Posted on 10/08/2009 12:05:05 PM PDT by Atlas Sneezed
Yesterday, the NYT ran a story about the White House acquiring art. It included a slide show of a dozen artworks.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/07/arts/design/07borrow.html?_r=1
This Freeper took a look and found one abstract work he admired:
"Watusi (Hard Edge)," by Alma Thomas, a longtime Washington resident who is an African-American painter. Photo: Gift of Vincent Melzac/Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden.
As I admired it, I thought it reminiscent, even derivative of a favorite artwork of mine by Matisse. I recall seeing that one decades ago at the Tate Gallery in London. A giant collage (about ten feet tall) from late in Matisse's life, when his eyesight was failing:
The Snail (L'escargot), by Henri Matisse, Nice-Cimiez, Hotel Regina, [summer 1952-early] 1953, Gouache on paper, cut and pasted, on white paper, 9'4 3/4" x 9' 5" (287 x 288 cm) collection Tate Gallery, London.
I had planned to post them for comparison, and to share my admiration for both. But when I saw them side-by-side, the similarity clarified. I realized that the new one was EXACTLY the same composition as the Matisse, rotated 90 degrees.
Is this fraud? If the new piece has been titled "Homage to Collage" or "Matisse in Blue", I would think the artist wasn't trying to hide the copying. But I wonder whether anyone realized that the artist copied almost every aspect of a famous work to sell her artwork. Perhaps everyone involved knew that this is a re-colored reprint. If not, it seems to be an embarrassment for the "sophisticates" who failed to spot a copy hiding in plain sight.
As too many people say about abstract expressionist art: "Even I could have done THAT!"
in grad school they expect you to put glitter on it.
Where they hire the deaf (they can't hear real Americans protesting), dumb (they fall for every spin and lie of the liberal politicians and talking heads), and blind (they can't tell an original artwork from an obvious copy/fraud - nor a Birth Certificate, either).
I guess you can say they are fully staffed with people who have occupational disabilities.
Good catch, Beelzebubba! A FReeper scores again with another expose.
ping
I agree with you. I wasn’t clear. I think modernism is a reaction to photography. Abstract art became the dominant form with the advance of photography. Artists no longer seemed needed to provide a record for posterity.
All I see is a kid with a bottle of glue, a pair of scissors, various construction paper sheets, and a stack of assorted tissue papers.
Easy-peasy fancy art.
Hitler repulses me much more than he could possibly fascinate me. I read Speer’s memoir, that’s about everything I need to know about the Nazis.
The artist knew good art? It’ll be a constant reminder to those in the WH the truth will be told in time.
With the above being said, that doesn’t excuse a wannabe lackatalent old lady from plagarizing a true artist’s original compositions and calling it their own........even if it’s written up in some artsy-fartsy publication.
We approach cisis on many fronts.
If I was going to buy some art, it would be baroque, not broke............
The difference is intent. If she admitted and was open specifically what this came from and why she did it (which by all accounts I can find she did) and there was no attempt to profit from it (which I can't find she did) then I wouldn't call it a rip-off. It would be like me paraphrasing a great statement you made and giving you credit. The intent was not to rip off your statement but to honor or study it.
If someone can show me that she purposefully did this to deceive and tried to hide the source and she attempted or did profit from it, then we can talk about it being a rip-off.
I think you have it backwards...I’d rather see a statement around 1963, in her own words, not someone else’s, where she says it was a “study”.
It’s not so much about the moustache as the larger Nazi art larceny, some of which is still being tracked down to this very day.
I like this one, too:
Brilliant!
Without going so far as to pay for the article, it looks like something like you are describing may exist.
Art News from 1968 has a discussion with her about Matisse.
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