In Which We Talk About Subjectivity, Personal Preference, and Mock The Old Greats

[pretentieuse]

On the odd chance you haven't gathered this, I'm taking an art history class devoted to 17th century/Baroque art. It completely consumes me and I am entirely rapt from the beginning to end. I've definitely determined it is my biological imperative to major in art history, if only so I can surround myself in gorgeous works of art without stealing them, ahem, ahem.
However, my comprehensive and enthusiastic study of the subject illuminated a single fact: some artists are completely overrated.

As a hipster (albeit a lonely and friendless one), I devote a lot of time to thinking about overrated and underrated things. Radiohead: overrated. Puppies: despite being very highly rated, underrated. Babies: definitely overrated. Breasts: overrated. And on and on. So, I thought of a truly brilliant idea: what if I combined my two favorite things for an overrated/underrated artists thread on ConceptArt? (Don't go thinking you're all my favorite thing. I'm talking about art history and arbitrarily rating things based on my knee-jerk evaluations of their qualities.)

Some ground rules, of course, should be established. I wouldn't want somebody to name an artist on here as underrated. Foolishly dismissing entire genres of art without closely examining the intentions, contents, and biographies of said artworks is not what I'm getting at here.

The ultimate goal, of course, is to determine what good art is, primarily for your personal benefit, and to work through challenging pieces and examining their merits. So who's up for this?

I'll start:
Nicolas Poussin.
http://i49.tinypic.com/23qyqtj.jpg
This guy just looks like a prick. First he dismisses Caravaggio. Then he expects me to worship at his feet for this painting:
http://i46.tinypic.com/9lefww.jpg
[Death of Germanicus, 1628]
The figures are just rendered so artificially. Of course, you can divide 17th-century art pretty easily between Caravaggesque and Carracci-influenced, and it's obvious what I prefer, but ARGH! The text of my art history book just FAWNS over this painting. I appreciate the skill, the challenge of squeezing so many figures into one picture plane, and communicating emotions within limited means and knowledge, but I'm just supremely frustrated looking at any and all of his paintings.

Underrated:
Simon Vouet
http://i47.tinypic.com/1g6lo3.jpg
Despite the incestuous implications of the content, the figures are gloriously rendered, the colors smooth and sensual, and the forms fully realized.

Your turn!

[jrr]

not this again, where's my hipster spray? HISSS HISSS!!

edit: how about artist who deserve more reconition... i'll go first, irwin greenberg. fantastic artist and teacher who passed away last year. he uses a similar technique as david levine, that is, lay the watercolor down and pick it up, on heavy multi ply bristol paper.

[Schnookiefoo]

Breast can never be overrated imo.

[pretentieuse]

not this again, where's my hipster spray? HISSS HISSS!!

Reserve your judgement for Cezanne or Sargent, unless, of course, you wish for me to judge your taste in music and make you feel inferior. I'll probably drink all of your PBR and throw up in your closet while I'm at it.

[Liquidpope]

...I'll probably drink all of your PBR and throw up in your closet while I'm at it.

All the classy dames hang out at CA! :yayca:
Oh, and PBR is highly underrated.

[Msegal]

Haha Poussin looks like a prick; I laughed out loud.

[pretentieuse]

All the classy dames hang out at CA! :yayca:
Oh, and PBR is highly underrated.

I actually don't drink. Just aping a hipster cliche. How embarrassing, right?

ANYWAY PARTICIPATE PEOPLE I WANT TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK

[Hyskoa]

Easy.

Overrated: Modernism.
Underrated: All before modernism.

[pretentieuse]

Easy.

Overrated: Modernism.
Underrated: All before modernism.

That's kind of the attitude I was looking to avoid.

Would you please go into more depth?

Besides, it's all too possible to get wrapped up in the present. At the moment Picassos and Van Goghs are worth millions, but they may decline depending on trends in the art market.

[Chris Saksida]

Hyskoa you're so right, but modernism is dying anyway, it doesn't have much to say anymore.

[Nightfalls]

overrated: The boatload of contemporary painters who don't have their own style but try to copy old masters.

underrated: Caligraphy artists, they're mostly just overlooked.

[Hyskoa]

That's kind of the attitude I was looking to avoid.
Then don't make a topic where you ask people to name overrated artists. It will always be inflamatory.
Would you please go into more depth?
I could, and have before. And it usually ended up in pissing matches, so I don't anymore.
Besides, it's all too possible to get wrapped up in the present. At the moment Picassos and Van Goghs are worth millions, but they may decline depending on trends in the art market.
Wouldn't that be getting wrapped up in the past? Since both those artists aren't exactly alive anymore?

