And for the record, I like the sculpture too. Be interesting to see how big it is.

Auckland gets taxpayer funded party central, Wellington gets taxpayer funded?

They could always make it 10x bigger and put it on the Wellywood hill ;-)

And for the record, I like the sculpture too. Be interesting to see how big it is.

And for the record I never said I liked the sculpture, I like the idea of it. As for size, they said 5m tall.

They could always make it 10x bigger and put?

It is art for people who don't like art.

The Fran Wilde Walk is a vast expanse of concrete designed solely for getting a large amount of people the fuck out of the stadium after an event.

That. But it was also a great place for my kids to learn to ride bikes and skateboards.

It's one of the many things I love about American sports, the honouring of history.

We could retire the number 13 =)

I did the trig and here's an estimate of the width

I did some trigonometry the other day. It was pretty weird finding a use for it =)

I did some trigonometry the other day. It was pretty weird finding a use for it =)

I use it occasionally, even though it's (ahem) tangential to my job.

I won't comment about the sculpture ... at least not under my real name.

Jesse Ryder?

this statue would be in Courtenay Place, surely?

this statue would be in Courtenay Place, surely?

In a horizontal position?

Am I the only person who thinks it looks like a sea of rugby-supporting undead?

It is five metres high and it is horrible.

Oh, sweet Jesus. I've just realised how high five metres is! Arrgh! Keep it away from the waterfront!

I think the difficulty with a special-effects company making monumental sculpture is that it's such a different medium. An idea that might work in film is unlikely to work the same in bronze. This should be a no-brainer.

But Weta also made the tripod on Courtenay and the trees at?

But Weta also made the tripod on Courtenay and the trees at Te Papa

The tripod is:

– relevant to Weta's industry;
– site-specific;
– self-mocking;
– playful.

None of which applies to the rugby sculpture.

Which trees at Te Papa are you talking about? The wire trees on the?

That it should, but art and architecture are the two creative activities that everyone thinks they can do.

I'm the opposite. By definition, if I could do it, it's not art.

Haydn's [sic] passage "filled with statues of the great players from Wellington's sporting past" could look something like this. I am just warning you, that is all.

Ew, busts! No I was thinking more like the sculptures outside baseball parks in the States. And I was really only thinking of?

maybe an artistic recreation of bernies corner at athletic park?

Athletic Park is now a retirement village but apparently there is a Bernie's Corner in it.

The tripod is:

– relevant to Weta's industry;
– site-specific;
– self-mocking;
– playful.

I thought they were just channelling Louise Bourgeois.

An idea that might work in film is unlikely to work the same in bronze. This should be a no-brainer.

Weta aren't just about digital special effects. They have skilled and talented model-makers, whose work has extended from film sets to the public.

They have the technical ability to make?

Take, for example, the Canterbury Heroes...

please do take them...
...and what's worse, I believe the corporate-minded goons who now run the Arts Centre actually think that these "disembodied notables" fulfil their brief to provide "public art" to the community...

Would someone please explain to me why the fuck Weta is doing this and not an artist? Why is Weta taking bread out of the mouths of New Zealand?s sculptors with this unimaginative pseudo-Fascist tat? Sadly it appears that art?

Take, for example, the Canterbury Heroes, Sir Miles with the giant head in particular. Haydn's passage "filled with statues of the great players from Wellington's sporting past" could look something like this. I am just warning you, that is all.

AT least it wouldn't look like this......grrrrrrrrr.

That sculpture looks like something you'd buy. from one of those "gifts for men" shops at the mall for your rugby-loving uncle, the afternoon of his 60th birthday.

It is art for people who don't like art.

It's art designed by an advertising executive. In fact I'm pretty sure I?

There's also this.

If I may be allowed to cross threads for a moment, I propose an objective measure of the quality of a work of art: if it has the words "iconic" or "legacy" attached to it, it's crap.

if it has the words "iconic" or "legacy" attached to it, it's crap.

Works for me; perhaps "celebration" as well.

I watched the video of Taylor introducing the work to the media, and noticed that the maquette rotates on a stand. I hope the finished work will do the same.

