Talk:Anti-art

Title
Misspelled article title!

"Anti-art"; there is a hyphen.


 * Thanks, it's been corrected now. -- ChrisO 29 June 2005 07:46 (UTC)

Definition
This page should include a definition before anything else.

Useful refs

 * Review of book on anti-art..
 * Interesting snippet from the Tate. Tyrenius 23:43, 19 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Comment References are way too long, in most cases just add the name of the source, page number etc.; and the text sections are too short; either eliminate irrelevant ones or merge short sections into larger sections...Modernist (talk) 11:49, 22 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Done some of that. I agree about the notes, which have more text than the articles, but some of this should be reworded or quoted into the text, which is often very bald. I've removed the refimprove tag as most of that has been done, although I know some sections remain. If anyone wants to re-add it, fine. Johnbod (talk) 14:36, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Let's be real
The article needs to be a "friendly" exposition to the reader of the place that "anti-art" and "anti-art" tendencies plays in the art world. It shouldn't be a screed about the "oppression" that visual art inflicts on the world. Visual art isn't slavery. It shouldn't be equated with slavery. Let's be real. Bus stop (talk) 12:50, 22 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I found this . I'm not sure how it relates to this article. If one moves one's cursor over or clicks on the items in the diagram, one finds what seems to be the basis for this article. Bus stop (talk) 17:27, 22 April 2009 (UTC)
 * The content is flowing the other way. It looks like it turns WP articles into mind maps. Pretty cool IMHO, but nothing to do with this article in particular.--Ethicoaestheticist (talk) 18:59, 22 April 2009 (UTC)
 * You'd have a job finding your way using that one! Johnbod (talk) 19:08, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

It continually reoeats itself. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 5.69.91.187 (talk) 20:34, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

Note bombing
The references are way too long. They need trimming to say the least...Modernist (talk) 21:10, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

The Guerrilla Girls
Bus stop has added this to the article : "The Guerrilla Girls are a group of radical feminist artists established in New York City in 1985, known for using creative posters to promote women and people of color in the arts." Bus stop, could you please tell us why they are in Anti-art ? Because they use posters ? Could you please explain and also provide a reference linking them to anti-art ? Thank you. Armando Navarro (talk) 21:55, 22 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Good point. Perhaps they should be removed from the article. Bus stop (talk) 23:05, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

I think it’s premature to draw conclusions about this article or my contributions now. It is far from finished, I only started working on it a week ago. Please give me (and yourself, and every other contributor) a little more time. I think we should all continue working on it, finding new references, adding hyperlinks here and on other relevant pages, and we’ll see what it looks like in a few months. This is still a work very much in progress.

But if you really want to make criticisms, you should take a look at the page before I started to work on it. You can see the last change before I intervened here : http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Anti-art&diff=271666457&oldid=233451641 There wasn’t a single reference on the page and it was all about Dada and practically nothing else. The anti-art article was created on 23 June 2005. So basically for almost four years it seems no one cared enough about the subject the make any serious contributions.

Armando Navarro (talk) 03:06, 23 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Agreed. And no problem. And I will try to do some research to support my point of view. Good to talk it out. Bus stop (talk) 03:22, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

"Array of concepts and attitudes"
What is the "array of concepts and attitudes?" (First paragraph) "Array of concepts and attitudes" may have a source, but how does that phrase belong in the article? Is there really an "array of concepts and attitudes?" What are they? Perhaps that deserves to be expanded upon in the article. If there isn't truly an array of concepts and attitudes, then I don't think that phrase belongs in the article, even if it is sourced. Bus stop (talk) 00:11, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

David Graver. “The aesthetics of disturbance: anti-art in avant-garde drama”. University of Michigan Press, 1995, p. 7. Graver states that “an array of concepts and attitudes (…) can be loosely grouped under the moniker of ‘anti-art’” Armando Navarro (talk) 14:06, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

What are they? They are the concepts and attitudes in   * 1.1 Anti-art art * 1.2 Anti-art non-art * 1.3 Depersonalization * 1.4 Destruction They are also the concepts and attitudes in   * 2.1 Jean-Jacques Rousseau * 2.2 Karl Marx * 2.3 Incohérents * 2.4 Dada o 2.4.1 The Dadaist revolutionary central council o 2.4.2 Marcel Duchamp o 2.4.3 Tristan Tzara * 2.5 Constructivism o 2.5.1 Alexander Rodchenko * 2.6 Surrealism o 2.6.1 André Breton * 2.7 Lettrism o 2.7.1 Isidore Isou * 2.8 Group Kyushu * 2.9 Situationist International o 2.9.1 Giuseppe Pinot-Gallizio * 2.10 Fluxus o 2.10.1 Henry Flynt o 2.10.2 George Maciunas o 2.10.3 Joseph Beuys * 2.11 Black Mask * 2.12 King Mob * 2.13 Roger Taylor * 2.14 Stewart Home * 2.15 K Foundation * 2.16 Other movements Armando Navarro (talk) 14:13, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Apples and oranges
I am getting the sense that anything anti-formalist; conceptual; postminimal; minimal; avant-garde; new - is being lumped together as anti-art. I agree with the question above posed by Bus Stop concerning these opening remarks, an array of concepts and attitudes [1] which reject art and then follow with lists and references to literally dozens of works of art and artists...seems like point of view pushing to me...Modernist (talk) 03:07, 24 April 2009 (UTC)


 * I agree. Unless a source specifically specifically talks about a mode/style/school or whatever as "anti-art", then it is purely an editorial interpretation in violation of WP:NOR, therefore not allowed. See WP:SYNTH.  Ty  03:47, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Agreed. For example I'm dubious the Surrealists belong here. Johnbod (talk) 11:57, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Could you please both be more specific and say which specific individuals, groups or movements should't be in this article ? Thank you. Armando Navarro (talk) 13:59, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
 * As I say, the Surrealists. Johnbod (talk) 14:18, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Joseph Beuys (cf. my comment here) Enki H. (talk) 14:36, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Specifically - these art movements that you mention:

and both Marcel Duchamp and Joseph Beuys both artists intended to expand the definition of Art as we know it to be; Rodchenko on the other hand intended the end of art - making art in the process of ending it - and wound up making second rate art at the end of his days....Modernist (talk) 17:32, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
 * 1. Dada
 * 2. Surrealism
 * 3. Pop Art
 * 4. New Realism
 * 5. Neo-Dada
 * 6. Fluxus
 * A dissenting opinion: I think Alexander Rodchenko is no more second-rate than Marcel Duchamp. Bus stop (talk) 20:45, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

This is an interesting read about Rodchenko by Peter Schjeldahl:, as for Duchamp, he was always a first-rate artist like him or not; as was Rodchenko for a while...Modernist (talk) 21:05, 24 April 2009 (UTC)