And Chris, a lot of money/reputations is currently held up in modernistic collections. People aren't likely to shoot themselves in the foot that quickly, there might be a very slow(think continental drift) change to a more realism-based art market, but there won't be a massive revolt-esque change sadly enough.

And nightfalls, contemporary artists kind of have to follow those styles, mostly because a lot of potential financial sources don't exist anymore and the market demands old master styles rather than exploration of new contemporary angles. Otherwise we'd be seeing much more successfull digital artists(exploration of medium to give an example).

[pretentieuse]

Then don't make a topic where you ask people to name overrated artists. It will always be inflamatory.

I'm looking for enlightened discussion, not thoughtless, instantaneous dismissal. And you can contribute an "underrated" artist.

I could, and have before. And it usually ended up in pissing matches, so I don't anymore.

Take the time to link me.

Wouldn't that be getting wrapped up in the past? Since both those artists aren't exactly alive anymore?

How clever you are. Warhols, Pollocks, Picassos, and de Koonings occupy the top slots on "most valuable paintings." Mortality has nothing to do with it. Don't be so obstinate; I was looking to generate conversation and you enter like a drunkard into a tea party (a real tea party, not a raucous one full of racists and bigots) dismissing the content due to some grudge you maintain needlessly instead of chilling the fuck out and appreciating it for what it is.

[Hyskoa]

I'm looking for enlightened discussion, not thoughtless, instantaneous dismissal. And you can contribute an "underrated" artist.
Then leave out the overrated part when creating the thread in the first place. People will post pretty pictures. In fact we've already had several threads like it but under different names like "Post unknown artists" or "post your favorite oriental artist" and so on. You asking for the addition of discussion to the process of posting pretty pictures as well as adding the element of allowing people to give their picks of overrated artists will always end in a flamewar. No matter how enlightened you want it to be.


Take the time to link me.
Not all conversations I have are digital. And I'm sure if you're curious you can browse through my posting history for some opinions. I'm sure there are some.


How clever you are.
I know.
Warhols, Pollocks, Picassos, and de Koonings occupy the top slots on "most valuable paintings."
Still not making them any more contemporary. Selling pieces of art doesn't contemporize a piece of art, it just means money changes hands and a profit or a loss is being made.
Mortality has nothing to do with it.
It kinda does, that's the point of it being contemporary rather than say part of a movement as say modernism or neo-classicism.
Don't be so obstinate;
Kinda have to when I'm right.
I was looking to generate conversation and you enter like a drunkard into a tea party
You're trying to downplay my opinion by comparing me with an inebriated person. Good for you.
(a real tea party, not a raucous one full of racists and bigots) dismissing the content due to some grudge you maintain needlessly instead of chilling the fuck out and appreciating it for what it is.
I do appreciate it for what it is, a collective lie to drain dumb collectors from their money.


Anyway, seems like you just want to "obstinately" keep the overrated artists part of your topic so you can keep discussing it with all whom disagree. Creating a pointless debate which will end up in a flamewar.
Something the topic itself will make sure it does on it's own unaided in most cases.
So I'm going to go do something more useful with my time.
I'm sure you want the last answer in this thread, so go ahead, I'm off to bed. If I don't forget, I might read it.

[OmenSpirits]

Change the title of this thread to possible get a better reaction.

There's been threads like this before, none have ended well.

Just an idea.

[Chris Saksida]

what is considered "most valuable" in the art market has nothing to do with "quality" IMO, I mean; I respect Modernism and abstraction, I highly respect artists like Picasso, Pollock, De Kooning, Warhol... but put those against artists like Caravaggio, Diego Velazquez, Francisco de Goya... maybe it's a matter of tastes, but I think they are overrated.

[pretentieuse]

http://i49.tinypic.com/23t5xco.jpg
I acknowledge the significance of John William Waterhouse for both the Pre-Raphaelite and Impressionist art movements, but there's just something about his women:

http://i47.tinypic.com/5kn4vr.jpg
http://i47.tinypic.com/hwh16u.jpg
http://i45.tinypic.com/9fmqsp.jpg

Those bitches have crazy fucking eyes. That might be part of their allure. That might be Waterhouse's intent. But as a woman generally wary of other women (seriously, women are terrifying), I try to avoid "bitches with crazy fucking eyes." Even in painting.

http://i47.tinypic.com/2n0ombm.jpg
Sir William Blake Richmond's work, An Audience in Athens, captivated me from the moment I saw it. However, the book jacket mislabeled the artist as "Sir William Blake," leaving me confused until I found a corrected version. I wish there were more information on him, but all I know is he was a portraitist in London in the 19th century, which is kind of sad :(

[pretentieuse]

Change the title of this thread to possible get a better reaction.

