https://www.artbasel.com/artworks? See if you can locate the examples which I explain below. The painting here is thrown in because this is art critique but I didn’t want to get sued so I used my own work. Sorry. Click on the link for the really good stuff done by whirled class pro’s.
Behold these.
I did find some stellar examples of deepity and profundity, such as the one called “untitled” which shows a mysteriously affixed plastic bowl resting on a wall with an accumulation of powder near the bottom. That one really got me thinking. I mean, the bowl is blue – the color of happy skies but also the color of emotional melancholy, juxtapositioning the promise of a joyous new perfect day against the reality of our tear stained existence so poignantly illustrated by those myriad tears obviously in their DEHYDRATED form. So profoundly sad that it makes me feel groundless as evidenced by the white environment that has no top or bottom, depth, or proximity. This is very very deep. I can’t tell you.
Moving on, if my legs have the strength,
I was mesmerized by “child with a toy hand grenade” where the lad with the offending toy is undone to the point that his (dare I assume the specificity of his own inclination?) knicker strap is off one shoulder. He’s already undone without even recognizing how duped he has been both emotionally and clothingly! And yet, he looks at you like you could provide his traditional lunch of grilled cheese and tomato bisque despite his ability to blow you to smithereens – at least in his mind. Meanwhile, he has another little secret that the artist never shares, but which you instinctively grasp. He’s an imbecile. But imbeciles go on to congress, so he has a real future. Realizing that, you feel instantly safe. You know his grenades really are toys. He’s saving himself for then.
Along the way, one is both troubled and elated at the classic erasure of recognition for decency in the string of boozum and bare skin art which is secret code between the artist and you the patron that the rest of the world is nasty and depraved (the ‘troubled’ part) while you and the artist are paragons of decency (the ‘elation’) which is why the artist creates and you enjoy their nudie art. It reminds you how much better you are than the dirty minded slouches who don’t ‘get’ the high art of low standards.
All this could not prepare me for “the artichoke eater – first encounter) by Trevor Yeung which not only depicts a plate full of artichokian delight, but the mouth half of an Asian face presumably scraping the edible bits from an artichoke bloom LIKE SHE KNOWS EXACTLY WHAT SHE IS DOING. Pity. We’ll never know her. We have too little to go by. And there is the rub. Someone has the answers, but one we will never be able to identify. Oh the humanity! So there, miniscule person, there you are. You can never get your answers. Meanwhile, she – the one who “knows” has that bit of the wisdom of nature in her mouth giving her nourishment every hour of every day. None for you. Sorry. Serves you right for being you.
Now that was a disturbing piece.
“Thread and nut” and it’s obviously too nice to actually use. Maybe it’s stainless steel. Righty tighty leftie loosie stuff. It reminds me that there is a form and function to human pursuits and the collaboration of the conforming opposites holds everything together, except that there isn’t anything this is holding together, it’s just there. Pretty, solid, precise. useless. All mankind’s fasteners, good as they are, are worthless and hold together our human nothingness which I can’t see because it is not. So this piece is light because I now realize that human endeavors are of naught which thing I never realized, but now I have purpose. So I should get income. Then I can eat, which leads to a trip to the throne, which creates the need for paper products and a sewer system which creates jobs which allows the purchase of more foods which are ingested and keep the circle of life rolling along. I like this piece. It gives me peace. I realize as long as I eat and go, I am someone. Pinch it off.
And then there is the Picasso, which is maybe the art work that made him laugh the hardest on the way to the bank.
I think this stuff is of sufficient quality to be displayed in the Civilized Relativity At Portland gallery. Known also just by it’s acronym.
I hope this short critique of the best of modern art inspires you.
Save up your money and remember, the show goes on two more days in Miami. “In Miami” said just like in the Will Smith rap song.
