Mr. Januszczak is one of a kind. Spell check can't grasp his name but I grabbed hold of his passion for art and ability to inspire art enthusiasts. I got through pandemic and grew as a direct result, enjoying being guided by the Hitchcock of the art doc. In my home we call him Waldy! Thanks so much for all your hard work. I wish I'd had these docs as a middle school kid bored to tears watching a television rolled in on a metal cart showing art I had zero interest in. Been to the National Gallery and Tate my interest peeked. Hip Hip Hooray.
I think the biggest issue with modern art is how one seems to need a long paragraph explaining the context of the art. All I need to appreciate the classical works in the Lourve are my own eyes, with the modern pieces presented in this documentary, I only gain an appreciation for them after listening to an interview of the artist. Modern art seems unable to stand on its inherent qualities.
Fair enough, have you seen Waldemars fabulous documentary about Jan van Eycks "Arnolfini marriage"? We are fascinated about all the puzzles both in the picture as well as the technical mastery of the painting , but it ain't speak to us immediately. I would call the disappointment of modern art the "I could have done it myself" effect. As if it was some clever scam, impossible to predict and not necessarily evil , but trivial in hindsight. Like the invention of a cheap trick. It is also somehow democratic, not devoid of "inherent quality" but it lacks a quality which sets it apart.
I don't know anything about art. I only know what I like. Art is what I can't do. I thought so for a long time - then came Waldemar. He can explain art that doesn't appeal to me at first glance like no other. Thanks sir.
What is incredible…exceptional… about this film is the artists interviews. When I binge watch Waldemar’s videos and then come across one where I can witness him interview the artist, it makes my brain pause. It is a treasure.
Everyone has access to a pencil and paper, but only an artist can do magic with it. That is what Art is all about to me. All these expensive and luxurious projects don't promote art but make it inaccessible.
I just love how Waldemar explains every art movement. He helps me to understand so much. It is like studying art history on youtube und much better than in the 80s in real university 🙏🏻🤗
I was going to walk over to the National Gallery of Art this afternoon, but instead this video came out so I stayed in to watch this. I've been on a WJ kick the last week or two. I'm guessing he'd be annoyed at me staying in to watch a video rather than going to an actual museum, but I wonder if he'd cut me a break since it was HIS video?
The video is a piece of art in itself. Playful, humorous, informative, above all thought provoking. I didn't have time to see it through in one go...but I did so anyway.
@@marissashantez6051 Yeah, the MLK statue from what I've seen in videos looks like a mistake. But that's quite a leap you make to saying all modern art is nonsense. Is all Renaissance art nonsense by having one bad piece? Is all literature nonsense by one bad book? Is an art form nonsense if it contains one bad work of art?
Part of what people find objectional about this sort of modern work is not the stuff itself, but its dominance in art galleries, and the price its sold for. How is that worth X million dollars!!? What many are unaware of is that there's a whole field of decorator abstractionists. Many moderately moneyed like the spareness or texture of much contemporary modern art, but don't want to pay those prices or even have the responsibility to care that much for them. In comes the decorator artist. Decorator first, artist second. "Here's a portfolio to look at. What sort of things do you like? We spoke about this space here needing something warm, perhaps red? And something hanging here 4 metres wide and a drop of six." A commission is made, a work constructed, and sold for say six to ten times the cost of materials, plus consultation and wages. If someone falls into it at a party, the kids ruin it, or you get sick of it three years later, just throw it out. "We only paid a few thousand for it after all."
@@artriot4758 Waldemar Januszczak does not understand art is although he knows far more about it than I will ever know . Most people have no idea what art is. I often dislike real art at first because it is telling me something that I do not understand. Art essay about perception in the language of the right brain. I don't think that the kitsch is art because it doesn't have anything to say. Kirsch is pleasing to the eye and that is all anything has to be. It doesn't have to be beautiful and doesn't have to be art, just nice to look at.
@@artriot4758 I didn't say it was objectionable. Just that many do because it controls the art world stage. I then pointed out that however others do like it, but really mostly only at the level of decoration and sensation. As such, decorator art, striped of conceptual attachment (Which the gallery pieces usually fail to illustrate.) is more honest in purpose.
To me there's a vast uncross-able difference between Art & Exhibitionism. What so many modern exhibitionists seek feels like acceptance into or validation by the greats. I'm sympathetic to their need but not swayed enough to embrace performance anywhere near the emotions classical evokes. Usually my first reaction is "That's clever" or "Your joking, right?" Which pales a lot with the deep fascination & awe of human accomplishment I get from classical masterworks. I can't help myself but to categorize the majority of modern "art" in with advertising media & go from there. Simply put, like pop music it's fun to tap your foot for five minutes but ultimately forgettable. I am entertained by their egos though
I think this is my favorite of your presentations so far, Mr. Januszczak. You've made older art and contemporary art cohere in ways that cheapen neither. In fact you've elevated all. Thank you for this.
In 1919, a Romanian poet and philosopher wrote this : I do not crash the crown of world's marvels / and do not kill with my mind the secrets I meet on my way in flowers, eyes, lips, or graves... Some other's light strangle the mystery of the impenetrable unseen... His name is Lucian Blaga, and I got a very high grade at the final exam ( baccalaureate) for having read his poetry.
For sure. It seems to me that modern art has been an ongoing effort to come to terms with the Modern world (scientific-technological-metaphysical materialism). And it is still struggling to find an adequate response. Much of modern art is a simple capitulation to capitalist standards. imo.