I watched the video of Taylor introducing the work to the media, and noticed that the maquette rotates on a stand. I hope the finished work will do the same.

but only rotated by wind... right ;)

Gio: I think I vaguely remember the ad you're talking about. There's also this.

Why all the lineout art? It's not even our strong point. Could we have a statue of stoic defence?

Works for me; perhaps "celebration" as well.

I think this one is going to be the celebration of an iconic legacy.

Why all the lineout art? It's not even our strong point.

It would if we were allowed to use the surging undead. Time for a new ELV?

It would if we were allowed to use the surging undead. Time for a new ELV?

By the next World Cup Brad Thorn may have started looking like the undead, after all.

Why all the lineout art? It's not even our strong point. Could we have a statue of stoic defence?

The scrum also rises...

...and noticed that the maquette rotates on a stand. I hope the finished work will do the same.

That's a roundabout way of saying
a Lazy Susan,?

I know it doesn't do to be like Australia, but in this case, works for me..

It looks very climbable.

Would someone please explain to me why the fuck Weta is doing this and not an artist? Why is Weta taking bread out of the mouths of New Zealand?s sculptors with this unimaginative pseudo-Fascist tat? Sadly it appears that art in this country is getting assimilated?

I do hope Mr Wood realises that while starving in a garret may have created some great works of art it is not, in itself, a necessary condition for being an artist.

The likes of Andrew Drummond, Neil Dawson and Bill Culbert aren't exactly starving in garrets. They're just producing?

The likes of Andrew Drummond, Neil Dawson and Bill Culbert aren't exactly starving in garrets. They're just producing stuff that looks a lot more interesting than that Weta sculpture.

I have no particular comment to make on the actual sculpture as presented, but the idea that the people working at?

I have no particular comment to make on the actual sculpture as presented, but the idea that the people working at Weta aren't artists is wrong. I know a couple of people who slaved away on the various movies and got their jobs precisely because they had fine art degrees.

?

I know a couple of people who slaved away on the various movies and got their jobs precisely because they had fine art degrees.

I'm a sound artist, and I use the same set of skills in my day job as a sound engineer. Does that mean that, if I?

Also, there's a difference between sculpture and set design. (Demarcation issues, as the guild of philosophers sez.)

Well, one of the people I'm thinking of spent about 10 years doing art work. Scuplture, painting etc. Like many artists, it was her full time hardly paid job on the side. She?

So, is making models for movies 'art'?

Well, it is one of the functions of an Art Department as is Set Construction and Decoration, Backdrops,the Props department and the like.
So, yes.

is making models for movies 'art'?

Ah, but what is art? How can we define it? Are our definitons objective, or subjective? How do we tell what is 'good' art, and what is 'bad' art?

(running, hiding, etc)

And 'Art Department' is a specialised and technical usage of the word 'art'.

'Art' is a big tent, attempts to exclude people from it (particularly with quasi snobbery like people who make works for entertainment shouldn't also make public art works) are silly.

It isn't snobbery. I wouldn't suggest that Bill Hammond make a sculpture on the basis of his paintings, because painting?

Anyway, what's proposed is more a monument than a sculpture. Give this commission to a real?

Rather than argue about it here why not LookIt Up

I had this discussion the other night with 3410
"Kiri Te Kinawa, or whatever her name is, is referred to as an artist, an opera?

Len Lye is an artist because he is accepted by the Art World as such. Artists are identified by the Art World by?

How is being a singer not being an artist?

Gio.

Of course Len Lye was an artist.

Paul.

Artists are identified by the Art World by the fact of their making expressive pieces of work, and the purpose of those works being expression.

I think Paul won that one...?

I'd submit the "Going West" ad as evidence for art existing in the bowels of commercialism.

Who is the V/0? It sounds rather like Murray Gray, Murray-ther-Malt?
Yes? No?

It's a bit of a mystery who does the V/O here. Murray Grey is the director of the annual Going West Literary Festival so there is a connection. The Sound design was done in Shoreditch, East London, by?

There is also a big question of skill here. The sculptural output of Weta Workshop is not of good quality.

I'll respectfully disagree.

No?

But as sculpture, they are rubbish: more GI Joe than Giacometti.

Oh go on Paul, why don't you say what you really mean?
Weta has some excellent technicians, I have worked with a few of them in the past. Artists?. Well, I guess that is the question we have been?

