Objectivist Esthetics, R.I.P.

[Jonathan]

As the ranking physician in the room, I'm calling it. The patient has expired. It's 2:04 pm central time, September 10, 2016, and we'll go with that as the official time of death.

 

Some brief comments :

 

The other day I visited Michelle Kamhi's bossypants blog, I read her most recent entry (http://www.mmkamhi.com/2016/09/01/how-not-to-be-an-arts-advocate/), and posted a reminder to her in the comments section that she hasn't addressed any of my criticisms or answered any of my challenges (the links and content that I provided her are copied below). She censored the comment -- she didn't allow it to be published publicly on her blog.

 

Kamhi is fighter. Like Torres, she seems to find her greatest joy in confronting and arguing with others on the topic of art, or, more precisely, on the topic of what is not art. In your face. Bossypants. But, now, when faced with some very obvious, rational, objective and essential challenges that I've placed before her, she is silent, evasive, has no desire to argue her case or even allow the questions to be seen on her blog?

 

She has nothing. And she was the Objectivist Esthetics' last hope. Lesser O'vishes, like His Royal Published Highness, the Majestic Roger Bissell, and even lesser ones, like Tony (see link below), have failed before. But now the most informed, intelligent and aggressive defender of the Objectivist Esthetics has been tripped up by the simplest and most fundamental of challenges.

 

That is surrender. Defeat. It was the last gasp of the Objectvist Esthetics.

 

R.I.P.

 

J

 

 

http://www.objectivistliving.com/forums/index.php?/topic/14839-michelle-marder-kamhis-who-says-thats-art/&do=findComment&comment=255869

 

1. If your argument does not boil down to your basing your claims of others’ “depth of meaningful response” on nothing but your own personal lack of response, then please identify the objective method that you’ve used to scientifically measure others’ depth-of-meaning responses to the art forms in which you personally experience little or no depth-of-meaning.

2. Please post the data and results of such objective testing methods and experiments so that we may analyze and review the research, weight its merits, and criticize any potential errors.

3. Please reveal experiments in which you’ve tested people’s ability to identify "artists’ meanings” in works of art which you have accepted as validly qualifying as art by your own criteria. Please objectively demonstrate that any work of alleged art has been objectively shown to comply with your criteria. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I’ve tested many Objectivists with representational paintings, and none, so far, has succeeded in identifying “artist’s meanings.” Have your tests yielded better results?

4. You suggest that, since some viewers “misread" Rothko’s intentions with his art, then it therefore surely indicates that there was something wanting in his approach. In the deleted post of mine, I identified ways in which people have interpreted Rand’s The Fountainhead much differently than she intended, and they did so based on the objectively identifiably content in the novel (Roark’s violating his own morality by working on a project to which he is morally opposed, his conspiring to commit the fraud of passing off his work as someone else’s in order to subvert the rights of the owners to not hire him, his presenting the false and irrational argument in court that a contract that he did not have with the owners was violated by them when the reality was that he actively hid his involvement in the project from them, etc.).  Applying your own method that you just used on Rothko, shouldn’t we conclude that people’s “misreading” of Rand’s intentions also “surely indicate that there was something wanting in [her] approach [to literary/aesthetic theory]”? 
 

 

 

http://www.objectivistliving.com/forums/index.php?/topic/16100-concerning-essences-especially-in-art/&do=findComment&comment=25707

 

Where is such empirical testing of people's ability to identify artist's meanings in the images in the left hand column???

Why is it that none of you Objectivish aesthetic geniuses, and none elsewhere, has been able to identify any artists' meanings in any realistic, representational paintings?

One of the points of my posting the two columns of images, long ago, was to apply Objectivist criteria to various works and begin to test them in reality. I did so because O'vishes had demanded proof from others that abstract visual art could actually meet their criteria. In other words, they weren't content to take people at their word when describing the depth and meaning that they claimed to experience in abstract art. Well, I decided to call the O'vishes' bluff by applying their own standards to them: I'm not content to take you at your word -- I don't accept your empty assertions that the works which you declare are valid art have actually been shown to meet your criteria. I require proof, the same proof that you demand of fans of abstract art! So, as part of my investigation and testing, I have challenged, and continue to challenge, you and all other O'vishes to identify the artists' meanings in the representational images in the left column (as well as other tests involving other representational images beyond still lifes). So far, only a few people have even attempted to identify only a couple of the artists' meanings, and none have succeeded. Actually, they failed miserably.