There's been threads like this before, none have ended well.

Just an idea.

I don't see why it's so difficult for people to have a discussion about art while maintaining restraint and good judgement.

To what should I change the title?

[RyerOrdStar]

I don't think any artist is overrated.

I'll go for underrated, though: Lawrence Alma-Tadema

982934
982932

[pretentieuse]

I agree; Alma-Tameda is chronically underrated. I find him to be a much better history painter than our friend Bouguereau, and his works indeed are like time-traveling back to Ancient Greece, a sentiment I rarely receive looking at other history paintings.

Valentin de Boulogne is also very accomplished:
http://www.artrenewal.org/artwork/322/5322/27884/the_four_ages_of_man-large.jpg (awful quality, gorgeous picture)
http://www.artrenewal.org/artwork/322/5322/27890/martyrdom_of_st_processus_and_st_martinian-large.jpg

I'm just such a sucker for the Caravaggisti.

[Demo]

Over rated= Dali and Warhol

Underrated: a ton of art pretty much anything before modern art, such as some one stated above. Baroque, Rococo, and Neo-Classicism, also some stuff from earlier periods of the renaissance. Now a days almost all painters and illustrators are underrated except for maybe a handful. I hopes to change that personally its somewhat of a life goal :P call it a w.i.p then again becoming influential just with in your own sphere of colleagues and friends is also pretty sweet

[Overtow]

The problem you run into when dealing with under-rated versus over-rated artists is personal bias. There are artists who are absolutely under-represented or merely glanced over in history books. Typically, the ones we focus on are those that made the greatest impact on advancing art in their period. So are there over-rated artists? Of course but usually with good reason. Titian is a good example as someone who helped push the late Renaissance into the Boroque period.

And just because a "under-rated" artist didn't get the recognition they deserve doesn't mean they are less of an artist, especially if you consider them to be a truly great artist. What you might like about Caravaggio's paintings someone else might not. Then we get a huge discussion between you and others comparing the merit of these artists by tossing in big, pseudo-intellectual phrases or words as an anchor for your "argument". This is opinion. Nothing more.

By analyzing works you prefer based on quality, which itself is entirely your personal opinion, you set the stage for someone to counter and start an argument (AKA flame war).

Change the thread title to "Artists you like but didn't learn about in art history class".

[Craig D]

That's kind of the attitude I was looking to avoid.
.

So where you go
"This guy just looks like a prick. First he dismisses Caravaggio. Then he expects me to worship at his feet for this painting"

That's the type of objective and detailed analysis you were hoping for?

[cdejong]

Wow, you think Waterhouse is overrated just because his women "have crazy fucking eyes"? That's ridiculous and insulting, why bother participating in this discussion if you're going to insult artists without any merit behind your words. Respect for other artists, whether living or dead, is an important trait that we should all share (if one would like to be taken seriously).

[pretentieuse]

the thread was intended 1. to break down the lofty airs of the old masters and have fun with art history and 2. as a distraction. i'm perfectly aware of subjectivity and personal taste over objective truth; it's a light-hearted discussion on silly things that have always bothered you about painters or sculptors. i've stated within the posts that i respect the artists and understand their contributions to the field of art, i just have minor annoyances (i.e. waterhouse's serial-killer-eyed women) i happen to find amusing. it's about first impressions and stepping away from "great" works of art--maybe art you find intimidating--and poking fun at a work. or drawing attention to severely underrated artists you favor, but ones we may not know.

now that we've established this, can we have fun?

[ajvenema]

overrated: The boatload of contemporary painters who don't have their own style but try to copy old masters.

underrated: Caligraphy artists, they're mostly just overlooked.

cheers to that!

[PxelSlayer]

now that we've established this, can we have fun?

Dinner first. Fun later. My momma raised no fool.

