Old art and letting it go

[tsumik]

I was think about this while looking at paintings at the high musuem. Paintings that were several hundred years old and depicted various landscapes and people. I honestly was quite bored with most of them. I love art don't get me wrong and I have a grand respect for these painters and their skill, but something about looking at a 300 year old painting of unknown people talking just bores me to death.

So these painting just keep pileing up. In the back of musuem store rooms, private estate vaults, and goodness knows where else. and while it shows a lot of history at what point does one simple let it go? And did these painters ever think or hope their paintings would out last them like children?

So we store these psuedo legacies of these painters and put the out on display from time to time. Here is so and so from the 1700s who was responsible for this little tiny movement in this little tiny town after he came back from this little tiny voyage from spain. We'll keep his painting for another 500 years cause it's part of our history. Yeah great but doesn't this go against the cycle of nature? Things die and decay away to make room for new things?

I mean could you imagine if animals did the same things or if plants did also? Saving the best acorn foraged to show younger generations of squirrals about the year the birds came and took all the nuts in a little tiny town in indiana. Or saving various pine cones for all the little pine cones to see of the intricate seeds a particular group of evergreens from a tiny little nursery in france. Seems sort of silly doesn't it?

So while I can appreciate these painting part of me feels we spend too much time holding onto the past and instead of building a better future. I'm definitely guilty of the same as I save everything. Every year I go through my boxes and look through all the knicknacks, cards, reciepts, rocks, brochures, etc. I hold each in my hand and if I can no longer remember why I saved it out it goes. If the memory that's associated with it no longer holds significant spaces in my head it more then likely doesn't need to be saved. After a few years I end up with memory concentrate. This purified mass of items that each piece has a nearly instant emotion or memory attached.

So is that what musuems are? Memory concentrate? At wht point do they do their yearly look through and chuck a few paintings? I think at some point they forgot you have to clear some stuff out to allow for new stuff. Cause there sure seemed to be a lot of painting that help little value versus some of the other musuems I've been in had a lot of memory concentrate.

Comments

[moober.livejournal.com]

Who would make the call as to what's valuable and meaningful, and what's not? I think that's why there is so much of this stuff in museums - what moves one person might be boring to someone else, and vice versa.

I think you could say the same thing about music. Should we keep recording and performing *all* of these old dead people's music, or just keep making room for new stuff? Again, some of classical music is boring to one person, yet can make someone else cry. I guess there are "highlights" from every art genre, the pieces that everyone is most familiar with, but I wouldn't necessarily say that those pieces are the best representation of that artist's work.

I'm rambling, don't even know if this makes sense. :)

Oh, BTW, I had lunch with Chris Jenson last Friday. He says hi. :)

[c10sneak.livejournal.com]

I agree with the other comment - value is subjective.

But then the libertarian comes out. Museums are publicly funded (at least that's my understanding), and aren't really the result of any market decision. *Some* people may value the art, but everyone has to fund it. Would museums be around if they weren't given such funding? Would art lovers step up and give enough to support them? Would museums charge more to keep up? I don't know. Funded as they are now, they are not an accurate result of an aggregation of individual preferences. /semi-rant

I enjoy art too, but not *all* of it. I feel guilty going into museums sometimes because I skip a lot of stuff that I find to be boring or ugly or uninteresting. If it were up to me, it wouldn't be there. But that's my preference.

I'll end this comment before I trip over my tongue even more.

[c10sneak.livejournal.com]

Oh, and I also totally relate to the memory concentrate idea. I've saved receipts and movie ticket stubs and miscellaneous stuff for years. I recently cleaned up a bunch of it, and whew was it cathartic. It wasn't any one memory, but looking at all those slips of paper and little pieces of junk and deciding to throw them away or not - I was deciding if I should let go of the last tangible shreds of evidence that those events happened.

[raistlinvassago.livejournal.com]

Places like the Smithsonian are funded by taxpayers and such as well as some private funding, but i believe most places in Atlanta, such as the High Museum and Fernbank and Zoo Atlanta get most of their funds by selling tickets. That's why the Smithsonian is free and the High Museum is not.
I'm very appreciative of art (being that I'm an artist myself :) ) but i like a museum that keeps the art fresh, moves some things in and out and gets new and interesting works in once in a while to see, otherwise i won't be visiting much, especially if i have to pay $18 a visit to see the same old thing. I strongly believe that instead of clinging to the oldies but goodies, museums should embrace newer artists and help boost a few careers. There are too many out there with talent and amazing works that go unnoticed because museums are still fawning over landscapes in Antwerp from the 1500's.

[c10sneak.livejournal.com]

btw, what's your username mean? I think I know where "raistlin" came from, but I'm gonna go google "vassago" now.

[raistlinvassago.livejournal.com]

oh, :) its just a couple of characters from different books i've read.

[craftybastard.livejournal.com]

I always though of them as places to enjoy an artist works, while they are still capable of being viewed.... though it seems like paintings can last forever.... they like us, also have a life span. :)