Nothing, ever, has yet been demonstrated to qualify as art by Objectivism's criteria!

NOTHING!!! NIHIL!!! Aesthetically, that is what you stand for! You're destroyers and haters, and nothing excites and satisfies you more than screaming in everyone's face, "It's NOT ART!!!!"

[BaalChatzaf]

De gutabus non disputandum est...

[Brant Gaede]

7 hours ago, Jonathan said:

As the ranking physician in the room, I'm calling it. The patient has expired. It's 2:04 pm central time, September 10, 2016, and we'll go with that as the official time of death.

 

Some brief comments :

 

The other day I visited Michelle Kamhi's bossypants blog, I read her most recent entry (http://www.mmkamhi.com/2016/09/01/how-not-to-be-an-arts-advocate/), and posted a reminder to her in the comments section that she hasn't addressed any of my criticisms or answered any of my challenges (the links and content that I provided her are copied below). She censored the comment -- she didn't allow it to be published publicly on her blog.

 

Kamhi is fighter. Like Torres, she seems to find her greatest joy in confronting and arguing with others on the topic of art, or, more precisely, on the topic of what is not art. In your face. Bossypants. But, now, when faced with some very obvious, rational, objective and essential challenges that I've placed before her, she is silent, evasive, has no desire to argue her case or even allow the questions to be seen on her blog?

 

She has nothing. And she was the Objectivist Esthetics' last hope. Lesser O'vishes, like His Royal Published Highness, the Majestic Roger Bissell, and even lesser ones, like Tony (see link below), have failed before. But now the most informed, intelligent and aggressive defender of the Objectivist Esthetics has been tripped up by the simplest and most fundamental of challenges.

 

That is surrender. Defeat. It was the last gasp of the Objectvist Esthetics.

 

R.I.P.

 

J

 

 

http://www.objectivistliving.com/forums/index.php?/topic/14839-michelle-marder-kamhis-who-says-thats-art/&do=findComment&comment=255869

 

1. If your argument does not boil down to your basing your claims of others’ “depth of meaningful response” on nothing but your own personal lack of response, then please identify the objective method that you’ve used to scientifically measure others’ depth-of-meaning responses to the art forms in which you personally experience little or no depth-of-meaning.

2. Please post the data and results of such objective testing methods and experiments so that we may analyze and review the research, weight its merits, and criticize any potential errors.

3. Please reveal experiments in which you’ve tested people’s ability to identify "artists’ meanings” in works of art which you have accepted as validly qualifying as art by your own criteria. Please objectively demonstrate that any work of alleged art has been objectively shown to comply with your criteria. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I’ve tested many Objectivists with representational paintings, and none, so far, has succeeded in identifying “artist’s meanings.” Have your tests yielded better results?

4. You suggest that, since some viewers “misread" Rothko’s intentions with his art, then it therefore surely indicates that there was something wanting in his approach. In the deleted post of mine, I identified ways in which people have interpreted Rand’s The Fountainhead much differently than she intended, and they did so based on the objectively identifiably content in the novel (Roark’s violating his own morality by working on a project to which he is morally opposed, his conspiring to commit the fraud of passing off his work as someone else’s in order to subvert the rights of the owners to not hire him, his presenting the false and irrational argument in court that a contract that he did not have with the owners was violated by them when the reality was that he actively hid his involvement in the project from them, etc.).  Applying your own method that you just used on Rothko, shouldn’t we conclude that people’s “misreading” of Rand’s intentions also “surely indicate that there was something wanting in [her] approach [to literary/aesthetic theory]”? 
 

 

 

http://www.objectivistliving.com/forums/index.php?/topic/16100-concerning-essences-especially-in-art/&do=findComment&comment=25707

 

Where is such empirical testing of people's ability to identify artist's meanings in the images in the left hand column???

Why is it that none of you Objectivish aesthetic geniuses, and none elsewhere, has been able to identify any artists' meanings in any realistic, representational paintings?