 * I think a case can be made for Dada's inclusion, indeed the article goes some way to do so. But as Ty says, anything included needs to be justified with specific references. Johnbod (talk) 17:46, 24 April 2009 (UTC)


 * "Anti-art is associated with Dada". "Anti-art: "A loosely used term associated with art which debunks the traditional categories or concepts of art. It was supposedly coined by Marcel Duchamp in 1914. Dada was considered the first anti-art movement." The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art Terms.http://www.oxfordartonline.com  Ty  00:20, 25 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I don't have a problem with this - "Refers to art that challenges the existing accepted definitions of art", it's this - an array of concepts and attitudes [1] which reject art

(which I have since changed) that I disagreed with...Modernist (talk) 00:37, 25 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Generally, very little of the stuff below is in the article so far. Johnbod (talk) 03:29, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

References that support Dada's inclusion in the article

 * John Xiros Cooper. "Modernism and the Culture of Market Society". Cambridge University Press, 2004, p. 28. "Indeed even the anti-art of Dada, Duchamp’s R. Mutt urinal for example, carried a double charge of meaning, the absolute primacy of pure form, over and above function, and a social critique of the fate of art in a commercial and philistine culture."
 * Larry Shiner. “The Invention of Art: A Cultural History”. University of Chicago Press, 2003, p. 254. “Among those in the anti-art wing of dada, Tristan Tzara was perhaps cleverest at provocation: ‘ART — a parrot word — replaced by DADA, PLESIOSAURUS, or handkerchief".
 * Beret E. Strong. ""The poetic avant-garde: the groups of Borges, Auden, and Breton"". Northwestern University Press, 1997, pp. 27-28 : ""A movement of nearly unremitting anarchism and nihilism, Dadaism clearly also represents the most radical canonical in¬stance of an avant-garde critique of society's relationship to art. One of its defining characteristics is a deep hatred of the bourgeois status of art, a hatred that led the movement to try to produce anti-art. Eagleton (1990) may have the Dadaists in mind when he discusses art that tries to reinvent itself as anti-art:'There would seem only one route left open, and that is an art which rejects the aesthetic. An art against itself, which confesses the impossi¬bility of art. . . . An art, in short, which will undo all this depressing history, which will go right back even before the beginning, before the dawning of the whole category of the aesthetic, and seek to override in its own way that moment at the birth of modernity when the cognitive, the ethico-political and libidinal-aesthetic became uncoupled from one another. This time, however, it will seek to do it not in the manner of the radical aestheticizers, by the aesthetic colonizing of these other two regions, but by folding the aesthetic into the other two systems. . . . This is the revolutionary avant garde. (370)'Whether Dadaism's mission was to integrate poetry and sociopolitical activism is arguable, but its fate illustrates the riskiness of achieving pres¬tige on a platform of pure destruction. Once everything, including the movement itself, had been leveled, there was no convincing raison d'etre: Dada's mission had been accomplished and it was too late to rewrite the agenda."
 * Thomas Patin and Jennifer McLerran. "Artwords: a glossary of contemporary art theory". Greenwood Publishing Group, 1997, p. 6. : “ANTI-ART This term is often linked to artists associated with Dada, because of their aggressive opposition to bourgeois cultural values, and their emphasis on chance, nonsense, and absurdity.”


 * I don't object to Dada being included in the article; I do object to the mis-perception of Dadaists as not making art; Dadaists made what was intended to be art; Duchamp redefined art; he doesn't end art; he doesn't stop art; he redefined what art is....Modernist (talk) 02:01, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

From the Wikipedia article : "Anti-art can take the form of art or not.[2][3] Some of the forms of anti-art which are art strive to reveal the conventional limits of art by either redefining its properties from within or from without.[12] From within art, they reduce the definition of art to the fundamental properties of a given medium:[12] these types of anti-art can be monochrome paintings, empty frames, silence as music, chance art. From without art, they expand the definition of art to foreign elements:[12] these types of anti-art can be readymades, found art, detournement, combine paintings, appropriation (art), happenings, performance art, body art."Armando Navarro (talk) 02:27, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

References that support Duchamp's inclusion in the article
Armando Navarro (talk) 03:23, 25 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Larry Shiner. “The Invention of Art: A Cultural History”. University of Chicago Press, 2003, p. 227. “‘Anti-art’ movements such as dada and Russian constructivism or the authors of anti-art gestures such as Marcel Duchamp or John Cage, for example”
 * Rob van Gerwen. "Art and Experience". Publications Of The Department Of Philosophy, Utrecht University, Volume XIV, 1996, p. 64 : "What to do with the so- called hard cases of anti-art, such as Duchamp’s Fountain, and Cage’s 4’33’’?" p.66 : "There is no artistic intentionality in 4’33’’ or Fountain, only causality, and the effects of these works of anti-art are restricted to philosophers trying to find out how to devise a definition of art that might accommodate them without expelling more traditional procedures."
 * J. M. Bernstein. "Against voluptuous bodies: late modernism and the meaning of painting". Stanford University Press, 2006, p. 247 :"The anti-art moment of modernist works, the moment that Duchamp and Rodchenko attempt to make complete, enacts art's desire to be world and not art; but only as art, as semblance, can art evince that desire, perform it."
 * John Xiros Cooper. "Modernism and the Culture of Market Society". Cambridge University Press, 2004, p. 28. "Indeed even the anti-art of Dada, Duchamp’s R. Mutt urinal for example, carried a double charge of meaning, the absolute primacy of pure form, over and above function, and a social critique of the fate of art in a commercial and philistine culture."

References that support Surrealism's inclusion in the article

 * "Editors : Hent de Vries and Lawrence Eugene Sullivan. ""Political theologies: public religions in a post-secular world"". Fordham Univ Press, 2006, pp. 619-620. ""Yet surrealism's actual involvement with aesthetics, like its involvement with theology, has been premised, more often than not, upon the spectacular demise of art itself. In the wake of Dada, surrealism's engagement with art was really a question of anti-art, although the surrealists, unlike the dadaists, carried this dialectical demise through to its complete end, making a full cycle past the destruction of art to arrive at a point where something new—a radically new approach to artistic production—could arise like a phoenix from the ashes. In a mono¬graph on the minimalist painter Ad Reinhardt—not a surrealist himself, but not entirely unsympathetic to surrealist sensibilities—Susan Sontag outlines the mystical movement between art and anti-art:'As the activity of the mystic must end in a via negativa, a theology of God's absence, a craving for the cloud of unknowingness beyond knowledge and for the silence beyond speech, so art must tend toward anti-art, the elimination of the ""subject"" .... the substitution of chance for intention, and the pursuit of silence.. .. Therefore, art becomes estimated as something to be overthrown. A new element enters the art¬work and becomes constitutive of it: the appeal (tacit or overt) for its own abolition, and, ultimately of art itself.7'This description holds true for surrealism as well as for minimalism: as a critical practice, surrealism carefully balances on this fine line between art and anti-art, or perhaps more legitimately, between the development of anti-art as a productive strategy and the call for the ultimate overthrow of art, whose limitations were far greater than those of the human imagination."""