OT - My favorite (especially since he`s from my own country, which, alas, equals an invisibility curse) - Vlaho Bukovac

http://www.artrenewal.org/artwork/315/2315/36701/Bukovac_Portrait_Gustav_Pongratz-large.jpg
http://www.vjesnik.hr/html/2009/08/06/Japanka.jpg
http://zitniks.com/cgi/wp/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/vlaho_bukovac.jpg
http://www.ugdubrovnik.hr/zbirka/35%20copy.jpg

He did group paintings as well, but for the life of me I can`t find decent reproductions online...go figure. I was lucky enough to see some of his works up close...man, could that guy paint skin tones! *gawk*

[Black Spot]

Well trying to fit Jesus' and Madonna's head into a perfect circle didn't do early artist's any favours. Madonna ends up looking fat and Baby Jesus was an alien. Quite glad they did as ripping into old art with a friend is a lot of fun.

Everyone has good days and bad days. Once I was so tempted to stab a really bad Van Gogh at an exhibition, especially as it was right next to a wonderful one. Just being a 'name' doesn't mean that the artist is immune from criticism.

[Overtow]

i'm perfectly aware of subjectivity and personal taste over objective truth;

First of all everything about art, whether it's how great an artist Leonardo was or the quality of the Mona Lisa, is subjective. There is no "objective truth".

And if there were an "objective truth" could you tell us exactly what that truth might be?

Edited to sound more mild.

[Ilaekae]

Underrated: Me

Overrated: Everybody else





...being as objective as I can, of course...

[Aly Fell]

Overrated -
Looking at art on-line and trying to appreciate it in 600 pixels wide.
Comparing 'modernism' to 'classicism'.

Underrated -
Appreciating art in it's context.
Standing in a gallery and getting lost in an image the way it was supposed to be seen whatever its 'ism'.

:)

[QueenGwenevere]

Breasts: overrated. Women: overrated.

Hardly. Definitely a matter of opinion, there. ;)

The ultimate goal, of course, is to determine what good art is, primarily for your personal benefit, and to work through challenging pieces and examining their merits. So who's up for this?

You CAN'T determine what "good" art is, art is 100% subjective. All you can determine is what YOU think is good art, or what qualifies as "good" given a set of specific criteria (different cultures will have different criteria, different art movements will have different criteria, different fields in art will have different criteria, different groups of people in general will have different criteria, etc. etc. etc.)

So without a fixed set of criteria, this WILL rapidly devolve into a battle of personal tastes.

But just for kicks, I've always been personally annoyed by the way Cezanne is practically treated as a god in art history classes and books - I actually went through a short spate of appreciating his work for what it was, but now I detest him purely because he gets HUUUUGE amounts of attention at the expense of more interesting artists and even whole art movements. I swear, in art history we spent a whole week on Cezanne and then segued into cubism, and barely even touched on any of the other artists or movements going on in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries... and for that I am miffed.

I also feel Renoir is totally overrated - some of his mid-career works have promise, granted, though they edge a little on fluff. But GOOD GOD, look at everything he did in the latter half of his career! That is SCHLOCK, people! There's no other word for it! Fluffy pink girlies and fluffy pink flowers and fluffy pink clouds... the stuff would be at home on a kleenex box.

I confess I also have mixed feelings about Van Gogh, simply because he tends to be blindly worshiped. Some of his work is striking and well-composed and worth looking at, but some is just a MESS. (Those potato eaters. And everything from the potato-eating period. UGH.) Even later, his stuff is very hit-or-miss.

Underrated:
Pretty much everything that happened in the nineteenth and early twentieth century that doesn't fit into the art-historical lineage of impressionism -> post-impressionism -> cubism -> abstract art.

For some reason art historians have seized on that lineage as being more important than anything else, and so a lot of other movements and trends get ignored or briefly mentioned and then dismissed as "unimportant". Including futurism, divisionism, expressionism, symbolism, the pre-raphaelites and aestheticism, art nouveau, the Vienna secession, constructivism... the list goes on. And on.

Also underrated are quite a lot of excellent renaissance artists - Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Raphael, and Titian tend to steal the spotlight, which is a pity because there are so many others worth looking at... Veronese, Correggio, Tintoretto, Bellini, Del Sarto, Ghirlandaio, Signorelli, Pontormo, Bronzino, pretty much all the mannerists really, and so many more...

Oh, yeah - and most non-Western art. Seriously, it's like the only Japanese artist known to the western world is Hokusai... It's damned difficult to find good art books on any pre-twentieth century Asian artist besides Hokusai, Hiroshige, and maybe Utamaro. (Art books in English on individual Chinese artists? Forget it!)