One of the points of my posting the two columns of images, long ago, was to apply Objectivist criteria to various works and begin to test them in reality. I did so because O'vishes had demanded proof from others that abstract visual art could actually meet their criteria. In other words, they weren't content to take people at their word when describing the depth and meaning that they claimed to experience in abstract art. Well, I decided to call the O'vishes' bluff by applying their own standards to them: I'm not content to take you at your word -- I don't accept your empty assertions that the works which you declare are valid art have actually been shown to meet your criteria. I require proof, the same proof that you demand of fans of abstract art! So, as part of my investigation and testing, I have challenged, and continue to challenge, you and all other O'vishes to identify the artists' meanings in the representational images in the left column (as well as other tests involving other representational images beyond still lifes). So far, only a few people have even attempted to identify only a couple of the artists' meanings, and none have succeeded. Actually, they failed miserably.

Nothing, ever, has yet been demonstrated to qualify as art by Objectivism's criteria!

NOTHING!!! NIHIL!!! Aesthetically, that is what you stand for! You're destroyers and haters, and nothing excites and satisfies you more than screaming in everyone's face, "It's NOT ART!!!!"

Objectivist Esthetics are axiomatic--self evident. You can't argue against them without affirming them.

--Brant

don't ja get it?

[anthony]

14 hours ago, Brant Gaede said:

Objectivist Esthetics are axiomatic--self evident. You can't argue against them without affirming them.

--Brant

don't ja get it?

'Affirming' is exactly the right word. The prime question I think one needs to ask is not "what is art?", it's superseded by "what is consciousness?" Then: how crucial is consciousness to man? (Rhetorical) We know that the consciousness of an artist produces *something real* for the consciousness of a viewer. (Self-evidently and axiomatically as you say, without the existence of minds and the existence of existence, there can't be art). The priority matters, art then is secondary and by-product of a single consciousness, for an other. Next, does art - or an art work - "affirm" consciousness, or detract from it? Does it immediately bring to one's vision an intelligible concrete relating to one's abstractions and beneficially 'grounding' them? Or does it instead cause a visual/mental fog? I've agreed all along that there's no doubt that a wide experience and study of art counts, to glean more and take more value from art nuances and technique ("Esthetics"). Up to a point, though, after which some artists' obfuscation only conceals and frustrates. (Why did he/she bother to create a picture devoid of any referents to reality? Why should I bother to try to comprehend it?) Those borderline and blurred, or other Impressionist images CAN often be identified, but this is a distraction and besides the point here. Impressionism whatever its debatable merits or lack of, is a recognizable art form - which doesn't justify abstract art. Moving into total Abstractionism, the only thing I think is clear is that the artist does not believe in ~the importance~ of his image, enough to want to be the least clear. Fine, that's his right. I'd suggest to take him at his 'word' and his picture at face value.

The 'organ' of identification, evaluation and emotion and the repository of conceptual knowledge, a consciousness, has to first know, always and clearly: :"what IS it?" - before assessing any image's life-value (much, neutral, none) and answering with some or other emotion. As it has to do with all existence. Either that, or else submit to confusion, arbitrariness, the 'authority' of those experts purportedly 'in the know' and the lack of its own independent efficacy, admitting its own defeat and bringing appropriate, negative emotions. 

(J.'s back...)

[Max]

19 hours ago, BaalChatzaf said:

De gutabus non disputandum est...

That should be: "de gustibus non disputandum est".
 

[Brant Gaede]

4 hours ago, anthony said:

'Affirming' is exactly the right word. The prime question I think one needs to ask is not "what is art?", it's superseded by "what is consciousness?" Then: how crucial is consciousness to man? (Rhetorical) We know that the consciousness of an artist produces *something real* for the consciousness of a viewer. (Self-evidently and axiomatically as you say, without the existence of minds and the existence of existence, there can't be art). The priority matters, art then is secondary and by-product of a single consciousness, for an other. Next, does art - or an art work - "affirm" consciousness, or detract from it? Does it immediately bring to one's vision an intelligible concrete relating to one's abstractions and beneficially 'grounding' them? Or does it instead cause a visual/mental fog? I've agreed all along that there's no doubt that a wide experience and study of art counts, to glean more and take more value from art nuances and technique ("Esthetics"). Up to a point, though, after which some artists' obfuscation only conceals and frustrates. (Why did he/she bother to create a picture devoid of any referents to reality? Why should I bother to try to comprehend it?) Those borderline and blurred, or other Impressionist images CAN often be identified, but this is a distraction and besides the point here. Impressionism whatever its debatable merits or lack of, is a recognizable art form - which doesn't justify abstract art. Moving into total Abstractionism, the only thing I think is clear is that the artist does not believe in ~the importance~ of his image, enough to want to be the least clear. Fine, that's his right. I'd suggest to take him at his 'word' and his picture at face value.

