Man Attacked By Babies?

If you say so.

It’s still not art.

I can say that without feeling the need to judge you personally.

I have never understood why so many people seem to feel they have to attack someone personally just because they don’t agree with something as stupid as a statue.

Want my interpretation of art? Just look up there at the top and click on my Bowie blog. It’s an entire blog dedicated to the art surrounding David Bowie. I’ve got gay people out the wazzoo, I’ve got people so strange they were never accepted in their own country. I’ve got people that defined entire cultural trends. What I don’t have is a single post in that entire blog where someone made something exactly as it appears in real life. That’s not art to me.

And, as offended as you may feel because more people did not think it was art, that’s the fact in that poll. How many other options there is irrelavent, they have the right to say it’s art and chose not to.

As far as the crime aspect which seems to have you so torqued, if that were merely a photograph of a naked man kicking a baby, he would be prosecuted for child abuse and probably do some jail time. So, the depiction of a crime, as in the case of porn, can be a crime in itself. I’m not willing to go that road, but as a judgmental option, it’s valid.

I agree with the other Matt. You lose.

I’d go into the details of how you lose, but you’ll just try to justify your perspective.

Don’t bother. You are wrong in every way.

I happen to think it’s pretty funny. The series “The Human Condition” have a series of very beautiful sculptures, and even though I’m not an art guy, I really do appreciate the whole series. It shows the absurd, the beautiful, and the everyday of human life. I don’t really understand that statue at all, but at least I can laugh at it – and appreciate the rest of the sculptures. The statue is quite hidden away, compared to the rest of the statues, which are displayed proudly on the beautiful promenade of the park. (Gee, wonder why… )

And if you do look at the statue closer (It’s pretty hard to get a good photo of it, because it’s directly behind the sun) the babies *are* attacking the man, and not the other way around. It’s not abuse, it’s completely surreal, and the concept of angry killer babies attacking a man is frankly fairly hilarious.

BTW, I live just across the street from the park. It really is a beautiful park, and I frequently walk through it.

Second BTW, your “poll” was fairly terribly biased.

I think it’s art but I respect the fact that you have a different definition than me. As an artist myself I don’t do things to be “interpreted” I do them because I have an idea for something creative and want to see it come to fruition. I mean, I guess deep down I’m hoping you’ll interpret it as “nice” and want to look at it but I really don’t care because, unless I’m shooting your wedding, I’m doing art for me. In that, I’m a different kind of artist than Vigeland and most other artists, including nearly all I went to school with, don’t understand why I don’t care to actively force my work upon the rest of world. Just like I don’t care to force my opinion.

It’s not art?

What if it was a sculpture of sad little parrot sitting in his tiny, provincial cage and bickering to the world: “This isn’t art, This isn’t art! Wah! Wah!”.

Now that would be art!

Your page is constipated by contradictions: You can’t write at first about how it ought to be torn down, while on the same page claim refuge in pluralistic ideas of art. Either you’re a boot-boy brownshirt who wants to judge for others or you ain’t.

At the very least, you’re sadly narrow-minded. At best, it’s obvious you’re uncomfortable with unusual ideas. At worst, you seem like a frightened animal, threatening to remove all the ones you don’t understand.

Perhaps the artist was expressing a fear of children. Perhaps he was worried they’d all grow up like you.

Good day!

as a parent i find it expressing a familiar feeling. that of being overwhelmed by the responsibility of parenthood, and its unshakable nature. i would agree that it is part of the human condition.

Why is there no place in that quiz where I can vote for “hilarious”?

I think it is best appreciated that each individual has their own definition of art, and to leave it at that. To give global statements that ‘this piece is art, and this piece is not’ without the qualifying “I think” or “To me” . . .well, it disrespects artists everywhere. Plus it leads down a very dangerous path indeed of acceptance and proverbial witch hunts. All that aside, you do have your opinion. Please don’t force that opinion on others by using the global statements (prolly why you did get a few strong reactions: you were telling people it is not art when that is not what they think, hence there is offense taken).

Cheers.

It is important for people to hold their own opinions for what they believe in. What I see here though is a contradiction of opinions in your postings and it seems that a few readers are commenting on that aspect of your postings, Moonage.