I dissent. Much of this is the Emperor's New Clothes. It reflects the religion of meaninglessness of our times. I was at a show in NYC where Yoko came into her long white chessboard. I say came into because clearly she orders a fabrication of elements with her millions of dollars, and it is placed there for her. I spent years as an art mover in New York, and got into nearly every museum, most galleries, met many artists, saw tons of shows. When Sean Lennon came in for the cameras to pose with Yoko sitting at the blank chessboard in her long fetishization of her late husband, it just felt dead. As did most of other empty objects in the group show. (Koons also just hires fabricators, he asked me once if I new anyone who worked with a certain material.) I had just come over from the Thrift Store art show, and the attempts at amateur obsessive art there felt far more genuine than anything in this exhibition. I bumped into a friend. She asked what I thought. I explained what I just wrote. She was shocked and replied 'You know I'm a gallery owner?' Of course I did. But that response suddenly made me realize the utterly cultish nature of the Gnostic imagery of Postmodernism. If you are in the cult you bow. Give me back ornamentation, unabstracted texture, narrative, and most of all deep meaning. As Tarkovsky said about art, ‘Art is born and takes hold wherever there is a timeless and insatiable longing for the spiritual, for the ideal: that longing which draws people to art. Modern art has taken a wrong turn in abandoning the search for the meaning of existence in order to affirm the value of the individual for its own sake. What purports to be art begins to look like an eccentric occupation for suspect characters who maintain that any personalised action is of intrinsic value simply as a display of self-will. But in artistic creation the personality does not assert itself, it serves another, higher and communal idea. The artist is always a servant, and is perpetually trying to pay for the gift that has been given to him as if by a miracle.’
Thank you, my search for the perfect comment is over. This salute to the filling of the God-shaped hole in the world with whatever comes to hand is depressing. However, I remain a Januszczak fanboy, for now...
@@theflyoverlandcrank I agree. Januszczek is quite valuable. But he is constrained by what I would call a contemporary weakness. On my other channel, The Anadromist, I have lectures on art and culture by the late Dutch Christian art historian Hans Rookmaaker that I have been given permission to annotate visually. I have a playlist there of his work. Start with his lecture What Is Reality? It sounds like exactly what you might be looking for.
@@GravityFromAbove Thanks for the reference. Will check it out. Your comment, and Gravity From Above's, both seem accurate to me. Still much appreciate Januszczek.
Okay, thank you yet again. "Permanent change is what life is about." I shall be more open-minded--or honestly aware--when approaching current art of all types. "The struggle is important." Wow.
Waldemar, your insights and creative interpretations are wonderfully idiosyncratic, often profound, and provocative in a personal way. But in this show your comparison of these current artists to past painters [dead animal paintings/Hirst, Tiepolo/Yoko Ono, Canaletto/creator of wall art, etc.], you side-step a huge difference: the artist's touch. In the older work, the connection of eye-hand brush translated onto the canvas with a sticky substance we call paint is an alchemical transformation. So the connections you're making regarding the similarity of subject matter or generalizations about delicacy or texture don't hold water. They sound good, but they don't work. You think we won't know that the important elements of a work of art are not subject matter alone but HOW the work is created along with that subject matter. While I love your personal insights (such as the one about your mother's picture), the show as a whole fails because your premise has serious faults. Better that you choose artists such as Kentridge, Dumas, or Doig to compare with past art. And what is "ugly" about Yoko Ono or Carl Andre or Anish Kapoor's work? Maybe elusive or ambiguous or conceptual . . . but ugly? No. They're even rather elegant. Still, I applaud you for your you-ness and humor, and often depth.
He is pretty much the best presenter of art I've had the pleasure of watching. I'll sing at his funeral and my voice isn't very good. Thanks for another great documentary.
Excellent! I wish my National Gallery could have it's own Waldemar to breath this kind of life into it's presentations. I'll suggest they pay him to do it. So good.
I love how Waldemar engages us as viewers and challenges the status quo notions of art and its history. His perspective truly brings out the raw emotion behind the arts and their many variations. Would love to take an Art History course with this chap.
Thanks, Waldemar. Beautifully done. When I was young I didn’t see much of the art in the modern. Now it makes me smile and think about what I’ve lived for or thought of while doing the living. Perspective maybe.
I deeply love films/videos presented/produced by Waldemar Januszczak - I wish I’d encountered him long before now and am grateful that it did finally happen. Just wonderful!
Another terrific video from Mr. Waldemar Januszczak. I can't get enough! Thank you so much, Waldemar. ...and thank you so much for spending time on Yoko Ono. I loved her installation, and even more I loved your interview with her. She's still going strong at 91.
The interviews made these artists appear clearly as opportunists, whose works are not powerful enough to stand on their own without a large paragraph of explanation on the wall. I don’t expect everything to have a particular devotion to beauty, however, filling one’s CV with participation installations, encased taxidermy/vivisection exhibitions, and preserved walls debris, is not even meeting the ground level of creativity. It’s a double slap in the face to any artisans and traditional artists, because their actual efforts are so poorly compensated, relative to these charlatans. The brazenness of Andre is particularly hard to forgive. He boasts about how miserly he has been with inexpensive materials, then complains about how his audience doesn’t know the value of his cheap materials. An ego without a ceiling.
Hi ShaneyElderberry. Thanks for your clear, articulate perspective on this art, with which I pretty much agree. It seems to me - I'm no expert - that from the beginning, Modern art has struggled to respond to the revolutionay changes in the mode of human existence - the likes of which are unprecedented from (as MANY historians state) at least the beginning of civilization. It still has not found its footing. (Have any of us?) In addition, it does seem that the capitalist market calls the tune in regard to what gets produced, or at least noticed. Thanks again for sharing your insight.
I said in an earlier comment that art is used to launder money and I think making it ugly is a kind of an inside joke amongst the rich to thumb their nose at the rest of us.
Well said ... so many of these 'artists' don't even do their own work ... they get others to do it (real artists) and pay them the base costs - while selling the works at galleries for fortunes ... it is a 'celebrity artist' scam. There are great artists out there - but you will never see their works in galleries due to the art collectors obsession with 'celebrity' ...... what a joke!
I agree with your observations, and I want to emphasize that without an essay of explanation, there is no meaning in the art at all. I thought I was looking at a giant egg, but no, it was all about color and time. If the artist wasn't there to explain his/her unique vision and exoteric attempts at something new, no one, and I mean absolutely no one would get what is going on. That's a foolish idea of art.
