In “ Modernism, Postmodernism, or Neither?,” I had previously cited Johns’s inane sketchbook jottings and further observed: As translated by Leo Rosten in The Joys of Yiddish, that apt term means “To fuss or ‘mess around’ inefficiently and inexpertly.” One of Rosten’s sentences illustrating the word’s proper use fits perfectly here: “ He potchkees around with paint and they call him a painter.” Instead, they were engaged in what my grandmother might have referred to as potchkeeing around in the studio. As their own words attest, they made no attempt to embody meaning intelligibly. What Johns and Rauschenberg did is in no significant way comparable to what true artists have always done. Use this in a painting.” And “Take a canvas. Among their aimless jottings are the following: “Put a lot of paint & a wooden ball or other object on a board. Nor do Johns’s notebooks suggest any deeper meaning or thought. which I have chosen to limit and describe space.” 3 I feel that what I am doing is quite literal.” 2 And another: “ are just the forms. The visual meaning may be discovered afterward-by those who look for it. So I went on to similar things like the targets-things the mind already knows.” 1 On another occasion he explained: “My primary concern is visual form. took care of a great deal for me because I didn’t have to design it. Regarding his choice of these pictorially unpromising subjects, he told Time magazine: “ainting a picture of an American flag. Johns first achieved fame in the 1950s, with paintings of flags and targets. Typical works by Johns featured in a 2008 retrospective at the Metropolitan Museum included such banalities as Coat Hanger II and Flashlight, both from 1960. The pointlessness openly admitted to by Rauschenberg also characterizes the work of his younger colleague Jasper Johns. To begin, here’s what I wrote in Who Says That’s Art? (links are added here): In lieu of an exhibition review, therefore, I cull here some of my previous thoughts about Johns and his ill-founded artworld repute. Because I subscribe to the old-fashioned idea that art needs to do more than challenge prior notions of what art is. But I know enough about Johns and his work to suspect that I would have found it mind-numbing in the extreme. early use of common objects and motifs, language, and inventive materials and formats upended conventional notions of what an artwork is and can be.Ĭircumstances have kept me from visiting the exhibition in person. Johns’s groundbreaking work sent shock waves through the art world when it was first shown in the late 1950s, and he has continued to challenge new audiences-and himself-over a career spanning more than sixty-five years. What entitles him to an exhibition of such unprecedented scope? In the Whitney’s exalted view (generally shared by the artworld mainstream): Jasper Johns: Mind/Mirror-a mammoth two-part show at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York and the Philadelphia Museum of Art through February 13, 2022-is the most comprehensive retrospective ever devoted to Johns’s work.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |