pablo
Some stupid things I heard people saying at the Picasso and Africa exhibition include…
“Look at these pictures Karen. It looks like fifth grade drawings.”
“If I draw a couple of lines like that, do you think I would also be famous?”
“You must be joking, my daughter can draw better pictures than that.”
Now I’m not a big art critic, and I don’t pretend to know a lot about art and the deeper meaning of it either, but hearing comments like that makes me want to grab the “offenders” by their necks and knock some sense into their heads.
Anyway, it’s not everyday that we get exhibitions of this nature and quality in South Africa. I found it very informative and revealing to see that a lot of Picasso’s work was influenced by the African continent. If you’ve ever seen African masks and you look at some of his work, it is actually very obvious where he found his inspiration. So if you have time, go catch this exhibition in Johannesburg before 19 March or in Cape Town from 13 April until 21 May.
Christiaan Kuun wrote on March 9th, 2006 at 5:28 pm
Very interesting.
I also went to see the exhibition, but on a totally different day from old Hermie. The interesting thing is that I heard the exact comment:
“You must be joking, my daughter can draw better pictures than that.” – Those exact words! I remember it clearly, because I thought the guy was a fool.
Sure, even I can draw things on the level that Picasso did, but I didn’t, still don’t, and never will have the same ability to see things from all the different angles and perspectives and be able to put it on paper so that others can see what he saw. And I would also never have thought of doing it ever in my life had I never gone to look or study his paintings. You do get crap art though and, having grown up in Grahamstown, I’ve seen a lot of it. But the crap art never makes it, it allways dies out. So surely you have to ask yourself, “If this painting is worth R20 million, what am I missing?” You will then look a little deeper and hopefully find something that speaks to you.
Something else I thought of. Is this the same guy? Could it be that this guy visits the exhibition every day, and makes that comment to see if he can provoke people? Or does he actually love Picasso so much that he goes to the exhibition every day and states in amazement, “This is incredible, even my daughter could draw this, but what feeling! What mysterious grace! This is powerful, this is it, this is art.” Could this be the true feelings of the mysterious visitor? Or, is it the ghost of Picasso that could be whispering in your ear? Still trying to find peace with his work, and still hating it? You never know…
hannes wrote on March 14th, 2006 at 10:30 am
hey! last year i overheard this guy in paris
just to be clear, did he have an american accent?