@@jmontgomery1178 not sure what your point is but the way I had it explained to me an " artist " paints a small black dot or a fly whatever on one corner of a canvas then goes into a long winded explaination why that corner instead of the other to sell it..it means nothing it`s a fly on a canvas
When you use the word "Modern", when you mean "Contemporary", it confuses folks, and they say things like "I can't remember the last piece of modern art I liked!"; then when you say "What don't you like about Monet?", it confuses them further. Their derision is usually reserved for Picasso, those awful! distorted! portraits! because he's when your random worker bee stopped paying attention to "Modern" Art. 'Tis sad, but true. Damien Hirst should have been featured in the kitsch section, as in "The Kitsch of Death"; I unfortunately own one of his murderous pieces; it was a gift, I hate it, I won't sell it because I don't wish to pass along the bad, bad karma. I suppose I should bury it or throw it out, but I don't wish to hurt the feelings of my friend who gave it to me. Dilemma. And face it, Jeff Koons makes high-end home furnishings. Or rather, his "assistants" do. But of course Waldemar REIGNS in art docs; I just wish he'd make some new ones!
@@grainofsand4176 Thank you for your thoughtful and kind suggestions, but were I to give it to a museum, that would put it before the eyes of patrons in perpetuity, an exposure I would be uncomfortable with having caused and therefore being responsible for; were I to sell it, I could not control its path once it left my possession; it could very well wind up in a museum anyway. Robert Rauschenberg famously bought a Willem de Kooning drawing and erased it, thereby creating a new work. I'm certainly no Rauschenberg (and DH ain't no de Kooning), but this concept, though not my own, is starting to feel comfortable . . .
@@luiscuixara4622 I'm sorry you are suffering from this burden. I admire your conviction. I hope a solution find it's way to you soon- I believe you will just Know when it does
I love much of modern art. In some places it feels as though the artist is trying to turn US into the artist with our eyes. We turn it into art in our own perspective.
This, like your other films, is a magnificent attempt at showing an audience the value behind an art movement. However, on modern art, I remain wholly unconvinced.
I’ve always looked as art in everything I see that interested me . When I look at other peoples art it tells me how they see the world and gives me a good idea on who they are . Creativity in people are different but we all want to get the same thing across the thinking part of what someone gets out of it is better than the visual responses. Art has been a love every since I picked up my first pencil and that library book I checked out in 2nd grade using shapes
Beauty lies in the eye of the beholder. (whoever said that?) Why has art to be beautiful? Though I admit, I expect of artists, that they are capable of making art that one can recognise. If they can (Joseph Beuys, Picasso and many more) then they can do what they like. Great when Waldemar explains art!
Cudowne odcinek, naprawde! Thank you so much! You make the best Art History teacher ever. So fun. So sumptuous! And so for free. One ought admire that these days. And as for me this episode rules so far. Although the Dark Ages of Light... I die to know though what that last etheric projection in the back is.. hologram rafters? How? Also: Who? Cheers from Mokropsy
Seeing him in the Louvre under that beautiful vaulted and sculpted ceiling, next to a Breughel makes me sad. I lived in Paris, moved back to America, I miss it so much. All that incredible art/archtecture/grandeur everywhere you looked. I never took it for granted though, have memories for a lifetime. I can always go back, but its just not the same as living there.
Yoko Ono's "My mom is beautiful" was quite a deep experience though. Giving you a time and space to write a message to your mother, the most dear figure to many people, it's something that many people don't appreciate. The frenziness of life impedes us from stopping and thinking, especially about people who are gone, people who we held (or hold) dear, and sending them a message, even if they won't be able to read it, even of they are only a part of our memory. While watching him write a message to his mother I saw my mother.
Making beautiful things is hard and takes years of study and practice. Many modern artists prefer to opt for "clever." You don't get it? Oh, that's because your not smart enough.
Meaning, yes. Expression, yes. Beauty, mostly not. I think there is actually more consensus about what is beautiful than contemporary artists would acknowledge. It's just not so easy to put into words.
Had it not been for Yoko, we would have had at least two more Beatles albums. When John had reconciled himself by 1973 and was willing to record with the others again,, Yoko stopped him. She should NEVER be forgiven or celebrated. Hers is a name that should not be spoken.
This is probably one of my fave documentaries you've written and performed so far. I absolutely adored what Mr. Koons said. (how much does it take to produce one of these things anyway? I'd love to see you do the one that you've always wanted to do...)
really good art can be extremely ugly and powerful. If you haven't seen the art that was created in the USSR in the 1950s and 1960s, the stuff people hid in their walls, find a way to see it. Much of the art created was about persevering. Dissent and new ideas are expressed through art, also, as we can witness through art via time. And life experiences.
@@ZetaReticulian Sure, that's precisely the postmodernist perspective that is behind every work of contemporary mediocre artists. Incapable of creating beautiful works, they argue a hyper-individualistic point of view that is sustained solely by their abstract argument. But you can theoretically argue whatever you want about it. However, they works are there, and I know that the Sistine Chapel frescoes are beautiful, and that cans of poop titled "Artist's $hit" are not. If under your postmodern perspective in which those cans of $hit are in theory beautiful as a work by Michelangelo or Rembradt. Go ahead. But at least for these two artists, beauty was a supreme an absolute value. not subjective. And only in that truth, they did their work.
Hi Waldemar. I'll follow you anywhere, but you lost me on this one. I think we're being conned by many of these artists and the galleries that represent them. I'd love you to do a video on the art market, and how galleries and collectors can promote an artist and make huge profits. And as for Jeff Koons, I'll misquote him: "At the end of the day, it all comes down to .....money".
Agreed. Of course there's fantastic modern art. But there's also people just literally shitting on canvas and people WILL find meaning in anything if they look hard enough
At 14:47. Ahhhhh...one of my most favorite paintings of all time, Rembrandt's "Dead Cow" painting (don't know the official name). I've never had the pleasure of seeing it in person. I bet it's in some Russian gallery, inaccessible to me. Just like my other favorite Rembrandt paintings. Sigh. Anyway, this is extremely modern, though it was painted about 400 years ago. Unlike all the other "dead animal" paintings of the Renaissance, Baroque and Rococo, this Rembrandt painting shows one single carcass, completely devoid of skin and any other markings of "animalness." It's so visceral, so raw. I love it! Rembrandt truly was a painting genius, for having conceived of this.
