Martin Rice on sun 21 mar 10
I think I understood what Fred Parker meant in his letter. I had felt the s=
ame way. In my academic days as a literary scholar, I was, fortunately, too=
late to be bitten by the structuralism, deconstructionism, etc. bugs. But =
I remember how the young asst. profs. used to say Jacques Derrida's name al=
ways with some kind of hushed reverence whenever they spoke. They would quo=
te lines of the master such as: ""To pretend, I actually do the thing: I ha=
ve therefore only pretended to pretend." There are a million of them.
Then, reading the following this morning from Lee:
"They say thought isn't the problem, but the thought chasing
thought. The thought of a thought of a thought, that keeps you from
the original experience.
"Katagiri Roshi used to say, "It is when you are in the woods
and see the Moose. It is the 'Ah!', before you say, 'A Moose!'"
He actually saw a Moose at the North Shore of Lake Superior once and
had this epiphany."
I just cracked up, laughed so loudly my wife hurried over to see what was s=
o funny. This reads like a brilliant satire. The first paragraph could be a=
Derrida quote and the second . . . well, unique, I guess. Has anyone else =
ever had a moose epiphany? I just love it!
Vince in his defense of the Japanese thing writes: "I have a little trouble=
with Western potters using the Japanese names for various teabowls. That =
is a little cloying and inbred." Well, I think this is just the kind of th=
ing that Fred was referring to, this and a lot more that appears from time =
to time in the annals of Clayart. And I didn't read anything in Fred's emai=
l that denigrated the "Japanese wood-fired aesthetic," as Vince put it.
Rather he's hitting on the fact that "potters constantly speak in hushed to=
nes and high reverence of the designated Japanese 'masters' and 'national t=
reasures' . . ." and he's certainly right on the money. The postings here a=
re frequently just dripping with reverent references to Japanese place name=
s, potter names, Japanese words for this and that, references to stays ther=
e, apprenticeships, masters, etc., etc. And that's fine, I guess, but it's =
that name-dropping, place-dropping, Japanese vocabulary-dropping breathless=
tone that eventually grates and also makes one laugh.
Fred was right on the money here, in my opinion, about many of us. He wasn'=
t denigrating the Japanese tradition.
Martin
Who fondly remembers his stay at a hotel at Maihama, Japan, only 0.6 km fro=
m Tokyo Disneyland (true :-)
KATHI LESUEUR on sun 21 mar 10
On Mar 21, 2010, at 7:52 AM, Martin Rice wrote:
> I think I understood what Fred Parker meant in his letter. I had
> felt the same way. In my academic days as a literary scholar, I
> was, fortunately, too late to be bitten by the structuralism,
> deconstructionism, etc. bugs. But I remember how the young asst.
> profs. used to say Jacques Derrida's name always with some kind of
> hushed reverence whenever they spoke. They would quote lines of the
> master such as: ""To pretend, I actually do the thing: I have
> therefore only pretended to pretend." There are a million of
> them......
>
> Rather he's hitting on the fact that "potters constantly speak in
> hushed tones and high reverence of the designated Japanese
> 'masters' and 'national treasures' . . ." and he's certainly right
> on the money. The postings here are frequently just dripping with
> reverent references to Japanese place names, potter names, Japanese
> words for this and that, references to stays there,
> apprenticeships, masters, etc., etc>>>
It's always entertaining to see how people "not in the know" respond
to work held in such high regard as the Japanese masters. Years ago,
when I was chairman of the Standards committee for the Michigan Guild
of Artists and Artisans, I made and inserted slides of Hamada's work
in the standards review. And, just for grins and giggles I also did
it with a Texas painter named G. Harvey whose paintings were going
for $30,000 or more (and if I'd had a spare $30,000 I'd have bought
one even though cowboy" art" is not my thing). Both failed to make
the cut. Hamada, especially, was criticized for his lack of
craftsmanship. Of course, no one knew they were looking at a Japanese
master. They thought the slides were from some American potter.
I would dare say that the response by those judging other things, say
an English Comp panel judging Jacques Derrida's work without any
knowledge of his exalted position, would have the same response.
KATHI LESUEUR
http://www.lesueurclaywork.com
Lee Love on sun 21 mar 10
Martin,
Sometimes we are like little children, and what is not in
our experience seems amusing. That is totally natural. It is how
we keep in touch with our youth. I bet you laughed a lot at
Maihama. You get out away from Tokyo (Tokyo has more in common with
NYC than it does the rest of Japan), and you'll see a lot of things
that seem peculiar. But one of the major things about getting out of
your culture, especially for longer periods, is that you start to see
your own culture in a new light.
There is a good book on psychology and how the mind
works in time.
http://www.amazon.com/ZEN-TRAINING-Philosophy-Katsuki-Sekida/dp/0834801140
In meditation, you can see exactly how it works.
Sekida speaks of thought being in quantum packets called nen.
Here is a little essay, putting it in short form:
http://members.core.com/~ascensus/docs/nen.html
Sometimes things seem funny. But folks have to speak
from their experience.
--
Lee, a Mashiko potter in Minneapolis
http://mashikopots.blogspot.com/
=3D93Observe the wonders as they occur around you. Don't claim them. Feel
the artistry moving through and be silent.=3D94 --Rumi
Lee Love on sun 21 mar 10
On Sun, Mar 21, 2010 at 7:04 AM, KATHI LESUEUR
wrote:
>
> I would dare say that the response by those judging other things, say
> an English Comp panel judging Jacques Derrida's work without any
> knowledge of his exalted position, would have the same response.
Much is dependent upon what work we chose to represent the artist.
We can really skew the perspective if we want to. Especially
someone like Hamada, whose work is all over the place. He made some
real clunkers, but the freedom he allowed himself is what allowed his
masterpieces. It is too bad you couldn't explain that aspect.
The same could be done with Picasso, except that his work
is so well known to artiste that you probably couldn't fool your
artist. Probably Voulkos too. It has little to do with the
Japaneseness of Hamada. Actually, there is a lot of the West in his
work that he learned from Leach and his time in Europe. Most of the
work he made in Mashiko was never made by Mashiko potters before he
did it.
--=3D20
--
Lee, a Mashiko potter in Minneapolis
http://mashikopots.blogspot.com/
=3D93Observe the wonders as they occur around you. Don't claim them. Feel
the artistry moving through and be silent.=3D94 --Rumi
Martin Rice on sun 21 mar 10
Lee:
I'm hardly a little child. I speak 3 languages other than English =3D
fluently. I've lived in three countries other than the U.S., as much as =3D
five years at a time. I've traveled extensively all over the world. I =3D
have a million and a half miles on Delta alone. I am sensitive to =3D
foreign cultures, having had so much involvement with them during my 72 =3D
years.
My involvement with literature and literary criticism was hardly =3D
something not in my experience, as my bibliography would show you =3D
instantly.
I didn't laugh at anything in Maihama except at Bill Atkinson, an Apple =3D
computer legend, who, when I remarked to him in the lobby that I thought =
=3D
all the little Japanese children in the hotel were just gorgeous, =3D
replied, "All children are gorgeous, Martin!" To which I answered, "Oh, =3D
give me a break, Bill." Other than that, I laughed at nothing else that =3D
I can remember during my travels in Japan, or any of the other myriad =3D
countries I've spent time in.
What I find funny, indeed hilarious, is pompous, uncritical, fanboy =3D
adoration taken to extremes.
Martin
Signal Mountain, TN
On Mar 21, 2010, at 9:15 AM, Lee Love wrote:
> Martin,
>=3D20
> Sometimes we are like little children, and what is not in
> our experience seems amusing. That is totally natural. It is how
> we keep in touch with our youth. I bet you laughed a lot at
> Maihama. You get out away from Tokyo (Tokyo has more in common with
> NYC than it does the rest of Japan), and you'll see a lot of things
> that seem peculiar. But one of the major things about getting out of
> your culture, especially for longer periods, is that you start to see
> your own culture in a new light.
>=3D20
> There is a good book on psychology and how the mind
> works in time.
>=3D20
> =3D
http://www.amazon.com/ZEN-TRAINING-Philosophy-Katsuki-Sekida/dp/0834801140=
=3D
>=3D20
> In meditation, you can see exactly how it works.
> Sekida speaks of thought being in quantum packets called nen.
>=3D20
> Here is a little essay, putting it in short form:
>=3D20
> http://members.core.com/~ascensus/docs/nen.html
>=3D20
> Sometimes things seem funny. But folks have to speak
> from their experience.
> --
> Lee, a Mashiko potter in Minneapolis
> http://mashikopots.blogspot.com/
>=3D20
> =3D93Observe the wonders as they occur around you. Don't claim them. =3D
Feel
> the artistry moving through and be silent.=3D94 --Rumi
Lee Love on sun 21 mar 10
Martin, I didn't call you a little child. I said that we all have
"the little child" in us. It makes us laugh at things outside of our
usual experiences.
Please my article in the next Studio Potter. It is a critical
perspective on Japanese ceramics. You really can't be critical of
things you don't understand.
--
Lee, a Mashiko potter in Minneapolis
http://mashikopots.blogspot.com/
=3D93Observe the wonders as they occur around you. Don't claim them. Feel
the artistry moving through and be silent.=3D94 --Rumi
James Freeman on sun 21 mar 10
On Sun, Mar 21, 2010 at 9:04 AM, KATHI LESUEUR
wrote:
>
> It's always entertaining to see how people "not in the know" respond
> to work held in such high regard as the Japanese masters. Years ago,
> when I was chairman of the Standards committee for the Michigan Guild
> of Artists and Artisans, I made and inserted slides of Hamada's work
> in the standards review. And, just for grins and giggles I also did
> it with a Texas painter named G. Harvey whose paintings were going
> for $30,000 or more. Both failed to make
> the cut. Hamada, especially, was criticized for his lack of
> craftsmanship. Of course, no one knew they were looking at a Japanese
> master. They thought the slides were from some American potter.
>
> I would dare say that the response by those judging other things, say
> an English Comp panel judging Jacques Derrida's work without any
> knowledge of his exalted position, would have the same response.
Kathi...
Doesn't your story strongly and convincingly make Fred's and Martin's
point? We value the name more so than the work, and as you
demonstrate, in many cases the actual work is almost irrelevant to the
exalted or celebrity status of the maker.
Cy Twombly makes some marks on a paper, and it goes into a museum. A
kid makes some marks on a paper, and it goes on the refrigerator. We
will argue that though they appear alike, the marks are not the same,
that Twombly's marks are informed, and therefore more important and
valuable than the nearly identical uninformed scribble of the child,
but this argument too does nothing but bolster the case that it is the
artist we value, not the art.
Some years ago I read a wonderful 1951 book by John Godley entitled
"Master Art Forger". It is the fascinating true story of a painter
named Han Van Meegeren. After being rejected by the academy and told
that he had no talent, he concocted a brilliant scheme to prove his
detractors wrong. He painted a Vermeer. He did not copy a Vermeer,
but rather painted a new, never before seen Vermeer. His plan was to
enter it in an art auction, allow all the great critics and art
authorities to examine the painting and certify it as a new,
undiscovered painting by the great master, then after they bid it up
to a fortune he would stand up and proclaim that the work was his,
thereby proving that he was a great painter.
Everything went according to plan. The greatness of the painting was
universally proclaimed, and the painting was bid up to a princely sum
of over $100,000 (late 1930s, early 1940s as I recall). With all that
money on the table, Van Meegeren got greedy, changed his plans, and
allowed the sale to be consummated. Over then next several years he
painted and sold many more, with the prices for his work, which was
believed to be Vermeer's, reaching half a million dollars.
To make a long story short, the plot eventually crumpled. Van
Meegeren's paintings went from hundreds of thousands of dollars to
nearly nothing overnight.
Now, how is it that the same physical painting, the painting qua
painting, can be worth half a million dollars yesterday, but nothing
today, when absolutely nothing about it has changed? The unavoidable
answer, of course, is that the value resided not in the object itself,
but rather only in the name of the maker of the object. If the
painting was good yesterday, it is good today, as it has not changed.
One can make an analogy to other star artists, star musicians, star
actors, or star potters. Is their work really so different from the
rest, or are they merely the ones who were "picked".
So to my point (and I do have one). We tend to simply dismiss the
supposed lack of taste, understanding, or discernment of the masses,
the philistines, the common rabble with a smug or superior "They do
not understand". We, the educated, know that X is a great artist, or
actor, or singer, or writer, so we therefore defend the product of
these great artists in an automatic fashion. "Only a fool would say
that X's rotting cow head in a vitrine, or Y's wobbly ceramic cup, are
not great art!" We never for even a single moment consider the
possibility that the masses, the philistines, may be seeing, with a
child-like honesty and innocence, the work as it really is, shorn of
all pretense, and that the "greatness" in the work it is only the
product of our own overwrought and over educated intellect. Perhaps
the Emperor really is naked.
Just my opinion, for what little it may be worth.
...James
James Freeman
"All I say is by way of discourse, and nothing by way of advice. I
should not speak so boldly if it were my due to be believed."
-Michel de Montaigne
http://www.jamesfreemanstudio.com
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jamesfreemanstudio/
http://www.jamesfreemanstudio.com/resources
KATHI LESUEUR on sun 21 mar 10
At the time I tried my experiment I wanted to show that the "jury"
system" was just an opinion and had nothing to do with the quality of
the work. In both cases I chose to present works that were consider
the best by each artist. I was definitely a fan of G. Harvey. I
thought his use of light was nothing short of brilliant and had his
paintings been of something other than western things I don't think
the bias of the jurors would have affected their opinion of his
paintings. I'm not as much an admirer of Hamada but as we know,
others are. My point to that jury was that their opinion was just
that--an opinion. But it had huge effects on the lives of those they
were judging. Failure to pass meant the artist could not do the Ann
Arbor art fair and would loose thousands in income. Most of the
people supporting the system were very self-righteous and believed
that they knew good art from bad. They couldn't understand why I, who
they considered a good potter, would be willing to exhibit along side
of those people who they thought weren't good.
Today we revere the art of the impressionists. But, in their day, the
powers that be thought their work wasn't up to par. They wouldn't
have been juried into Ann Arbor. There is always someone deciding
what we should think is good, be it art, literature, or anything
else. But, in the end I think the opinion of the common man most
often prevails.
In the Toledo Art Museum there is a roomful of donated art. Things
that donors purchased over the years at art fairs or exhibits and got
rid of by donating them to the museum. I call it a history of bad
art. Trendy at the time but not able to stand up in the long run. I
think that will be the fate of much of the exalted art of today.
KATHI LESUEUR
http://www.lesueurclaywork.com
On Mar 21, 2010, at 11:01 AM, James Freeman wrote:
> On Sun, Mar 21, 2010 at 9:04 AM, KATHI LESUEUR
>
>
>
> Kathi...
>
> Doesn't your story strongly and convincingly make Fred's and Martin's
> point? We value the name more so than the work, and as you
> demonstrate, in many cases the actual work is almost irrelevant to the
> exalted or celebrity status of the maker.
>
> Cy Twombly makes some marks on a paper, and it goes into a museum. A
> kid makes some marks on a paper, and it goes on the refrigerator. We
> will argue that though they appear alike, the marks are not the same,
> that Twombly's marks are informed, and therefore more important and
> valuable than the nearly identical uninformed scribble of the child,
> but this argument too does nothing but bolster the case that it is the
> artist we value, not the art.....
>
> So to my point (and I do have one). We tend to simply dismiss the
> supposed lack of taste, understanding, or discernment of the masses,
> the philistines, the common rabble with a smug or superior "They do
> not understand"..... We never for even a single moment consider the
> possibility that the masses, the philistines, may be seeing, with a
> child-like honesty and innocence, the work as it really is, shorn of
> all pretense, and that the "greatness" in the work it is only the
> product of our own overwrought and over educated intellect. Perhaps
> the Emperor really is naked.
>
Lis Allison on sun 21 mar 10
wrote:
> > It's always entertaining to see how people "not in the know" respond
> > to work held in such high regard as the Japanese masters. ....
James Freeman wrote:
> Doesn't your story strongly and convincingly make Fred's and Martin's
> point? We value the name more so than the work, and as you
> demonstrate, in many cases the actual work is almost irrelevant to the
> exalted or celebrity status of the maker.
What is a Great Artist? Person who makes Great Art.
What is Great Art? Art made by a Great Artist.
Think about for a while! There is a deep grain of truth here. Making Art
is not making one terrific piece, it is living the life, being the artist,
making many....
Lis
--
Elisabeth Allison
Pine Ridge Studio
www.Pine-Ridge-Studio.blogspot.com
Lee Love on sun 21 mar 10
On Sun, Mar 21, 2010 at 11:29 AM, Lis Allison wrote:
>
> What is a Great Artist? Person who makes Great Art.
> What is Great Art? Art made by a Great Artist.
>
> Think about for a while! There is a deep grain of truth here. Making Art
> is not making one terrific piece, it is living the life, being the artist=
=3D
,
> making many....
Many folks appreciate Hamada's life example more than his pots.
He learned a way of living when he lived in England.
Leach took Hamada to visit the English weaver Ethel Mairet in
Ditchling. We was interested in the way these educated folks could
work and prosper in the countryside, bringing a cosmopolitan mind to
the country. When he went back to Japan, Tokyo was in ruins from a
terrible earthquake. His friend in Kyoto, Kanjiro Kawai, wanted him
to settle down in Kyoto, because of the disaster in Tokyo. But
Hamada refused. He wanted set up country living in Mashiko, inspired
by the example of Mairet, Eric Gill and other folks in the arts and
crafts movement in England. So he set up in Mashiko.
--
Lee, a Mashiko potter in Minneapolis
http://mashikopots.blogspot.com/
=3D93Observe the wonders as they occur around you. Don't claim them. Feel
the artistry moving through and be silent.=3D94 --Rumi
James Freeman on sun 21 mar 10
This evening, while passing a few idle minutes before journeying to
the land of nod, I came across a website called
pictureisunrelated.com. It's tag line is "Look! I found u some
crazy!!!", and it is a collection of co-called "WTF" pictures, photos
of the oddest, most inexplicable subject matter on the planet, photos
that make you scratch your head and say "What the f-ck???" There, on
page 15, is a photo of the Beth Cavender-Stichter (sp) kissing billy
goats from the last issue of Ceramics Monthly.
While we, the educated, the informed, insist that such things are
great art, the rest of the world laughs at us, or exclaims "WTF???".
The point I tried to make in the last post is that we never, even for
a moment, consider that the great unwashed may be seeing clearly, and
that we may be the ones who delude ourselves.
We insist that the Hamada pots are great art because we are educated
enough to know that Hamada is a great artist, yet a jury, in an art
analog to a blind taste test, sees ho-hum pots. We insist that the
light-filled cowboy paintings are great art because the painter is a
great artist, yet the jury sees ho-hum work. We insist that a rotting
cow head in a vitrine or a giant inflatable bunny cast in steel is
great art, while the public, the know-nothings, see nonsense. Should
we ever leave our cloistered and inbred art world, we might be shocked
by what little regard the world at large holds toward our
self-proclaimed great art. Why do we smugly dismiss them? Why do we
never consider that they may, even if in some tiny and remote way,
have a valid point? We praise the vision and honesty of a child,
because we know that their view was reached without a shred of
pretension or intellectualization. We praise the work of outsider
artists, because we know that their view was reached without a shred
of pretension or intellectualization. Yet we dismiss the artistic
opinions of the "public" as uninformed and invalid precisely because
they were reached without a shred of pretension or
intellectualization.
Just some idle thoughts, at a very late hour, after a stressful day
and a couple of adult beverages...
All the best.
...James
James Freeman
"All I say is by way of discourse, and nothing by way of advice. I
should not speak so boldly if it were my due to be believed."
-Michel de Montaigne
http://www.jamesfreemanstudio.com
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jamesfreemanstudio/
http://www.jamesfreemanstudio.com/resources
On Sun, Mar 21, 2010 at 1:29 PM, Lis Allison wrote:
> =3DA0 wrote:
>
>> > It's always entertaining to see how people "not in the know" respond
>> > to work held in such high regard as the Japanese masters. ....
>
> =3DA0James Freeman wrote:
>
>> Doesn't your story strongly and convincingly make Fred's and Martin's
>> point? =3DA0We value the name more so than the work, and as you
>> demonstrate, in many cases the actual work is almost irrelevant to the
>> exalted or celebrity status of the maker.
>
> What is a Great Artist? Person who makes Great Art.
> What is Great Art? Art made by a Great Artist.
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