Technical competence?

Kindergarten, yes; St Kevin's is Roman.

When were the Romans here, did I miss something?.

Artists are identified by the Art World by the fact of their making expressive pieces of work, and the purpose of those works being expression.

Without a clear definition of the "Art World" I'm not buying this, as the definition is clearly ciircular in the context used here.

n.b. I?

The tripod in courtenay place is just stupid – why the hell is it still there?

I quite like it. It's playful and is perfectly located – right in front of the Embassy theatre, just down from the Paramount, in the town's entertainment district.

It's taken the skills that the?

I quite like it. It's playful and is perfectly located – right in front of the Embassy theatre, just down from the Paramount, in the town's entertainment district.

I could tolerate it for all those reasons if it was temporary, like the troll on top of the embassy. As a?

I think it quite a small tent.

Well, I'm of the (subjective) opinion that pretty much everything 'created' by Emin, Hirst, or any of those Hoxton twerps is an enormous heap of steaming, stinking ordure.

In some cases, almost literally.

When were the Romans here, did I miss something?.

Substations of the Crossing...
an alternate history...
Escaping from the flames of Mesopotomia, the Roman Legion of the Parthian Less Trodden (Naval Division) fled south, drifting across the Arabian Sea and The Indian Ocean, missing Australia completely to wash ashore on?

Due to decimation only a cohort survived

I believe you're going to hear from Craig's attorneys on this one.

I believe you're going to hear from Craig's attorneys on this one.

Bloody Mathematicus – point taken...
Decimation is taking one-in-ten
and a Cohort is a tenth of a Legion
sorry, I was all at sea with that one
but ya get my drift...

I suppose I could get into?

When were the Romans here, did I miss something?

More to the point: what did they do for us?

Everyone I Have Ever Slept With, 1963-95.
Appliqued tent, mattress and light. 122 x 245 x 215 cm. – Tracey Emin.

is this work the genesis of the phrase:
"being sold a pup"?

But the quality of the idea? Come on.

Yeah but you can say that about umpteen pieces of art. Lots of statues and portraits are faithful representations of various kings and queens sitting. Busts are even worse. Royal artists often faithfully recreated the members of the royal family (some adjusted?

I'm saying that that the tripod is pedestrian if competent in its execution and utterly unimaginative in its conception.

I'm not sure if I've seen it, so OK, sure.

But that doesn't make something 'not art'. There's plenty of unimaginatively concepted art out there.

Art is identified by the Art World; that is not circular. The Art World is everybody involved in art: curators, critics, dealers, the interested public.

You may want to try googling 'institutional theory of art circular'.

I'm just saying it's the kind of art I'd happily take a blowtorch to.

Upcoming performance piece by Giovanni Tiso: "Artworks I don't like melting before your eyes."

But that doesn't make something 'not art'. There's plenty of unimaginatively concepted art out there.

And, by what I've read here about Wellington, they certainly have their fair share. I do like Kinetic Art for arts sake, in public spaces. It draws the public in,(not literally) and allows personal contemplation?

Around this point in the debate I tend to say (or agree) the question isn't normally significant anyway; I think when people ask whether something's art they normally want to know if it's,?

Agree, I'm not saying it's not art. I'm just saying it's the kind of art I'd happily take a blowtorch to.

How about something more maniacally mechanical, rather than mechanistic, to give you that Tinguely feeling...

Bet this blowtorched beauty by Wacko Giaco would give the Tripod a run for?

Art is identified by the Art World.

Art = Art world.

Circular, as Art appears on both sides of the equation.

The Art world as?

Bet this blowtorched beauty by Wacko Giaco would give the Tripod a run for its money...

A run for our money you mean surely?

A run for our money you mean surely?

Ha, not "our" money, we live in Auckland ha ha ha... ooops. yes our money is. your money down in Wellington. Thanks Rodders.
;-)

Art = Art world.

Circular, as Art appears on both sides of the equation.

Your equation, not mine: Art and the Art World are not the same thing.

The Art world as you put it, has a presumed knowledge of what Art is, where has this come from ?

Art is not?

He claims that one of the failures of Dickey's theory is...