I mean, ideally you’d presume your wife can walk on her own. She wouldn’t need saving. But if she was any kind of mate she’s helping you carry out the art. 😂
@@kokolanza7543 nee dat is het niet , meer van wat ik eens gelezen heb in de bijbel wat mij een houvast gaf als anker ondanks met gebutst heen en weer geslingerd ,ergens tegenaan gevallen ,moet men toch weer opstaan en de zware koffer dragen, want dat houd in dat hij je sterk vind en je mag best eens uitrusten en genieten want hij draagt dan even voor jouw de zware koffer, want je geeft niet de zwakkere een koffer die men niet kan dragen ,daaruit mocht ik opmaken dat hij mij als sterk zag om een zwaar koffer te kunnen dragen ,zeker valt het niet altijd mee zuchten en klagen zit ook in die koffer ,ik denk ook vaak daar komt hij weer met een zware koffer aanzetten ,waarom altijd ik ? Maar dan realiseer ik het weer dat ik niet de enigste ben die het zwaar heeft maar met elkaar zijn wij sterk dat is wat ook als inhoud zit in die koffer LIEFDE , vraag wat zal dat juffertje vandaag uit die koffer halen ,mijn broer is jarig vandaag hij was een Moederdag kindje ik geef hem een dikke knuffel want hij draagt wel een hele zware last al jaren in een GGZ ( zalig zijn de armen van geest ) hoe blij het mij maakt dat hij een vrijkaartje heeft voor de hemel daar zit een kracht die zo troostend is maar bovenal blijdschap ,ja die emoties die je voelt hoe groot God is maar je moet het willen zien ook de zwakkeren laten ons een gezicht zien van lelijk of mooi het is aan ons hoe willen wij geslepen worden tot een schitterend diamant van het leven oh wat is de kunst van het leven ,om op een perfecte wijze geslepen te worden en goed gekeurd te worden door de diamanten slijper onder de loepzuivere 💎🔍
Mooi hoe jij jouw moeder in herinnering bewaart en zeker op een voetstuk geplaatst moet worden ,wij vergeten maar al te vaak dat zij een sleutelfiguur is in ons leven zij die ons met raad en daad bijstaat en zonder meer haar kinderen liefheeft een band die levenslang meegaat ondanks vele kopzorgen die kinderen hun moeder kunnen geven is haar liefde onvoorwaardelijk ( een geschenk van de Schepper )
I sometimes disagree with you, and other times think you're all wet. But, I do enjoy your videos and always find myself enlightened and uplifted at the end of each one. Thank you.
What a great documentary. I'm thrilled to discover Mr. Januszczak today - though I could not pronounce his name without coaching from him...:-). May I call you by your first name, Sir? And then say: Waldemar, thank you so much for helping me become even more inspired by my self-education in ART program.
I really enjoyed this as I do al your programs. I hope Yoko is right. In the future we'll all make art and music and peace will transform the planet. I also carry a similar photo of my own mother who came from a area nearby to your parents in the former Poland in the modest clear change purse she carried it in. Hugs.
Mr. Januszczak is a treasure. His videos are the best thing on You Tube. Informative, very engaging, and inspiring.
Except on this one. In this one he's full of shit
They really are. And he is.
Mr. Januszczak is one of a kind. Spell check can't grasp his name but I grabbed hold of his passion for art and ability to inspire art enthusiasts. I got through pandemic and grew as a direct result, enjoying being guided by the Hitchcock of the art doc. In my home we call him Waldy! Thanks so much for all your hard work. I wish I'd had these docs as a middle school kid bored to tears watching a television rolled in on a metal cart showing art I had zero interest in. Been to the National Gallery and Tate my interest peeked. Hip Hip Hooray.
Thank you so much Waldemar! No one brings art to life like you. 💚💛💙
I think the biggest issue with modern art is how one seems to need a long paragraph explaining the context of the art. All I need to appreciate the classical works in the Lourve are my own eyes, with the modern pieces presented in this documentary, I only gain an appreciation for them after listening to an interview of the artist. Modern art seems unable to stand on its inherent qualities.
Perfectly said! 👏👏👏👏
100 % agree
Oh, well said.
Fair enough, have you seen Waldemars fabulous documentary about Jan van Eycks "Arnolfini marriage"? We are fascinated about all the puzzles both in the picture as well as the technical mastery of the painting , but it ain't speak to us immediately. I would call the disappointment of modern art the "I could have done it myself" effect. As if it was some clever scam, impossible to predict and not necessarily evil , but trivial in hindsight. Like the invention of a cheap trick. It is also somehow democratic, not devoid of "inherent quality" but it lacks a quality which sets it apart.
Totally!!!!
I don't know anything about art. I only know what I like. Art is what I can't do. I thought so for a long time - then came Waldemar. He can explain art that doesn't appeal to me at first glance like no other. Thanks sir.
Shame on you for saying “you can’t “. You just have to find the right medium and let all judgement go, you have art inside you.
No question, Waldamer is the greatest art historian in the world. I have learned more from his amazing films than anything or anyone regarding art.
Old art has been filtered by time. I am very happy to be 50 years behind. Great video, once more.
“It’s a beauty that’s been earned”. That struck me deep. Old cars, old houses, old cities. Etc. well said.
metoo
exactly!
What is incredible…exceptional… about this film is the artists interviews. When I binge watch Waldemar’s videos and then come across one where I can witness him interview the artist, it makes my brain pause. It is a treasure.
Everyone has access to a pencil and paper, but only an artist can do magic with it. That is what Art is all about to me. All these expensive and luxurious projects don't promote art but make it inaccessible.
That thumbnail is absolute perfection
I just love how Waldemar explains every art movement. He helps me to understand so much. It is like studying art history on youtube und much better than in the 80s in real university 🙏🏻🤗
I was going to walk over to the National Gallery of Art this afternoon, but instead this video came out so I stayed in to watch this. I've been on a WJ kick the last week or two. I'm guessing he'd be annoyed at me staying in to watch a video rather than going to an actual museum, but I wonder if he'd cut me a break since it was HIS video?
WJ would totally give you a pass
WJ doesn’t care about you on a personal level.
@@sealisa1398 Tell him I said "Hi!"
The video is a piece of art in itself. Playful, humorous, informative, above all thought provoking. I didn't have time to see it through in one go...but I did so anyway.
HAHAHA! Go look at the MLK statue in Boston. Modern art is nonsense.
