Art and Subobjectivity

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Now, about Ravel. Ravel did indeed say some things critical of his Bolero, but he also commented on his intentions in composing the piece, some of which involved his envisioning specific "virtual entities" and their goal-directed actions, and he believed that the composition successfully portrayed or evoked imagery of those entities and actions. (Perhaps the fact that he felt that the piece was "without music" despite its successfully depicting what he envisioned might be an indication that he thought that such depiction wasn't the essence of music). I wonder why Objectivists can't "see" what Ravel "depicted," or, if they can, why they are so hesitant to report it.

I know one filmmaker (Blake Edwards) who saw one hell of a visual entity with Bolero, but I don't think it was similar to the one Ravel saw: Bo Derek. Without the music, the composition later inspired this masterpiece by said visual entity: Bolero.

I know this isn't the case here, but when I think of the contrasts between the artistic intent of the original music and that of those films (especially the second), the word "postmodern" comes to mind.

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

All painting (art) is abstraction. There is no objective way to demonstrate where art ends and design begins. Much art is garbage but that's subjective. There is no objective way to show that "abstract painting" is not art. Quite a few pictures have been put up that are art but, as Dragonfly notes, also "Objectikitsch." Aside from the monetary value, there is much abstract painting I'd prefer to art that's kitsch.

The attempt to objectify some art as not art is an attempt to control the artist by shutting him up. One can define what a painting is but not show what painting is not art.

A lot of the Objectivist philosophy as commonly understood by Objectivists is only for keeping people under leaders' thumbs--in line. Shutting them up not only in regard to independent thinking but to their very personalities as they try to be Dagny or John or Howard instead of themselves. This is evident in "Atlas Shrugged" itself, where all the heroes kowtow to Galt who was on top of the heap, though he, of course, does the same to the author and her philosophy by eschewing a world of strife and conflict ("The Strike") for the comfort of a post-world cemetery where evil has been vanquished by removal of the sanction of the victim.

Evil is not to be denied by denying the potential for evil out of a normal human brain re free will. Ayn Rand never really explained how her heroes got to herohood and one presumes therefore that they were born that way and since no one in the real world grows up that way she set an impossible standard for would-be Objectivists to repair to so they pretended and pretend--that they aren't human, actually. So did Ayn Rand.

--Brant

On what basis do you say any of this?

Jeff, the basis is decades of thought and observation including introspection and actually interacting with Ayn Rand and some of her associates. You know much, much more at the age of 16 than I did at 16, more in fact than I did at twice your age, but you can't duplicate experience as a learning tool. 45 years from now I'll be long gone but you should still be around to tell another 16 year-old much the same thing. He probably won't listen, but that's all right; it's not that important that he does. I'm not trying to do an argument from authority here, just answer your question.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Christian,

I just got around to reading your post #627. That's an important post. I'll come back to it when I get a chance -- might not be till Monday or Tuesday.

Ellen,

I beat you to this, but I had not posted it. I drafted the response below yesterday, but I was too tired to finish it. Still, I hope you do come back to this. Christian tapped into a very important aspect that I only touch on below (how a normative approach delimits cognitive understanding).

To put a finer point on it: anyone who attempts to "objectively" or "cogitative" define "art', by way of "representationalism" will necessarily run into the problem that any and all attempts at defining what is or isn't "representational" must rely almost exclusively on subjective perceptions; leaving the aforementioned definition completely non-objective. Following this line of thinking, we end up with the absurdity of someone saying (as a pretense at objectivity, nonetheless) "I don't see it (representational form), therefore it isn't art".

In other words, it is certainly a cognitive statement to say "art must be representational to be art", but the only way to find out if the cognitive statement is true is to check it with normative judgments.

Christian,

That hits the nail on the head when you get to the outer edges and exceptions. But in the middle, where a painting looks like a photograph with some "stylization" to deform it ever so slightly, it is easy to call it representational.

The problem of normative goes even deeper, though, especially if one wishes to use the Objectivist definition of art. The idea of physical representation is not the only normative factor. There is what the subject means symbolically. I have to borrow from literature to give a short-cut to what I mean. Ragnar Danneskjöld was not merely a character in Atlas Shrugged. He was a symbol for justice. His appearance was allegorical. All of Rand’s characters are like that (some merely not as obvious as others). The subject itself of a painting has a similar main normative load for Objectivists (and most people), with all the rest (style, colors, perspective, etc.) merely being lesser aspects.

