"LAFC"...LA2...whatever

First rule of holes.

 

That's why my motto is "******** Picasso!"

 

Great, now I have to look something up. Thanks.

Edit: Touche.

 

There's clearly a difference. When Banksy did one of his paintings on a billboard advertisement in front of the DGA prior to Oscars, I would not call that vandalism.

 

It undeniably was.

Though comparing an artist defacing a mass reproduction to a someone defacing an artist's work, regardless of it being commercial or not, is a false equivalence.

 

Um, you guys do realize @Lazy Assed Assassin is someone who gets paid to make art for a living, right?

Public art has inherent value. There's really no justification for this; its thuggery by definition (and I don't use the term often). For me, defacing art is a step away from burning books.

 

And your homework this week is to watch Exit Through the Gift Shop. There will be a quiz on Monday.

 

Without trying to seem like a philistine, this is a flawed value judgment.

I have seen absolutely crap public art. Eastern Europe was replete with Stalinist public art. Did it have inherent value? Did pulling down the statue of Sadam Hussain count as vandalism? What about the statue of Nicolae Ceaucescu? Was it vandalism to tear that down?

 

Him. Design – and you don’t pay me for it, well indirectly you do as you undoubtedly use products and or services for which I have been paid to create work for and in other indirect means. Again though that’s well beside the point, in this specific instance you did not pay for it, it was a private commission by a private company and it was vandalized. Period.

To expound on this idea I’m not opposed to graffiti art, street art, guerrilla art at all, quite the contrary, the respect I have for graffiti artists cannot be overstated, and some of the best street art around are ones which coverup and transform a pre-existing work or in the case of Banksy are a social commentary.

This was not any of those things. Technically it was crude, conceptually it was unoriginal and childish. It was no different than a kid drawing a cock on the bathroom wall. To sling your own assertion back it was something my 8 year old nephew could do – and unlike your scenario the vandals would have had the exact same thought process as my nephew, it wouldn’t just be a surface level interpretation.

 

A personal anecdote. I went to art school, I sat through 4 years and 8 semesters of art history classes – and I absolutely loathed most anything after the classical era. Pollack? Lichtenstein? Rauschenberg? ********ing Duchamp? Eat a dick art world. Then I went to see an exhibit of Rothko’s at the Tate in London an artist whose works I had mocked out loud and I was nearly in tears. The magnitude of these pieces cannot be conveyed without seeing them in person. I sat in that room for hours. Maybe I’m 1 of 1000 or 1 of 10,000 for whom those pieces had that impact, it doesn’t really matter though. So that crap public art might not ever impact you, none of it might and that’s cool, but if it makes the world a better place for 1 person in a 10,000 and it cost you a nickel – that’s a hell of a return on investment.

This is a fascinating question and I genuinely don’t know the answer. Hussein, Ceaucescu, Stalin, Lenin, et. al., were monuments and the line between a monument and art is fuzzy to me and I suspect most people. Is the Washington Monument art? Is Mount Rushmore? There are naval warships and natural parks considered monuments. I think you can draw a distinction that a public art work justifies its own existence. A monument is art created specifically to memorialize a specific person or event.

As for the specifics of actual art works in the Eastern Bloc during the Cold War, I wouldn’t be so quick to dismiss, some of the Brutalist work is absolutely stunning.

 

“They did it first” is not an acceptable justification.

Four years of art school, 8 semesters of art history. Yeah, I get to be the art critic.

 

Every job looks like a nail.

But to be less glib I don't care about Wolfgang. Forgeries have existed in the art world well before him. I care more about the Wylands and Kinkaides of the world they're far more damaging.

 

And all it took was someone vandalizing someone else’s hard work. I’m not sure that’s something to take pleasure from, but to each their own. I genuinely hope no one finds their world a better place at the expense of your hard work.

 

Extra credit for watching My Kid Could Paint That.

I am actually in the mood to watch Exit Through the Gift Shop again. I still find it hilarious that the academy nominated the film for best Documentary. It's a magnificent film, but clearly a mockumentary. Mr. Brainwash is a creation of Banksy, Shepard Fairey, and crew. It's a commentary of how street art has moved into the commercial art world (hence the title); and a social experiment to see if they could get, an obvious knockoff, mainstream success.

To me, it's like if Waiting for Guffman was somehow confused for an actual documentary.

If you watched it at face value before, I suggest watching it again with this new lens.

 

It's all just so stupid. The painting of the LAFC mural, the ridiculous LAFC "hooligans" stealing a Galaxy banner from outside Lowes or wherever. It's all just stupid.

Against my better judgement I went to a certain "ultras" forum where the cool kids from Eastern Europe talk about being neo -Nazis and beating the shit out of each other in the woods. Sure enough, some douche posted the mural thing there. I'm sure their idiot cred went up with the far right ultra scene 1000%. Nice job!

The Galaxy and LAFC are the same company. Their competition is the entire LA sports and entertainment scene more than each other. This is forced, there is no rivalry yet. Neither team has any identity that would put it in conflict with the other side. If a rivalry develops it will probably be along the lines of Tigres - Monterrey instead of Celtic - Rangers.

I don't know man, the whole thing just seems forced and silly at this point.

 

The LAFC mural was fixed, sort of:

View image on Twitter

 

Not true in the art world. Artists retain ownership to their work and grant a license to the buyer assuming it wasn’t created as an employee or in a work for hire situation. It’s pretty cut and dry in commercial art settings, but it’s true even in “fine arts”; if I sell a painting the buyer can’t materially alter it without my permission as I retain copyright. I can make prints or put it on a t-shirt and make money from it, the buyer can’t. So in the instance of this mural, unless stipulated in the contract, the artist retains ownership of the art regardless of his or her compensation.