The one person who commented that the adult is being attacked by babies is much of an opinion as much as it is the title of the statue. It is called “Man Attacked By Babies” and under that title I feel as though the crime is not on the adult but rather the babies for attacking a defenseless and nude man.

As for the “porn”, if a person can appreciate art they can also appreciate the human body. The sculpture of nude children and man is not pornographic but rather the illustration of the human body as a naturalists viewing on it. If art depicting nude humans bothers you I can only assume that you find animals throughout nature obscene for its nudity.

And yes, this statue is hilarious in a surreal manner and a great piece in that it creates controversy and conversation.

This is a riddle, not a waste of bronze. It poses a question about life & the human condition. It is art. Only after it is understood and/or contemplated as art can it be “a waste of bronze”, granite. There’s your contradiction of terms. Try to think about it. Art is for people, not ungrateful zombies.

hmm.. it’s a matter of opinion if you simply like this particular statue or not, but it is art. it seems like people are forgetting that not all art is pleasant and is sometimes made to shock their audience. art is a form of all sorts of expressions.

there’s so much work out there that offends people like chris ofili’s “holy virgin mary” which has clippings from pornographic magazines. the artist also added an interesting medium to this piece.. elephant dung.

creativity also does not equal art. A LOT of people do not for instance call claes oldenburg’s “dual hamburgers” art because it just looks like a pile of painted mess.

moonage calm down, you are entitled to your opinions and these people who are disagreeing with you, these people with “small minds” like you said have a right to have an opinion of their own as well. that is your biggest contradiction to this post. putting up a poll and wanting to have a discussion over this piece without an open mind. for someone who enjoys art as much as you (or so it seems) i’d think you’d have that.

and please don’t quote anything from monty python movies just cause you’re getting flustered.

BEST STATUE IN THE WORLD!!! MAYBE IF THE MAN WAS KICKING CATS, THAT WOULD BE A CRIME……BABIES? BEST IDEA EVER…THEY’RE OBNOXIOUS

This is art, anything that elicits response is an art. Even if you don’t get it, or see the merit in it, it’s art. Go to a museum, and see if every painting evokes a deep understanding and appreciation inside of you. I highly doubt that. Art, like any other taste, is subjective. I may not like a band, but simply dismissing them as “Not qualifying as music,” is a wrong argument, based entirely on my own distaste for said band. This is art, I personally think it’s interesting, clearly an odd idea, created in entire absurdity. It is not a man attacking babies, the sculpture clearly is a man being attacked by babies. But I won’t try to have a lighthearted joke moment, you seem to clearly be against such things.

Point is, your personal distaste for something doesn’t disqualify it as artful. As long as there are, and clearly there are, people who believe it to be art, it is. End of story. Disagree all you wish, claim I, and all the other supporters of this basic tenant of art, claim we’re wrong, it does not matter. One could look at a Dali painting and see nothing but useless melting clocks. But not seeing the merit in something regarded as art, doesn’t disqualify it as art on the whole. Maybe it means nothing, or means something negative to you; Regardless, it’s still art, claiming otherwise is ignorant.

As such, the poll could be considered biased if it didn’t come from an entire article slanted against the statue in question, so the slant of the question seems to fit.

G’day.

You are an extremely misinformed person. I use that word where I wanted to use ‘stupid’, but if I started that, I imagine you would write the rest of my response off as a ranting idiot who doesn’t know what he is talking about. But, seriously, what are you thinking?

"If this were a photograph of a man kicking a baby, he would be prosecuted and do jail time" BUT IT’S NOT YOU ASININE TWERP. That’s the whole point. This is art. The question of weather or not this is art is neither subjective nor yours to answer. The answer to weather or not it is art is answered by the creator of the piece, and I am pretty sure he would answer that, yes, this is art. Art is an expression of something, it can be anything anyone wants to express. Artists do it in different ways, through writing, speaking, drawing, painting, sculpture, music. If you don’t want to consider it art, ha, so be it – who cares? Do you want to go around claiming cars are not called cars? Do so, nothing you can say, no matter how many people support you, will ever be correct in claiming a car is not a car. And you can never claim that something that the creator claimed was art, is not art. This entire poll shows an unbelievable misunderstanding, and is a complete farce.

