October 7, 2012

"Then we heard the sound of a pen, but by the time we turned around he was pretty much finished with his tag..."


A man wrote "a potential piece of yellowism" on Rothko's "Black on Maroon." I'm not going to dignify yellowism by linking to any manifestos.

ADDED: "A Russian artist who claims to have defaced a Mark Rothko mural in the Tate Modern gallery says he has engaged in a piece of art and improved the value of the multimillion-pound work...."
"I believe that if someone restores the [Rothko] piece and removes my signature the value of the piece would be lower but after a few years the value will go higher because of what I did," he said...

"I didn't destroy the picture. I did not steal anything. There was a lot of stuff like this before. Marcel Duchamp signed things that were not made by him, or even Damien Hirst."

He said that he admired Rothko, describing him as one of the great figures in art of the last century, but added: "I don't believe that what I have done is criminal. If the police are going to arrest me, then they are going to arrest me. I am OK with that."

27 comments:

J Scott said...

If graffiti is considered art, then this is just more of the same.

The nihilism of modern art contains its own destruction.

yashu said...

Ugh. Idiot.

There's a trend here, publicized by the media, which would naturally motivate copycats, unfortunately. (The first two that occur to me is the woman leaving lipstick traces on a Cy Twombly and of course the infamous Cecilia Gimenez transforming Jesus into a primate in Spain.)

I really despise these people. (OK, maybe not if they're too stupid or psychologically sick to know better. But still.)

coketown said...

That's pretty funny. The guy sounds nuts. His manifesto sounds nuts. Here it is, since Althouse wouldn't dignify it with a link--as though ignoring it makes it not exist.

We believe that the context for works of art is already art. The context for Yellowism is nothing but Yellowism. Pieces of Yellowism are only about yellow and nothing more. All manifestations of Yellowism have the same sense and meaning and express exactly the same. In Yellowism, all the possible interpretations are reduced to one - are equalized, flattened to yellow. Interpreting Yellowism as art and being about something other than just yellow deprives Yellowism of its only purpose.

See? Batshit crazy. But funny. And no more dignified than it would have been with everyone in the dark about it. Live freely through yellowism.

The painting he tagged was ugly. This is an insular scandal for the insulated art establishment. Nobody outside that establishment cares. Someone wrecked a gaudy painting? T.S. Nobody cares. Besides, Mona--can I call her Mona? Or Ms. Lisa?--has been through much worse: acid-dousing, kidnapping, warped paneling. People care about her.

Wince said...

"I am not violating [free speech]. I am expressing myself freely against hate and racism."

Dante said...

Actually, I like this concept. Consider the idea of a huge wall, with a single idea written on it. Maybe one of the freedoms in the bill of rights. And all different cultures, over time, are allowed to write their reaction to it, allocated a contained space.

Oh, I like that idea.

Joe said...

The man's an idiot. On the other hand, the painting is a silly pile of shit.

Chip Ahoy said...

In my new medium, bottles, I do feel pangs of guilt by junking up with modern crap, up a perfectly good bottle that survived all these years, sometimes more than a hundred years. Bottles used to be really cool and sometimes still are.

That one bottle on eBay was dug out of a pit and shipped to me. I thought I accidentally tossed it with boxes, a lot of boxes due to incoming bottles and other crap, and the horror of the idea of that bottle being sent to the dump in Denver after being dug up from a dump in England was too much to bear. Bare. Bear. Bare. Too much to deal with. So I looked all over the place. Then it arrived in the mail. I got mixed up with bottles and pictures of bottles. Duh. It is someone else's art and I come along and goof on it. It's disrespectful. But then I think, so what, fuck 'em. Apparently I cannot clean up my thinky-thoughts.

And that's the way it stands, your antique art is my starting point, and what I do with it is pure crap, a lot less than your achievement, but so what, bite me, I'm alive and you're dead so shut up why am I even arguing with you?

I've been thinking, between things, a rice vinegar bottle goes straight up with beehive shoulders. That would be upsidedown. Howzabout going for a mini steam punk look with pieces of copper wire. Wire without purpose except for decoration shapes. You know how steam punk has rivets and gauges, and valves, and tiny thick porthole windows, and tubes that for all kind of unknown crap.

