Remember Metaphysician Undercover likened him/herself to an Escher painting.

I won't deny it, but I'm grateful to have read it after experiencing the work first. When I saw your painting, I felt an almost mystical sense of moving into the unknown. As the artist, you're free to shoot this down as a dumb interpretation, but it won't change the experience for me. Now that I know what the painting represented, it adds depth. But again, only afterwards.

I agree with what you say about my work, there is a tension in the act of viewing an art work between what the viewer experiences and what the artist wishes to convey. Perhaps the answer is to have the statement written in small script besides the work in the gallery, so that the viewer experiences the work before reading the statement.
Personally, I tend to ignore the statement, if there is one. Preferring to simply look at the piece and perhaps read about the artist. Often when attending a concert, I try to avoid reading, or finding out about the performance before I go in. I don't think this is necessarily appropriate for the general public, who often wish for some guidance as to what they are looking at, due to not being well educated in the genre, or artist.

I think what is important is to retain the maximum freedom and flexibility for both the artist and the viewer within reason and not restrict either due to problems on the periphery.

I thought you required polite considered debate.

So we would should treat the findings of the IPCC with caution, fair enough. Meanwhile California and Australia burn, the UK and Bangladesh and numerous islands flood regularly, southern Europeans die in extreme heat waves. The Greenland ice cap is shown to be irreversibly compromised. I could go on but why bother, we can't trust committees the're nothing more than gravy trains for the so called experts who sit on them.

You know, I have a problem with moss in my lawn. But I wouldn't ask a moss removal expert to deal with it, the're crooked. My neighbour has had a moss man coming twice a year for as long as I can remember and there's still just as much moss as there was five years ago. I think he is secretly spreading the moss, so that there's more work for him next time. If he solved the moss problem, he would be out of a job. I wouldn't let him get his hands on my lawn.

That's the official line. Was that a Chinese documentary that you watched?

This is the documentary, I don't know if you can watch it without a TV licence.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000btl7/panorama-how-to-brainwash-a-million-people

It was a long time ago that I watched it, so I can't remember much detail. Panorama is usually a quite reliable investigative program. I can imagine the re-education is quite brutal.

are you going to answer my question? So we can discuss it?

Politely of course.

It makes me think, maybe sometimes the statement might be more valuable than the piece itself. What do you think of Banksy's "statement", with the self-destructing piece? Isn't this a case where the statement is supposed to be more important than the piece itself? The problem though, as I think I mentioned earlier in the thread, the artist does not get to determine the value of the piece.

Banksy is an interesting artist, this is a work he produced this week in Bristol.

He turns the art buying and art establishment world's on their head like a kind or art terrorist. The person who owns the wall on which the artwork was placed is now potentially a rich person. But what should she do? She did have a perspex sheet attached over it to shield it after she discovered the work, but members of the public destroyed the shield (but not the work), presumably because they abhorred the concept of the shield defaming this piece of terrorist art.
She could have the wall removed and put in an auction, which would be very costly and controversial. But that might expose her to ridicule, or something.

Going back to the work which shredded itself. I saw footage of the event, it was fascinating. There were all those rich establishment figures in a packed room at Sotheby's the piece sells for over a million pounds and then the look of horror and shrieks form the crowd as it begins to shred itself. There was wild speculation about whether it was now worthless, if Sotheby's were selling some kind of fraud. The purchaser was said to be distraught and worried about the status and value of the piece.

I expect it is actually more valuable now, as it is unique. I welcome this development and am interested in art terrorism myself.

IPCC is a political orginization with a political purpose. You might want to read one of the exposees about it.

Let's get back to reality,
Where do you live? I don't mean the country be more specific. I'm interested in your local climactic conditions.

I bet you will find just about everyone posting here, from around the globe, are beginning to experience the changes in the climate in their location. Some far worse than others. You don't need to have blind faith is some some scientists to see what's happening, you just need to look out the window.

I think you may be correct about me being a Miro. I think I’m “The Beautiful Bird Revealing the Unknown to a Pair of Lovers”.

It seems plausible to me that the critical complex, for reasons I can't put my finger on, needs to wrap up artworks in a discursive web shot through with ethical considerations. I'm no innocent here, I do it too, but it does seem like a certain kind of smoothing out.

Yes, but from where I am, the establishment including academia feels they have a privelidge over the artist and the public, the viewer. Which is little more than snobbery. This is conflated, or tainted by large amounts of money changing hands.

I would counter that and say some works (hopefully all of them, actually) "invite interpretation", not explanation.

Yes, there are, but this is not to deny there are others which benefit from some qualification by the artist. I think the issue is with either the viewer being limited, or directed to view a piece in a certain way. Or the artist being limited by what a viewer, a critic, or the establishment say.

