Hello all,
My admittedly uneducated opinion:
If it takes 5 pages of discussion to devine the "meaning" of a painting (esepecially such a simple one) then the artist has failed to communicate, not to mention uglifying the sitter(sure....it's a word).
I noticed that nearly everyone had a negative reaction to it at first (i.e. it is aesthetically unappealing). After we saw his self-portrait (which I thought was interesting, but not that great) then we started guessing at what he could be "saying" by creating such work, and the amateurish, ugly nature of the painting seemed less important.
In my view, if you're painting a portrait as a gift, aesthetic pleasantness should be a minimal requirement, even if you're not trying to beautify the sitter.
I'm sure you're right that Freud couldn't care any less. As with a lot of paintings, it's the hype that gets the praise and notoriety, not the work itself (may not be true of all his work, but I think it applies to this one).
Hope I don't seem too judgemental,
Nathan
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