@@marissashantez6051 Yeah, the MLK statue from what I've seen in videos looks like a mistake. But that's quite a leap you make to saying all modern art is nonsense. Is all Renaissance art nonsense by having one bad piece? Is all literature nonsense by one bad book? Is an art form nonsense if it contains one bad work of art?
Part of what people find objectional about this sort of modern work is not the stuff itself, but its dominance in art galleries, and the price its sold for. How is that worth X million dollars!!? What many are unaware of is that there's a whole field of decorator abstractionists. Many moderately moneyed like the spareness or texture of much contemporary modern art, but don't want to pay those prices or even have the responsibility to care that much for them. In comes the decorator artist. Decorator first, artist second. "Here's a portfolio to look at. What sort of things do you like? We spoke about this space here needing something warm, perhaps red? And something hanging here 4 metres wide and a drop of six." A commission is made, a work constructed, and sold for say six to ten times the cost of materials, plus consultation and wages. If someone falls into it at a party, the kids ruin it, or you get sick of it three years later, just throw it out. "We only paid a few thousand for it after all."
The technical art term is money laundering.
The Painted Word by Tom Wolf explains why modern art don't hold its value.
How is affordable decorator art objectionable? Better to support the art you enjoy rather that dwell on grievances about the the art you don't.
@@artriot4758 Waldemar Januszczak does not understand art is although he knows far more about it than I will ever know . Most people have no idea what art is. I often dislike real art at first because it is telling me something that I do not understand. Art essay about perception in the language of the right brain. I don't think that the kitsch is art because it doesn't have anything to say. Kirsch is pleasing to the eye and that is all anything has to be. It doesn't have to be beautiful and doesn't have to be art, just nice to look at.
@@artriot4758 I didn't say it was objectionable. Just that many do because it controls the art world stage. I then pointed out that however others do like it, but really mostly only at the level of decoration and sensation. As such, decorator art, striped of conceptual attachment (Which the gallery pieces usually fail to illustrate.) is more honest in purpose.
To me there's a vast uncross-able difference between Art & Exhibitionism. What so many modern exhibitionists seek feels like acceptance into or validation by the greats. I'm sympathetic to their need but not swayed enough to embrace performance anywhere near the emotions classical evokes. Usually my first reaction is "That's clever" or "Your joking, right?" Which pales a lot with the deep fascination & awe of human accomplishment I get from classical masterworks. I can't help myself but to categorize the majority of modern "art" in with advertising media & go from there. Simply put, like pop music it's fun to tap your foot for five minutes but ultimately forgettable.
I am entertained by their egos though
Well expressed!
Agreed. I keep looking for some substance. I'm still struggling with Kandinsky, which should tell you how far my search has gotten. Best regards.
Exactly! Well said!
@@kokolanza7543 ha ha zoekt naar wat stof,man je bent gemaakt van stof ,dus klop jezelf eens uit 😂😅
I think this is my favorite of your presentations so far, Mr. Januszczak. You've made older art and contemporary art cohere in ways that cheapen neither. In fact you've elevated all. Thank you for this.
In 1919, a Romanian poet and philosopher wrote this : I do not crash the crown of world's marvels / and do not kill with my mind the secrets I meet on my way in flowers, eyes, lips, or graves... Some other's light strangle the mystery of the impenetrable unseen... His name is Lucian Blaga, and I got a very high grade at the final exam ( baccalaureate) for having read his poetry.
There is something disturbingly trivial about a lot if modern art.
For sure. It seems to me that modern art has been an ongoing effort to come to terms with the Modern world (scientific-technological-metaphysical materialism). And it is still struggling to find an adequate response. Much of modern art is a simple capitulation to capitalist standards. imo.
Precisely
@@kokolanza7543 wat zijn wij weer lollig vandaag Imo ,zeker één lachspiegel in huis
Unskilled people with little or nothing to say. Who attempt to replace creating art by talking about it.
it`s mostly irrelevant..most of it will eventually end up in landfills
I dissent. Much of this is the Emperor's New Clothes. It reflects the religion of meaninglessness of our times. I was at a show in NYC where Yoko came into her long white chessboard. I say came into because clearly she orders a fabrication of elements with her millions of dollars, and it is placed there for her. I spent years as an art mover in New York, and got into nearly every museum, most galleries, met many artists, saw tons of shows. When Sean Lennon came in for the cameras to pose with Yoko sitting at the blank chessboard in her long fetishization of her late husband, it just felt dead. As did most of other empty objects in the group show. (Koons also just hires fabricators, he asked me once if I new anyone who worked with a certain material.) I had just come over from the Thrift Store art show, and the attempts at amateur obsessive art there felt far more genuine than anything in this exhibition. I bumped into a friend. She asked what I thought. I explained what I just wrote. She was shocked and replied 'You know I'm a gallery owner?' Of course I did. But that response suddenly made me realize the utterly cultish nature of the Gnostic imagery of Postmodernism. If you are in the cult you bow.
Give me back ornamentation, unabstracted texture, narrative, and most of all deep meaning. As Tarkovsky said about art, ‘Art is born and takes hold wherever there is a timeless and insatiable longing for the spiritual, for the ideal: that longing which draws people to art. Modern art has taken a wrong turn in abandoning the search for the meaning of existence in order to affirm the value of the individual for its own sake. What purports to be art begins to look like an eccentric occupation for suspect characters who maintain that any personalised action is of intrinsic value simply as a display of self-will. But in artistic creation the personality does not assert itself, it serves another, higher and communal idea. The artist is always a servant, and is perpetually trying to pay for the gift that has been given to him as if by a miracle.’
Thank you, my search for the perfect comment is over. This salute to the filling of the God-shaped hole in the world with whatever comes to hand is depressing. However, I remain a Januszczak fanboy, for now...
@@theflyoverlandcrank I agree. Januszczek is quite valuable. But he is constrained by what I would call a contemporary weakness. On my other channel, The Anadromist, I have lectures on art and culture by the late Dutch Christian art historian Hans Rookmaaker that I have been given permission to annotate visually. I have a playlist there of his work. Start with his lecture What Is Reality? It sounds like exactly what you might be looking for.
