I've just ordered a couple of books about my favourite artist. I know Mr Snowy and Ms Grabec et al, will enjoy this thread. Just thought after my recent naughtyness, I'd better do something Cultural.

Anyway my favourite artist is Jack Vettriano, discuss in less than 500 words.

Edward hopper rip off with less style. It's a no from me but each to their own.

That's a lot less than 500 words.

Mr Fireball, your final sentence is what I do these days! Seems sad but I have found some lovely frames in Charity shops! Just throw away the poor "painting/print" in it!

Living in Newcastle I visit The Baltic about every three months, just to be depressed, underwhelmed or downright angered by the overblown tripe masquerading as "art" nailed to the walls, strewn on the floor or dangled from the ceiling of that fine building. It's usually preceded by a load of psychobabble gush printed on the wall in an attempt to explain the artists efforts. I know all art is subjective but there seems to be an unmistakable air of "Emperor's New Clothes" about the whole modern art world. Sometimes, however, there are truly magnificent exhibits, thrown in to crisp focus by the dross that generally surrounds it. One such was "Scenes from the Passion" by Coventry born artist George Shaw. Bleak, empty scenes of the council estate he grew up in and so familiar to every town in Britain. I found the generally twilight images, devoid of people, haunting, nostalgic and slightly disturbing. But, I loved them!

Was that the artit or similart from Middlesbrough? Was focused on "Look North" a while ago. his paintings were from the bleak Steel Industry etc, but focused on the people.

I wouldn't have thought so. The guy was definitely from Coventry. If you Google "scenes from the passion George Shaw" you'll find loads of similar pictures to the one I posted. Often just dilapidated lock-ups, boarded up shops, half demolished pubs and such like, painted with the cheapest possible materials (humbrol enamels on board). They reminded me of Owton Manor on Sunday afternoons years ago - school in the morning and that general air of melancholy.

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooo, he had his heyday 15 years ago.
Sorry about that........., but if YOU like it, that's what counts. Art is like music, we all like different things and no one has the right to tell anyone what to like.

Art? Whats the point?

Honestly whats the point? Painting especially.

I was in a meeting at the national portrait gallery in october. An informal meeting at the roof top cafe.

I walked through some of the galleries just to see what the fuss was about.

Loads of weird people staring for an absolute age at a painting of another person.

Very fucking odd.

I came across a museum of modern art unexpectedly while strolling through the narrow streets of old Tarragona last September. It was a pretty cool place. Shame I was half blaked at the time, but luckily for their exhibits I wasn't fully blaked.

I really liked the stuff by that Mirror bloke.

Sound familiar.,,,,,?

I am enjoying Bishop's thread but don't know anything about Jack Vettriano except that I once bought a calendar that featured his work.

I think I like art but then I read 'experts' in the Guardian going on about 'interpreting brush-strokes' and whatnot, so realise I know nowt and had better keep quiet.

I recently spent a long weekend in Vienna with the other half, she's well into her art having recently bought some Billy Childish prints, anyway we visited a couple of museums/galleries and we took in a lot of Klimt and Schiele paintings which although quite bizarre I very much enjoyed staring at. Can't wait to go back there as it's a fantastic City.

Art is a strange one, now I get paintings but what I don't get is this exhibition sort of shite. A few year back I was in the Tate modern and they had an exhibition on, basically it was a load of giant white cardboard boxes in a room... thats it. Now I had to double check to make sure I didn't take a wrong turn but apparently it was "art".

Or there was the exhibit few years back, where the 'artist' had 'created' a pile of dust on the floor. Apparently everyone was outraged because a museum cleaner had misunderstood about the pile of dust, swept it up and binned it.

Or maybe they know nowt and just hope you keep quiet?

Aye. The Guardian fails in so many ways these days. Their official poetry column is in the same vein.

I was once warned by a minion at The Baltic to "be careful not to tread on the exhibit". Hardly surprising as it seemed to consist of a gold coloured bin liner that had bust out over the floor. These massive pieces of "concept art" disturb me most. They can only be displayed in places like The Baltic, Tate Modern etc. and these places only exist to display these massive pieces of, largely, junk. Sometimes the logistics of the exhibit are far more interesting than the exhibit itself. Recently, The Baltic had a piece inside a massive articulated HGV. On the fourth floor! How the fuck did they get it there?

Only pieces of art iv purchased is by a Catherine Stephenson. Some pictures of rabbits trying to reach carrots growing from a tree.

Well our lass purchased them not me like.

Yves Kleins' painting IKB79 is a blue square, apparently he mixed the paint himself which to me is a huge paint colour sample. It has qualities apparently of freedom and a sensation of spirituality. It's a huge blue square.
Kings new clothes come to mind, but some people will always listen to 'experts' to avoid questioning anything.

Bishop is a bit of an enigma, buys coats that smells of dog, eats the unmentionable on fish fingers and then spouts bollox about art, I would have thought the only cultural item in your life would be a pot of Aldi yoghurt!

The Sistine Chapel I get. An unmade bed I don't. Maybe it's me.