This leads to the main objection to abstract art by Objectivist-oriented people. There is no subject from outside reality in abstract art to make an allegory with. But going deeper into the artistic experience, even with the allegorical approach, the reason for the allegory is to evoke an emotional experience of seeing the world constructed selectively according to value judgments about existence itself.

A painting might exist as an end in itself, the person being portrayed might be an end in himself in real life, but the allegory that goes with it does not. It is wedded to what the aesthetic experience is all about. If the man portrayed is a rotten beggar with open sores all over his body, this is an allegory for a bad sense of life and thus portrays a fatalistic worldview. If the man is a handsome swashbuckler, this is an allegory for a heroic sense of life in a benevolent universe.

The idea behind art for Objectivism is to feed the sense of life. Rand called it “emotional fuel.” It could have just as easily been called “emotional nutrition.”

Now we come to abstract art, which deals more with the act of perception than with the object perceived. Is it possible to wed a sense of life to a manner of perceiving and integrating, or can we do that only with photographic-like entities? I say it is not only possible to do this with internal processes, but doing so can be very much pro-life.

Ironically, the fundament for this is in Rand's epistemology itself. Although she stated that all concepts were sense-based, she had several exceptions that were not. One was what she called “concepts of consciousness.” If you see Chapter 4 of ITOE, you will even find the term “introspective concepts” to designate this, which, in itself, opens a fascinating suggestion for introspection. Also, the basis of the difference between normative concepts and cognitive concepts is given there: teleological measurement (based on ordinal numbers) for normative, and cardinal numbers for cognitive.

Where this is pertinent to abstract art is with what Rand calls a special category of concept of consciousness, method. Of course, the method she was most concerned with her entire career was logic and reason, rarely venturing into areas like the automatic mental functions (except for proclamation-like acknowledgments), or speculative methods like daydreaming.

Another internal process of forming concepts, this time sense-based on a distant level, but otherwise purely abstract, was abstractions from abstractions. She came up with the term "mental entity" to describe the basic stuff these processes use for the process of abstraction and integration, despite the fact that such entities have no physical existence, nor do they provide material for the sense organs. And she used what she called the "conceptual common denominator" as a substitute measurement (to eliminate) when abstracting from abstractions. This resolved the need for a physical standard of measurement.

(As an aside, she came up with a weird idea called “implicit concept,” which she claims is a concept present in sensations. If concepts are made from integrations of sensations, I find it quite a stretch to say that a special category of concept can exist before integration, being built-in to sensations, in a sense, coming before the presence of a mind. I understand the concept of “concept” being dependent on a mind in order to exist.)

If such a "mental entity" is considered only in terms of words, the world becomes very much simplified, but it is a mistake to think this way. A concept is not a word. A word is only a concrete tag we put on a concept. That is how the same concept can be called “chair” in English and “cadeira” in Portuguese. The words are different, but they both mean the same concept.

So here is the issue. Are there other tags we can put on concepts? Can purely visual tags be put on them, ones that are not words? And can this extend to non-verbal tags involving the other senses? My answer is a resounding yes! Not only can there be such non-verbal tags, they are always present in our minds along with words. If a person is blind, he will not have visual tags, but he has all the other senses. As an example of how verbal communication can involve another sense, a blind person uses touch with Braille for reading instead of sight. In the same manner he is able to use touch for nonverbal tags (texture, temperature, etc., standing for an entity, attribute or action).

Moving back to “concepts of consciousness” and no longer external entities like chairs, what happens if we put a nonverbal visual tag on such a concept like “method,” say integration? Not only does a visual tag stand for such a method, it uses the method itself to bring it to awareness in order to evaluate it. As a visual symbol is a concrete, as is the case with an abstract painting, the mind, in trying to process it, brings the method up to conscious awareness in a manner that allows us to experience it as if the method itself were a concrete. This is the particular aesthetic pleasure I derive from abstract art.