I won’t even go in to how stupid the answer "endangering the welfare of minors is". I think it stands alone as one of the stupidest responses to a piece ever, ever given. Also, why are ‘hilarious’ and ‘art’ two separate answers?

You are violating your own logic. By saying something is crap, stating it as a fact with that language, those semantics, you are stating your opinion as fact. No matter how many times you have said it is your /opinion/, in those same replies you make statements of facts. People take them as states of fact because of the way they are phrased, because they are imposing. From what you have said, I don’t think this is what you want to do, but only state your own opinion. You could say I think this sculpture is a piece of crap, what do you guys think? But that’s not what you are doing. You aren’t coming to your readers on an even plane. You’re automatically pissing on everyone else’s opinion.

Also, if you say it’s crap, but everyone is entitled to their own opinion and that’s your opinion, why do you have such hard time letting people state their opinions without having an overwhelming desire to put up defenses. It’s your opinion. You shouldn’t have to defend it. So don’t. State what you think, why you think it, and let it be. People aren’t going to want to post constructively if you attack them the second they state their own opinions. It’s counterproductive.

The question of "What makes art art?" or "What is art?" has been debated ever since art came into being, so you can go on and on and on from your point of view of what art is, but the fact is, there are different schools of thought on this issue, and many of them are very well respected and recognized. Not all of them recognize each other (like you are doing now), but they were all created for the simple reason of trying to define what art is, to capture it, to reproduce it, to distill it and make it better. For instance, Clive Bell defended abstract art, claiming that the purest forms of art evoke an emotional response to the lines, color, and shapes. Therefore, an abstract piece that can move people to tears would be superior to a Norman Rockwell. Any subject matter, anything that has components that can be traced back to cultural context such as a painting with giraffes from the African plains would make it more inferior because it narrows the scope. It’s obvious there are a lot of people who would disagree, yet this school of thought is taught around the country in introductory art theory classes.

You are mixing schools of thought, which you can do in your own opinion, but that doesn’t mean people will respect your opinion. You are also rejecting scores of respected art history, which again, you can do in your own opinion, but be aware you are losing respect. You are basing your own school of thought on your /desired/ cultural context, which again, you can do in your own opinion, but be aware that you’ll end up with about as much respect as Hitler when he burned surrealist paintings and appropriated art for his Aryan galleries.

So, just because you say it isn’t art, doesn’t make it /not/ art.

I appreciate the answer. I think you failed to even acknowledge parts of my post, but that’s okay. Now that you’ve answered I’m curious, and not meaning to be combative. I don’t agree with you wholly, but really, I’m just curious. What is your notion of art? Let’s say, statues and or sculpture. Statues seem to be tied to the state’s agenda over history, so maybe that’s not the best form of sculpture to discuss. How about pure sculpture, not made from a government grant. What is something you would consider art?

Also, would you consider crossover pieces art? Something I would consider a crossover piece was when Andrew Goldsworthy took those balls of twine and twigs (and all sorts of nature) and froze them into big balls, like giant snowballs. The piece is called Midsummer Snowballs. Then he put them in well trafficked areas of London. This obviously falls under the category of installation art, but I think that what made it a good piece (whether art or interactive theatre) is that people interacted with it. It’s a piece that isn’t about the beauty of the ball. It’s about something natural in an unnatural space…but also I think much more. Obviously this piece is doing something more than just standing there. People interact with it. It melts to reveal different parts of itself. I won’t go on and on, but what would you make of something like that?

I wasn’t trying to say that you /were/ Hitler. I’m just saying that Hitler had his own notion of beauty and so on and so on particularly in art which is fascinating, but not very well respected. Not just because of what he did to other people groups, but because he was exclusive to the point of rejecting any form of surrealism and burning works that opposed his views. I’m not suggesting you go out and burn art either, but Hitler’s thoughts on art were narrow, and as far as I’ve tried to figure it out, he didn’t really give much basis. It’s like, for him, everything that fell within his /tastes/ was art. Everything that didn’t, was not art. That could cover everything from moral reasons to aesthetic reasons. A lot of his art was about the morals he wanted to promote.