The 'organ' of identification, evaluation and emotion and the repository of conceptual knowledge, a consciousness, has to first know, always and clearly: :"what IS it?" - before assessing any image's life-value (much, neutral, none) and answering with some or other emotion. As it has to do with all existence. Either that, or else submit to confusion, arbitrariness, the 'authority' of those experts purportedly 'in the know' and the lack of its own independent efficacy, admitting its own defeat and bringing appropriate, negative emotions. 

(J.'s back...)

I was being sarcastic.

--Brant

nothing stops you

[BaalChatzaf]

4 hours ago, Max said:

That should be: "de gustibus non disputandum est".
 

quid?  vexari me?  

[Jonathan]

On September 11, 2016 at 11:40 AM, anthony said:

'Affirming' is exactly the right word. The prime question I think one needs to ask is not "what is art?", it's superseded by "what is consciousness?" Then: how crucial is consciousness to man? (Rhetorical) We know that the consciousness of an artist produces *something real* for the consciousness of a viewer. (Self-evidently and axiomatically as you say, without the existence of minds and the existence of existence, there can't be art). The priority matters, art then is secondary and by-product of a single consciousness, for an other. Next, does art - or an art work - "affirm" consciousness, or detract from it? Does it immediately bring to one's vision an intelligible concrete relating to one's abstractions and beneficially 'grounding' them? Or does it instead cause a visual/mental fog? I've agreed all along that there's no doubt that a wide experience and study of art counts, to glean more and take more value from art nuances and technique ("Esthetics"). Up to a point, though, after which some artists' obfuscation only conceals and frustrates. (Why did he/she bother to create a picture devoid of any referents to reality? Why should I bother to try to comprehend it?) Those borderline and blurred, or other Impressionist images CAN often be identified, but this is a distraction and besides the point here. Impressionism whatever its debatable merits or lack of, is a recognizable art form - which doesn't justify abstract art. Moving into total Abstractionism, the only thing I think is clear is that the artist does not believe in ~the importance~ of his image, enough to want to be the least clear. Fine, that's his right. I'd suggest to take him at his 'word' and his picture at face value.

The 'organ' of identification, evaluation and emotion and the repository of conceptual knowledge, a consciousness, has to first know, always and clearly: :"what IS it?" - before assessing any image's life-value (much, neutral, none) and answering with some or other emotion. As it has to do with all existence. Either that, or else submit to confusion, arbitrariness, the 'authority' of those experts purportedly 'in the know' and the lack of its own independent efficacy, admitting its own defeat and bringing appropriate, negative emotions. 

(J.'s back...)

Blah, blah, blah. Nothing but more long-winded, empty chatter and bullshit bluffing. My questions and challenges remain unanswered.

Nothing has ever been shown to qualify as art by the Objectivist Esthetics, nor even by the variations on the Objectivist Esthetics that Rand's followers, such as Kamhi and Torres, have proposed. It's a dead theory. Its most ardent supporters are incapable of applying it in reality when challenged to do so. They have no proof to back up their assertions both about what is and what is not art. Not one of them has ever objectively demonstrated that a single work which they allege to be valid art actually qualifies by their own standards. When challenged to do so, they dodge and evade, they whine that they are victims of horrible abuse, they censor and ban their challengers, they flounce or outright flee from the discussion, the spin, bluff, equivocate, cry, scream and squeal. The one thing that they don't do is take up the challenge, answer it, and provide the required proof.

J

[anthony]

5 hours ago, Jonathan said:

Blah, blah, blah. Nothing but more long-winded, empty chatter and bullshit bluffing. My questions and challenges remain unanswered.

Nothing has ever been shown to qualify as art by the Objectivist Esthetics, nor even by the variations on...

J

Identifiable, re-created reality, "qualifies as art", else it's just spinning wheels.

"Regolable e instiviable colustics, pour grests dans fondle swindolsticks, flerring o'er diurnality".