@@GravityFromAbove Thanks for the reference. Will check it out. Your comment, and Gravity From Above's, both seem accurate to me. Still much appreciate Januszczek.
Okay, thank you yet again. "Permanent change is what life is about." I shall be more open-minded--or honestly aware--when approaching current art of all types. "The struggle is important." Wow.
Waldemar, your insights and creative interpretations are wonderfully idiosyncratic, often profound, and provocative in a personal way. But in this show your comparison of these current artists to past painters [dead animal paintings/Hirst, Tiepolo/Yoko Ono, Canaletto/creator of wall art, etc.], you side-step a huge difference: the artist's touch. In the older work, the connection of eye-hand brush translated onto the canvas with a sticky substance we call paint is an alchemical transformation. So the connections you're making regarding the similarity of subject matter or generalizations about delicacy or texture don't hold water. They sound good, but they don't work. You think we won't know that the important elements of a work of art are not subject matter alone but HOW the work is created along with that subject matter. While I love your personal insights (such as the one about your mother's picture), the show as a whole fails because your premise has serious faults. Better that you choose artists such as Kentridge, Dumas, or Doig to compare with past art. And what is "ugly" about Yoko Ono or Carl Andre or Anish Kapoor's work? Maybe elusive or ambiguous or conceptual . . . but ugly? No. They're even rather elegant. Still, I applaud you for your you-ness and humor, and often depth.
It is such a great pleasure to see him making the combination between the old and new art, to connect them in such in inspiring way. Thanks, Hélène
Did not want it to end! Is so refreshing to watch a Waldemar. Thank you!
Art is creativity, beauty is balance. Light and darkness, inside and out.
He is pretty much the best presenter of art I've had the pleasure of watching. I'll sing at his funeral and my voice isn't very good. Thanks for another great documentary.
The hazy cosmic haziness has a special vibrational feel of becoming the light. Its truly beautifull 🧡
Excellent! I wish my National Gallery could have it's own Waldemar to breath this kind of life into it's presentations. I'll suggest they pay him to do it. So good.
This series is extraordinary. What do I know about art - nothing. What do I care for it - nothing. But I csn't look away
My current favourite of your series. These interviews are astonishing
Thanks!
I love how Waldemar connects past artists with modern ones.
I love how Waldemar engages us as viewers and challenges the status quo notions of art and its history. His perspective truly brings out the raw emotion behind the arts and their many variations. Would love to take an Art History course with this chap.
Always the Best 💐
Thank you 🌷
Thanks, Waldemar. Beautifully done. When I was young I didn’t see much of the art in the modern. Now it makes me smile and think about what I’ve lived for or thought of while doing the living. Perspective maybe.
I deeply love films/videos presented/produced by Waldemar Januszczak - I wish I’d encountered him long before now and am grateful that it did finally happen. Just wonderful!
Another terrific video from Mr. Waldemar Januszczak. I can't get enough! Thank you so much, Waldemar.
...and thank you so much for spending time on Yoko Ono. I loved her installation, and even more I loved your interview with her. She's still going strong at 91.
dzieki Waldemar for your devotion also to bring knowlegde ansd to share the passion of art
hadn't read about the candles on van gogh's hat. some lovely surprises. thank-you.
Glad to finally have you back on screen, Waldemar! You tell epic art stories like nobody else can!
I love the video, the script and the narration. Absolutely an work of art in itself.
OMG Waldemar! BRILLIANT IDEA to make a film on Soutine! Oh, PLEASE do it. I'm sure you can do it. Crowdsource it. We will love you even more!
“Your money or your life!” “I’m thinking!” - Jack Benny
Great lesson, W.J.! Lots of emptiness out there!
This video is the best thing I could have seen this morning. Thanks to everyone involved in its production.
What a beautifull interpretation “ the all embracing nothingness”
I've been watching ur videos nightly for the past week.
Wow
Thank you Waldermar each of these videos are a Gem I Love them Thank You for making them. ❤️🙏
If Waldemar is part of the video, I am watching AND giving up the like!
What a marvellous moment - Van Gogh's Hat of Many Candles! Priceless.
The interviews made these artists appear clearly as opportunists, whose works are not powerful enough to stand on their own without a large paragraph of explanation on the wall. I don’t expect everything to have a particular devotion to beauty, however, filling one’s CV with participation installations, encased taxidermy/vivisection exhibitions, and preserved walls debris, is not even meeting the ground level of creativity. It’s a double slap in the face to any artisans and traditional artists, because their actual efforts are so poorly compensated, relative to these charlatans. The brazenness of Andre is particularly hard to forgive. He boasts about how miserly he has been with inexpensive materials, then complains about how his audience doesn’t know the value of his cheap materials. An ego without a ceiling.
Hi ShaneyElderberry. Thanks for your clear, articulate perspective on this art, with which I pretty much agree. It seems to me - I'm no expert - that from the beginning, Modern art has struggled to respond to the revolutionay changes in the mode of human existence - the likes of which are unprecedented from (as MANY historians state) at least the beginning of civilization. It still has not found its footing. (Have any of us?) In addition, it does seem that the capitalist market calls the tune in regard to what gets produced, or at least noticed. Thanks again for sharing your insight.
I said in an earlier comment that art is used to launder money and I think making it ugly is a kind of an inside joke amongst the rich to thumb their nose at the rest of us.
Well said ... so many of these 'artists' don't even do their own work ... they get others to do it (real artists) and pay them the base costs - while selling the works at galleries for fortunes ... it is a 'celebrity artist' scam. There are great artists out there - but you will never see their works in galleries due to the art collectors obsession with 'celebrity' ...... what a joke!
I agree with your observations, and I want to emphasize that without an essay of explanation, there is no meaning in the art at all. I thought I was looking at a giant egg, but no, it was all about color and time. If the artist wasn't there to explain his/her unique vision and exoteric attempts at something new, no one, and I mean absolutely no one would get what is going on. That's a foolish idea of art.
@@jmontgomery1178 not sure what your point is but the way I had it explained to me an
" artist " paints a small black dot or a fly whatever on one corner of a canvas then goes into a long winded explaination why that corner instead of the other to sell it..it means nothing it`s a fly on a canvas
The NFL draft and a new Waldemar art doc. Been a good weekend
This is a wonderful video. Thanks so much for featuring Yoko.