IMHO a misreading of Surrealism. Or rather once again a rather shadowy definition of Anti-art to mean whenever changes take place to the status quo - that becomes anti-art...until it becomes the status quo...Modernist (talk) 02:05, 25 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Joanne Wieland-Burston. “Chaos and order in the world of the psyche”. Routledge, 1992, p. 16-17 : “But, as is basic to any and all of the chaos-oriented movements, the surrealists were adamantly ‘anti’: anti-art, anti-clerical,anti-establishment. Whatever values were cherished by the establishment, the surrealists adamantly rejected. Their rejection of ruling values led them to consider themselves as revolutionaries. Some of them even joined the communist party, but eventually withdrew because it was not revolutionary enough.
 * Joan Hawkins. “Cutting edge: art-horror and the horrific avant-garde”. University of Minnesota Press, 2000, p. 268 : “As Suarez points out, like other writers in the Anglo-American tradition, Greenberg defines the avant-garde broadly as any form of modem art that defies traditional modes of representation. The “avant-garde" art he most admires. though, is art that Suarez- and I - would term “modernist": that is, experimental art that is critical of industrial society and popular culture and - while opposed to a certain view of high art - does not embrace a radically anti-art stance (as the dadas and surrealists did).”
 * Ad Reinhardt. “Art-as-art: the selected writings of Ad Reinhardt.” Editor : Barbara Rose, University of California Press, 1991, p. 16 : Ad Reinhardt : “No. Surrealism never had any fascination for me at all. I would cast out all expressionist, dadaist, futurist, and surrealist art. They don’t fit in with art-as-art at all. In fact, the surrealists were programmatically anti-art.”

Armando Navarro (talk) 11:04, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

References that support Neo-Dada's inclusion in the article

 * Thomas R. H. Havens. “Radicals and realists in the Japanese nonverbal arts: the avant-garde rejection of modernism”. University of Hawaii Press, 2006, p. 137 : “As pioneered by Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns, the ANTI-ART of Neo-Dada and of pop art was the next step beyond abstract expressionism and informel, Miyakawa contended.”


 * Sorry - this is utterly unacceptable. I see no mention of Anti-art here..are you kidding? The next step beyond Abstract expressionism and a rejection of modernism does not anti-art make...Modernist (talk) 01:43, 25 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Günter Berghaus. "Neo-Dada Performance". Art. In: “Neo-Avant-Garde”. Editor : David Hopkins. Avant Garde Critical Studies 20, 2006, p. 78 : “The following points of contact between Dada and Neo-Dada were regularly referred to in artists’ statements and press reviews in the years 1958-62: Both movements seek to destroy the aura of the masterpiece and the ideology of the artist-as-genius by elevating common objects to the status of High Art. They make use of Ready Mades, or of readily available materials taken from a quotidian environment.  They incorporate fragments of urban detritus into artistic creations, or reconfigure everyday objects according to a junk aesthetics.  They use collage and assemblage techniques.  Their compositional practices are determined by chance and indeterminacy.  They promote an ideology of ANTI-ART.  They advocate a conceptual rethinking of the role of art and of the artist in bourgeois society.  They take an irreverent approach to the system of production and distribution of art, and of the role of museums and the art market.  They focus on the context that defines art and attempt to dissolve the boundaries between art and life.”


 * Once again - no mention here of Anti-art...all I see are objections to High Art, the aura of masterpieces, and the ideology of the artist-as-genius...no mention here of Anti-art...Modernist (talk) 01:43, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

From the wikipedia article : Certain forms of anti-art reject only some aspects of art. Depending on the case, they reject (...) high art, individualism in art..."Armando Navarro (talk) 02:25, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

References that support Pop Art's inclusion in the article

 * Tilman Osterwold. “Pop art”. Taschen, 2003, p. 44. “‘I want to be a machine,’ says Andy Warhol, the founder of an art ‘Factory’ in New York, where pictures were reproduced using photographic clippings as models. Even confirmed painters like Robert Rauschen- berg, Roy Lichtenstein and Jasper Johns spoke of the ‘depersonalization’ and ‘anonymity’ of their work.” P. 55. : “Pop artists saw their work as anti-art, at least in relation to traditional notions of art. They expressed this in their depersonalization of style, their anti-subjectivism, in the roles they assumed in mass society and in their redefinition of art itself.”


 * Mentioned here...but the context here is - in relation to traditional notions of art. Which is essentially my point...Modernist (talk) 01:45, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

From the Wikipedia article : "Certain forms of anti-art reject only some aspects of art. Depending on the case, they reject conventional artistic standards..."Armando Navarro (talk) 02:29, 25 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Thomas R. H. Havens. “Radicals and realists in the Japanese nonverbal arts: the avant-garde rejection of modernism”. University of Hawaii Press, 2006, p. 137 : “As pioneered by Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns, the anti-art of Neo-Dada and of pop art was the next step beyond abstract expressionism and informel, Miyakawa contended.”

Armando Navarro (talk) 01:35, 25 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Mentioned here...but again, the context is the next step beyond which once again underscores my point...Modernist (talk) 01:45, 25 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Richard Kearney. “The Wake of Imagination”. Routledge, 1998, p. 254 : “Marcel Duchamp announces the end of humanist art as an expression of the creative imagination: art becomes an anti-art which ironically mimics the dehumanizing tendencies of our mechanistic age. The works of Lichtenstein, Beuys, Ben Vautier, Ballagh and Warhol confirm this conviction. Warhol, for example, represents the dissolution of the personality of the artist in the mechanical gesture of reproducing media images. He uses a seriographic technique which replaces the notion of an ‘authentic’ original with that of a multiple series. Here art derides itself by playing on the idea of the image as an artificial imitation of another equally artificial image. Reflecting the consumerist ideology of interchangeable cultural objects. Warhol’s pop art negates the humanist notion of creative subjectivity. Hence Warhol’s response to the news that Picasso had produced four thousand paintings in his life was to declare: ‘I can do as many in twenty four hours-four thousand works which will all be the same work and all of them masterpieces." The phenomenon of a unique human imagination producing a unique aesthetic object in a unique time and space thus collapses into a play of infinite repetition. The work becomes absolutely transparent, a mechanically reproducible surface without depth or interiority, a copy with no reference to anything other than a pseudo—world of copies.”

Armando Navarro (talk) 18:58, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

References that support Fluxus' inclusion in the article

 * Roswitha Mueller. “Valie Export: fragments of the imagination”. Indiana University Press, 1994, p. XV : “On that occasion Maciunas also gave a lecture titled "Neo-Dada in the United States,” in which he delineated in manifesto fashion the characteristics of the new movement. As the title indicates, Fluxus was viewed as a renewal of Dadaism. Like Dadaism, Fluxus is anti-art, favoring spontaneous, improvised actions over intentionality and the concrete and living over the artistic: “The anti-art forms are primarily directed against art as a profession, against the artificial separation of producer or performer, of generator and spectator or against the separation of art and life."”