And anyone who doesn't *feel* what this line of poetry communicates, is an uneducated peasant and probably a pre-post post-modernist, word Fascist, anti-progressivist who still insists on "meaning" and "intelligibility". So -old school. Pff. If you have to ask 'the meaning', you woudn't get it anyway and I'm not wasting my time telling you. All that matters, I know what I mean and my deep emotional state when penning it, and only those few (you know who you are) who are sensitively attuned to my poetic art will understand me. All you deprived lessers - it's you who have the burden of proof to empirically prove that my words don't make sense..

[Brant Gaede]

Huh?

[Brant Gaede]

7 hours ago, Jonathan said:

Blah, blah, blah. Nothing but more long-winded, empty chatter and bullshit bluffing. My questions and challenges remain unanswered.

Nothing has ever been shown to qualify as art by the Objectivist Esthetics, nor even by the variations on the Objectivist Esthetics that Rand's followers, such as Kamhi and Torres, have proposed. It's a dead theory. Its most ardent supporters are incapable of applying it in reality when challenged to do so. They have no proof to back up their assertions both about what is and what is not art. Not one of them has ever objectively demonstrated that a single work which they allege to be valid art actually qualifies by their own standards. When challenged to do so, they dodge and evade, they whine that they are victims of horrible abuse, they censor and ban their challengers, they flounce or outright flee from the discussion, the spin, bluff, equivocate, cry, scream and squeal. The one thing that they don't do is take up the challenge, answer it, and provide the required proof.

J

If the artist--proclaimed or self proclaimed--says it's art, okay. Nothing to do with any "esthetics." Just my view.

I believe Rand did say a work of art bypassed cognition. (Not sure if she applied that to literature.) She also said that for an additional art form to appear would require a human being to have another sense organ. That makes me wonder if the taste of food--or just plain taste--would be/could be the basis of an art form?

She also said she thought homosexuality was "disgusting" ("If you ask me what I think"). She didn't objectify that either so I guess it was a matter of taste could be call it "art"--her art?

I'm beginning to think Ayn Rand was even more a force of nature than anything else--that is, they ought to name a hurricane "Ayn."

--Brant

I predict they will

[Roger Bissell]

Earlier today, I saw some comments on Michelle Marder Kamhi's blog that were posted by a rather ill-tempered feller named Jonathan Smith. Any relation to our semi-anonymous chum? (I mean "chum" in the sense pertaining to fishing bait.)

REB

[Brant Gaede]

ART: Something man-made of no apparent utility evincing positive or negative reactions from the experiencers--and arguments with Jonathan.

--Brant

Down with Esthetics Fascism!

Up with Creativity!

Let the Consumer Sort Them Out!

[Brant Gaede]

Is it art?

Did someone buy it?

Did he/she say it's art?

If so--it's art!

--Branto

[Brant Gaede]

Is it art? Did the sayerso say it's art? Did the sayerso say it's congruent with "Objectivist Esthetics"? If the sayerso said those then it's so and so--I mean, so.

Never mind WTF is "Objectivist Esthetics." That's anything so IDed as such by the sayersoer.

--Brant

retreating from lucidity posthaste, going to the fun

[Brant Gaede]

The Objectivist Esthetics is validated by reference to the Objectivist Esthetics. It's circular but the congruence is perfect. Consider the bread of a sandwich (named after an Earl of Sandwich); those are the esthetics. Between the slices you find the art. Whoever put the meat (cheese, mayo, tomato, lectuce?) in there has to be an Objectivist (Esthetician) for he/she knows what Objectlvely goes and only an Objectivist can (subjectively) objectify ART!

In a perfect world--there'd be no, uh,  Jonathan. (He doesn't fit in the above paragraph.)

--Brant (did my best)

nutz!

[anthony]

10 hours ago, Brant Gaede said:

Huh?

The perfect response - to non sense. I aver that it is poetry but a reader tries to make sense of it, and fails, and rightly rejects my claim. Unintelligble. So? Why do we accept geometric lines and paint blobs/spatter as 'art'?

A poem is not just any words strung together, and art is not colors and lines just put together. But the artist "says so" and those who don't know how art is made, or why an artist creates, must believe. Whew. There are more frauds in art and the industry that supports them, I think, than in any other human activity (but for politics).

