Entartete “Kunst”
Blue Boy, ees Preeence Beeno,
Ruler of Goodwin and Proctor!
I have been remiss. Three days have gone by without my commenting on a Ben Shapiro column titled “No Bodily Fluids in the Public Square,” which reveals, of course, the great liberal conspiracy to take God out of the public square and put bodily fluids there instead. Even better, the column gives the world the opportunity to savor deep thoughts on aesthetic theory by an associate in the Real Estate Practice Group of Goodwin and Proctor. It just doesn’t get better than that, folks!
[B]ecause art is so difficult, so amorphous and difficult to define, civilized people have shied away from attempting to place limits on it.
So, naturally a civilized fellow like Ben isn’t going to try to place limits on art. Or is he?
There’s only one problem with this strategy: If you pollute the artistic marketplace with unmitigated crap, no one will want to visit the marketplace. Art itself will die … . Art thrives most when it has reasonable limits.
Such as these limits. Okay, before anyone invokes Godwin’s law on me, just keep reading.
When there are no hard limits, artists who push the envelope are given the most attention. Those “artists” attract the most imitators. And so the “artist” who drops a crucifix in a jar of urine breeds the “artist” who douses herself in chocolate syrup.
I guess by “hard limits” Ben must mean the death penalty. Otherwise, you know, artists will continue to outrage young Republican lawyers by wearing chocolate rather than by, say, taking it out of the mouths of poor children.
And all of these artists breed the “artist” who supposedly artificially inseminates herself, induces her own miscarriages, films those miscarriages, saves the blood, mixes it with Vaseline, spreads the mixture on saran wrap and then projects the video of her miscarriages onto the saran wrap screen.
Ben has apparently been too busy reviewing deeds of trust to actually read a newspaper and discover that this was a hoax designed to scandalize people like, well, Ben.
All rights have reasonable limits. The right to bear arms does not include a right to own a nuclear weapon.
Ah, those liberal Harvard values have certainly rubbed off on Ben — although probably not so much as to have him exclude any other weapons, such as a shoulder-fired rocket launcher, from Second Amendment protection.
The public has an interest in preventing the pollution of its artistic culture — and the law should reflect that interest.
So those of you who invoked Godwin’s law a little while ago when I trotted out the Degenerate Art comparison, I bet you just regretted that, didn’t you?
As for the “boundary-pushing” performance “artists,” those “artists” who cannot work within the bounds of common decency should find another line of work.
Such as the legal profession. Or maybe as a columnist for Clown Hall.
Clif adds: The photoshopping of VB into Gainsborough’s Blue Boy inspired commenter tb to create this highly amusing injection of VB into another artistic masterpiece. My only quibble: I think VB’s johnson is much smaller than this depiction might suggest.
I know exactly what the VB is talking about. Why, I remember a few years back, there was some horrific photography coming out of Iraq. Hooded men attached to electrodes, men piled into a naked pyramid, smiling soldiers giving thumbs-up to brutalized corpses, and so on. Truly, leftist degeneracy knows no bounds.
Be fair. You know the Virgin Ben has a phobia about all bodily fluids…hence “virgin” Ben. Even worse, these bodily fluids issued from a dirty coochie, the one thing the Virgin Ben has tried most to avoid.
Ooooooohhh boy.
“If you pollute the artistic marketplace with unmitigated crap, no one will want to visit the marketplace. Art itself will die…”
No. Just no. Good god.
“And so the “artist” who drops a crucifix in a jar of urine breeds the “artist” who douses herself in chocolate syrup.”
Yeah, that’s the logical next step on the evolution of “things covered in other things” genre of artistic expression. Hey, you got asshat in my internets!
“All rights have reasonable limits. The right to bear arms does not include a right to own a nuclear weapon.”
Ohhhh, SOMEbody’s going to get hate mail over that little America-hating comment. I’m saving up for one of those keen Aegis destroyers, myself!
“The public has an interest in preventing the pollution of its artistic culture — and the law should reflect that interest.”