Similarly, I was impressed with the design of the Borg from the moment I saw them. I pulled up a stool and studied them on the teevee. I pointed out the details and remarked why each touch was so outstanding, why the whole thing such an incredible plateau, hallmark of sci-fi design, then looked back at Mum sitting there and she was looking not at the things I was pointing out but directly at me, nonplussed, dismayed, her son was quite insane.

Palladian said...

Defacing artwork in this way should be a capital offense. Funny that its often Russians and other casualties of communism that do this sort of thing. The appreciation of beauty and sensitivity toward the metaphysical was forcibly destroyed in these people, and replaced with a crass iconoclasm, a disdain for aesthetics and a love of pointless revolutionary action. We're well on the way ourselves.

Geraldus Maximus said...

Google Mark Rothko and then click images. I checked out his work. Granted, it might take 30-40 years of training, blood, sweat and tears, but I think I could do something similar with a enough inspiration. But, there is so much emotion and nuance I might never get there. My question is, where does he get all those crazy ideas?!?!

Geraldus Maximus said...

I read about him some. "Mark Rothko is one of the towering figures of Abstract Art." Towering, I tell you!!!

rhhardin said...

What happens to the copyright now.

Kirk Parker said...

Wow, life imitates Art.

Anthony said...

I was at the Tate yesterday, or more correctly, meeting up with my family who was standing outside while the sirens were going off. All the stewards would say was that "There has been an incident". Very British response.

Anthony said...

I was at the Tate yesterday, or more correctly, meeting up with my family who was standing outside while the sirens were going off. All the stewards would say was that "There has been an incident". Very British response.

Chip Ahoy said...

I'm bad. Read Coke's paste of the manifesto and that put the image of the Rothco ruined with yellow. I visualized Rothco, and I have looked at those before, and imagining them spread over whap whap whap yellow. Pure yellow. No subtly, no hidden statement, the statement is yellow and only yellow. And that being the art on top of art. I accepted the manifesto. To me it's as good as Rothco's post modernism. I'm sure you disagree, but I'm shallow when it comes to that. The kid coloring outside the lines of the coloring book, Rothkco end is the Russian guy's start, did appeal to me. It did add value. Now, that would be worth hanging. But then it turned out to be a just crummy dark signature and that wasn't as dramatic or startling, just random vandalism, no adherence to his manifesto at all, so now I'm back to hating it.

yashu said...

Chip Ahoy, how about this: Erased de Kooning Drawing.

edutcher said...

Too bad Giuliani didn't catch him.

This is what we get for indulging kids' petulance.

Rusty said...

Chip.
The bottle itself is just a piece of utilitarian trash. Even if it's a rare bottle, it's lack of ubiquity does not make it art.
You make it art. Or, if I can be crude, you give the bottle a new utility.

a psychiatrist who learned from veterans said...

@ Gerald. A museum in Houston has Rothko paintings which are stunning, a looming dark space floating in another lighter color.

Palladian said...

I checked out his work. Granted, it might take 30-40 years of training, blood, sweat and tears, but I think I could do something similar with a enough inspiration.

Bullshit. You didn't, and you couldn't.

But, there is so much emotion and nuance I might never get there.

You've got that right.

My question is, where does he get all those crazy ideas?!?!

Considering that Rothko's been dead for 42 years, you're using the wrong tense.

Anonymous said...

Rothko, like many other moderns, cannot be captured by a photograph. You have to see them in person to "get" it.

Paddy O said...

Probably an iphone user.

Yellowism sounds pretty derivative.

Using the contribution of another to build one's own identity, and thinking that in that construction the original work is worth more--egotism as, literally, an art form.

Paddy O said...

I would prefer, personally, a hooloovoo movement.

AmPowerBlog said...

Rothko's my favorite artist. Unreal that someone would deface his work.

Geraldus Maximus said...

Palladian said...
a lot of things.

Palladian, I will admit that I just don't get it. However, I am not the final arbiter of what is or is not "art." Also, it could be like a psychiatrist who learned from veterans said...that you really have to see it in person to get it.

jungatheart said...

I find Steam Punk dreary, but that's just me.

The Borg design was cool, but ultimately it called into question sanitation/secretion issues.

carrie said...

It's kind of like shouting down a speaker at a political rally. Drowning out the speaker's message so that your message will be heard instead.