[pretentieuse]

QueenGwenevere, thanks for your educated and articulate response. And I completely agree: I love looking at Parmagianino, Correggio, et cetera. I appreciate all of the contributions Botticelli made to art, but really, my personal taste finds his works at worst disappointing.

I just remember being terribly upset looking through my library's art books section and not finding a single text on French Academic artists. I have my own problems with them, of course, but I'd at least like to be better informed about their methods of work and their reception in their time. Besides the incessant fawning over at the ARC.

[OmenSpirits]

I don't see why it's so difficult for people to have a discussion about art while maintaining restraint and good judgement.

To what should I change the title?
Because the prior title was combative in its assertion of Overrated/Underrated, by defining certain artists in either category, and on this site, when you shoe-horn someone into such subjective listings, the first reaction, is to fight.

Your title change works better.

That's all.

[Elwell]

Diggin' the new thread title.

[Flake]

I acknowledge the significance of John William Waterhouse for both the Pre-Raphaelite and Impressionist art movements, but there's just something about his women:


Waterhouse was neither a Pre Raph nor an impressionist.

If he owes a debt to anyone it's (a sprinkle of) Alama-Tadema and the French naturalists (Bastien Lepage and chums)

You don't actually own a dirty paintbrush, do you?

[Elwell]

You don't actually own a dirty paintbrush, do you?
Awwwww, SNAP!

[Flake]

Sorry, I'm all cranky, I go to bed now.

[pretentieuse]

Waterhouse was neither a Pre Raph nor an impressionist.

If he owes a debt to anyone it's (a sprinkle of) Alama-Tadema and the French naturalists (Bastien Lepage and chums)

You don't actually own a dirty paintbrush, do you?

No, I prefer cleaning them after I'm done. And I don't feel confident enough in my artistic abilities to tackle such a medium.

[pretentieuse]

You must be new here.

Indeed, and I thank everyone for my warm, loving welcome.

[Goog]

To be fair, starting a thread like this on an artist's forum is usually viewed (in layman's terms) as "player hating". So you shouldn't be surprised when someone calls you out on it.

[Msegal]

Insert additional bash comment here

No use fretting about.

Who here is looking to become world renowned? To make that one master piece which will make you famous?

Or is that you are trying to make a living; striving to get better at something you enjoy or love.

As for who is overrated and underrated ; it is unimportant to me. I'll leave that to the people with their nose in the air. I'll make my own judgment.

[velderia]

Well... Here goes. Feel free to disagree with me:

Overrated:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Warhol-Campbell_Soup-1-screenprint-1968.jpg

Underrated:
http://beksinski.dmochowskigallery.net/galeria_karta.php?artist=52&picture=2447

Also:

Overrated:
http://i910.photobucket.com/albums/ac306/bobbyawesome/1.jpg

Underrated:
6SuXFVv1vTA

[DBZMerciter2005]

Overrated:
http://i910.photobucket.com/albums/ac306/bobbyawesome/1.jpg

I seriously laughed at that, because it's so true.

I've never studied art history, so I can only comment on what I have seen: Comics.

Overrated: - Clamp. Their artwork isn't pretty by any means, mostly because I can't stand overtly disproportionate characters.

- Western style comics. Realism is great and all, but most western style comics go way overboard, and it's hard to understand which emotion they're intending to portray.

- Most manga/anime. The style is so, so simple. In fact, in most cases, if you didn't have the hair or clothes the characters would all look the same. I don't care for that either.

Underrated: Sad as this is for me to say, Akira Toriyama (creator of Dragon Ball Z). His newest stuff is amazing. No, seriously, it is. He's gotten a lot better since the DBZ days. Unfortunately his characters all do look the same if you made them naked and hairless, but he gets a lot of slack when really he's pretty good.

- Disney traditional 2d art. I know people love it and I know that people respect it, but I feel it doesn't get the attention it deserves.

[sharprm]

Dissapointed you didn't work ballpoint pen into the title somehow.

Overrated: detail?
http://files.myopera.com/opera%20kanta/blog/harbour.jpg

From picture story book 'wreck of the zephyr'.

[justinkhuong]

Radiohead: overrated
Okay, this is what makes me angry :) These 'overrated, underrated' things are pretty much nonsense. Who are we to judge someone or something with such a stupid manner?

And the way you called somebody looks like a prick, I just dont get it... :) And dont tell me I have no sense of humor. Why dont you just pick some brushes and paint and create something?