 * George Maciunas. Fluxus Manifesto, 1963. “PROMOTE A REVOLUTIONARY FLOOD AND TIDE IN ART, Promote living art, anti-art, promote NON ART REALITY to be grasped by all peoples, not only critics, dilettantes and professionals.”


 * Sally Banes. “Greenwich Village 1963: Avant-garde Performance and the Effervescent Body”. Duke University Press, 1993, p. 61 : “From the start, Maciunas was interested in a notion of mass production and circulation that was partly inspired by Soviet constructivist, functionalist experimentation in art and graphic design of the Twenties. But in his desire to make art accessible, he was partly inspired by Cage and his Zen-influenced use of everyday experiences in art. Maciunas’s program was specifically framed as anti-art, in the sense that he railed against the professionalization of art and called instead for amateurization. He believed that art should be able to be made by everybody and should be accessible to everybody through the mass distribution of low cost multiples.”

Armando Navarro (talk) 02:11, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

References that support Beuys' inclusion in the article

 * RoseLee Goldberg. “Performance: live art, 1909 to the present”. H. N. Abrams, 1979, p. 96 : “Beuys's polemical art and anti-art attitudes soon began to disturb the authorities; considered a disruptive element within the institution, he was always up against considerable opposition there and was finally, in 1972, dismissed amidst violent student protest.”
 * Moira Weigel. “Grand illusion”. The Guardian, 25 April 2009. “Nor could he [Gerhard Richter] embrace the anti-art ideals of Beuys and the Fluxus group, which were deeply hostile to his form of studio practice.”
 * Michael Kimmelman. “Exploring A Labyrinth Of Ambiguities”. The New York Times, February 19, 1993. “Nonetheless, many of these early works are peculiarly exquisite. Beuys reveals in them a formal sensibility, a feel for the poetry of materials and a delicacy of touch that belie his anti-art posture.”
 * Richard Kearney. “The Wake of Imagination”. Routledge, 1998, p. 254 : “Marcel Duchamp announces the end of humanist art as an expression of the creative imagination: art becomes an anti-art which ironically mimics the dehumanizing tendencies of our mechanistic age. The works of Lichtenstein, Beuys, Ben Vautier, Ballagh and Warhol confirm this conviction.”

Armando Navarro (talk) 18:53, 26 April 2009 (UTC)


 * You are citing four isolated occurrences of the term by mostly unremarkable authors that use it incidentally, not centrally in their exposition. This is in contradiction to Beuys' own claims, as well as an overwhelming(!) body of work to the contrary. I shall give you only one counterexample: in "Joseph Beuys, Diverging Critiques" (1995, Tate Liverpool), Editor David Thistlewood sums up a lecture series/collection of essays of "historians, critics, museologists", all of them notable experts on Joseph Beuys and his reception. There are many relevant passages but most literally perhaps this: He had one hand in conventional modes of artistic production and the other in activities which, conventionally, had never before been considered 'art'. Most certainly therefore Beuy's position is not regarded as being anti-art and in fact his inclusion as an example of "anti-art" would contradict most of what he stood for and what he is appreciated for. It may be your personal opinion but it does not appear to be shared by other experts or knowledgeable editors. In this regard, please have a look at Fringe theories, to wit: Coverage on Wikipedia should not make a fringe theory appear more notable than it actually is. I am not sure how to help you here, I will (again)l remove the Beuys passage for now and I sincerely ask you to establish a consensus here if you still cannot agree. Thank you Enki H. (talk) 05:28, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

Some points
Where to begin? Anti-art is not a term with much of a definition. It is used. It is language. There is no such thing as anti-art. There is language that is sometimes used. In point of fact no reliable source goes so far out on a limb to say: this is what anti-art is. Anybody can pick up the phrase and use it. There is certainly no agreed upon definition of it, and nobody, in the sources so far given, even attempts a definition. It is only used; it is not defined. And those who use it, importantly, don't define it. That is why it basically doesn't exist. It can be categorized as fanciful language. Or creative language. It can be the title of an article on Wikipedia if this is borne in mind. In my opinion, all of the above should be brought out in this article. I have pointed out that anti-art is not an art movement, but more than that needs to be said. Worked into this article should be the blaring fact that art is always anti-art. (Or almost always.) There is no art of note that is not anti-art. Importantly, there can't possibly be anti-art that is not art. That is for the simple reason that art has the habit of being inclusive. (Its definition is always inclusive.) I know of no exception to this. Every "new" type of art has been given the stamp of validity by the cognoscenti of art. Is there one voice out there, of any scholastic stature, that denies that sound art is art, that installation art is art, that performance art is art, that pop art is art, that found objects are art, that conceptual art is art? If an artist or a group of artists ceased making art, and claimed that the fact of their not making art was a form of art, then that can be noted separately. But that sort of thing, which I might point out is not even solidly sourced in this article, should not be in the lead as a definition of anti-art. Anti-art does not have much of an definition, and that one exception should not be elevated to a key aspect of any definition proffered. By the way, the same thing is true of many terms. Hard edged painting is just a descriptive term, or it is a term that designates a particular output of art. The only difference is that in this article, so far, anti-art as a particular output of art -- has not been established, or at least not very solidly at all. Bus stop (talk) 17:23, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I believe these are the 2 sources that supposedly support the idea that anti-art can take the form of non-art. I am posting them here, because they have since been removed from the footnotes. (The full wording of them has been removed -- the sources are still there.) One of them asserts almost the opposite: it questions the notion. And the other I think only tangentially implies this, and only in relationship to the situationists. I hardly think that qualifies this aspect of anti-art for inclusion in a sweeping definition, as is now the case, in the lead paragraph. Here are the 2 sources:


 * 1) Paul N. Humble. “Anti-Art and the Concept of Art”. In : "A companion to art theory". Editors : Paul Smith and Carolyn Wilde, Wiley-Blackwell, 2002. Page 250 : According to Paul N. Humble, the philosopher of art George Dickie considers that "What is not clear from Dickie's account is how we can have two genuine forms of anti-art, one of which (readymades) counts as art and one of which (dematerialized objects) seemingly does not. The distinction appears to be quite arbitrary."


 * 2) Martin Puchner. “Poetry of the revolution: Marx, manifestos, and the avant-gardes”. Princeton University Press, 2006, p. 226. “the situationists thus drew a radical conclusion that set them apart from most neo-avant-garde movements: to renounce the making of art entirely”.