Rand mentioned “intensity” as one of the standards to apply to “concepts of consciousness.” I know she was groping for a manner to explain emotions with this, but there are other intensities. For example, there is an intensity of awareness (and this would be ordinal numbers, not cardinal ones). This is one of the main normative parts of abstract art.

I understand the logic behind the Objectivist complaints, though. If abstract art is thought of as portraying external reality only, it becomes an attack on integration (i.e., rationality) because nothing we see comes even close to what is on the canvas. This is the standard Objectivist beef. Seen that way, it is anti-life. And if the intent of the artist is to destroy our method of awareness and thinking by this means and reduce us to a state of pretending that the world is like that, and we can only perceive it thus, then this is a despicable intent.

But if the art portrays an internal reality instead of a perceived outside subject, i.e., how a person perceives, integrates, weds thoughts to emotions, etc. (his method of awareness), and if it portrays this through visual nonverbal symbols that actually engage that method, then the experience starts to become allegorical in a "consciousness" or "process" sense. Instead of Ragnar Danneskjöld (in Atlas Shrugged) standing for justice, or a painting of a beautiful woman with her head thrown back standing for elation and a triumphant sense of life, Pollock’s Lavender Mist (as Kevin Haggerty brilliantly pointed out) stands for the mental process of identifying visual entities, or the process of visual integration.

If an external visual entity were present, the intensity of the awareness of the process would be sacrificed. By not having such an external entity present, but displaying attributes that typically belong to external entities in a random form, the mind starts trying one thing, then trying another, then another, etc. This can become intense enough for us to become aware of it. As we experience ourselves in life as ongoing processes, this heightened awareness of who we are and how we function becomes a very pro-life experience.

Thus the subject of an abstract art work is an entity that is non-representational in terms of external reality, but one that is used to turn on a process of perceiving and thinking. If you think about it, this is identical for representational art, except that the subject for this is an entity that we are familiar with from external reality (like a person or an object). As the perception/integration part does not get “stuck” like with abstract art, the mental process remains below our awareness radar and is experienced as automatic.

Representational art does use abstract elements in the sense I am talking about (Rand called this “style”), but they are basically used to induce mental processes to contribute toward the impact of the allegorical message of the subject. The emphasis is not on the process itself, but on the meaning of the subject from external reality. Abstract art uses entities from external reality in the same manner that representational art uses style. As the mind constantly tries to find the entities in the painting, but has to give up and try something else, they contribute toward the impact of the allegorical message of the abstract subject, but in this case, such message is about mental processes or ways of thinking and perceiving.

In both cases, the intensity of pleasure or disgust, the aesthetic response, is automatic. If art (as given in Objectivism) is to present man as how he can and should be, then being aware of the mental processes he uses for knowing the universe (like visual integration) is one fine manner of how he can and should be. Being unaware of this process is the alternative, and lack of awareness is not an ideal state.

These are just some initial thoughts, but I hope you can see where abstract art does not really conflict with Objectivist epistemology—and I can already hear the groans from the orthodoxy. This is one case where Rand’s tastes (which were very limited) did not follow the implications of her ideas. Abstract art only conflicts with Objectivist epistemology if it is used specifically to do that. And there is such abstract art that does that, as with the case of horrible color combinations, lack of visual balance, etc. But then representational art can do that too, like with Rand’s example of a cold sore on the beautiful woman (which makes a viscous hash out of the normative concept of what a “beautiful woman” can and should be).

Michael

[Danneskjold]

Brant said,

Jeff, the basis is decades of thought and observation including introspection and actually interacting with Ayn Rand and some of her associates. You know much, much more at the age of 16 than I did at 16, more in fact than I did at twice your age, but you can't duplicate experience as a learning tool. 45 years from now I'll be long gone but you should still be around to tell another 16 year-old much the same thing. He probably won't listen, but that's all right; it's not that important that he does. I'm not trying to do an argument from authority here, just answer your question.

--Brant

I can appreciate that you have done many things which I have not. However, for the sake of argument can you tell me the logical thought process that lead you from your basis to your conclusion? Because you did not connect the two, although I am sure you can, what that post says is that essentially I am not capable of understanding because I lack something that I cannot get, that being experience. I am sure you are not trying to use an argument from authority, and I am sure that the issue could be quickly resolved by giving insight into the logical process you followed based on your experiences that I lack.