[zx52hg]

I'll throw in my own opinion and say technical illustration. Without seeing all those old cutaways of tanks and planes, I really wouldn't have much enthusiasm for art.

Maybe to other people it is just a picture of something with no mood or atmosphere, but I love seeing all the machinery perfectly rendered. Here is an example from a book cover to show what I mean.

Not my own work, obviously.

[bhanu]

I sometimes feel a little underrated ...........

[Armonah]

Overrated:
http://www.artnewsblog.com/famous-paintings/mona-lisa/mona-lisa-painting.jpg

[ajvenema]

No, I prefer cleaning them after I'm done. And I don't feel confident enough in my artistic abilities to tackle such a medium.

you are not getting any confidence from hanging around on forums, you're getting confidence from doing, and using your brush. :)

[Serpian]

It's not that he's underrated, he's just under-known. Everyone should know about him and i try to mention him whenever I can, because I think he is one of the greatest geniuses of 19th century painting.

His name i Jacek Malczewski, and you can find a surprisingly large body of his on his wikimedia (http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Paintings_by_Jacek_Malczewski) page. Here are some examples:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/66/Malczewski_Jacek_Autoportret_w_zbroi.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2e/Malczewski_Jacek_Autoportret_z_paleta.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ad/Malczewski_Jacek_Chrystus_przed_Pilatem.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d1/Malczewski_Jacek_Ludwik_Zelenski.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9f/Malczewski_Jacek_Melancholia.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0b/Malczewski_Jacek_Nieznana_nuta.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/dd/Malczewski_Jacek_Prawo.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/69/Malczewski_Jacek_Proroctwo_Ezechiela.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6e/Malczewski-Thanatos-I.jpg

[pretentieuse]

Serpian, oh my God, thank you so freakin' much. My mind has been BLOWN. Wow!

And to answer the persistent question of "who are you to judge a painter," I'm a human, just as the painters/artists before me, and they had personal taste and disliked artists as well. Creating art is god-like, but it doesn't make you God. And sometimes I find it helpful to take a step back from the greatest painters and evaluate them for what they really are, beyond the hype.

I tried really hard not to have any opinions, but then I realized it made me worthless. We can joke about the past. We don't have to reverentially gaze upon a Waterhouse, Poussin, Alma-Tadema, or others all of the time. Especially when this is the freakin' Internet. Of course art's difficult. Duh. Everything in life is difficult. But if we approach it like the old greats were gods in their own right, I believe we're limiting ourselves. It's like Aristotle or Plato: of course what they said is monumental and Western society owes a great deal to it, but some of the hypotheses are either bizarre or just wrong.

I think it's important to appraise history with a sense of caution. And there's absolutely no reason you can't have fun with it, including developing your own opinions. It's how I, at least, intend to remember Poussin. It's how I identify Waterhouse.

I'm not trying to take down the whole of art and art history, which is why I fail to see why people are so hostile to the idea of teasing a painting until we can figure out why it matters.

And besides, a little aestheticism never hurt anybody.

[Zirngibism]

Serpian: Woah, I had never heard of him before! Awesome work, thanks for bringing him to our attention!

---

A complaint I have about my art history curriculum at school is that they totally skipped over certain movements that I respect (when I finally found out about them, of course). It leads me to wonder about overrated (I mean, overrepresented) MOVEMENTS, not just individual artists.

For example, as soon as impressionism started to come about, the only thing that we learned was that:
impressionists = groundbreaking, heroic "good guys", and
everybody else = stodgy, uncreative "bad guys".
So from the mid-late 1800's on, the teacher glazed over ANYTHING that wasn't impressionism. No naturalism, orientalism, preraphaelite painting, romanticism/hudson river school, etc... Some of the work during these times seems to me to have reached not only a pinnacle in technical skill, but also provided a foundation for golden age illustration. Not to mention containing some very creative, brilliant work. But somehow, all of these other movements have been totally glazed over.

I don't know if it was because she was trying to simplify the curriculum for a one semester course, or if there's actually a belief by historians that, for the time period, impressionism was THE superior movement. Sure, it was kinda the gateway to modernism and caused people to look at art in a different way, but even still, I think it was overrepresented as a whole.

(Don't get me wrong, I'm not knocking on impressionism in itself and I think it brought a lot of good things to the art world. Just using it as an example of applying this question to movements.)