Here is another Gormley, it's so well known you have probably seen images of it.
Angel of the North.

By valid aspect of the work, do you mean that the statement may belong to the work itself so that without it, it would be unfinished? In that case I disagree.

Ok, I'll give you my artist's statement for my painting with the orange sky.

"Homage to Gormley"

Anthony Gormley is probably the most admired British artist of these times. He has created many cast iron installations around the country and the world. My painting is of this beach, Crosby beach.


There are many artistic works set on this beach by many artists, they are all to a degree a homage to Gormley.
Here is another one of my favourites.


So now you know all this, are you to deny my artist's statement and insist that we all stay where we were before I wrote this post?

Given the last election they don't need the support of the young to win.

Give it a little time. The Tory's do now have to deliver on all those promises.

Yes I know that student debt can be seen that way. But try getting a mortgage and say that to your broker.

Two things. People grow old and change their views and voter can be dismayed by poor performance. Only a few hippies stayed hippies. A lot of the radicalized youths later came yuppies and middle class. And that existential panic is actually good for any political party.

This crisis is real, it's deep and they can't see a way to avoid it. The younger generation is saddled with student debt and can't buy their own houses. They have become financially disenfranchised from the older, baby boomers, who benefited from the good times in the 1980's and 90's and the big increases in house prices. Not only this, but they have seen through the capitalism promised by the Tory's and can see how they represent the greedy and privileged. They look at the crises in public services and the lack of management of them by the Tory's. What is in it for them if they vote Tory?

Yes, he had quite a philosophical approach to art. This is the edition I have, I just looked on Amazon and they are asking £1000 for a copy, amazing. There are many books by commentators about his work, just google.

Yes, this is the issue. The traditional Labour voter has largely disappeared, due to social economic changes. Blair only got in because he managed to court the middle ground and moderate Tory vote, while the Conservatives were in a mess. So the majority is in the middle and soft right and has been so since Thatcher.

The demographic is changing though now. There is little support for the Tory's in the young and they have no strategy to win their support. There is an existential crisis around the corner for the Tory's and they know this. Which is why we have been conned into Brexit and a hard right agenda to try and force the country to the right.

Somehow I don't think it is going to succeed.

I might be a Paul Klee.

We could easily look at an exhaustive list of socialist states and cross-reference it with various indexes of quality of life, freedom, human rights records etc.

Socialism is a political principle, like capitalism. So called socialist states, may, or may not be practicing these principles. But analysis of these countries becomes complicated by the historical, cultural and social conditions. So is not a very helpful way of considering the principle.

What do you understand socialism to be? Is it just things like higher taxes on businesses, single-payer healthcare, regulated economy, welfare? Or is it comprehensive nationalisation? I think it's too vague to simply assert that "socialism is good" or "socialism is bad".

Yes I agree it is to vague a term without any qualification. For me socialism is the principle of the many working for, or contributing to the well being of the few (the vulnerable, or the minority). As opposed to reliance on the market, charity, or philanthropy, for the well being of the few.

I see it as a reaction to the subprime mortgage crash of 2008. The dominance of Capitalism was put under question, to restore the economies and the remedy the problem socialism might be in order. The trouble is the powerful vested interests within the establishments are becoming protectionist, they will fight against any move towards socialism, because it weakens them both politically and financially.

To them, the privileged, more equality feels like repression, a loss of that privilege and they will fight to keep their privilege even if it is bad for the economy, or the country. The answer in their eyes is populism.

Just a bit of fun, I think you would look like a Miro myself.

Then a Kandinsky, or a Miro? (I won't mention Escher)

Is it a Dali, a Toulouse Lautrec, or a Picasso?

Nice summary. Yes I expect Cummings to be found unconscious in some gutter somewhere around Fleet st, worse for wear.

There is talk about the border poll in Ireland and that it is a requirement of the Good Friday Agreement that the pole be held should public opinion in Northern Ireland demand it. This is under international law. Next Scotland, these are unstoppable forces and Johnson knows it, but he is prepared to throw the Union under the buss to get his term in No10 and save the Party*.


* I reiterate my view that there is a wider agenda than this. That it is imperative for the Tory party to do this on the back of Brexit to force the country to the right, while demonising Labour in order to secure Tory dominance for another generation. Because they have looked over the edge of the abyss of a turn to the left and socialism.

I wasn't trying to catch you out, that would fall into the category of artists and critics trying to defeat each other's arguments about the merits and meaning of the artwork.

I'm simply pointing out that you can't remove the artist from their work entirely, and that if the artist thinks that a statement of some kind is required to appreciate the work, then that is valid, a valid aspect of the work.

This is entirely different from the contortions of a conceptual artist trying to legitimise the work they have produced in an atmosphere of conceptually validated works. Or a sterile establishment comment by a critic.

It really is remarkable how rightwing voters, and people who just listen to the media, don't know what socialism is, or how it benefits them. It's just a dirty word for them.

It's even worse here in the UK, with the drip feed of rightwing ideology in the popular press. Most people, except university educated politics aware folk, equate socialism with Communism and would go for a privelidged rightwing populist loon every time. The fact that he will just make many of them poorer and poorer with less and less rights and greater social division, is just more socialist(communist) propaganda.

Sajid Javid, the chancellor of the exchequer, the second highest office in the government has resigned this morning. Having been given an ultimatum requiring him to dismiss his key advisers and accept some others appointed by No10.

Or in other words he refused to take direction from Johnson and Cummings. Interestingly he has been replaced by Rishi Sunak, who has had a meteoric rise recently, a talented hawk, who is married to the daughter of Indian billionaire Nagavara Ramarao Narayana Murthy.

More evidence of the new administration consolidating power in order to push forward a hard right agenda. Or it is a sign of the paranoia of Johnson and Cummings, turning inwards and demanding to hold all the reigns from the centre.

I’m a very stable genius.

There's no such animal as a stable genius. A genius is the epitome of instability. Trump is either speaking alternative facts, or highly unstable. Although one can probably speak alternative facts while being highly unstable.

P.s. I like deepfake, I'll add that to my vocabulary.

He sees opposing opinions as so foreign that he simply refuses to believe people will disagree with him

So I should believe you. As an outsider, I can see where the populism has been employed.

but will refuse to abide by his own standards and says nothing about those who serve to confirm his biases.

You didn't answer my question about the integrity of the office of the President?

As I see it the artist's statement became mendacious with the advent of conceptual art. There was a point where artists were presenting poor artworks and then propped them up with a lengthy ambiguous concept which they used to justify and qualify the piece. I experienced such artists being cross examined by critics, who were attempting to defeat the attempt to qualify the piece. It left me with a bitter taste in the mouth and I disregarded the piece out of hand. I don't think I am alone in this.

If an artist’s statement is needed, it means that work of art is uncapable of fulfilling its purpose of communicating the intended idea, and consequently it is worthless.

I think this is to simplistic, some works of art are carried out, or conceived of by the artist which are not evident in the finished work. There is a case, especially if the artist wishes it to be so, for some kind of explanation.

This is a work I produced a while back, I won't give an artist's statement at this stage, but I might later on to qualify the work.

What as a viewer do you see (as a work of art)?

NOS4A2,

Prove or otherwise admit that you have imagined it all. Admit you’re speculating. Admit you’ve invented it. Admit that you have no proof. It is a part of trying to be objective.

NOS4A2 is just trolling. He/she waits for posters to comment on the issues and then hits back with spin from the Republican propaganda playbook. There is no engagement on issues outside of this propaganda bubble in which the two sides are portrayed as locking horns. When outsiders point these things out, there is no response.

The whole playbook is based on Machiavellian divide and rule principles. The office of the president is treated with contempt, in plain sight.

Beating Trump shouldn't be the goal, transforming US politics and aligning it more with what a majority of people want should be the goal

I agree with what the US needs, but the populists just promise these things while smearing the opposition to get into power. Once in power the promises don't matter any more. If the Democrats make the same promises, they have to have something equivalent to the smear so as to discredit their opposition. They have to defeat the slogans like "drain the swamp" and "make America great again". Because the voter thinks they are getting the promises fulfilled, as well as make America great again, and to have a strong leader.

Is it because he served McDonalds in the State dining room? Is this what you mean?

Is that all you've got to say?

He's a laughing stock around the world, I wonder why.

He's squirming ;)

I don't know enough about him. I think though that to beat Trump they need someone who can equal him on the media stage.

Buttigeig is young and looks the part. It worked for Tony Blair, who brought the left wing to power in the UK in a country strangled by right wing biased media.

All he needs to do is pick Trump apart with slick sarcasm. The media will love it.

NOS4A2 is discredited as an impartial commentator here. He/she has gone around the block a number of times now, simply trotting out the same tired responses. If there is difficulty in defending Trump, just pull out a divide and rule trope and then anything your opponent says is smeared as jealous partisan scheming. It's right out of the Trump, "how to get into power using populism to play the media" playbook.

The fact that it is diminishes the office of the President of the United States, or deflates the integrity of the country on the world stage is not mentioned, it's an inconvenient truth.