 * Again: I don't see how those sources support the notion that anti-art can in fact take the form of non-art. If that notion is to be stated, it should be noted that there is known only the solitary instance of this, and even that I think is questionable. Just because the situationists renounced art-making does not make art of renunciation. Bus stop (talk) 20:04, 24 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Please be succinct and avoid making your own logical arguments. Just work from sources. Thank you. (tl;dr).  Ty  00:17, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Neutrality dispute in Anti-art
Hello. You placed a template which says "The neutrality of this article is disputed. Please see the discussion on the talk page. Please do not remove this message until the dispute is resolved" at the top of the article on Anti-art but it is not clear to what discussion you are making a reference to on the talk page. Is what you call "note bombing" supposed to be the problem of neutrality ? If so, could you please make the issues of neutrality you see in "Note bombing" clearer and in any case could you please make all this clearer by naming the section about the dispute with a clear name such as "neutrality dispute" for example. Thank you. Armando Navarro (talk) 21:40, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

How can you talk about Rodchenko's monochromes and the incohérents' foreshadowing of it without mentionning anti-art once in the monochrome article ?

From the Wikipedia style guidelines :The "See also" "may be useful for readers looking to read as much about a topic as possible, including subjects only peripherally related to the one in question." Armando Navarro (talk) 22:38, 23 April 2009 (UTC)
 * While see also can be useful (and I use it too) it is usually just so much wasted space...Modernist (talk) 02:03, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Armando Navarro (talk) 03:27, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
 * 1) Varvara Stepanova: Lecture on Constructivism, 22 December 1921.In: Peter Noever: Aleksandr M. Rodchenko - Varvara F. Stepanova. The Future Is Our Only Goal. Munich: Prestel, 1991, pp. 174-178. "From here, Constructivism proceeds to the negation of all art in its entirety, and calls into question the necessity of a specific activity of art as creator of a universal aesthetic."
 * 2) ^ "I reduced painting to its logical conclusion and exhibited three canvases: red, blue, and yellow. I affirmed: this is the end of painting." - Alexander Rodchenko.
 * 3) ^ Rodchenko, A. and V. Stepanova (1975) [1920] 'The Programme of the Productivist Group', in Benton and Benton (eds), pp. 91-2. "1. Down with art, long live technical science. 2. Religion is a lie. Art is a lie. 3. Destroy the last remaining attachment of human thought to art. . . . 6. The collective art of today is constructive life."
 * And if Rodchenko had stopped making art after 1921 I might not think that the above was utter nonsense...He made art until the 1950s...His wife Stepanovas aesthetic drivel is still drivel...the guy stopped painting, turning to collage, photography and design..please! Sadly to quote Peter Schjeldahl Having dashingly declared painting dead in 1921, the marginalized Rodchenko painted pictures of sad clowns. Modernist (talk) 03:34, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

1. Down with art, long live technical science. 2. Religion is a lie. Art is a lie. 3. Destroy the last remaining attachment of human thought to art.... 6. The collective art of today is constructive life. (Elliot 1979,130; Lodder 1983,94-99) And what should take the place of "art"? Construction. One should simply participate in producing a useful object."
 * Pam Meecham and Julie Sheldon. "Modern art: a critical introduction". Routledge, 2005, p 148 : "Rodchenko was disillusioned with easel painting which he in fact 'gave up' in 1921 to concentrate upon the relatively mechanised processes of photography, photomontage and graphic design. For him 'art has no place in modern life', but photography, particularly experimental photography as opposed to 'connoisseurial photographs', was the ultimate anti-bourgeois, anti-art practice."
 * J. M. Bernstein. "Against voluptuous bodies: late modernism and the meaning of painting". Stanford University Press, 2006, p. 247 :"The anti-art moment of modernist works, the moment that Duchamp and Rodchenko attempt to make complete, enacts art's desire to be world and not art; but only as art, as semblance, can art evince that desire, perform it."
 * Larry Shiner. “The Invention of Art: A Cultural History”. University of Chicago Press, 2003, p. 256.“If the provocations of Tzara seem merely naughty and those of Breton overly esoteric, the anti-art declarations of the Russian constructivists were potentially of greater social importance, given constructivism's roots in marxist theory and its opportunity to help build a new society.” (...) ""The spell of painting was broken and ""construction"" had taken its place for artists such as Aleksandr Rodchenko, Vavara Stepanova, and Lyubov Popova, who combined it with socialist commitment to become leaders of the First Working Group of Constructivists. One of their early manifestos declared:

Armando Navarro (talk) 17:01, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
 * So much rhetorical crap, blah, blah, blah, - Rodchenko returned to painting - so much for the end of painting - have you seen his three monochromatic paintings? They look like Ellsworth Kelly, Brice Marden and they most definitely look like art....Modernist (talk) 17:06, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
 * If the sources are reliable, which they seem to be, then their content can be included + any reliable source with content which refutes them, if any exists. It would be best to conduct this on the article talk page, and in fact to copy this conversation to there.  Ty  00:15, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Apples and oranges II
As I said - I am getting the sense that anything anti-formalist; conceptual; postminimal; minimal; avant-garde; new - is being lumped together as anti-art. The definition here now of ANTI-ART is ten miles wide in every direction...one term fits all; over nearly 100 years; whenever changes take place to the status quo - that becomes anti-art...until it becomes the status quo....Modernist (talk) 02:38, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Attempt at synthesis and a way forward
Armando Navarro has collected quite a number of references that appear to use that very term. That would support the claim that the term is used - at least by some. While some editors (me included) believe it is a misnomer, this doesn't change the fact that it has been published. But what needs to be worked out is:
 * 1) What artist/movement exactly is the term being applied to in each specific source (as opposed to taking that usage and applying it to other artists/movements we think might fit the definition - as per WP:OR).
 * 2) What exactly is the definition of "art" and "anti-art" in each instance - (if different authors use the same word with a different definition, these are still different concepts). If we apply the 19th century idea of "art" - a very specific domain of cultural techniques - then calling Dada, surrealism etc. not that, appears factually correct. But that's just no longer what we mean by "art" today. Since different definitions of "art" underlie the term anti-art, it becomes crucial to limit the term to the correct historical context and make that explicit.
 * 3) Contextualize statements that are confusing and contradictory (A statement like Anti-art can take the form of art or not. actually says it can be everything and is therefore nothing.)
 * 4) Make sure the article focuses on the term and its published use (as opposed to interpreting the term and using the interpretation to search for other applicable situations.)  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Enki H. (talk • contribs) 14:41, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

IMO a way forward would be to start the article with:
 * Anti-art is a term that has been used to describe ...

and then describe the concepts it has applied to, source that, and don't unduly extend the original scope. (by "has been applied to" I don't mean: has been applied to Dada, but has been applied to express exactly  what about '' Dada..."). Enki H. (talk) 14:33, 25 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I would agree broadly. Also the stuff in the quotes, and the notes currently in the article, has to be worked into the article text much more. Since there are, I'm sure, at least as many who would deny that say the Surrealists are "anti-art", a more distanced tone should be used: "fooists have been claimed to be/associated with" and so on. It is always a somewhat rhetorical & nebulous concept, so I don't mind casting the net widely, but description of a particular artist as anti-art should be presented as a one critical view among many (even when it is cited to the artists themselves). Johnbod (talk) 14:45, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