[reason.on]

The idea behind art for Objectivism is to feed the sense of life. Rand called it "emotional fuel." It could have just as easily been called "emotional nutrition."

Exactly. I've also been thinking of O'ist aesthetics in terms of a "nutrition" metaphor for some time. For Rand it seems the *value* of art is tied almost exclusively to its *purpose*, which Rand asserts is tied to the effective functioning of consciousness itself. So then Rand's aesthetics become a nutritional recipe or formula, and that which is "nutritious" according to Rand is good or virtuous art. The O'ist aesthetics become like an extreme diet (like a vegan diet, South Beach or Atkins) where the only things "allowed" are those things which fit the predefined purpose and function.

This tends to leave out a whole range of pleasurable and worthwhile artistic experiences, just as the aforementioned diets leave out a whole range of pleasurable and worthwhile gastronomic experiences.

RCR

Edited February 2, 2007 by R. Christian Ross

[Danneskjold]

Michael, I think I finally have a handle on where and why we disagree. You say that abstract art makes someone evoke an emotion. It inspires an emotion in us. I completely agree. In order for an emotion to be felt, interaction is necessary. Someone who has no relation to anything cannot have emotion because consciousness is dependent on reality first. If there is nothing, consciousness cannot exist.

When something is completely abstract it uses sensing and percepting. It does not make you conceive of what it is you are showing, in fact it defies you that. In other words, it lets you know that something is there and it lets you differentiate between entities, but it does not tell you what is there. If something does not tell you what is there it cannot show you anything.

The difference is in that there is a difference between being made to have an emotion and showing that emotion. I can take a visual image and it can depict an idea. Abstract art can make you feel it without showing you.

Lunch time. I'll write more soon.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

So then Rand's aesthetics become a nutritional recipe or formula, and that which is "nutritious" according to Rand is good or virtuous art. The O'ist aesthetics become like an extreme diet (like a vegan diet, South Beach or Atkins) where the only things "allowed" are those things which fit the predefined purpose and function.

This tends to leave out a whole range of pleasurable and worthwhile artistic experiences, just as the aforementioned diets leave out a whole range of pleasurable and worthwhile gastronomic experiences.

Christian,

That is a very amusing, but spot-on, way of looking at it. For a meat and potatoes kind of thing, I want to go on record saying that I love most of the work I have seen online at the Cordair gallery. I have no doubt that over time, Kat and I will own several works from there.

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

Brant said,

Jeff, the basis is decades of thought and observation including introspection and actually interacting with Ayn Rand and some of her associates. You know much, much more at the age of 16 than I did at 16, more in fact than I did at twice your age, but you can't duplicate experience as a learning tool. 45 years from now I'll be long gone but you should still be around to tell another 16 year-old much the same thing. He probably won't listen, but that's all right; it's not that important that he does. I'm not trying to do an argument from authority here, just answer your question.

--Brant

I can appreciate that you have done many things which I have not. However, for the sake of argument can you tell me the logical thought process that lead you from your basis to your conclusion? Because you did not connect the two, although I am sure you can, what that post says is that essentially I am not capable of understanding because I lack something that I cannot get, that being experience. I am sure you are not trying to use an argument from authority, and I am sure that the issue could be quickly resolved by giving insight into the logical process you followed based on your experiences that I lack.

Sure, Jeff. I'll try to flesh it out later on today. You asked me for the "basis" and that's what I tried to give you, literally.

Edit: Tomorrow.

--Brant

Edited February 3, 2007 by Brant Gaede

[Danneskjold]

Ok, I can't fault you for that.

[Ellen Stuttle]

The idea behind art for Objectivism is to feed the sense of life. Rand called it "emotional fuel." It could have just as easily been called "emotional nutrition."

Exactly. I've also been thinking of O'ist aesthetics in terms of a "nutrition" metaphor for some time. For Rand it seems the *value* of art is tied almost exclusively to its *purpose*, which Rand asserts is tied to the effective functioning of consciousness itself. So then Rand's aesthetics become a nutritional recipe or formula, and that which is "nutritious" according to Rand is good or virtuous art. The O'ist aesthetics become like an extreme diet (like a vegan diet, South Beach or Atkins) where the only things "allowed" are those things which fit the predefined purpose and function.