Is art history more about the philosophy of art than the history of the great works themselves? In that case you're going to see a ton of awesome artists ignored in the books because they didn't forward a new idea about what art is, which to me is a shame.

[Aly Fell]

Waterhouse was neither a Pre Raph nor an impressionist.

If he owes a debt to anyone it's (a sprinkle of) Alama-Tadema and the French naturalists (Bastien Lepage and chums)

You don't actually own a dirty paintbrush, do you?

I know what you mean Flake but to be fair Waterhouse was Pre-Raphaelite, but he was part of the second wave. He was actually born about the time the 'Brotherhood' started. What is slightly skewed is how people see him as typically Pre-Raphaelite because he painted dreamy, doe-eyed lasses usually pondering their own navel in some sort of medieval or mythological setting/outfit. I love his work, but the original Pre-Raphaelites were at least more interested in social commentary than just allusion to some mythical past. Millais was a better at using metaphor, Hollman Hunt symbolism. Rossetti probably comes closest to the popular conception of the Pre-Raphaelites, who were actually interested in shaking things up a bit. Waterhouse, although wonderful, was neither social commentator or revolutionary so his Pre-Raph credentials should be seen accordingly.

[TASmith]

My two cents. You're an art history student who wishes to see more than your teachers are showing you. I went through the same thing. I read Gombrich's story of art. I took the renaissance history class (luckily in Florence), and I took the Post Modernist history class, along with a nice Alternative Cinema course (Ernie Gehr, Scorpio Rising, et alia). The main beef is that these courses present a story in a neat, linear format that lists all the big names of each period and links them together.

And it's really just the tip of the iceberg to a much larger, more chaotic story. The best art history experience I had in college wasn't the courses I took, but the opportunity to go to major museums and look at everything, noting all the artists there, and what they made. I made a list of it that's somewhere around 150 pages on my computer. Then, years later, the-atheneum.org appeared, and I discovered a whole new slew of artists I'd never seen before. Then I started up a thread on here devoted to favorite artists listed alphabetically, and again, I came across a ton of great artists I'd never heard of. And even then, I started following blogs of active artists and found hundreds of new artists and works.

My points:
1. To really understand art history, you'll have to delve into many texts outside your school and local library.
2. (already mentioned) don't judge the original by it's low quality digital reproduction. Don't even judge the original based on its current, deteriorated condition. Find out what paints were used, and how it must have looked originally - fact, most green paints from the Renaissance times have turned grey/blue now. Go to museums while you're young and can travel. See it in real life and take notes.
3. Everything you'll ever know about art is just a drop in the bucket of what's going on in our world. It's the same for everyone, but it's still great to try to learn it all, and every new discovery's like a newborn child.
4. It's hard to appreciate what makes art exceptional when you haven't tried it yourself. Get over your inhibitions and start painting. You don't have to show it to anyone, hell I only show about 1/10th what I do now.
5. The best point in Gombrich's art history book is that there's no wrong reason to like an artwork, but there are wrong reasons to dislike them. The women in your waterhouse seem frightening. They're supposed to be. Sometimes a work isn't supposed to be pleasing so much as moving. To tell a story and matter.
6. If you want to be an art historian, beware of your professors. Not to say there aren't some great ones, but as a field of study, this is one where the professors are "always right" and the students must copy opinions verbatim using the appropriate vocabulary. Only people who've graduated from schools (the bigger name the better) and become professors in their own right are allowed to speak authoritatively on anything. I've made the mistake of stating an opinion that was contrary to a professor's, and it came back to haunt me. So be careful what you say.

[Xeon_OND]

Easy.
Overrated: Modernism.
Underrated: All before modernism.
THIS!

[dpaint]

It would be interesting to be around in two hundred years to see how revered 20th century art is. Much of the argument here reminds me of those polls they take on the presidents with people saying Reagan and Bush are equal to Jefferson and Lincoln. They see the recent presidents as important because they experienced life with them. People don't see them in the context of history; historical context needs more time to see if they really are as great as the founding fathers or Lincoln.
It's too soon to see 20th century art for what it is; I think a couple of hundred years is about right to strip away the personalities and bombast and then what you have is just some Art in a museum next to other Art in a museum. Most people will have forgotten the names of the artists and the fights they had over style and content. The art will have to speak for itself.

[Nezumi Works]

Overrated:

Japanese comics in general. While you get some real gems once in a while, like Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou, most of it is kinda bland with huge hype laid on top. And there seems some sort of rule that shoujo manga must be badly drawn with stiff poses, dead eyes and faux lens flare all over the place.

