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Does Any One Else Miss This Nutcase?


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I still have his poster from the Fort Worth NECECA up in my studio, he's not clothed and his wife and grad student are semi dressed.  I saw him wearing a long kimono type robe, thinking that he was probably naked underneath it and was going to start flashing people at NECECA.  Denice

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Guest JBaymore

I remember that one too, Marcia. But also can't remember where. NCECA is so 'tame' these days B) .

 

best,

 

......................john

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I remember that one too, Marcia. But also can't remember where. NCECA is so 'tame' these days B) .

 

best,

 

......................john

 

Have to grin ... maybe NCECA craziness has only changed for those who are old enough to remember these things! :D:rolleyes::P

Could be asleep when all the memorable stuff happens.

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Guest JBaymore

Could be asleep when all the memorable stuff happens.

 

You might have cut to the core of the issue here, Chris.  :D  :D  :D:rolleyes:  B)  

 

best,

 

....................john

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  • 2 weeks later...

The Pit and the Pendulum . If the pendulum swings back it either frees us or..............We may be like a Soldner mixer with 200 lbs of clay left out to dry and sixed up ,no amt of work can break us free, but we were younger then and didn't care about what was to be.

Wyndham

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I came into doing ceramics rather late and never got to meet any of the more well known clay artists of the pre-millenial era. They all seem so "bigger than life" in the articles I have read about them. That said, I really don't much like the art that many of them ended up doing. I once watched a video of Peter Voulkos tearing off blobs of clay and stomping on it then slapping it together as art. Paul pretty much ended up doing the same. Big crappy, slabs slapped together and everyone saying...OOH...AHHH Abstract Expressionism!

 

I think a large part of art is technique, and I think a large number of people abandoned it to "get with the program". Probably Paul thought what he was doing was pretty funny... he seemed to have a wry sens of humor.

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I came into doing ceramics rather late and never got to meet any of the more well known clay artists of the pre-millenial era. They all seem so "bigger than life" in the articles I have read about them. That said, I really don't much like the art that many of them ended up doing. I once watched a video of Peter Voulkos tearing off blobs of clay and stomping on it then slapping it together as art. Paul pretty much ended up doing the same. Big crappy, slabs slapped together and everyone saying...OOH...AHHH Abstract Expressionism!

 

I think a large part of art is technique, and I think a large number of people abandoned it to "get with the program". Probably Paul thought what he was doing was pretty funny... he seemed to have a wry sens of humor.

 

The work they were making had nothing to do with being likeable. Judging the lot of these figures on their work alone would clearly miss their contributions. Also, take note of the "circles" in which their work participates. It contains significance in both historical and culturally formative contexts, whether or not it is pleasant or unpleasant. And to trump all of this, many of these figures had more to offer as educators. Their presence in the art world can be seen as coincidence or happenstance that resulted in their fame because of the wide-spread consumption of art as a primary media source of the time, which additionally participated in cultural cultivation.

 

Don't misunderstand my argument as a suggestion that specialized education is required to understand the work, moreso a request to evaluate the work in both original and contemporary contexts. It's completely valid to like or dislike the work, just be aware that the reason these figures are held as "bigger than life," is not wholly attributed to the work alone. 

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I think required reading for any artist should be " The 12 Million Dollar Shark" by Don Thompson. Also the film "Exit through the gift shop". The impact of art in society has a lot more to do with being at the right place at the right Time or being  "branded". George Ohr did some of the same things much earlier and was seen as kind of an nut case till he was "discovered" in the 60's. But I really like his work better since he allows his previous mastery of the medium to show through (IMHO).

 

I should have kept my opinion to myself, since I know that ascetic issues of form and function don't get resolved by argument. My point was that it seemed that the later works were rather sloppy constructions that showed little of the previous mastery. The beginners in my clay class could pretty much throw something together that pretty much would pass for a Voulkos piece.

 

I took a look at your galley Colby, and I can see that you like to diverge from the more classic forms and into sculpture. I totally agree with what you are trying to do mostly because I am trying to do the same thing. To me, your work is outstanding technically and ascetically. When I look at it  there is no doubt in my mind that it was done by someone who has attained a high level of mastery of the medium...and not by a six grader. :)

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Guest JBaymore

 But I really like his work better since he allows his previous mastery of the medium to show through (IMHO).

 

........edit.......

 

 My point was that it seemed that the later works were rather sloppy constructions that showed little of the previous mastery. The beginners in my clay class could pretty much throw something together that pretty much would pass for a Voulkos piece.

 

Ohr's work show his "mastery" but Volkous' does not?  It could as easily have been said the other way around.  How would you support saying this?