Or they could just… ignore bad art. I don’t watch crappy films or listen to tripe music, but you don’t see me trying to make federal laws out of it, do you? So you’re all in favor of free markets, unless those markets produce something you don’t like, THEN we need federal stormtroopers to step in and shut them down.
Perhaps you mean “Entartete Kunst”?
I’ve never understood why people who don’t do something be it a) go to a modern art gallery, b) listen to rap or c) watch cable television get so worked up about the contents of such things. If “teh market” is magical and always leads to the best outcome, surely conservatism can win the culture wars.
Is Gainesborough’s Shapiro holding a hat in his right hand? I believe so.
Yeah, goddammit.
Some art is beyond the pale and should be limited by law. Banned, confiscated, the artist imprisoned for a five year term and only released if he or she is willing to sign an agreement that he or she will never produce another work of art.
Of course, I KNOW what you’re thinking. You’re thinking “Well duh, mikey, but who’s gonna be the arbiter of what’s acceptable and what crosses the line”?
Well, hell, that’s a stupid question. Me, of course. Every piece of art produced will have to be vetted by me before it can be allowed into the public square, and by that we mean sold or exhibited anywhere in any way for any reason. And if I find that a given piece crosses the line, the penalties and sanctions are invoked immediately, without trial, hearing or discussion. And the work of art is destroyed.
Now this is an important job, so I’m going to need a seven figure salary and a private jet so I can keep up with the workload.
Now that you’ve seen a basis for implementation of this plan, I bet you’re rethinking your original ridicule of VirBen’s idea. ‘Cause now that you’ve thought it through you’ve concluded “hey, what could go wrong?”, haven’t you?
Oh, uh, one point of caution.
I REALLY hate ballet.
Sorry…
mikey
I know enough about church to know it’s a complete waste of my time, which is all I need to know about it. The fact that you find it a good use of yours says a lot more about you than it does me. And the things it’s saying…they ain’t good.
The guy’s a sheltered little tool whose entire worldview will fall apart the second a woman brings him to orgasm (c’mon, ladies, think of the readers), but he’s actually on to something here. Check out the stuff that came out of the Soviet Bloc during the late 70s.
I myself would prefer they just kept their creepy mitts off our rights of expression, but nothing would revitalize the American art scene like giving oversight power to bluenoses like Shapiro.
Disclosure: I believe NEA grants should be witheld from any visual artist who can’t draw Tippy, so my views on this subject should be taken with a grain of elephant dung.
Hey, don’t go hatin’ on real estate lawyers. Some of my best friends are real estate lawyers, and they’re not fucktards at all.
Unlike this goober.
The problem with your theory, J.D., is that some of my best friends are violent, mentally disordered substance abusing thugs.
And the fact that they are my friends is a crappy basis for anyone else to make a judgment about their value to society…
mikey
It’s telling that Ben considers a naked women covered in chocolate syrup to be more disgusting than a crucifix dropped in a jar of piss.
The “writer” who says that America is a Christian nation and should follow Christian Principals, breeds the “writer” who thinks anything that sends him reeling for the fainting couch should be banned.
We need a sterilization program.
By pinch-ass little wanks who somehow accidentally and without meaning to at all just happen to stumble upon all the shocking filth in the world. Naturally they are so shocked that they must inform the public of this shocking filth that it would have never otherwise noticed.
I’m insecure about the size of my penis.
Most art is crap these days and we just are afraid to admit that fact, even to ourselves. If you don’t believe me, go and look at some stupid installation that the NY Times dumps praise all over.
Mmmm, chocolate, naked women. Two of my favorite things. Can I haz beer, too.
Most art has ALWAYS been crap. Personally, I find this much more offensive than chocolate Jesuses or Piss Christs or elephant dung Madonnas.
Bob Ross? Pfft! He’s practically Robert Williams compared to this guy.