(The original cavemen had art, and good honest - life-affirming - art; the realism continued for 1000's of years' and it's only very recently that abstract art came along - for me, at its best, good decoration - and been elevated to "art". This matter predates and goes well beyond what Objectivist "Esthetics" may pronounce. Abstract artists and their advocates with vested interests have worked a collective con on the public).

 

[Brant Gaede]

7 hours ago, anthony said:

The perfect response - to non sense. I aver that it is poetry but a reader tries to make sense of it, and fails, and rightly rejects my claim. Unintelligble. So? Why do we accept geometric lines and paint blobs/spatter as 'art'?

A poem is not just any words strung together, and art is not colors and lines just put together. But the artist "says so" and those who don't know how art is made, or why an artist creates, must believe. Whew. There are more frauds in art and the industry that supports them, I think, than in any other human activity (but for politics).

(The original cavemen had art, and good honest - life-affirming - art; the realism continued for 1000's of years' and it's only very recently that abstract art came along - for me, at its best, good decoration - and been elevated to "art". This matter predates and goes well beyond what Objectivist "Esthetics" may pronounce. Abstract artists and their advocates with vested interests have worked a collective con on the public).

 

I accept a lot of "art"as art and reject a lot of it as art, but without any reference to Objectivist Esthetics, WTF they are.

--Brant

you are trying to force feed "esthetics" of a particular kind into the public weal as some kind of universal

[anthony]

3 hours ago, Brant Gaede said:

I accept a lot of "art"as art and reject a lot of it as art, but without any reference to Objectivist Esthetics, WTF they are.

--Brant

you are trying to force feed "esthetics" of a particular kind into the public weal as some kind of universal

Still, you don't get me. The "universal" that all have in common, is man's consciousness and its nature, (agree?) - that's my over riding concern here, and much of art doesn't perturb me much, to me it can just be what it is. (Notice how few things are 'craft' or 'decoration' today. Good words, for good work by people - but replaced by 'Art' so everyone feels inclusive!)

'Which is why I refuse to be cornered into any caricature of Oist "condemnation" of art works ,per se. 

But the mind and thinking, is another story, and where I become vehement in their defence. Ever wondered why all the significant philosophers (inclusive of Rand) all have their own art/aesthetic theories? Simplistically, I think they knew that you get people by the balls of their (unidentified and 'causeless') emotions on art, their minds will follow.Then they will fit tamely into a nice, orderly society' planned for them.

Also, like several here, I am old enough to have seen the slow and at times, steep descent of cultures and values in Western societies. The main theme today, is don't identify, don't judge. Familiar.

 At the same time has been the declne of standards of art to 'whatever goes'. Coincidence?  

"Culture" as the main thought and morality of a time is influenced by art, and art influences behavior and thinking in return, it seems is clear. Parallel mirrors. Modern art, abstract art, willl largely fade as temporary fads, when people start to think for themselves again.

[william.scherk]

1 hour ago, anthony said:

I am old enough to have seen the slow and at times, steep descent of cultures and values in Western societies.

 

 

1 hour ago, anthony said:

"Culture" as the main thought and morality of a time is influenced by art, and which influences it in return, I'd think is clear. Parallel mirrors. Modern art, abstract art, willl fade as fads, when people start to think for themselves again.

 

On 9/12/2016 at 11:14 AM, Jonathan said:

On 9/11/2016 at 9:40 AM, anthony said:

(J.'s back...)

Blah, blah, blah. Nothing but more long-winded, empty chatter and bullshit bluffing.

On 9/11/2016 at 9:40 AM, anthony said:

Next, does art - or an art work - "affirm" consciousness, or detract from it? Does it immediately bring to one's vision an intelligible concrete relating to one's abstractions and beneficially 'grounding' them? Or does it instead cause a visual/mental fog?

On 9/11/2016 at 9:40 AM, anthony said:

The prime question I think one needs to ask is not "what is art?", it's superseded by "what is consciousness?" Then: how crucial is consciousness to man?

On 9/10/2016 at 0:07 PM, Jonathan said:

The patient has expired.

 

Edited September 13, 2016 by william.scherk
Fixed fritzed image URL

[Jonathan]

17 hours ago, Roger Bissell said:

Earlier today, I saw some comments on Michelle Marder Kamhi's blog that were posted by a rather ill-tempered feller named Jonathan Smith. Any relation to our semi-anonymous chum? (I mean "chum" in the sense pertaining to fishing bait.)

