Art
Older than prefrontal cortical thought
With patience playfully in sand wrought
To you brought
By Leonardo da Pufferfish
Art
That classical thought sought
And consumer culture convincingly taught
Plato and, much later, Kant probably envisioned the progress of humanity as intrinsically linked to higher moral standards and closely associated with the education of the state's citizens. The French Revolution was also, in no small way, a tribute to such humanistic thinking. The American founding fathers were almost fully drenched in congenial humanistic tradition.
But the mouthpieces of the consumer society, supported by economical theories, that sound and smell more like tribal mythic or mercantile ideologies with prominently displayed selectively chosen statistics to mimic quantitative scientific disciplines, albeit even winning Nobel prizes _ seemed to have hijacked the original ideal of the enlightenment, that is, raising brave, free, educated, and enlightened citizens of a state.
How could it be different in institutionally1 recognized art! It is phenomenally well supported by a statement from an artist from New York, Andy Warhol; acclaimed by the media and by the media-influenced new-age academics, whose works have become big assets for trade and barter in the very economy which they, for various reasons, celebrate. And the more sensational, provocative, aggressive, and defaming of others the work, the more media coverage! A most recent example, the depiction of the persons, who became mindbogglingly rich in the digital economies, as robotic dogs at the Basel Art Fair, Miami, 2025; it incidentally also included Warhol, for whatever reasons.
Green Coco-Cola Bottles by Andy Warhol
1962.
Acrylic, screenprint, graphite on canvas
Whitney Musuem
https://whitney.org/collection/works/3253
What’s grand about this country is that America started the tradition where the richest consumers buy essentially the same thing as the poorest... you can know that the President drinks Coke, Liz Taylor drinks Coke, and, just think, you can drink Coke, too. A Coke is a Coke, and no amount of money can get you a better Coke.
Although a laudable achievement of a nation in many ways, albeit today, after just two decades with 1% have-all 99% have-not-much, affording a coke sounds so childish a claim, such thinking unfortunately does not celebrate the coming of age of a human being, by virtue of one's morality, education, and critical thinking, but regards the buying power of the citizen as the sole determinant of human progress.
As a member of the consumer society, I have, of course, my own Readymade.
A Tachikawa Nib Holder
A digital Readymade, slightly modified, downloaded from:
:http//www.jetpens.com/Tachikawa-Comic-Pen-Nib-Holder-for-Various-Pen-Nib-Model-25/pd/4583
“It is neither trendy nor provocative,” did I hear you say?
It is, in fact, the opposite of that, rendered in no less passionate, even if not trendy, voice. It celebrates the enlightened classical thought, without which the new-age protesters would probably not have the means and the technology with which they so vociferously protest against the past legacy. It is, in short, a tribute to classical learning, and in my opinion, well represented by ink and nib.
artworks of milos bhat
in stone and textile wrought
... And Hollywood's influence had even penetrated the academic realms as far away as Berlin! I once got acquainted with a group of HDK students in Berlin, who invited me to join them on the Annual Student Exhibition Day at this relatively prestigious academy. All that the students seemed to know about Western art seemed to be just Andy Warhol and his Marilyn Monroe; they did not know much about Phidias, let alone their own Albrecht Dürer or the Berliner Karl Friedrich Schinkel or the more recent Hans Scharoun, whose masterworks are just a foot walk away from the HDK and, who, although a modern Expressionist, did not propound severing the ties with the local or foreign, like Chinese traditions. You could hardly talk about any art except Warhol and Lichtenstein! You felt you were in some kind of cult! Even the rock musician Lou Reed was celebrating Andy Warhol! But most surprising of all, it seemed that the sacrosanct German academy was on the verge of marrying the marketing industry! The students had been taught what it was dictating! Warhol was everywhere in their exhibits, as was his Hollywood icon!