But Mikey, do you hate ballet danced to the Pixies? http://www.boingboing.net/2008/04/25/ballet-dancers-perfo.html
“And all of these artists breed the “artist” who supposedly artificially inseminates herself, induces her own miscarriages, films those miscarriages, saves the blood, mixes it with Vaseline, spreads the mixture on saran wrap and then projects the video of her miscarriages onto the saran wrap screen.”
Holy God that’s brilliant. As a hoax I mean.
There’s only one problem with this strategy: If you pollute the artistic marketplace with unmitigated crap, no one will want to visit the marketplace.
It’s true. Thomas Kinkade has ruined Deck the Walls for me, probably forever.
Hey, pedestrian.
You’re wanted on the thread below…
mikey
Welsh Person –
For years I’ve been threatening to take a defoliated dead Christmas tree, cover it with strings of burned out Christmas lights, wads of used wrapping paper, broken toys, turkey carcasses, etc. and call it “Ghost of Christmas Past”.
Stronger yet is my desire to re-interpret the Last Supper using the McDonaldland characters…Ronald in the center with a glowing Golden Arches over his head, with his own personal Judas – the Hamburglar – seated on the opposite side of the table, clutching the Burger King sack holding the thirty burgers for which he has betrayed Ronald. Title of this masterpiece: “The Last Happy Meal”.
….alas, inspiration exceeds my skill level….
You know, it’s actually kind of funny that VB should mention this, because I’m working on a sculpture of George W. Bush right now, made entirely of horseshit.
I’m working on a sculpture of George W. Bush right now, made entirely of horseshit.
I think they call that a “clone”, not a “sculpture”.
If you pollute the
artisticpolitical marketplace with unmitigated crap, no one will want tovisit the marketplacevote.This is what Ben knows.
Sorry, VB, our time does not have a monopoly or even the franchise on crappy art. Crap art goes all the way back to the cave art days. Whenever less talented cave artists produced crap, more talented artists would overwrite it with something better. Anyone who has strolled through an “art fair” knows that 95% of the art produced by any generation is crap.
And another thing – for the most part, avant garde art never really assimilates into the mainstream. It’s *always* avant garde.
Pop quiz: what recently collapsed superpower used to have the output of its artists closely supervised by bureaucrats?
we should be content with our lives and thankful for what God has already given us instead of getting bitter about things we don’t have.
…unless we’re rich, in which case we need to piss and moan about another capital gains tax cut.
Piefilter!
In retrospect, bodily fluids would have been preferable…
Well hell yeah.
I’m a BIG fan of urine – based displays.
‘Course, we tend to call them something altogether different.
But we still say bring the yellow…
mikey
This really happened. Not that I have problem with what the did – but it isn’t art. :-p
My greatest artwork ever involved my initials and some snow.
Thomas Kinkade has ruined Deck the Walls for me, probably forever.
Well if it’s any consolation, it looks like Kinkade has indulged in some questionable spontaneous performance art too:
Kinkade is also accused of urinating on a statue of Winnie the Pooh outside Disneyland Hotel in Anaheim, saying “This one’s for you, Walt.”
Take that, virgin Ben.
http://www.artnet.com/magazineus/news/artnetnews/artnetnews3-21-06.asp
I attend the Church of Teh Poisoned Mind
And this abortionist slash artist person shows yet again just how stupid and feckless Liberals truly are sometimes. Forget the infanticide art, she seems to be really on to something with being able to ‘induce’ miscarriages with the ease, apparently, of changing a tampon or something. Now that’s a marketable skill! Make an infomercial and Liberal Abortion Lovers™ everywhere would be snapping them up like hotcakes. She’d make, you know, a killing!
Yeah, America really needs to put God back in the public square.
Sort of hard to reconcile that with a “No Bodily Fluids” clause though.
What with the public executions & all, I mean.
Seeing as that’s the way public squares go in, um, roughly 100% of countries that “put God first” … Iran, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, I’m looking at you here!
Mandated & enforced standards for art.
Hoo boy, what a GREAT idea, huh?
Yeah, because eveeryone knows that monitored, censored, filtered Nazi art was so wicked tasteful & all.
Real intellectual too.
It’s easier than that. Get a progesterone-free IUD and viola, abortions every month for years! I know, my mom had one, and she told me she had an unreported miscarriage after getting it.
But I didn’t sniff for the dozens of baby brothers and sisters that were no doubt killed. Feckless, remember?
Lesly,
I jest madam, I jest!
Ben Shapiro:
Continuity error. Karen Finley was doing the chocolate syrup thing long before Andres Serrano photographed ‘Piss Christ.
Christ, Ben’s a fucking idiot. How long would it have taken to Google that?
.
I’m covered from head to toe in chocolate syrup right now, but I’m alone so it’s OK.
Thomas Kinkade has ruined Deck the Walls for me, probably forever.
That’s the “magic” of the marketplace: Thomas Kinkade is the perfect artist for people who buy pictures to match the new upholstery, as in, ‘Deck the Walls’, aka, ‘Swatch Yer Sofa’. If the Virgin Ben would stick to such fine mall-based chains as DtW, he would not risk finding himself shocked, shocked! by non-generic art products that haven’t passed the corporate marketing tests. Your own fault, Master Shapiro, for wandering off the Heartland(tm) reservation!
And before anyone gets their spotless all-cotton knickers in a twist about elitism, I have not only purchased collectible plates of my own volition, I even display them in my home, right next to the juried-show serigraphs. Despite Ben’s fondest dreams, here in modern America nobody can force you to choose between cutting-edge Arttttt and mass-market reproductions of stuff that just makes you happy to look at.
Hey, I’m famous! Teh Spambot said my comment was interesting!
First rule of WingNut Club:
Never let facts get in the way of a good pearl clutching.
Second rule of WingNut Club:
Never let facts get in the way of a good pearl clutching.
The whole point is to be Shocked and Outraged at the deviant, decadent devilish libruls. If the DDDLs aren’t doing anything to cause outrage, make shit up. Exhibit A: That story about the Yale student was (in addition to being an obvious joke) busted within hours of it hitting the MSM. Sapiro didn’t miss the debunking, it was just inconvenient to his rage-on.
Most art is crap these days
Sturgeon’s Law: “Ninety percent of science fiction is crud, but that’s because ninety percent of everything is crud.”
This really happened. Not that I have problem with what the did – but it isn’t art. :-p
From the Feministing post that you linked to:
I’m not going to get into a debate over what is and isn’t art, but I think what she did is much more interesting than eating McDonald’s for 30 days.
The only thing funnier than reading a Sadly, No! post is reading it out loud with a bunch of Sadlynauts!
The only thing funnier than reading a Virgin Ben line about a nuclear weapon is reading a Virgin Ben line about a nuclear weapon underneath a big-ass bomb at PR.
Thanks, everybody, for making me laugh and laugh tonight!
So what the hell…are people handcuffing this guy and dragging him into museums? No? Then what’s his problem?
There are lots and lots of music, movies, TV shows, books, etc. that offend and/or bore me. Guess what: I don’t pay attention to them.
Ah, Konservative Kulturkampf. A world where it’s always 1989.
If you pollute the artistic marketplace with unmitigated crap, no one will want to visit the marketplace….artists who push the envelope are given the most attention. Those “artists” attract the most imitators
Who else sees the contradiction in this?
“No one goes to see crappy art….but everyone’s paying attention to [art I don’t like]”?????
I’m wondering when was the last time VBen has been to a gallery.
Cuz the one thing all these right wing tools have in common when they write about art is the total lack of first hand familiarity with the art they’re writing about.
Get a progesterone-free IUD and viola, abortions every month for years!
You mean it has to be a viola? Won’t a violin work just as well? If you play the right key?
I’ll bet a six-pack that VB has a copy of that “Poverty Sucks” poster, you know the one, with the posh tit sitting on the hood of the posh car with the ice bucketed bubbly on the front bumper and OMG he’s got one of those classy gold-plated necklace things I never noticed that before HA!
UPDATE: Anyway, just had the Lagunitas “Gnarlywine” (what is the thing, they can’t actually call anything barleywine for legal reasons or what — it’s always ‘barleywine style ale’ or something). So that’s good. I wonder if there’s one called ‘Barley Legal’.
UPDATED AGAIN: There is, and it was for the tenth anniversary of a brewery in NJ (should’ve waited a few more years, eww)
Let a = artist
So that
acrucifix+urine = a(2)chocolate
Hmm… I’m thinking your math is wrong.
I’ve been a back-office, paper pushing, memo-readin’ wage slave (that may cause you to spend an extra $600 at your closing and you’ll never know my name) in the real estate business. From that experience, which involves an immense amount of dealing with real estate attorneys, I can tell you that real estate practice is where big firms, like Shitpiro’s™ employer, put the retards who’s surnames look good on the letterhead.
i just spent an evening with people who actually create and teach ART, so I thin perhaps Virgin Ben doesn;t know wha thte fuck he’s talkign about.
They also had lots if wine, if you didn’t figure that our from the quality of my spelling in my post.
I’ll bet a six-pack that VB has a copy of that “Poverty Sucks” poster, you know the one, with the posh tit sitting on the hood of the posh car with the ice bucketed bubbly on the front bumper and OMG he’s got one of those classy gold-plated necklace things I never noticed that before HA!
You know, Michael O’Harro is only remembered for that one picture, but he actually had a long and varied career as a professional douchebag
The fact is, I prefer to smear my shit-art on comment threads.
The fact is, you liberals make me dry-heave.
Sorry, “one picture” should have linked here:
http://www.povertysucks.net/povsucks.html
I can’t believe that nearly 20 years later Andre Serran is still getting flogged by conservatives. What’s next? Complaining about rap? Unbelievable.
It all started to go south a long, long time ago.
Homer Sprague, president of the New England Society for the Suppression of Vice, wrote that in 1882 because HE KNEW what a boy would do if he took a book with a verse like this to the privy:
Sprague knew that precious bodily fluids would flow, possibly even reaching the marketplace, because youth couldn’t resist the image of shameless avowals of deliciousness.
I hope that Ben will accept Sprague’s mission and use the new laws he proposes to get Whitman’s filthy poems out of American bookstores. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if you found copies of “Leaves of Grass” in high school libraries across our nation. I bet the kids are always stealing them for immoral purposes.
Gary, didja ever think maybe it’s the fact that you keep playing with your shit that’s causing the dry heaves?
Just sayin’…
First they came for the dirt-eaters, and I didn’t speak up because hey, mouthful of dirt.
who cannot work within the bounds of common decency should find another line of work.
my sentiments about Republicans.exactly.
Btw, Ben’s mind needs some lye soap sudsing. It smells horrifically of hypocrisy.
I REALLY hate ballet.
Trust me, Mikey, if you’re exposed to enough Contemporary Dance, then ballet doesn’t seem so bad after all.
first they came for the dirt-eaters, and I didn’t speak up because hey, mouthful of dirt.
Damn fine album, by the way. Excuse me if I can’t be arsed searched for a You-tube version.
Ballet haters watch out, those broads may look like you could break them with two fingers, but they are all muscle and wear shoes that feel like concrete boxes.
As for the Virgin Ben and “modern” art haters, how long do they hold these grudges? Serrano and Finley? Why not Piero Manzoni? Maybe Ben’s still mad at Marcel Duchamp? Or about the Venus of Willendorf?
Telecom asks;
And, hey presto, from the Clownhall comments:
We aim to please.
Why not Piero Manzoni?
Good point. If anything will drive customers away from the “artistic marketplace”…
“And Ace, if you’re interested, I’ll be in my quarters at lunchtime, covered in taramasalata.’
“I didn’t know your bread was buttered that side, Bongo.”
“It isn’t. I’ve been happily married for 35 years. It’s just, a chap like you can turn a guy’s head.”
“I’m sorry, Bongo. Lunch is…on Millie.”
“Would it make any difference if it was…hummus?”
“I’m sorry, Bongo. I’m strictly “butter-side-up.””
Seeing Ben’s face hideously pasted onto the Blue Boy has inspired me to create this, using the other great masterpiece of boy “loving” art- Caravaggio’s Amor Victorious. I hope to Christ the img tag works:
Fuck. Clif, a little help?
tb – you can’t embed an image tag in the comments. You need to give a link to the image. If that doesn’t work send the pic to me at clif (put the at sign in place of this parenthetical) outs1dethetent.com (and change the 1 to an i), and I will figure something out.
I remain astonished that converatives are still harping on “Piss Christ” and the Chocolate lady–they do know that these were from the 1980s, right? They sound like Grampa Simpson doing art criticism.
And, just to end the list: Does this idiot realize that the art he no doubt
worships (eg, the Impressionists) were just as reviled when they began? In exactly the same tones of offended propriety? With exactly the same appeals to “objective standards” that were supposedly–well, actually, they *were*–violated?
The only thing more entertaining than an indignant WingNut ™ is a stupid indignant WingNut ™.
Oh, and Jennifer: those are two excellent ideas. I don’t know if you’d get enough characters to fill out the Last Happy Meal, but the Ghost of Xmas Past is tip-top.
I second theflix. Are they so bereft of material that they are pushing the same exact story that was out back when I was in college? And if so, I have two questions:
1) Why aren’t they bringing up Maplethrope? Surely, the man is still mucho offensive to this set. Come on, show Bob some love (hate)?
2) Should the artistic community step it up? How shocking are they if the best that VBen and company can come up with is artwork that is over 20 years old? Come on you producers of shocking “art”, you underminers of all that is good and decent in the world, get to it.
You want continuity? Before a yam came anywhere near Karen Finley’s backside chocolate syrup was employed in the service of art in Sweet Movie in 1974. From memory, the delectable Carole Laure took a bath in it to end the film.
Perhaps, then, art is devolving from a nadir of chocolate-dipping to revisit piss-dipping, to trend so logically, as the VB would have it, to the aesthetic of the Lascaux paintings? I vote we skip abstract expressionism!
That little virgin lick-spittle will get my nuclear warheads when he pries them from my cold, dead hands.
In 1967, Frank Zappa proclaimed he wished to:
“Cover my daughter in chocolate syrup and boogie ’til the cows come home”
– from the lyrics to “Brown Shoes Don’t Make It”.
Chocolate dipping never gets old.
Brown Shoes Don’t Make It
Fabulous! I bid one Gazillion dollars for it.
This could be a trace of Mannerism in Caravaggio’s technique. Artists of his time were prone to wild exaggerations in proportion, often rendering certain parts of the body much, much larger than they would appear in real life, straining credulity well beyond the breaking point.
Maybe teh Gey makes Ben feel all odd and tingly and in need of a cold shower.
You know, chocolate isn’t really a bodily fluid, unless you live in Candyland. Although… if Ben did live there it would explain so much.
For “The Last Happy Meal” you could always pad things out with Fry Kids and McNuggets. There’s more then enough of them to fill up the whole painting.
The abortion thing: What, no pregnancy tests? I think she should’ve gone all out to look credible. That Feministing article kind of irks me:
See, I’m not one of those “Oh, abortion is awful, I sure feel sorry for the little fetus, but a person’s bodily integrity can’t be compromised to keep another person healthy” types (Although I do agree with that line of thinking). I’m more of the “fuck fetuses” school of thought. Abortion on demand is abortion on demand, and it’s not my job, and it’s certainly not the state’s job to make sure you aren’t getting an abortion for the wrong reasons.
Anyway, this was a fine idea for an artistic piece; it doesn’t just tweak the bluenoses, it forces abortion supporters to confront their own attitudes.
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