[Juan Martinez]

Dear Jim, et al.:

As I said in my earlier post; this issue never reaches a resolution. I doubt that there is anything you could say that would make me see my wrongness, or vice versa. However, it is always, for me, a useful excercise in polemics.

Much of what you do say bears closer examination, but I won't attempt to deal with everything in one post in the interest of keeping our readers' collective attention. Unfortunately, it is part of a larger phenomenon that goes like this: if one asserts what is more-or-less the established wisdom, as you are, then no extensive backing or validation is required. One simply needs to make assertions. So, asserting the genius of contemporary masters needs no further comment. In fact, all of what you have said I have heard a million times over. Conversely, I am the one who gets dismissed as a crank, as petulant, or just as someone lacking in true understanding. This is because if one wishes to dissent from the established opinion, as I do, one requires huge amounts of backing, evidence, validation, argumentation, etc.. And this, in turn, requires time and/or print space. So for me to deal with everything you have said would encompass many pages. As such I will deal with only one or two of the things you mentioned. Even with that, it is a longish essay, by cyber standards.

I wish to consider the issue of "insulting someone's intelligence", particularly the "millions of people who make an effort to see and appreciate visual art", by my suggestion that we no longer know how to look at representational pictures. I believe that to be true, for the most part. Of course, I don't mean everyone, but just generally, as a rule. Explaining that would take a rather longer essay, so I'll write more broadly-speaking here. First of all, though, the number of adherants to some belief or cause, or other thing, is quite irrelevant and does not say much one way or the other about that cause, belief, or thing. Do we for a moment think of the hurt feelings of the millions of Nazis, Facsists, Communists, terrorists, and sociopaths there must be out there? Do we agree with them simply because there are or have been so many of them? No. So the numbers are simply a statistical measure that is only the beginning.

In any event, there are also other ways of insulting a person's intelligence. For instance, if one claims to dislike or find little of value in the efforts of Picasso, Matisse, Rothko, Jackson, etc., and says so to someone who has devoted his/her life to loving that art, it would certainly be taken as a personal affront. As such, one must use some tact or diplomacy. I am not setting out to insult or to hurt anyone's feelings.

But, for argument's sake, just whose intelligence is it okay to insult? Mine, I guess--or so it seems--and the millions like me. I am expected to worship at the altar of drip paintings and colour field expressionism just as I would in front of a Titian, eh? And I am to do that unquestioningly. These pictures are, after all, housed in the finest museums and galleries in the world, aren't they? Moreover, I will not truly "understand" art unless and until I do like those pictures and am thereby "moved" by them. But, somehow, throughout that experience, my intelligence is not supposed to be insulted. Curious.

Here's an especially curious example of an assault to our intelligence, courtesy of Canada's National Gallery in Ottawa. Last year, they awarded a $50,000 prize as the Millenium Award in the Visual Arts. Please note that the prize was for "visual" art. It went to a recording of the 20-or-so separate voices of a choir, taped while they were rehearsing. That's right, a recording. In other words, the award for "visual" arts went to a work that could just as easily be enjoyed by the blind as by the sighted. Frankly, that not only insults my intelligence but my pocketbook, because it came from a publicly funded institution. There are thousands of examples like this all over the world. But I can't say "boo" about the Modernist "masters" without being accused of crying over spilt milk or of insulting someone's intelligence. Again, curious.

Finally, speaking of Robert Bateman, our National Gallery is also noteworthy for not having a single work of his in its collection. Bateman is probably the most successful and well-known artist during his lifetime that has ever come out of Canada. Yet, he doesn't merit inclusion in our National Gallery? Is this simply because he is no Vermeer? Must be. (By the way, Mr. Shanks also said that Mark Rothko's pictures are to art what eye charts are to literature.)

It is true, as you say, that representational art didn't really die off in the 20th century. It remained the most popular form of art among the "people". (Any poster shop's sales records will attest to this). My complaint is not with "the people". The problem lies in the realm of the art cognoscenti or, at least, among those who are serious about art, the dealers, curators, and generally those who consider themselves connaisseurs, and the like. In other words, the "establishment". They are the ones who set the tone and get the media's ear, who establish criteria for funding and exhibiting, both private and public, etc.. They are the ones who are supposed to know, yet they largely, do not. Citing a handful of examples of representational painters who are now getting a bit of recognition within some circles of this group, does not really get to the heart of the matter.

I could go on. If this were a discussion in speech--perhaps over a couple of bottles of wine in the real Cafe Guerois--it would not seem to be so long-winded. But, as it is, I'll stop.

Next up: Conspiracy theories.

All the best.

Juan