This tends to leave out a whole range of pleasurable and worthwhile artistic experiences, just as the aforementioned diets leave out a whole range of pleasurable and worthwhile gastronomic experiences.

RCR

The "nutrition" analogy is a good way of thinking of her approach. I'd never thought of that particular analogy, but now I see Rand's approach put in "nutrition" terms, I like the comparison.

Re Rand's seeing art as "emotional fuel": I've always felt that I could sympathize with where she was coming from in that respect, given her personal background, despite my thinking the approach narrow (even disastrously narrow, given what it's done to the ability to appreciate art of a lot of Objectivists I've known). Have you read Who Is Ayn Rand? You recall how that starts? (I'll go get it and type some of the beginning in a minute.) With an opening line to the effect that it was a world of gayety. What's being described is light opera which Ayn, as a young girl in Russia, suffering the deadening dreary privations of her life there, was watching from a row high up in the tiers; and her getting the message from the light operas, and the foreign films, she saw that there was some other world out there which she could get to, away from Russia, I think was tremendously significant to her whole later approach to aesthetics. And even before then, she felt she was trapped amongst boring people as a child. Certain of the books she read gave her a sense of some adventurous world elsewhere which she would find later. So art truly was being a lifeline to her, especially after the Commnist regime started.

Ellen

___

[Ellen Stuttle]

I'll quote the whole passage. It's just beautifully written. Barbara is and was then a very skilled writer.

This is the start of the title essay of Who Is Ayn Rand?, © Copyright, 1962, by Nathaniel Branden. Random House. (I don't know why there wasn't a separate copyright for BB's piece.)

[Extra paragraph break added for easier reading.]

"To hold an unchanging youth is to reach, at the end, the vision with which one started."

It was a world of irresistible gaiety. It was made of the music that tinkled arrogantly against crystal ovals of brilliance strung across the vast solemnity of the ceiling--music that danced defiantly on the soft, faded elegance of velvet drapery and on the stern white marble of glistening walls--music that surged upward through the stately grandeur of the opera house, carrying, in its rise, the laughter of a weightless exultation. It was made of graceful bodies whirling in effortless motion on a stage held in light rays, of silk gowns and radiant smiles and gleaming top hats--against the backdrop of a huge window which framed the painted image of lighted streets and the skyscrapers of a foreign city, sparkling and beckoning in the distance.

Beyond the walls of the theater--beyond the reach of the operetta--was a city of unending grayness: the grayness of crumbling buildings and crumbling souls, of stooped shoulders and bread lines and ration cards, of chronic hunger and chronic despair and the odor of disinfectants, of steel bayonets and barbed wire, and marching feet moving in a grim parade of death to sudden arrests in the night, of weary men crushed to their knees under waving flags and clenched fists. Only the flags and the fists relieved the grayness: the fists were stained, by a different dye, the same red as the flags. The city was Petrograd. The year was 1922.

A slender young girl with large eyes sat high in the last balcony of the opera house, leaning forward tensely, listening to the meaning of the most ecstatic sounds she had ever heard. The bright notes sparkling and leaping in the air around her and the reckless gaiety of the scene spread out on the stage below, were carrying a message to her, and a promise They told her there was a sunlit, carefree world--a world of unobstructed action, of unobstructed fulfillment--somewhere beyond the dark night and the darker horrors, and it waited only for her to claim it.

She listened with grave solemnity to the promise--and she gave a promise in return: that if she could not be the physical citizen of that glittering world, she would be its spiritual citizen. She took her oath of allegiance, with passionate dedication--with the gay score of an operetta as the holy bible on which she swore--an oath never to let the reality of her true homeland be dimmed by the gray exhaustion of a life lived under the alien weight of the ugly, the sordid, the tragic; to hold the worship of joy as her shield against the sunless murk around her; to keep burning within her that fuel which alone could carry her to the world she had to reach, the fuel which had kept her moving through her seventeen years: the sense of life as an exalted, demanding, triumphant adventure.

Thirty-five years later, and more than five thousand miles away, the young girl was to erect a monument to that music, and to the sense of life she had never lost or betrayed. The monument was Atlas Shrugged. The girl was Ayn Rand.

The next paragraph starts, "Ayn Rand was born on February 2, 1905 [...]."