Underrated, at least in North America:

European comics. There's so much good over there, especially in France/Belgium/Spain, that rarely gets translated. There's a trickle, things like Skydoll and so on, but Blacksad? Pierre Alary's Belladone or Sinbad stuff? Even most of the Spirou series, and that's been going over 70 years now! But no, everyone's still manga, manga, manga, no time for good art that really works the format and presents solid stories.

Oh, and Tintin is overrated. There, I said it.

[TASmith]

"Reagan and Bush are equal to Jefferson and Lincoln"

No, no, Johnson. Lyndon Johnson, only minus the progressive domestic policy. And Reagan bears as closer resemblence to Nixon. But I get what you're saying.

The two great gifts of the 20th century are the freedom we have now as artists, and the change in the way art is perceived (by the general public) from something straight forward and simple to something more complex and intellectual. Both of these changes have their downside, but whatever.

In terms of art survey texts, all the great names are overrated, and all the minor artists are omitted.

In terms of what the average person knows about art, every artist is underrated.

[tobbA]

Overrated:

Japanese comics in general. While you get some real gems once in a while, like Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou, most of it is kinda bland with huge hype laid on top. And there seems some sort of rule that shoujo manga must be badly drawn with stiff poses, dead eyes and faux lens flare all over the place.

While I do agree somewhat here, saying something is overrated just because a lot or most of it is crap is a bit of a contradiction to me. Because the same could be applied to almost anything.

There's a lot of really crappy European and American comics. And you really need to dig to find the gems.

But I do agree European comics get much less love than they deserve. That's why I liked the Swedish the Phantom magazine. The stories about the title character are seldom very good, but they tend to bring in a lot of good french and other European comics like Jerome K. Bloche, Thorgal and Valérian and Laureline.

[Flake]

Serpian, oh my God, thank you so freakin' much. My mind has been BLOWN. Wow!

And to answer the persistent question of "who are you to judge a painter," I'm a human, just as the painters/artists before me, and they had personal taste and disliked artists as well. Creating art is god-like, but it doesn't make you God. And sometimes I find it helpful to take a step back from the greatest painters and evaluate them for what they really are, beyond the hype.

I tried really hard not to have any opinions, but then I realized it made me worthless. We can joke about the past. We don't have to reverentially gaze upon a Waterhouse, Poussin, Alma-Tadema, or others all of the time. Especially when this is the freakin' Internet. Of course art's difficult. Duh. Everything in life is difficult. But if we approach it like the old greats were gods in their own right, I believe we're limiting ourselves. It's like Aristotle or Plato: of course what they said is monumental and Western society owes a great deal to it, but some of the hypotheses are either bizarre or just wrong.

I think it's important to appraise history with a sense of caution. And there's absolutely no reason you can't have fun with it, including developing your own opinions. It's how I, at least, intend to remember Poussin. It's how I identify Waterhouse.

I'm not trying to take down the whole of art and art history, which is why I fail to see why people are so hostile to the idea of teasing a painting until we can figure out why it matters.

And besides, a little aestheticism never hurt anybody.


Quite right, but....

One week with a brush in your hand will teach you more about painting than any of those expensive college courses did.

Go buy some cheap paint, some craft store brushes, have at it. Copy a Rembrandt or something.

You'll come out of it with at least a grudging respect for people who spent 50 years of their lives perfecting something that you are scared to try.....

Alternatively, just be a giant scared whiney pussy snipeing from the sidelines if that's more your speed...

[pretentieuse]

Why is it so hard for half of the commenters here to see that you can respect something and make fun of it at the same time?

Painting's HARD. I get it. I know I'm never going to be Caravaggio or Poussin. I'll damn well try.

You don't have to be Hemingway to find the Great Gatsby bloated and florid (though I love The Great Gatsby way more than I do Hemingway). You don't have to be Jean-Luc Godard to find Jerry Bruckheimer films irritating pieces of fluff. You don't have to be Tchaikovsky to think Animal Collective is massively overrated. Why am I a "sniping pussy" if I prod Poussin or Waterhouse in the side?

By the way, I think I have a little more depth than a vagina. I'm being superficial now. But this argument was intended to go a little deeper.

[TASmith]

I thought Fitzgeral wrote that. Or am I dumb?

I was going to thank Flake for his post right up to the point where he started swearing. Then I paused...