Couple mistakenly vandalizes $440,000 painting at exhibition
An art piece by an American graffiti artist showcased in South Korea was damaged by a couple in their 20s who thought the sets of paint and brushes laid in front of the artwork was for spectators’ use.
Staff at the gallery exhibition noticed new brush strokes on the wall — small swipes of dark green to the right of center — last Sunday. After checking the security camera, two suspects were taken by the police for investigation.
“We called the police immediately and talked to the insurance company for the damaged artwork,” Kang Wook, the CEO of Contents Creator of Culture, co-organizer of the exhibition, told ABC News. “But as the agency in charge, we will do best to minimize the harm to the couple who unintentionally vandalized the work.”
JonOne completed the artwork in question during a graffiti museum show, “The Great Graffiti,” in Seoul Arts Center at the time. When the piece was complete, it was displayed along with the props used by the artist, in the same way the display is on now.
“The paint and brushes used by the artist comprise a complete set with the graffiti canvas work,” said Kang. He explained that the props were part of the exhibition to help highlight the history of the artist’s work.
“Due to the characteristics of contemporary art, there will be many happenings like these going forward. Exhibit organizers must take extra care in physically protecting the artwork, as the audience may mistake the art like that of JonOne’s to something they can scribble on,” Ha Jae-geun, a Korean pop culture expert, told ABC News.
If your art looks like and is presented like something that random people made by smearing paint on it, then it isn’t art.
If you don’t agree with me, fuck you. I am an absolutist.
Nobody would walk up to a Michelangelo, Rembrandt, Bosch, or Botticelli (you can tell I like High Renaissance and Baroque paintings) and think “I should add my own personal touch to this.”
Fuck this guy and his art.
$440,000 that’s not art, it’s future tax evasion.
That was my immediate thought, too. I think I may have even read this here, but apparently the modern art scam goes something like this:
1. Hedge fund manager owes taxes on $50 mil in gains for the year, meaning (let’s say) $10 mil
2. Hedge fund manager pays an artist $50,000 to create something like what’s in the article
3. Hedge fund manager pays an appraiser $100,000 appraise it
4. Appraiser, who does this every year for this hedge fund manager, appraises the art at $53 mil
5. Hedge fund manager donates the art to The Met, deducts $53 mil from his taxes, and pays nothing.
In other words, Hedge Fund Manager was able to avoid $10 mil in taxes by paying $150,000 in “legitimate” business costs.
The numbers are exaggerated but that’s basically how it works.
You can look at the Venus of Willendorf and tell it’s art. You can look at the stretched caricatures of Egypt’s Amarna period and tell it’s art. You can look at a kindergartener’s crayon work and tell it’s art.
But for some reason people with inflated credentials think random splotches should qualify not only as art, but great art.
Two thoughts.
First, these prices are what happens when too much money chases too few investments in a given category. (At least the banana on the wall was a somewhat original thought; this type of art was fresh when Jackson Pollock did it almost 100 years ago.)
Second … If the brushes are part of the exhibit and not to be used, note that on a little plaque by them, and put a clear plexi box over them or something. It’s not that hard of a concept, especially now that “interactive” art is becoming more common.
Do you remember a few years back where an art student put a pineapple I think on a pedestal at an art gallery as an experiment. He came back later in the week to find a case had been put around the thing and people were discussing what the artist’ intention was and how blah blah blah art term art term money laundering it was.
Another story from some years ago (20-30 perhaps): some museum in Holland had a “painting” by some US artist, I forgot his name. The painting had a title along the lines of “who’s afraid of red #2”. Basically it was a canvas painted red, not quite uniform color.
It was sent out for cleaning and restoration. A while after it came back there was an uproar because someone claimed the canvas had not been cleaned and restored (meaning small bits of damage touched up) but rather repainted — and the repainting had been done with a paint roller, the way you’d put paint on your ceiling. The restorer vehemently denied it, and I don’t know if it was ever conclusively proved whether the “painting” was still original, or just the product of a Home Depot paint roller and paint.
So… if you can’t tell if the thing was created by an artist or by the drunken apprentice of your local house painter, I don’t think I would call it “art”.
I would have thought one could tell roller- from brush-applied paint fairly easily, although I suppose that would depend on both the paint and the substrate it’s on.
In this case it reminds me more of a Mythbusters episode in which they painted a room using explosives. But, yes, your point is a good one.
https://go.discovery.com/tv-shows/mythbusters/full-episodes/painting-with-explosives
They should thank their lucky stars that the people were Korean, and thus polite.
Had I gotten the same idea, I’d have painted a gentleman’s sausage on it.
It’s graffiti art, ain’t it?
Are you sure you’re not a killer surfing snail?
https://youtu.be/XVWQCd5j_ec?t=570
Whole thing is funny, but the end is related to your comment … and more art than the above.
Whenever I find myself in a more modern art gallery/museum situation, I make a point of finding something that is innocuous, say a fire extinguisher, or an informational sign, and I stand and study it for a bit. Declare it is brilliant. Talk about what meaning I get from that light switch, or thermostat. How much insight on the human condition can you (pretend) to get from a potted plant?
Because most of the stuff hanging on the walls is just as vapid, frankly. And, the idiots that think they are getting something from it are morons that should be ridiculed.
I looked at the painting – and remembered that the article indicated the damage was “small swipes of dark green to the right of center.”
My only thought – How can you tell? How do you tell this random smudge from all the rest random smudges?
That said, the test for “art” is not technical ability, but emotive impact or insight. Art makes one feel something; it’s not about how good one’s technical ability might be. There is lots of music, for example, that is technically brilliant, but has little soul or emotional content; at the same time, there is great music that is technically simple, but emotionally powerful.
I don’t get the emotional impact or insight, I guess, of random paint smudges.
I know an artist who can paint marvelous lifelike portraits. Doesn’t make much money though. ( sigh…)
Tom Wolfe’s “The Painted Word” is invaluable for understanding this sort of nonsense.