Today is February 2, 102 years later.

Ellen

___

[Ellen Stuttle]

Here's a paragraph from further along in "Who Is Ayn Rand?" (pg. 168).

But she found a life line, thrown to her from the world abroad. it was the music of foreign operettas--of Lehar, of Kalman, of Millocker, of Offenbach--brought to Russia for the first time since the revolution. She saw Millocker's The Beggar Student eleven times; she saw Lehar's Where the Lark Sings eight times--and could not take her eyes from the backdrop on the stage, which showed the lighted street of a modern foreign city. She obtained the money for tickets by walking three miles to the university every day, to save her carfare. Every Saturday morning, she was standing outside the opera house by six o'clock, whatever the weather, waiting for the box office to open four hours later, so as to be certain of obtaining a seat in the last balcony, the only one she could afford.

You see why she would form the theory of art's main function being "emotional fuel."

Ellen

___

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Ellen,

I added your Post 686 here in the thread on remembering good things about Ayn Rand. Although this is not a memory per se, it was constructed from Barbara's interviews with Rand.

Michael

[Mike Hardy]

The next paragraph starts, "Ayn Rand was born on February 2, 1905 [...]."

Today is February 2, 102 years later.

Ellen

___

Geez, Ellen, I was going to question your understanding of arithmetic

on the grounds that your statement would actually imply that it is now

2007. Then I looked at the calendar.

Oh, well, as Emily Litella would say........

[Victor Pross]

These are just some initial thoughts, but I hope you can see where abstract art does not really conflict with Objectivist epistemology—and I can already hear the groans from the orthodoxy.

Michael,

I'm not of the Ortho-lot, but I am groaning. For a man who digs Lenny Bruce and paints bizarre caricatures, I think I would not be welcomed at the next Ortho meeting. I may not even be invited to Protestant Objectivist meetings (or whatever it could be called). I'm homeless! :shocked: But anyway, a question: would you say that my dismissal of abstract painting as art can be nothing other than a 'normative' orientation, that I'm barred from dismissing it from a cognitive stand-point?

Victor

edit:

Abstract painting, I should have also made clear, does not offend me as an “Objectivist” (although I agree with the epistemological formulations in Objectivist epistemology that caters to my dismissing abstract painting as ‘art’) but rather as an artist. I, like any visual artist, know what tension and devotion is takes to master drawing and painting skills. Once honing basic drawing skills, representational art demands imagination—qualities all lacking in abstract painting. Of course, representational painting is also intelligible—visually speaking. For example, a typical Flemish or Dutch still-life can be fully treasured and enjoyed without any need of obtuse and hybrid explanations about its "psychological meaning" or the "state of mind of the artist" that have perverted our appreciation of art. Last but not least, to justify the production of hundreds of theories of what Jackson Pollack was “really about.”

**

Edited February 3, 2007 by Victor Pross

[Victor Pross]

Being a long time defender and advocate for representational painting, I have been called a “Eurocentric demagogue” who wishes to rule by a “right-wing aesthetic populism”—among other repellent insults within a sectarian fractionalized art community, especially where academic art is castigated and marginalized. Here, being a defender of representational art and a stalwart critic of abstract painting, I am, quite naturally, an “Orthodox Objectivist” or a “"Randroid". This, of course, invalidates anything one has to say from the start. The inner workings of some Objectivist circles have much in common with the art community.

[Kat]

whatever....

[Victor Pross]

whatever....

? :ermm:

[reason.on]

[A] wizard and glitter unicorns [...] would NEVER find its way onto any of my walls...E-V-E-R.

You have something against wizards and unicorns, have you? ;-)

In fact, I do have a problem with wizards and unicorns. To tell you the truth, it is mostly unicorns that I have issues with, but in conjunction they definitely tend to give me the heebie-jeebies (to say nothing of glitter).

You know how some people have irrational fears of clowns (I don't like clowns), well I'm like that with wizards and unicorns; they are just creepy. The typical kitch, anyway, that I envision sends shivers up and down my spine. Images of wizards and unicorns, to me, are somehow all inexorably tied in with triteness, people like EM and JA...and patchouli, and clove cigarettes, and peeps, and "circus peanuts" (those horrible orange things)....blech. Of course, I haven't quite finished up all the philosophy supporting this objective assessment of unicorns and wizards as antithema, but I can assure you a scholarly tome is in the works, and I intend to make good use of the fact that in Tolkien's world there were no unicorns, but in CS Lewis's there were.

