Art in America

This post is brought to you to the strains of the Asian Dub Foundation, a very cool band.

Today's post concerns the wonderful world of Art, as you might imagine. Now I'm not an Art Critic, but I play one on TV ("TV Show Made up to serve the purposes of this quasi-joke," Wednesdays, 9:30 PM, UPN). So Larry Kudlows latest article, a pean to the work of his wife (Judith) struck me as just a little self indulgent (not that I'm going to make a stink about that) and a little wrong headed.

Judith and her associates, especially Andrea Smith from the Florence Academy, are leading lights in the return to classical painting. Sometimes it?s called natural realism. I just call it conservative art. Let me tell you what it?s not ? it?s not modernistic, abstract, self-centered expressionism. It?s not just throwing paint at a canvas. It doesn?t tear down art, or the rest of the world, for that matter. It?s not the negative pessimistic crap that too often passes for art in blue states like New York and, well, you know where else. These are just beautiful, calm, pleasant pictures. Stuff you can enjoy looking at, which is what I think art should be.

Conservative art, eh? Smart of you to put your mark on it. That way everytime you see a naturalistic painting that pleases you you should think, "Thank you, conservatism."

But wait a second, what if you see something in a modernist style that pleases you? Like this for example.



I can assure you this is modern art as I lifted it directly from the Museum of Modern Art Website. So if you find this pleasing, should you think "Thank you Liberalism?" Probably not.

It's worth noting that both Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia had very similar ideas about what art should be and what it should not be. We are all familiar with Hitler's crusade against Modern Art. In Russia, the emphasis was on creating art that the peasants would enjoy. Of course, I'm not insinuating that Mr. Elder is a totalitarian dictator or a totalitarian of any stripe.

Personally I like Modern Art. Other people don't like Modern Art. That's fine. But the Artistic Spirit is a wandering spirit. You can basically expect that it will go places that a lot of people don't understand initially. Trying to fence it in will just produce dull and stagnant art.

But then again I'm not a fan of landscapes.