Comments on: “Everybody can Dada”

By: Lolly Knitting Around » Blog Archive » Museology

Lolly Knitting Around » Blog Archive » Museology — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 01:28:28 +0000

[...] museum trip brought about some of the same thoughts I had after seeing an exhibition last year. I posed the question then, and I still don’t have a definitive answer(and probably [...]

By: natasha

natasha — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 04:22:35 +0000

i love your blog. i love your energy. that said, i love color. when i was younger, and in college, i was not "into" color. how? no clue. i liked red. and black. that was kind of all. i missed all those years that i could have been in love. now, i find that not just texture and form is compelling to me...but color is hypnotic to me. when i dye fiber, or spin it up, i can just look at it and my heart swells. not that i am old, by any means, but as i get older, i find that i am able to really absorb the things around me, the light, how things smell, feel, and the minutia of how things look. like something being a gorgeous amazing color that seems to just hum.

as for art/craft...intention, i think. and the understanding of what you are doing, exactly. i like the fact that in europe, craft has an entirely different connotation, not country wooden signs with ducks, or whatever, not that there is anything wrong with that, i think you have to understand to some degree what art is about to make it, as opposed to just being a beautiful object. not that one is better than the other.

By: karen

karen — Fri, 31 Mar 2006 07:50:37 +0000

Thank you, Lolly for a very inspiring post!! I went to a dadaism exhibition in Paris last fall – but learned even more by reading your post!

By: Sydney

Sydney — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 23:02:12 +0000

I’m going to avoid the whole art vs. craft controversy. It’s way too complex to pin down. Thanks for the good, thoughtful post, Lolly.

By: Mimi

Mimi — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 18:01:12 +0000

I loved going to the museum with you that day. There was something wrong with the authentication number earlier. I am glad it is better now...
I am home now. I will have to tell you the wild story later. Thanks for the thought-provoking entry. Love you!

By: Lola Lee Beno

Lola Lee Beno — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 15:23:38 +0000

Dadaism doesn't really strike a chord with me. Come to think of it, modern art doesn't do anything for me, either. Often when I'm standing in front of a painting with huge circles of solid color paint, I'm thinking "what on earth was this artist thinking? I could do this just as easily."

Impressionism and realism, as well as 16th and 17th century art, are much more appealing to me.

By: Margie May

Margie May — Wed, 29 Mar 2006 22:23:56 +0000

Some of my favorite classes in college were my two Art History electives (I was a poli sci major). This post reminded me of how much I loved sitting in that darkened classroom listening to my professor lecture as she showed beautiful slides of art. Anyway! IMO, art doesn’t have to be removed from us in museums or text books. Beauty and art can be found in our every day living. I like to think that the things I make are art.

By: Emily

Emily — Wed, 29 Mar 2006 21:07:49 +0000

I loved this post Lolly! This exhibit, or at least many of the same items, were at the Dallas Museum of Art last fall through January, and I was employed by them to do staged readings of many of the writings - poems, treatises, and letters to the bewildered crowds. Totally surreal experience. Busy with that, I totally missed the knitting connection, and now that I think about it, the crowds might have been less off center had I just knitted for them! At any rate, the DMA payed well (more yarn money!) and I am now eerily familiar with Tristan Tzara, Marcel Duchamp, Andre Breton, et al. I did love one line in particular, by Breton, and although it has no literal meaning, it is lovely:

"It was then that the bird with sulpher plumage sang. It sang the interiors of houses, and it's song complained of the trees; it sang the view one has from windows, and its song tucked a desperate bed. Then the star vanished in a scented vapor, and the sainfoin of the mirrors faded, and the closets opened onto boreal scenes, scenes of love that could not be verified because of the cold."

You have to say at least one thing for that set - they had good drugs.

By: Casey

Casey — Wed, 29 Mar 2006 19:26:37 +0000

I don't think that we can definitively say what is art and what's not because we all come to art with different perspectives and esperiences. I think that if you see something as art, then it is art. Tha same goes with creating art, I think. At the same time, though, did Duchamp think he was creating art when he put a mustach on the Mona Lisa? Or was he just being irreverent and making the point that we need to lighten up about art?
I think it comes down to the point that if something makes us reexamine ourselves or the world we live in or newly appreciate what we see around us everyday, that is art that's doing it's job. And it doesn't matter if it's a painting or a piece of clothing or a sculpture made out of a toilet. I think that too many of us are hesitant to call what we create art because that implies some level of greatness that we don't think we deserve- but we should!

Thanks for sparking this thought.

By: Mandy

Mandy — Wed, 29 Mar 2006 19:21:40 +0000

Wonderful post, Lauren!! I am not going to weigh in on the definition of art… after 4 years of art college and frequent, exhaustive discussions of that very topic, I am allergic to discussing it. Instead, I have to mention the funny title of Duchamp’s Mona Lisa (in case you don’t know it). It’s LHOOQ. When you say the letters in French, it sounds similar to “Elle a chaud au cul”, or roughly, “She has a hot ass.” Those crazy Dadaists…