I think everyone just wanted you to say why you thought it wasn’t art, and they weren’t intellectually or emotionally satisfied with your answers.

Frankly, there’s a lot of bad in the world, and I like to think there’s some good. I’m one of those people that tends to give everyone the benefit of the doubt all the time, even though I read the news, even though I know all this horrible stuff. I’m not stupid. It’s just my nature, and it’s partially me hoping that people will make good on it. If we don’t acknowledge the bad as a society in a lasting way, then we won’t better ourselves. If I had to walk by that statue every day, you better believe I’d be more aware of minor abuse in /my/ life (not that I do it but of people around me). And if I read the placard, I would reflect on the stresses of babies attacking me when I finally have one. It’s slightly absurd, but mostly metaphorical. Even the literal is farcical, and if one thought this was the man attacking the babies, I don’t see that as endorsement, but an acknowledgement of this evil in the world. Remember it. Erradicate it. This is what it looks like. Not once could I imagine this statue meaning anything different. This statue isn’t beautiful in its content. It /is/ beautiful in its arrangement and technical mastery. But something being beautiful by traditional western standards, modern or ancient, isn’t what makes something art anymore. Each time defines art for itself, and if your only criteria for something not being art to you is morality, then this shouldn’t violate that either. Most people, unless looking at this piece brings back memories of personal experience (yourself or about others close to you) would not evoke such a strong, negative reaction. This piece does more than just make you want to throw up or smash something or have a visceral emotive reaction. It makes you think about the world, reflect on how things are and could be no matter if you take it as the babies attacking the man or the other way around. You may not like it, but I’d be pretty shocked if you couldn’t acknowledge that it at least does that.

You are right that mannequins in a store aren’t art. Neither is someone’s decorative setup in their home. Art is not their function. They are not made for you to notice, but absorb. Their function is not to challenge, but to accept. Not all art has to challenge, but the best art usually does. That’s why the people that shift the art movements are the most famous. Art now is different from Realism or Dadaism. If someone painted my portrait with such skill, people would look at it now (even a common man) and say, “Oh, nice portrait.” The world would not see it, like a blind man. It may be incredible, but most of the world would not care.

I also would like to know if you distinguish between high and low art. I get the feeling from what you’ve said that you don’t consider low art art.

Sure glad you’re here to tell us what is and isn’t art.
I love this sculpture. It’s unique, funny, emotional evocative and well sculpted.

I agree. The big boy statue is both art, and intentionally funny. Hope you see it that way also. PS – I love the man being attacked by babies statue. as a piece in the “human condition”, it really does speak about a bit part of it.

you are hopeless

This is the best statue I have ever seen. It made me laugh out loud, which is something no other statue has ever made me do. Therefore, it’s the best statue ever created, and a masterful work of art. 81,5% of your poll takers agree.

I think when you ask “Is this art?” what you’re really asking is, “Is this good art?” Obviously it’s art but you think it’s bad, others think it’s good and most people might even be puzzled and indifferent to it. Why does something have to be good and pure and right in your eyes to be art and why have you defined art as such. The world is full of bad art, horrible art, offensive art, lame and boring art etc. That doesn’t make it “not art”, that just makes it “not good”. Maybe you think this particular piece would be good art without the naked guy, or maybe without the babies, or maybe with some clothes. I can’t even figure out what bothers you about it but can you see that even if it’s troublesome to you, saying it’s “not art” is nonsensical? Every piece of art doesn’t have to be ” the best statue ever created, and a masterful work of art” in your words. Just say you don’t like it and if you want to be actually interesting instead of just provoking people say why you don’t like it.

“The beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder”… The fact is that this is a STATUE… just that, the concept of art is completely subjective, so nobody can tell you what is art… maybe Pollock is art for me, but for a lot of people his work is just splattered paint.

Maybe Warhol was right when he made his “Soup Can” painting… saying that wasn’t art… thats just a painting of a soup can.

So, let this thread to rest… and give Moonage the credit for having his own opinion about the world in general… believe me, most of the people doesn’t have opinions.