 

best,

 

...........................john

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If you don't agree, then nothing I can say can support my opinion. All I'm saying is that... to me... the later "free form" constructions or sculptures of both Peter and Paul required little talent in the way of technique. What do you think  Voulkos was trying to get at or to say when he rolled out a bunch of slabs, ripped them apart, stepped on one and left a tennis shoe print and then randomly stuck them together all in a matter of ten minutes? Oh I forgot... he also poked a couple of holes in them when he was finished.

 

There doesn't seem to be anyone in this forum who is going anything at all like what we are talking about. I don't think that it is because they are not able, and yes John(IMHO) your work shows a mastery of the craft that Voulcos later work does not. Also. I'm sure you strive hard to further that mastery. Please don't start  tearing them down the middle or stepping on your pieces and leaving tennis shoe prints. I like them the way they are.

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have you considered the Abstrat Expressionism as part of an era when WWII vets came back and went to college on the GI Bill?

Could any of it have begun with PTS?

The movement pushed the media with raw emotion. Carlos Zauli , an Italian Contemporary work in a similar vein as Voulkos but used one glaze and I find his work more elegant than raw but still Abstract Expressionism and he was a POW in WWII.

Marcia

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I like the idea of the postwar climate having an influence on abstract expressionism, but I think it's more likely that it was a rebellion from the increasingly tight strictures of artistic convention in the years before.  I'm reminded of the strong anti-Wagner movement in the early 20th century musical scene.  To take up Colby's point, people like Schönberg are HARD to listen to, especially through his 12 tone period, but he had a real point to make against composers like Stravinsky.  

 

The statement of the abstract expressionists seems to be more about what art is and can be, and a rejection of what it is supposed to be, than actual art that participates in the preexisting social dialogue.  I think this is when a major break in aesthetics happened.  Prior to the this period art--piece, pot or painting--was an expression of a preexisting set of societal ideals.  The Greek tragedians, to me, are one of the most exquisite forms of this kind of art, using a known mythology to discuss social mores of the day.  Aeschylus' Oresteia discusses the mechanism of justice surrounding murder in Athens, for example.

 

But with the advent of mass cultural phenomena, art became something else entirely.  William Morris, I think was a pioneer of mass culture to some degree.  I may be off base with this, but I see him as a sort of industrial artist--a brilliant one.  His works in art, literature, textile design, decorative arts (including furniture), etc. appear to be for mass consumption.  By the time of the Abstract impressionists, I'm not sure there were such industrial designers.  Maybe Bauhaus?

 

At any rate, the individual artists after this shift seem to declare simply their own internal social dialogue and invite the viewer/participant to use the experience as an acculturating one.  The point isn't whether the work is good or not, but if it can be good.  12 tone music is very hard to listen to, but it can be brilliant when you're in the right mindset to figure out what's going on.  Nothing about it is technically difficult, usually, but it's not about the skill of the musician, it's about the artist.  I'm not always a fan of that approach, especially now that the two emotions most commonly expressed by such art in our current time are irony and sarcasm, but once upon a time there was some really deep stuff in there.

 

I sometimes feel like there's a fine line between making sense and raving when talking about this kind of stuff.  I hope what I've written makes some sense.

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(. I remember when he and Janet Mansfield ran nude across the stage at an NCECA..was that San Jose?)

There is a reason not to go-I always thought he looked better with his cloths on and wish he kept them on more.

Now as far as his clay mixer it was 4 feet to short. One hell of a mixer except that you had to bend over to do anything with it like dig out 200#s of clay with your hands.The intovative design was for a plus for chiroprators not potters.

My back still has a memory of thiose machines and trust me they are bad memories

I liked Paul -my brother took a clay class from him in the 60's in so -cal when he taught summers there.-I have some of those pots still.

So I do not miss the mixers and the nude ads but I did like his other ads and wheels-so its a 50/50 on the nutcase missing.

Mark

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Guest JBaymore

A while ago I was doing some kiln consulting work for a prep school with a good ceramics program.  (BTW..... I promised that this school must remain nameless when mentioning this following fact.)  There in a corner was a large maybe 5 1/2 -  6 foot tall piece.......... instantly UNMISTAKEABLE......... a still raw green Volkous "Stack".  I was blown away that it was there.  Nice one too.  That item is incredibly valuable........ and is just sitting there in their kiln room.

 

He had done a workshop there.

 

I love that old picture of Hamada, Leach, Yanagi, Archie Bray.... and Volkous at the workshop Hamada was doing.  And the comment from Hamada to Volkous, 'you need to loosen up' (see early Volkous pots).  He took it to heart.

 

best,

 

........................john

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