How to resolve this
There is an issue here, is there not? Why not acknowledge that issue from the outset, in the article? The article at present looks like a battleground. I have not removed anything placed there by anyone else, even though I disagree with it. I wrote a paragraph which acknowledged the difficulty the editors here are having. That paragraph has been peppered with "citation needed," even though I don't think there is anything there particularly controversial. I also placed in the first sentence the acknowledgement that this term is highly doubtful as a legitimate term in art, aside from its descriptive ability. That is simply an acknowledgement of the controversy that has been going on here. That first sentence has been replaced by the assertion, once again, that "Anti-art is an array of concepts and attitudes," even though nobody has the foggiest idea what those "concepts and attitudes" are, nor that there is an "array" of them. I've asked for that to be expanded upon. I am not aware that there has been an explanation forthcoming for what that "array of concepts and attitudes" is. I don't mean in cryptic terms. I can't understand it, and I don't think any reader will be able to understand it. If it is unexplainable -- it should be removed. If it is to be left in the article, common sense says that it should be explained in easy to understand language. Bus stop (talk) 19:24, 26 April 2009 (UTC)


 * From the core principles of Wikipedia :
 * "All articles must strive for verifiable accuracy: unreferenced material may be removed, so please provide references. Wikipedia is not the place to insert personal opinions, experiences, or arguments. Original ideas, interpretations, or research cannot be verified, and are thus inappropriate."


 * As to the question of "array", I already answered you above. If you do not understand my answer, please explain what you don't undertand about it.


 * You also say : "I have not removed anything placed there by anyone else, even though I disagree with it.". If you look in the history of edits of the article, you will see that on some occasions you have undone my contributions even though they were supported by references. Armando Navarro (talk) 19:11, 26 April 2009 (UTC)


 * I am aware that material has to be sourced. But you seem to be requesting citations for things that are barely in dispute. I am trying to allow for your point of view, as long as my point of view gets heard as well. I didn't remove any of your material recently.


 * Concerning the phrase, "array of concepts and attitudes," even if it is sourced, if it is meaningless, that is to say -- if it is a dead end street for the reader -- it should be removed from the article.


 * An array of concepts and attitudes should refer to concepts in the plural and attitudes in the plural. That is what array of concepts and attitudes means to me. What is the array of concepts and attitudes? Please tell me. Bus stop (talk) 19:30, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

De-escalate! (a way forward II)
I have placed a note on User_talk:Armando Navarro's talk page. I propose that consensus on this topic needs to be established before more editing is done. The days' edit logs on the involved pages are atrocious. This is heading for dispute resolution. We all have better things to do. Here are two steps with which we need to start:

1: we need consensus on a definition of anti-art as used "in the wild". Without a definition, we can't even begin to discuss. Note that this is not our definition, but the definition of the sources.

2: we need consensus whether the term as defined is a legitimate term in the art-related discussion. This is where we ask: is this fringe, or mainstream.

Once this is out of the way, we can start discussing who it would rightfully apply to.

Is this process acceptable? Enki H. (talk) 06:44, 27 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Agreed, most definitely a definition and consensus...Modernist (talk) 12:48, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

I just took it upon myself to reorganize the content that was already in the introduction, to streamline it so it at least makes more sense now. So I've either made it much better or just as bad as it was... No offense taken if it all gets reverted. Postdlf (talk) 17:19, 27 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Nice -- my initial reaction is I like it. Bus stop (talk) 17:26, 27 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Better - but wordy. How's this for a definition?
 * Anti-art is a n loosely informally -used term applied to an array of concepts and attitudes that reject the rejection of prior definitions of "art" and question art in general, but that conduct this rejection and questioning from within the art world itself.
 * Enki H. (talk) 01:45, 28 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I like it. To restate it, what you are saying is:
 * Anti-art is an informally-used term applied to the rejection of prior definitions of "art" from within the art world itself.
 * How about this:
 * Anti-art is an informally-used term applied to the rejection of prior definitions of "art," conducted from within the art world itself. Bus stop (talk) 01:51, 28 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Anti-art is a 20th century term occassionally used to describe various innovations and revolutionary changes that occurred periodically throughout the various periods that defined modern and contemporary art. It is an informally-used term applied to the rejection changing of prior definitions of "art," conducted from within the art world itself. Modernist (talk) 02:34, 28 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I see where you're coming from. Now, A.N. has listed sources that support the term. Therefore the article is not simply going to go away (I wish) . And I'm not even sure we can simply claim outright "fringe" WRT Dada - it's after all in the title of Richter's book (and some others). To represent a balanced view IMO requires acknowledging these sources and then properly contextualizing them with the (equally sourced) canon. The qualifications belong into the section where the context is provided. As far as I'm concerned, Bus stop' second version seems a valid starting point for a consensus. Enki H. (talk) 03:08, 28 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Very good, Modernist. I like it. I hope Armando Navarro comes back. His challenging thinking spurred the revitalization of this article, even though I disagreed with a lot of his edits. Bus stop (talk) 03:10, 28 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Frankly I do not like the widespread use; it is an outdated, outmoded term; that I can see in an historical context only here...so far there is no consensus...Modernist (talk) 03:37, 28 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Sources below in the next section show ongoing and contemporary usage.  Ty  08:22, 28 April 2009 (UTC)
 * My basic argument is that in a pluralistic art world in which anything and everything goes as the art of the 21st century has been described - so far; anti-art no longer exists..or rather no longer needs to exist or not exist. This is a great read by the way and tells the story well: ...Modernist (talk) 11:53, 28 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Yes, great read - thank you. I think the Encyclopedia of Aesthetics article reinforces what has been stated in the discussion: the term as such appears to be more of a shorthand than a standalone concept in its own right. For the article this would indicate: expand the shorthand regarding its meaning in the various contexts it has been used in, then defer to the main articles to discuss the actual concepts. If the article does not discuss the term but the underlying concept, it becomes a contents fork. Enki H. (talk) 12:34, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

(unindent) Any reader should be able to come to the article and obtain a complete understanding of the term. This includes a definition, origin, where, when and how it has been applied, to whom and by whom, the changing usage of the term and its current status, plus examples. Per WP:NPOV all valid viewpoints should be presented with the majority view given appropriate weight, so the reader can form their own conclusions. The term originated in relation to the "traditional" concept of art being painting/drawing/sculpture etc using certain media. Different media and approaches were seen (and initially deliberately employed) as "anti-art" but are now largely accepted, at least within the art world, as being equally valid as art. There is, though, still contention about this and that too needs to be included.  Ty  23:58, 29 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I've added specific references to anti-art in relation to various artists at Talk:Anti-art/Encyclopedia_of_Aesthetics.  Ty  12:04, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