REB

Where, Roger? Provide a link, please!

I've posted on Kamhi's blog, but I haven't been "ill-tempered" in the slightest. A few of my posts remain in the comments sections, and haven't been meddled with by Kamhi. Read them again. They are quite polite. Perhaps you're confusing your own emotions and behavior -- your anger, frustration and snarkiness in response to being unable to address the substance of my criticisms -- with mine? Projecting?

I've been polite and factual. If anything, my attitude is one of laughing at certain ill-tempered people who insist on telling everyone else that their aesthetic responses are not what they say they are, and are not valid. "That's NOT ART! IT'S NOT ART! NOT ART!!!" Heh.

I do understand, though, that my being factual and devastatingly accurate in identifying Kamhi's method as being nothing more than the fallacy known as the "argument from personal incredulity" is very upsetting to certain people. Many of Rand's followers believe religiously in her views and positions, including in the realm of aesthetics, and they can become enraged when they are shown to be advocating positions which are not objective, and which have no proof to back them up. I get it that it's very distressing and embarrassing for Objectivish-types to be challenged to actually objectively demonstrate that they've applied and tested their own stated criteria and standards to the works that they allege are valid art.

Anyway, did you come here only to express your feelings, or do you have something of substance to contribute? Do you have what it takes to address the questions above with which I've challenged Kamhi, and which she is unable to answer (and which she feels the need to attempt to erase from existence)?

I'm guessing not.

J

[Jonathan]

18 hours ago, anthony said:

Identifiable, re-created reality, "qualifies as art", else it's just spinning wheels.

Therefore music is not art, but wait, Rand and her followers nevertheless categorize it as art!

Silliness. Irrationality.

 

18 hours ago, anthony said:

And anyone who doesn't *feel* what this line of poetry communicates, is an uneducated peasant and probably a pre-post post-modernist, word Fascist, anti-progressivist who still insists on "meaning" and "intelligibility". So -old school.

No. No one's taking that position. It's the opposite. It's Rand's followers who have the "fascist" mentality. They resent the idea that others might experience in a work of art what Randians do not, and therefore declare that they cannot possibly be experiencing it! In other words, Rand's followers MUST BE the upper limit of cognition and aesthetic response, and how dare anyone even suggest otherwise! Heh.

 

18 hours ago, anthony said:

Pff. If you have to ask 'the meaning', you woudn't get it anyway and I'm not wasting my time telling you.

Wrong again. I've spent a lot of time patiently explaining what I see in images, and why I therefore interpret them differently than people who are comparatively unaware and unobservant.

 

18 hours ago, anthony said:

All that matters, I know what I mean and my deep emotional state when penning it, and only those few (you know who you are) who are sensitively attuned to my poetic art will understand me. All you deprived lessers - it's you who have the burden of proof to empirically prove that my words don't make sense..

Yeah, I know that you're very, very insulted and angered at the idea that someone else might observe and experience more than you do in a work of art, but your little feelings aren't really relevant. They are not an objective basis for determining what is or is not art.

And you're still dodging and evading. The challenges that I copied above in my initial post remain unanswered. They're not going to be blinked out of existence. Wishing and squealing and evading won't make them go away.

J

[anthony]

Nice William, very nice works you picked out' and clever progression. Did I say however that good and great artists have ceased to exist? You will note that all of these contain "referents to reality", so what's your implication? Find us some abstract art as contrast, would you?

[Roger Bissell]

2 hours ago, Jonathan said:

19 hours ago, Roger Bissell said:

Earlier today, I saw some comments on Michelle Marder Kamhi's blog that were posted by a rather ill-tempered feller named Jonathan Smith. Any relation to our semi-anonymous chum? (I mean "chum" in the sense pertaining to fishing bait.)

REB

 

Where, Roger? Provide a link, please!

 

You can find it yourself, unless you've been barred from accessing Michelle's blog. In the late June discussion of Rothko, two sizeable posts by you remain UNcensored, in all their glory. Michelle may not be the last word or final authority on visual art, but she recognizes a nihilistic take-over artist when she sees one. Even then, she allows your non-redundant rude remarks to remain. Rather magnanimous, considering.

REB

 

[william.scherk]