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My subject here is not so much art as it is the mind games postmodernists and others play to pawn strange ideologies onto us.
The quotes and examples below were not made up. The professor in question is a real person who taught at a real university. I attended his lectures as a fellow professor in a team-taught course. He saw himself more as a “coach” than an instructor. My aim here is to shed light on a basic strategy by which the absurd is presented as meaningful and all is equalized. I have no desire to offend but the examples below are pertinent
to my point and were used in a public academic arena.
THE COACH'S CLASS:
The Scream, by Edward Munch (1893), is a common example of early modernism in art. The Coach showed it to
our class and his comment was an ironic play on words: "I do not like this painting, but it is one of my favorite paintings."
I appreciate irony. However, I heard this lecture several times and never was convinced that he actually disliked that painting. His aim was to put the discerning faculties of our students off balance. Fine. Next slide please.
A Marcel Duchamp painting entitled "L.H.O.O.Q." (1919) was projected on (or off?) the wall. Duchamp simply defaced a copy of the Mona Lisa(by Leonardo da Vinci) and captioned it with letters that meant (in French) "She has a hot tail."
Coach: "I am not offended. I understand."
According to the Coach, the trench warfare of WWI was apparently the motivational force that made Duchamp scrawl a mustache and goatee on a print of Leonardo’s portrait of a girl. He offered no claim that Duchamp was ever in the war. He simply presumed that a certain insanity was in the air that made such nonsense understandable. Perhaps, the Coach just wanted us to think that enlightened understanding made him rise above being offended by something that was clearly meant to offend.
The professor’s last comment on the defaced Mona Lisa was, "This is just as valid as Michelangelo's David."
I felt like raising my hand and asking, "Will this be on the test?"
Actually, Duchamp went to the United States in 1915 (far from any battle trenches) and joined a circle of painters with an anti-art attitude. In 1917, he sent a work called "Fountain" to the New York "Independent Show" which was nothing but a urinal. The Coach often used the phrase "equally valid" to describe such antics.
Several more repulsive, perverse, and ugly art slides followed. According to the Coach, one depicted women in the woods rubbing breasts on stones and another showed a worm eating a bird’s heart out. The Coach exclaimed, "Gang, I'm just reporting the news so don't crucify
me afterwards."
I guess in lieu of a crucifixion, this article will have to suffice.
I am reminded of the time Phil Donahue did a talk show on "buns" (I was, aaah, doing research for future provocative articles like this one). As scantily clad men and women pranced around the stage with their rears to the camera, Donahue turned to the audience and said, "I’m just reporting the news."
Our class then viewed a slide allegedly depicting "the essence of a cockfight." The Coach implored, "Allow yourself not to be forced into literality." Actually, if anything was being forced, it was the notion that it was a picture of a cockfight.
Then the Coach introduced the class to Willem de Kooning’s abstract expressionism. He showed us a painting that could not speak for itself. The coach explained it as "a dynamic flux and flow of creation and cancellation." Then he stated the obvious: "[de Kooning] is dealing with ambiguity."
As one who graded their essay tests, I found that many of our students were also quite efficient at dealing with high levels of ambiguity.
In real life, de Kooning fell victim to senility and Alzheimer’s disease. When he could not recognize his family or control his bodily functions, the “experts” still claimed he was doing his best art work ever. There’s big money in admiring the emperor’s new clothes.
Another art slide depicted a simple table setting (bowl and utensils) made out of animal fur. The alleged artist was Mary Oppenheimer and the Coach said it represented lesbianism. He continued, "I believe she has a right to say this."
I guess he was still just "reporting the news." Let the thinker be aware, though, that the last refuge of a person without a valid point is their bold assertion of the right to be pointless.
Then the Coach showed a Salvador Dali painting allegedly about masturbation and excrement. He said, "I defend Salvador Dali's right to paint this because you cannot deny that things exist."
Can you spot a non-sequitur when you hear one? It does not follow that a human right is established merely because something exists. Shall we divorce all art from logic?
Dali belonged to the modern school of Surrealism. The Coach told us that the Surrealists sought out the supremacy of irrational association, imaginative insight, dreams, and the elimination of control. Irrational association is nothing new. But it's "supremacy" is a stretch.
Next, the Coach referred to Jackson Pollock’s splatter-the-canvas approach as "action painting." He observed with admiration, "He's using his whole body to do this." Yet, every form on the canvas was basically an accident, including the cigarette butts that fell into his "masterpiece."
It occurred to me that children also use their whole bodies to throw tantrums. So what?
"Action painting," to me, is a sugar-coated euphemism for thoughtless painting. Pollock, by the way, killed himself and a female passenger in an accident while driving drunk. Excuse my sarcasm, but he was using his "whole body" to cause that accident too.
Then came the nudes. The Coach said, "There are times in the world when you have to do the nude. You've got to show how things are."
Any art historian acknowledges a place for the tasteful nude. Still, the Coach’s logic sounded weak to me. Moviemakers apply a similar rationale to claim that profanity is necessary to convey realism. But nudity and profanity are not always actually “how things are.”
THE COACH'S PHILOSOPHY:
The Coach used to say; "Name something; that's dangerous." He believed that one sees more creatively as names are set aside and definitions are left open. He challenged us to look beyond the objects. What mattered was not reality but one’s perception of it.
He preached, "Question all authority! No one has a right to tell me what to do." He did not want to be limited by names, definitions, traditions, legacies or standards. What mattered was not external input or reality, but personal perception. Thus, he had no trouble claiming to dislike a painting that was also a favorite.
Still, there is partial truth to the Coach’s ideas. Excessive objectivism can indeed smother imagination. Also, one’s perception is not benign (but neither is objective reality). Finally, authority often does need to be questioned and held accountable.
However, flawed ideas can often claim partial validity while riding into a sea of foolishness. The Coach seemed to go so far as to consider objective observation as a dangerous barrier to aesthetic creativity. Most anything outside of his perceptual preference was regarded as an oppressive force. Plus, he seemed to have no place at all for authority or standards. Somehow, everything was “equally valid.”
But what’s so “dangerous” about naming things? As I see it, language demands meaning and organization. A language, whether verbal or visual, only has value when its symbols and shapes are pinned down and given meaning. Names help us organize our thinking. They are helpful handles for clearer understanding. I think a lack of organization and understanding can actually inhibit creativity. So can a lack of standards.
To the Coach, quality (like most everything) is relative. He once said that no one is "wrong for their ideas in art." Yet, one time he exploded at me in terrific anger because I voiced a view on art that he considered wrong. I expressed a low appreciation for the work of Pablo Picasso. It was as if I had blasphemed a god.
THE CRITIC'S CONCLUSION:
The Coach’s ideas are widespread. His side owns much of academia. Perhaps you agree with him.
I consider his views to be absurd. When art makes no sense or lacks creativity, the hype-masters must be creative instead with words and extra loose with logic. The word absurd refers to something preposterous, false, senseless and untrue. Webster’s dictionary says that absurdity stands "glaringly opposed to manifest truth." That definition, however, presumes that a standard of logic or truth actually exists. If there is no such thing as truth, then nothing is absurd. In such an absurd world, the Coach makes perfect sense.
Joel Mark Solliday , M.Div., is the editor of Campus CrossWalk and the pulpit minister of the Brooklyn Center Church of Christ in Minnesota. A Pepperdine graduate, he later worked in their Campus Life Office and at ACU as a Missionary in Residence. He earned his M.Div. at Fuller Theological Seminary.
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