A way forward - follow sources
Here are two sources that provide the basic definition:


 * "Anti-art: "A loosely used term associated with art which debunks the traditional categories or concepts of art. It was supposedly coined by Marcel Duchamp in 1914. Dada was considered the first anti-art movement." The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art Terms. http://www.oxfordartonline.com


 * "Anti-art: Refers to art that challenges the existing accepted definitions of art. It is generally agreed to have been coined by Marcel Duchamp around 1913 when he made his first readymades, which are still regarded in some quarters as Anti-art (for example by the Stuckist group). In 1917 Duchamp submitted a urinal, titled Fountain, for an exhibition in New York, which subsequently became notorious and eventually highly influential. Anti-art is associated with Dada, the artistic and literary movement founded in Zurich in 1916 and simultaneously in New York, in which Duchamp was a central figure. Since Dada there have been many art movements that have taken a position on Anti-art, from the lo-fi Mail art movement to the YBAs, some of whom have embraced the absurdities of Dada and Duchamp’s love of irony, paradox and punning."


 * There is a longer overview, which I have copied to Talk:Anti-art/Encyclopedia of Aesthetics. (I will delete this when it is no longer needed.) This sees punk within the anti-art context.

There are many references to the ongoing use and changing implications of the term "anti-art". Here are some:


 * "US art critic Clement Greenberg thought avant-garde art had clarified and purified the aesthetics of traditional art rather than overthrown it, as is usually thought. At the same time, the avant-garde spawned the Duchampian cancer of anti-art - Greenberg called it "Novelty Art" - that eventually destroyed art from within. For him, Duchamp's ironical destructiveness was a deliberate attack on aesthetic experience. It is a fragile experience, which is why the attack was successful. Anti-art - or, as Allan Kaprow, the inventor of happenings, astutely called it, post-art, meaning art in which the boundary between art and life is blurred to the extent that it becomes unclear what art is - has become the dominant mode of art-making."


 * "There is another irony to attacks on avant-garde art: the history of the modern avant-garde is itself full of the rhetoric of iconoclasm. Marcel Duchamp suggested using a Rembrandt painting as an ironing-board. The Italian Futurists recommended blowing up the Giotto-frescoed Arena Chapel in Padua. No end of anti-art movements have urged that the museums be put to the torch. Even so, the anti-art cause was never absolutely anti. One destroys art for art's sake, for the sake of expanded ideas of art."


 * "The interesting thing is that more and more, Puckish anti-artists have the values that today’s commercial barons want to associate themselves with. A representational portrait projects its subject’s mastery as a settled fact, monument-like, historical; today’s anti-art-for-hire instead projects innovation, edginess, and weds carnival-like populism with the connotation of luxury goods -- better suited to the modern capitalist."


 * "Modern art is not really art but anti-art and detached from true culture which develops amongst a people or community and grows traditions over time. However, the irony is that the people producing unmade beds or piles of bricks need the established old masters and traditional art as a background; for if the old standards were truly swept away, no one would be able to say: ‘Oooh, what a provocative statement, Tracey’."


 * Stuckist "Anti-anti-art manifesto".

 Ty  08:17, 28 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I say, go with a paraphrase of The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art Terms definition in the first sentence. Then, keep close to the sources that specifically use the term. Otherwise the article becomes an essay. Rousseau and Marx and all the 19th century sources need to be cut per WP:PRIMARY and WP:SYNTH.--Ethicoaestheticist (talk) 22:28, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Removal of Rousseau and Marx
I have reinstated my removal of the extensive quotes by Rousseau and Marx. Both philosophers did not comment on the subject of the article. Rousseau speaks about a particular instance of art; Marx speaks about the problem of the division of labour. These are both interesting philosophical contributions but (A) the way the material is presented here conflicts with WP:PRIMARY, (B) the way this is taken out of context and used to support a particular POV regarding the article topic conflicts with WP:SYNTH. Supporting secondary sources have not been quoted. To the best of my understanding the relevance of these quotes for the use of the term anti-art has not been established. Please establish consensus here before considering to revert (again). Enki H. (talk) 02:28, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

The first SECONDARY SOURCE reference describes Rousseau as one of the first secular anti-art writers. The second SECONDARY SOURCE reference shows that Marx refused the seperation of art. Their respective positions are rejections of "art as a separate realm or as a specialization" as written in the anti-art article.Armando Navarro (talk) 09:39, 7 May 2009 (UTC)


 * The interpretation of Rousseau as writing about "anti-art" is your original point of view. With it, you are violating WP:PRIMARY. To quote: All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by Wikipedia editors. Your quote of Marx has the same problem. Moreover, citing them in this context contradicts the article's (consensus) view that anti-art positions are expressed from within the art world and it is thus a contradiction within the article. If you are using these quotes as background for the SI, they belong into that article, not here. Finally, you have not established consensus here but merely stated your opinion and reverted my change. Please undo your reversion, then establish consensus here before proceeding. Enki H. (talk) 13:04, 7 May 2009 (UTC)
 * I reverted until a consensus is reached here...Modernist (talk) 13:16, 7 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Include a ref that describes Rousseau as an anti-art writer. If a similar source exists for Marx that can go in as well. Rousseau and Marx can't be used as primary sources in the article.--Ethicoaestheticist (talk) 18:39, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

I was talking about the SECONDARY SOURCES I added. Modernist, if you had read my contribution before deleting it, you would have noticed. When you delete someone else's contributions it would seem polite to at the very least make sure you read the contribution first. Armando Navarro (talk) 21:15, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Enki H., you say that there is a consensus "that anti-art positions are expressed from within the art" which is not true if you read the actual article. And in any case such a consensus should be supported by strong argumentions relying on reliable sources showing the current level of its acceptance among the relevant academic community which has not yet been done by anyone here as far as I can see - "If proper attribution cannot be found among reliable sources of an idea's standing, it should be assumed that the idea has not received consideration or acceptance; ideas should not be portrayed as accepted unless such claims can be documented in reliable sources." Furthemore, I have provided reliable sources which contradict your view. And finaly even if this consensus existed among everyone here and everything I was doing was Fringe Theory as you seem to constantly imply, you should be aware that, according to Wikipedia guidelines "a lack of consideration or acceptance does not necessarily imply rejection, either; ideas should not be portrayed as rejected or labeled with pejoratives such as pseudoscience unless such claims can be documented in reliable sources." and "ideas should not be excluded from the encyclopedia simply because they are widely held to be wrong."Armando Navarro (talk) 21:15, 7 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Excuse me? I did read your contribution before I deleted it. You seem to have WP:OWN issues here...You make your own consensus? Modernist (talk) 21:29, 7 May 2009 (UTC)