I'm thinking by the way, of images like this (this is definitely part of my horror file):

Btw, it is funny how much these have in common with some of the Cordair pieces....and still, "viva la difference!"

RCR

Edited February 3, 2007 by R. Christian Ross

[Victor Pross]

There are kitsch fans out there who know their taste is kitsch and they love it. I’m thinking of the opening scene from a movie called Ghost World where the central character, wonderfully eccentric as she is, dances to a cheesy but fun 1960s Indian pop rock tune.

Edited February 3, 2007 by Victor Pross

[reason.on]

The next paragraph starts, "Ayn Rand was born on February 2, 1905 [...]."

Today is February 2, 102 years later.

Ellen

___

Geez, Ellen, I was going to question your understanding of arithmetic

on the grounds that your statement would actually imply that it is now

2007. Then I looked at the calendar.

Oh, well, as Emily Litella would say........

I had to look this up, so I figure I'd save anyone else the trouble...:-)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emily_Litella

RCR

Edited February 3, 2007 by R. Christian Ross

[Jonathan]

You know how some people have irrational fears of clowns (I don't like clowns), well I'm like that with wizards and unicorns; they are just creepy.

My wife has the same reaction to Raphael's work. You could put 100 paintings by different artists on a wall and she'd spot the Raphael right away. If you asked her if she recognized his use of color, or his style, brushwork, or anything like that, she'd say, "No, I just felt creeped out when I came into the room, and I realized that the creepiness was coming from that painting."

J

[Ellen Stuttle]

I see, Christian, re the wizards and unicorns. Believe me, I SEE.

My wizard and unicorns are nothing like those wiziunikitsch items you posted. My wizard has an old, brownish face, a large old-man nose, the most benevolent of expressions and the kindliest of twinkling eyes. The wizard's face is the "centerpiece" of the painting, though it's off center to the right. The "glitter" isn't silver glitter; it's like a gold star dust of stars produced by his wand, which is angled off to the right. The unicorns are in a trail of gray clouds which go up off to the left, around a continuous curve from the burst of stars. They don't look like "the usual" unicorns, either. Instead, they look like horse horses, not mythological creatures. The horns are short, and to my expert horse-evaluator eye, the horses look like larger versions of Siberian ponies (and with a heavier kneck development, a better crest of the kneck). Two of them, which are just at the juncture past where the gold becomes clouds, are rising on hind legs and nuzzling each other -- the horse version of "kissing," I suppose. Then there are two others wending up off to the left, looking as if they're frisking up the path of cloud. The color scheme is similar to the Maxfield Parrish "Starry Night" -- another painting (reproduction of course) which we have. I do like Maxfield Parrish, sort of conditionally, some of his stuff better than others. The "Starry Night" one has a dark blue color to the sky which I love. The sky in my wizard painting is that sort of blue only a bit darker -- the scene is obviously happening at night. The wizard's robe is also shades of dark blue but with a sort of Chinese-orange lining to the turned-back sleeves, giving a central area of orange and gold (the starburst to the right), making a focal frame for his adorable face.

ES

PS: I see you changed the ES you originally typed to the EM you meant. SOME typos, Christian, are hanging offenses. ;-)

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Edited February 3, 2007 by Ellen Stuttle

[Ellen Stuttle]

I had to look this up, so I figure I'd save anyone else the trouble...:-)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emily_Litella

RCR

Ross Levatter on Atlantis once upon a time made an Emily Litella joke about one of my posts, a joke which fell splat-flat with me since I had no idea who Emily Litella was. He was astounded, couldn't believe that anyone wouldn't have heard of Emily Litella. I told him, I mean it when I say I don't watch TV. So he said, neither does JR, but surely HE knows of Emily Litella! Te-he; nope, JR had never heard of her either.

Ignorance is bliss (sometimes)?

Ellen

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Edited February 3, 2007 by Ellen Stuttle

[James Heaps-Nelson]

JR= Jeff Riggenbach??

Jim