That has to be one of the best documentation I have ever seen. Great job, Perspective!
Awesome take on today's art.
Once again you have given us a brilliant view into the art world. Thank you.
I saw a Turrell exhibit at the Whitney in the 90's and it freaked me out.
When you use the word "Modern", when you mean "Contemporary", it confuses folks, and they say things like "I can't remember the last piece of modern art I liked!"; then when you say "What don't you like about Monet?", it confuses them further. Their derision is usually reserved for Picasso, those awful! distorted! portraits! because he's when your random worker bee stopped paying attention to "Modern" Art. 'Tis sad, but true.
Damien Hirst should have been featured in the kitsch section, as in "The Kitsch of Death"; I unfortunately own one of his murderous pieces; it was a gift, I hate it, I won't sell it because I don't wish to pass along the bad, bad karma. I suppose I should bury it or throw it out, but I don't wish to hurt the feelings of my friend who gave it to me. Dilemma.
And face it, Jeff Koons makes high-end home furnishings. Or rather, his "assistants" do.
But of course Waldemar REIGNS in art docs; I just wish he'd make some new ones!
Preach it Luis!
You could donate it to a museum? If you sell it you can use the money for something good ...?
@@grainofsand4176
Thank you for your thoughtful and kind suggestions, but were I to give it to a museum, that would put it before the eyes of patrons in perpetuity, an exposure I would be uncomfortable with having caused and therefore being responsible for; were I to sell it, I could not control its path once it left my possession; it could very well wind up in a museum anyway.
Robert Rauschenberg famously bought a Willem de Kooning drawing and erased it, thereby creating a new work. I'm certainly no Rauschenberg (and DH ain't no de Kooning), but this concept, though not my own, is starting to feel comfortable . . .
@@luiscuixara4622 I'm sorry you are suffering from this burden. I admire your conviction. I hope a solution find it's way to you soon- I believe you will just Know when it does
@@luiscuixara4622 a bonfire in a public place might do the trick!
I love much of modern art. In some places it feels as though the artist is trying to turn US into the artist with our eyes. We turn it into art in our own perspective.
Thank you Waldemar, your work here is a treasure!
Definitely I needed your heads up, overview and rationales. Great stuff.
مجهود كبير و يحترم من قبل المتلقين و ثني عليه و نثمنه عاليا ... شكرا لهذه الوجبة الدسمة الجميلة
Brilliantly thoughtful. My god, this was well done.
Thank you Waldemar…..I was actuallly surprised at how Jeff Koons triggered my imagination after years of thinking I hated his art.
So why not feature some "blank canvas" artworks, if emptiness is good?
I am so down for this!
Hot coffee. Cheers🇨🇦
This, like your other films, is a magnificent attempt at showing an audience the value behind an art movement. However, on modern art, I remain wholly unconvinced.
I’ve always looked as art in everything I see that interested me . When I look at other peoples art it tells me how they see the world and gives me a good idea on who they are . Creativity in people are different but we all want to get the same thing across the thinking part of what someone gets out of it is better than the visual responses. Art has been a love every since I picked up my first pencil and that library book I checked out in 2nd grade using shapes
This film is itself a brilliant work of art. Bravo. And thank you 🙏.
Beauty lies in the eye of the beholder. (whoever said that?)
Why has art to be beautiful? Though I admit, I expect of artists, that they are capable of making art that one can recognise. If they can (Joseph Beuys, Picasso and many more) then they can do what they like. Great when Waldemar explains art!
AWESOME ! Thanks for showing.
Cudowne odcinek, naprawde! Thank you so much! You make the best Art History teacher ever. So fun. So sumptuous! And so for free. One ought admire that these days. And as for me this episode rules so far. Although the Dark Ages of Light... I die to know though what that last etheric projection in the back is.. hologram rafters? How? Also: Who? Cheers from Mokropsy
Seeing him in the Louvre under that beautiful vaulted and sculpted ceiling, next to a Breughel makes me sad. I lived in Paris, moved back to America, I miss it so much. All that incredible art/archtecture/grandeur everywhere you looked. I never took it for granted though, have memories for a lifetime. I can always go back, but its just not the same as living there.
such art i find it to be weak, it has no spirit , no soul. I dare anyone to experience an epiphany while listening/looking at Yoko's art .
Yoko Ono's "My mom is beautiful" was quite a deep experience though. Giving you a time and space to write a message to your mother, the most dear figure to many people, it's something that many people don't appreciate. The frenziness of life impedes us from stopping and thinking, especially about people who are gone, people who we held (or hold) dear, and sending them a message, even if they won't be able to read it, even of they are only a part of our memory. While watching him write a message to his mother I saw my mother.
Yoko’s art? The hype it appears is with the name not what she draws. My kid does better than she.
Making beautiful things is hard and takes years of study and practice. Many modern artists prefer to opt for "clever." You don't get it? Oh, that's because your not smart enough.
Meaning, yes. Expression, yes. Beauty, mostly not. I think there is actually more consensus about what is beautiful than contemporary artists would acknowledge. It's just not so easy to put into words.
Had it not been for Yoko, we would have had at least two more Beatles albums. When John had reconciled himself by 1973 and was willing to record with the others again,, Yoko stopped him. She should NEVER be forgiven or celebrated. Hers is a name that should not be spoken.
This is probably one of my fave documentaries you've written and performed so far. I absolutely adored what Mr. Koons said.
(how much does it take to produce one of these things anyway? I'd love to see you do the one that you've always wanted to do...)
As one scholar once put it: Yoko Ono is the only artist in history that is not famous for art she created but for the art she has obstructed.
I don't buy it. There is no point in trying to convince people that there is beauty in an art that no longer believes in beauty as a value.
Your argument falls apart once you internalize the unshakable fact that “beauty” is wholly subjective.
really good art can be extremely ugly and powerful. If you haven't seen the art that was created in the USSR in the 1950s and 1960s, the stuff people hid in their walls, find a way to see it. Much of the art created was about persevering. Dissent and new ideas are expressed through art, also, as we can witness through art via time. And life experiences.