(iii) its failure to distinguish good from bad art;

Aye, there's the rub. It is not the business of philosophical aesthetics to make that distinction.

Everyone; it requires consensus, but not agreement.

If there is consensus, surely everyone agrees?

Aesthetic conservatives often claim that non-representational works are not art. But what else can they be? Some may dislike them, but as works of art. If they were anything else, the question would not arise.

For example if I decide I am interested and decide I am an Artist does that make what I produce Art ?

If my wife is interested in my drawings does that make them Art ?

No: you need to be accepted, by people more disinterested than your wife.

I?

there must be a conscious act of declaring an object to be art by its creator

Yeah, I remember that. But I think it also allowed for confering the 'status' (and I don't mean that as high or low!) of art on artifacts later by the art-world (eg: Cheval's castle;?

You mean the paradox that it is not on Wikipedia, unlike the Abilene Paradox?

I might do... I might not.
Contrair?
Mio?

The practices we regard as art (painting, dancing, acting, etc) existed long before they were recognised as art

So – re the historical events – they weren't art then but they are now?

And the art world is temporally prior to art? Actually I'm imagining some co-evolutionary thing invloving thresholds,?

there must be a conscious act of declaring an object to be art by its creator

I never understood that. The paintings that my children make are art. What else could they be? They're not painted or drawn by numbers. They're terrible and nobody but us would want to pin?

The people?

Ah – at last -craft v. art.

The Etruscans had what we call "artigianato artistico" – artistic craft? – centred around their funerary customs. Sculptors would design and fashion amazing sarcophagi and urns which would then be mass produced by artisans. Fascinating stuff.

I think you arguing from?

The Etruscans had what we call "artigianato artistico"

Perhaps because it was the only art that poor people could?

Yes?

In which case, your world-view of "ART" is missing out on a huge amount of Art...snd we artists dont miss, or really appreciate, or even esteem in the slightest, your view of art-

The owners of the chairs did not think they had the same aesthetic value as the paintings the owners commissioned from George Romney. There?

The purpose of the chair is fulfilled by its having legs and a seat, not by its decorative scroll-work: its beauty is not necessary but applied. An aesthetic purpose is considered more noble and pure than a practical one.

By whom? I say bollocks to that myself. As for this:?

Art allows an escape from practicality.

Yeah, we can sit in our decorated chairs and drink our brandy, smoke our cigars and admire the work of the peasants because.

Craft requires skill but not intellect.

No amount of decoration will make that a chair I would gladly sit on, it?

Your wanting it to be art does not make it art.

Maybe not. But Gio's looking at it as art probably would- at least according to a fairly common reading of Dickie.
Art is a social phenomenon and activity, according to the "institutional theory" but it's not especially hierarchical or?

Your wanting it to be art does not make it art.

Yes, so long as we all comply with your narrow definition of art. I get that, believe it or not.

Holland and Holland shotguns are decorated (in much the same way as your working man's spade). They are not art. They are not intended to be art.

Says you. The specific tools I'm thinking of – and the handles of spades and the blades that I've seen – weren't carved?

I have a bowl made of glass. It is intensely blue. It holds, occaisionally, lemons or limes or tangerines. It is a?

I think there was a time before art. Larry Shiner argues that art was invented in the 18th Century, a part of the great enlightenment project of classification.

Man. Michelangelo, Leonardo, Leonardo, and the other teenage mutant turtle are going to be pissed that you brought that up.

Art is?

I'd like to point out, since no one else has seemed to do so, that this is crap. Lots of non-European societies have done non-utile art type activities.

I took Paul to mean that our idea of Art is European in origin. Which is also crap, but hey.

Man. Michelangelo, Leonardo, Leonardo, and the other teenage mutant turtle are going to be pissed that you brought that up.

Yes; I don't think he is right. I think art was invented in the 15th Century.

Lots of non-European societies have done non-utile art type activities

I said particular activities. Some of?

but generally art refers to the European traditions.

Yes, the figures on cave walls and the sculptures and paintings and drawings and etchings and the ceramics and the pottery fashioned by peoples all around the world for thousands of years are only Art if an art historian trained in the?

Pray, continue.