Lots of modern art passes me by but I went to a Louise Bourgeois exhibition at the Guggenheim in Bilbao and really liked it. Very big spiders and stuff made of old doors that looked a bit like repaired pigeon lofts but things like beds inside them. No idea why i liked it but I did.

For some time now I've suspected that Monkeybutt is an online installation controlled by old-Etonian heroin addicts. I can now confirm that on the day of Brexit his most damning posts are going to be projected onto the side of The Baltic while a giant glass of warm milk is carried up the Tyne on a tug. The old-Etonians will get £150,000 each and the pick of any children attracted by the milk.

So, you've met him then.

I saw a digital mock-up in somebody's studio if that counts. It was designed to grunt down CB radios and steal tenners from poor families.

I think with Art, the Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Someone may like looking at a painting of flowers in a field, some may not. Vettriano, I try to interpret some of his paintings. I dare say others will interpret differently. Again that is "ART"! Anyone can see what they chose in any work!

This is a wind up, right?

He supports Bishop Auckland, people interpret them as crap but he sees it differently, as we do with Pools, we see shite and Hignett sees it differently

Saw Hopper's work at tate modern a few years back, very good

I suspect the people that try to pass off random scribbles as art are the same ones who try to pass off random jazz as music.

Not an expert, but some modern art is OK - some is however complete hogwash. I like what Anthony Gormley does - Field I find intentionally playful, Another Place thought provoking for example. There's two sides to art in some ways, the technical ability and the artistic vision, some of the more feted artists I think claim a vision but the execution ends up mundane and hence baffling at best, ludicrous at worst... while some are great technicians but ultimately do little interesting with that technical skill. The test is for me, does it connect on a level more visceral than metre admiration of the process? A good example was a piece i saw in Manchester Art Gallery called I think The Smithsons - a video of images of the New Jersey shoreline, buildings mixed in with greenery, the music The Smiths Asleep. On the surface, rubbish - but when a few days later I saw a tower block, a tree in the foreground looking like it was the same size, the music was immediately in my head - I saw the connection. I'll take that over dozens of well executed but ultimately dull paintings by competent but uninspired painters. ...

Art, like any other subject has its share of bullshitters who are basically car salesmen selling a concept and some people want to be considered cool or informed and gulp down the snake oil patter.
Like what you like, but don't like something because the experts tell you you should.
I consider art a craft, a talent to produce a piece of work which can be seen as a such. I despair of the talentless bullshitters who lack even the basic skills and produce a 'concept', which means I am a talentless tossed who wants to be an artist, but lacks the talent but has has oodles of patter. A bit like a kid who wants to be a Premiership footballer, has all the kit, lives and breathes footy, but couldn't kick a ball to save his life.In footy, you'll be discovered as useless ver quickly, in art, you just adopt a new genre and you're famous. Kings new clothes and all that stuff.

Anyway my new books have arrived via a neighbour. I have had a very quick perusal and am happy with my Purchase. Ironically the £1-95 second hand one is in pristine/new condition and has more pages, pictures, writing and stuff!

What do the jury think of this masterpiece? Art or fart?

Art, Mr Monty. I won't spoil it but I think this snapshot is taken from a famous piece of Artwork!

Gadgies- Staithes - pubs, seaside and the best mini- arts fest in the North- Vettriano and Hopper are boring. Gan and buy something at Staithes- http://www.staithesfestival.com/

I don't know about famous, but that is the entire painting, not a snippet, and it is on permanent display with a collection of similar ones by the same artist in a well-known French art gallery.

Now, I'd like to know why that is art, but if it had been done by some random painter and decorator daubing a bit of canvas then cutting out a square in which he or she saw some Rorschach-style connotations, it isn't.

The name of the painting is "Peinture 33 x 41 cm, 1971 G", so don't go telling me the artist had something in mind when he daubed it. If I ask an artist why it's art, I get the same answer as I often did with my late sister when talking about the likes of Mondrian—she would just reply "ah you just don't understand." Too fucking true I didn't.

So can someone please walk me through the picture above and explain which bits of it are supposed to thrill me and why?

This looked like a snippet from a famous painting (I've forgotten the artists name but will get back to you on this one), of a chair and a table in a room.

So I suppose Art is what it means to some, I automatically thought it was a snippet of said earlier piece. However that is my memory and my vision! The art seems to be the top corner of an old broken chair, which may or may not have meant something to the artist, but will envoke visions/memories for other viewers! It's all bollocks really. However the brush strokes are superior!

I was in a gallery once with a friend who is an art school graduate. I asked her what a particular painting 'meant' and she said: oh it doesn't mean anything, he's just experimenting with colour.

Same with some poems I suppose. They don't necessarily mean anything profound, the writer is just, sometimes, experimenting with form. Trouble is when critics start claiming they know more than the artist/poet what a picture or poem means.

Converging the Hartlepoolese itchybay thread with this one, I came across this video.
Now as far I am concerned, when it comes to art, this beats the living daylights out of the above scribble.