You are right.
@@ZetaReticulian Sure, that's precisely the postmodernist perspective that is behind every work of contemporary mediocre artists. Incapable of creating beautiful works, they argue a hyper-individualistic point of view that is sustained solely by their abstract argument. But you can theoretically argue whatever you want about it. However, they works are there, and I know that the Sistine Chapel frescoes are beautiful, and that cans of poop titled "Artist's $hit" are not. If under your postmodern perspective in which those cans of $hit are in theory beautiful as a work by Michelangelo or Rembradt. Go ahead. But at least for these two artists, beauty was a supreme an absolute value. not subjective. And only in that truth, they did their work.
@@ZetaReticulian “beauty” is wholly subjective. No.
You, my dear man, are the masterpiece. Thank you.
Hi Waldemar. I'll follow you anywhere, but you lost me on this one. I think we're being conned by many of these artists and the galleries that represent them. I'd love you to do a video on the art market, and how galleries and collectors can promote an artist and make huge profits. And as for Jeff Koons, I'll misquote him: "At the end of the day, it all comes down to .....money".
Agreed. Of course there's fantastic modern art. But there's also people just literally shitting on canvas and people WILL find meaning in anything if they look hard enough
I have an Art History degree and I’m also an attorney so I know how to think critically, and I’m with you PT.
Modern art does little for me. It is for lower rate artists who have good marketers. Marketing is the key today. That is what draws the masses in.
Some work went there as in a book! Thankful
So Spot On. Cleaning- erasing layers of art history on buildings.. Such loss!
Art is here to nourish our Imagination and wonder
Oh, where has this video been all my life?!?!
Brilliant, thank you for this it was most informative and spot on
At 14:47. Ahhhhh...one of my most favorite paintings of all time, Rembrandt's "Dead Cow" painting (don't know the official name). I've never had the pleasure of seeing it in person. I bet it's in some Russian gallery, inaccessible to me. Just like my other favorite Rembrandt paintings. Sigh. Anyway, this is extremely modern, though it was painted about 400 years ago. Unlike all the other "dead animal" paintings of the Renaissance, Baroque and Rococo, this Rembrandt painting shows one single carcass, completely devoid of skin and any other markings of "animalness." It's so visceral, so raw. I love it! Rembrandt truly was a painting genius, for having conceived of this.
''One of the things I've always returned to is colour', says Anish Kapoor, artist.
I mean, ideally you’d presume your wife can walk on her own. She wouldn’t need saving. But if she was any kind of mate she’s helping you carry out the art. 😂
Eerlijk ik wist niet dat Waldemar getrouwd was , het spijt mij echt als hij door mij in de problemen is gekomen
HA! Although it might be just a wee bit satsfying watching a Damian Hurst painting burn. 😘
Lol! Exactly ! Great answer
@@jazw4649 Just the thought is satisfying. 🙂
@@kokolanza7543 nee dat is het niet , meer van wat ik eens gelezen heb in de bijbel wat mij een houvast gaf als anker ondanks met gebutst heen en weer geslingerd ,ergens tegenaan gevallen ,moet men toch weer opstaan en de zware koffer dragen, want dat houd in dat hij je sterk vind en je mag best eens uitrusten en genieten want hij draagt dan even voor jouw de zware koffer, want je geeft niet de zwakkere een koffer die men niet kan dragen ,daaruit mocht ik opmaken dat hij mij als sterk zag om een zwaar koffer te kunnen dragen ,zeker valt het niet altijd mee zuchten en klagen zit ook in die koffer ,ik denk ook vaak daar komt hij weer met een zware koffer aanzetten ,waarom altijd ik ? Maar dan realiseer ik het weer dat ik niet de enigste ben die het zwaar heeft maar met elkaar zijn wij sterk dat is wat ook als inhoud zit in die koffer LIEFDE , vraag wat zal dat juffertje vandaag uit die koffer halen ,mijn broer is jarig vandaag hij was een Moederdag kindje ik geef hem een dikke knuffel want hij draagt wel een hele zware last al jaren in een GGZ ( zalig zijn de armen van geest ) hoe blij het mij maakt dat hij een vrijkaartje heeft voor de hemel daar zit een kracht die zo troostend is maar bovenal blijdschap ,ja die emoties die je voelt hoe groot God is maar je moet het willen zien ook de zwakkeren laten ons een gezicht zien van lelijk of mooi het is aan ons hoe willen wij geslepen worden tot een schitterend diamant van het leven oh wat is de kunst van het leven ,om op een perfecte wijze geslepen te worden en goed gekeurd te worden door de diamanten slijper onder de loepzuivere 💎🔍
facinating observations Mr. J !
Thank you for sharing with us your mother - I’m sure she was a beautiful person in the ways that matter.
Another brilliant documentary.
I was really fascinated by Van Gogh story part. Can someone tell the name of the song played at 50:23 ?
Mooi hoe jij jouw moeder in herinnering bewaart en zeker op een voetstuk geplaatst moet worden ,wij vergeten maar al te vaak dat zij een sleutelfiguur is in ons leven zij die ons met raad en daad bijstaat en zonder meer haar kinderen liefheeft een band die levenslang meegaat ondanks vele kopzorgen die kinderen hun moeder kunnen geven is haar liefde onvoorwaardelijk ( een geschenk van de Schepper )
Another top drawer vid! Yesssir!
Zo zo ontroerend ,weet dat het wederzijds is 🤗 de mooiste video ooit 😳
I sometimes disagree with you, and other times think you're all wet. But, I do enjoy your videos and always find myself enlightened and uplifted at the end of each one. Thank you.
Some of the things Waldemar says are entertaining, hilarious!
What a great documentary. I'm thrilled to discover Mr. Januszczak today - though I could not pronounce his name without coaching from him...:-). May I call you by your first name, Sir? And then say: Waldemar, thank you so much for helping me become even more inspired by my self-education in ART program.
Waldemar, you give me hope!
I really enjoyed this as I do al your programs. I hope Yoko is right. In the future we'll all make art and music and peace will transform the planet. I also carry a similar photo of my own mother who came from a area nearby to your parents in the former Poland in the modest clear change purse she carried it in. Hugs.