Why? How? You seem to think that Art as we know it (as opposed to as you know it, which is quite obviously the case) started in the Quattrocento. Therefore, quite aside form all the non-European art that had been made until that point, it rules out the?

You are doing a disservice to history if you pretend that things which were not regarded as art at the time of they making are art in retrospect.

You are saying that Phydias and Praxiteles weren't considered artists in a meaningful sense in their own time? You're nuts.

unimaginative pseudo-Fascist tat

which is that the proposed work is unquestionably precisely that ("unimaginative pseudo-Fascist tat" I mean) and utterly horrid.

I don't care who works at?

I was referring to the craftsmen of the Middle Ages, who were not regarded as artists because there was no conception of art at that time.

Yes, but that's a very narrow example. Somehow you deduce from the fact that medieval Europeans had no conception of art that preceding cultures?

Of course not. I said they were rediscovered. I was referring to the craftsmen of the Middle Ages, who were not regarded as artists because there was no conception of art at that time.

They were artists in their own time, but were then rediscovered centuries later, but art was?

has been noted by more than one other, it closely resembles a woman's genitals: a vulva, with labia, clitorus, introitus, some hair, and even the hint of an anus.

So it IS Art then.
I'm glad we settled that one.

No one could be that stupid, could they?

Nah, Paul's not stupid but he is adept at the ancient British ART of the windup, speshly with some Italians.
;-)
I thought yo'all would have got that when he said St Kevin's Arcade was built by the Romans.

Nah, Paul's not stupid but he is adept at the ancient British ART of the windup, speshly with some Italians.

I'd be very happy if that was the case.

I thought yo'all would have got that when he said St Kevin's Arcade was built by the Romans.

You have to admit it would make sense given the strong Vandal influence in the rest of the CBD.

You have to admit it would make sense given the strong Vandal influence in the rest of the CBD

for the WIN.

Show me the evidence of these cultures having a conception of art. Do you expect me to abandon truth in favour of cultural sensitivity? You seem determined to make this an argument about race and class.

How about you prove to me that the Greeks, the Chinese, the Japanese and?

How about you prove to me...

Come to think of it: don't. I'm finding this conversation deeply unpleasant and to be honest I don't have time for this crap.

those Ancient Greeks and those slightly less Ancient Romans had no word for art

Just like certain native groups having no word for snow?

that thing is an axe, but not a tool". "Art" may be different; I don't know.

Ohh, (sucks index finger) I dunno. Maybe ;)

Eirc Havelock "...neither 'art'?

Has anyone mentioned cave paintings?

My opponents in this argument are taking the essentialist and universalist lines

One can be subjectivist or intersubjectivist without agreeing with you.

I don't know if it's worth trying to clarify my argument from earlier; I'm confident it won't advance things. But what the hell.

The thing that sounded flawed wasn't?

Has anyone mentioned cave paintings?

I did, but that was like years ago.

Ok everybody...
RUN!!!

Ohh, (sucks index finger) I dunno. Maybe ;)

... Was that sarcasm?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-qzeflmJvEU

I actually kind of feel like Paul has a point, at least in a capital-A Arts sense, though some of the resulting exculsions seem unhelpful.

Given that he's clearly having a discussion about a different definition of 'art' (as you say, capital A) than (I think) everyone else was discussing?

Ohh, (sucks index finger) I dunno. Maybe ;)

"Art is not a mirror held up to reality,
but a hammer with which to shape it."
– Mayakovski

art, truth, knowledge...
this off-episte(mology) run is fraught
with thin ice to be skating on...

I mean how come when one is artful?

I did, but that was like years ago.

This is me resisting quoting you out of context. Yeah, literally years ago. Who knew?

[I'll stop saying that soon Ben, I promise;-) ]

ART HISTORY explores visual?

Anti-Intellectualism on a pale horse.

I just want to report that my daughter has just asked me for some "Mona Lisa".

Don't you mean Mona Lisa on a pale horse? Well, next to it at least.
Who... Nahhhh!

I'm just trying to be helpful. No, really.

But I disagree with you Paul on a couple of points. First, that indigenous?

What is the problem with studying a "wide variety of different cultures?"

Nice try sunshine – not me who seems to have an issue with culture being plural

And still you think?