing at the site to describe the means of production.
Boaz
. . . But is it art?
Boaz
da...@darinboville.com (Darin Boville) wrote in message news:<419db384.03120...@posting.google.com>...
JeffreyMeyer
(groan) who simply shows complete films -- Taxi Driver, Psycho, etc.
-- slowed down to last 24 hours? I'm afraid I can't remember the
fellow's name... but that, to me, is at least enough of a change from
the original "source" to justify my interest. This Loeb guy I'm still
not sure about...
RufusTFirefly
jeffre...@philipkdick.com (JeffreyMeyer) wrote:
This Loeb guys stuff is not art, it is graphics. It may take a certain
technical skill to do, but it is still only the reproduction of other
people's art. If he did not license the images from the copyright
holders, then it is plaigarism.
Darin Boville
That would be Douglas Gordon.
An MFA-type would point out in defense of the work that it really was
a big change in that:
1) It is a painting, not a film. Not even a photograph.
2) It is placed in a very different context (the musem/gallery vs.
the theater/living room).
Both of which affect its "meaning" and the viewers' responses to it.
For the record, I once made a work that mocked Gordon's "24 hour
Psycho." Mine was called "24 Hour Tomato."
Cinemalad5
not.
Yes, it is a reproduction of another image. Yes, the paintings are done with
an extraordinary technical skill of an accomplished painter.
But is it art?
I, for one, would say yes. Seeing the single painted image as opposed to the
film source itself does differentiate one from the other. Even if it's just "a
copy", remember that it was a work that was crafted from inspiration.
I'm a freelance artist, and I get a lot of criticism as well as praise for some
of the pieces featured on my site, largely because many of them were inspired
or taken from still photographs. (If you're interested, www.adammcdaniel.com.
Yeah, a shameless plug, there.) I don't blame the critics for saying that -- I
actually consider myself more of an "illustrator" than a true "artist". But
illustration is WHAT I prefer to do because it inspires me. Sure, I guess I
could paint a few nudes or do some still lifes to justify my artistic
endeavors, but if Warhol could find inspiration in Campbell's soup, why can't I
find inspiration from a great movie???
P.S.: I'd LOVE to have any one of those "2001" inspired paintings in my house,
anyday...
Darin Boville
Oh, I think it certainly is art. Hard to tell from the web images but
it even displays a high level of technical skill. That's a combination
you don't always see now in the art world.
My complaint with it really boils down to the view that it is yet
another set of works of this kind--an art world strategy that
essentially takes existing (i.e. already "branded," widely
recognizable images), cloaks them in artspeak, and off they go. Sort
of the thing that breeds cynicism in artists for some reason.
On the other hand, maybe I'm being too harsh on the work. It certainly
has its attractions. Maybe after it settles in I can decide whether my
attraction is just spillover from my admiration of SKs work or whether
the paintings are offering something significant in their own right. I
did notice that the piantings from films that I hadn't seen didn't
strike m with near the force of those from films I had seen...
--Darin
JeffreyMeyer
House gallery, one Cole Case and his "Dawn Of Man" series: