Dean Walker on mon 26 may 03
In a message dated 5/26/03 1:27:23 PM Central Daylight Time,
Taylor_Hendrix@BAYLOR.EDU writes:
<< (for those concerned individuals, I will signal all future
impertinent personal information regarding the artist with the phrase
"damnable red herring") >>
I loved your post, Taylor. It was very educational and made me think. I
appreciate it.
Dean
Hendrix, Taylor J. on mon 26 may 03
Howdy all:
It pains me to say this, but after reading several recent posts on the
list I have come to the profound conclusion that H.V. Poor made some
weak pots. It can not be denied; as I type, I am looking at the glossy
black and white photographs in his _A Book of Pottery: From Mud into
Immortality_ (for those concerned individuals, I will signal all future
impertinent personal information regarding the artist with the phrase
"damnable red herring")
I have no idea what he charged for his pieces, but judging from the
really big pictures, any price was way too much. Outrage. To make
matters worse, Poor condemns himself with his own words. Damnable red
herring: "Loving drawing and painting, I follow wholeheartedly the
technique which I felt demanded least technical and scientific knowledge
and gave most freedom and richness to drawing and color. From the
beginning I had an obsession against letting technique be the
controlling factor. I even exhibited and sold cracked and imperfect
pieces if I felt the decoration was fine enough, as you would mount a
drawing, if you liked it, even though the paper was torn and
soiled....my sole criterion is still the life of each piece, and its
beauty of form and decoration, not its technical perfection." p87-90
And it is most certainly beside the point that this is a man who
believed damnable red herring there was something fundamentally
different between art 'saying' and art 'being.'
What laziness! Never mind that this man damnable red herring was one of
the four founding members of the Skowhegan summer school for promising
visual artists or that he was one of America's foremost muralists the
30s and 40s. Forget it that he damnable red herring painted beautiful
landscapes, still lifes (did I spell that right, Vince?),
portraits....or that he damnable red herring taught himself pottery and
architecture. No one could fault HIM for being over-informed. You
know, you can know too much, y'all.
What must give us from-the-gut, feely-feely visceralArians pause is the
fact that a man, dead and gone, would want to give what are clearly and
without shadows of doubt crapy pots immortal infamy between the pages of
a book.
We should burn that book. Better, we should hack that crappy mug site.
No, wait. We should hammer those mugs. Someone get Lee Love on the
phone.
Remember what the great Sir Willie A. Player once said, made-up damnable
red herring "All great works of art must stand on their own
recognizance," or "If you can't pay cash, don't touch the merchandise."
Taylor, T.I.C. in Waco
Pat Southwood on wed 28 may 03
Hi,
Hav'nt heard of him, who is/was he?
Like his philosophy though.
Pat.
Vince Pitelka on thu 29 may 03
> Hav'nt heard of him, who is/was he?
> Like his philosophy though.
Pat -
He may have made crappy mugs, as the original post said, but you would
probably enjoy seeing much of his other work. I saw his work for the first
time at the Everson Museum in Syracuse in 1985, and I was impressed. I did
some research into him, and he made much remarkable work before WWII. He
was way ahead of his time, at a time when there wasn't much groundbreaking
work in ceramics. He did ethereal, expressionistic figurative imagery on
ceramic plates, and many of them are very powerful. He was one of those
artist/intellectuals who made few pretenses about aiming for marketability,
although much of his work did find favor in his time.
Best wishes -
- Vince
Vince Pitelka
Appalachian Center for Craft
Tennessee Technological University
1560 Craft Center Drive, Smithville TN 37166
Home - vpitelka@dtccom.net
615/597-5376
Office - wpitelka@tntech.edu
615/597-6801 x111, FAX 615/597-6803
http://iweb.tntech.edu/wpitelka/
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