 * (1) The discussion under the heading "De-escalate! (a way forward II)" reflects a consensus among editors that "anti-art" applies to a position that is taken up by "creatives"(not to call them "artists"). Criticism that is levelled at art from the domain of philosophy, politics, religion etc. is not "anti-art" in the sense of the article. Enki H. (talk) 01:03, 8 May 2009 (UTC)


 * (2) Just to stay with Rousseau for the moment: if your source (Schouvaloff 1970) discusses anti-art and would justify his argument with his reading of Rousseau, then he would be a proper secondary source and could be quoted thus (note: not Rousseau could be quoted, but Schouvaloff could be). If you are quoting Rousseau rather than quoting Schouvaloff, you are making an original intellectual contribution by placing Rousseau's thoughts into a novel context. By all means, do that and get that published in a peer reviewed publication under your name, it's certain to be much more satisfying (and valuable) than what's happening here right now. But here on Wikipedia they have a number of policies against doing exactly that as frustrating as that may be at times to any and all of us. I sincerely hope this clarifies the issue now. Enki H. (talk) 01:03, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Marx: supported by source?
I checked out Larry Shiner's book. It's been cited as a secondary source for: art was a consequence of the class system and therefore concluded that, in a communist society, there would only be people who engage in the making of art and no "artists". 3 pages were given as reference. The first page is a section heading only, no other mention of Marx. The third page list Marx and Emerson, Ruskin, Morris, the Arts and Crafts movement, the German Werkbund, Kiekegaard, and indeed Tolstoy's essay What is art (somehow we overlooked to include Tolstoy in the article ;-). The second page cited (p.236) discusses Marx' views. It speaks about:
 * ''"Marx [and others] developing [...] challenges to the dichotomies of the modern fine art system" [...] "the capitalist class no longer made and participated in art..." [...] "the abolition of private property would enable a mode of production in which the making of art was no different from any other making. In such a society the artist would no longer stand apart as the only free creator[...] there will be "no painters but, at most, people who engage in painting among other activities [...] of course, the later Marx turned away from such utopian speculations to build a theory of "scientific socialism" and inevitable revolution, but his fragmentary reflections on art still inspire those who seek a reintegration of art and everyday life in a context of social justice (Rose 1984)" (quoted from Shiner op cit. p. 236, 237).

Marx was critical of many aspects of what he considered to be manifestations of the Bourgeoisie. But in my reading this source does not check out: it does not literally support what is claimed, it does not accurately reflect Shiner's views and it claims support of aspects that are clearly not in the source. Now what? Enki H. (talk) 01:55, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

Maciunas' take on Anti-art
I vaguely remember reading a definition of anti-art that stated it was not against art, but simply believed life to be more important, and that art should serve life, not vice-versa. Can't find the source anywhere though, unfortunately. Instead, I have an early quote from Maciunas; "The anti-art forms are primarily directed against art as a profession, against the artificial separation of producer or performer, of generator and spectator or against the separation of art and life. They oppose forms artificial in themselves, models or methods of composition, of artificially constructed phenomena in the various areas of artistic practice, against intentional, conscious formalism and against the fixation of art on meaning, against the demand of music to be heard and that of plastic art to be seen; and finally against the thesis that both should be acknowledged and understood. Anti-art is life, nature; true reality is the one and all. The bird song is anti-art. The pouring rain, the chattering of an impatient audience, sneeze noises... or compositions like "letting a butterfly caught in a net fly away" or "what an audience left to its own devices does for amusement"- all of these examples may be viewed in this sense as anti-art." Maciunas, Kleinen Sommerfest lecture June 9 1962, quoted in Fluxus Codex p23 The piece links Maciunas' ideas about concretism - real things as art, like the pebbles in the flux atlas (see )- as a politically inspired opposition to the mimetic nature of most western art, and its value as arbiter of its worth. Anyway, feel free to use it if it's in any way useful.Franciselliott (talk) 00:34, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

very (un)Important point
The current article (Jan 2nd, 2010) uses the word, "important" twice in the first paragraph. Although technically this is permissible, it is impermissible from a literary stylistic point of view. Someone please change it. Thanks, --&#123;&#123;subst:User:Skychildandsonofthesun/Skychildandsonofthesun/sig2}} (talk) 10:20, 2 January 2010 (UTC)
 * There is only one - importantly - there...Modernist (talk) 12:12, 2 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Looks good. --&#123;&#123;subst:User:Skychildandsonofthesun/Skychildandsonofthesun/sig2}} (talk) 00:26, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

Close paraphrasing in first paragraph
The first paragraph seems to have a close paraphrasing issue. (see PARAPHRASE)

Here is the entry:


 * The term Anti-art refers to art which presents a challenge to the currently existing definition of art.[1] It is a term that by wide consensus seems to have been coined by Marcel Duchamp.[1] This would have been around the time that he began making readymades around 1913.[1] Some still regard the readymades as being anti-art, for instance the Stuckist group of artists.[1] Duchamp's Fountain is highly noteworthy.[1] Anti-art is associated with Dada, an art movement founded in 1916 in Zurich, with which Duchamp is also importantly associated.[1] Many more art movements have over time taken a position in relation to anti-art.[1]

Here is: http://www.tate.org.uk/collections/glossary/definition.jsp?entryId=571


 * Anti-art refers to art that challenges the existing accepted definitions of art. It is generally agreed to have been coined by Marcel Duchamp around 1913 when he made his first readymades, which are still regarded in some quarters as Anti-art (for example by the Stuckist group). In 1917 Duchamp submitted a urinal, titled Fountain, for an exhibition in New York, which subsequently became notorious and eventually highly influential. Anti-art is associated with Dada, the artistic and literary movement founded in Zurich in 1916 and simultaneously in New York, in which Duchamp was a central figure. Since Dada there have been many art movements that have taken a position on Anti-art.

I see that this entry has a particularly active and passionate talk page, so I do not want to change anything on the page itself, but I want to point this out and suggest that, some of this information could be integrated into the rest of the article, the sentences about the readymades and Duchamp's Fountain being noteworthy could be moved to the pages about those two things (if that information is not there already), and some of the other information condensed (for example the second and third sentence could become "The term is believed to have been coined by Marcel Duchamp around 1913."

Nb99 (talk) 20:16, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Agreed it is too close to the source. One problem is that this is the key information that needs to be included in the lead (hence why it was in the Tate definition), so it's not appropriate to remove it altogether. The ready-mades and the Fountain are the seminal works of anti-art and need to be linked with the origin of the term, anti-art. "Is believed to have been coined" is not strong enough for the original: "by wide consensus seems to have been coined". I will have a look for another source also.  Ty  02:42, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Duchamp quotes
There are two quotes of Duchamps on the subject of art and more specifically anti art. evidence of them can be found here http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_profilepage&v=haon2DXWvLk I think the source of this interview is : The Late Show Line Up: BBC UK Interview with Marcel Duchamp, June 5, 1968 interview conducted by Joan Bakewell. this needs to be confirmed and checked.

Duchamp here states that he would like to get rid of art in the way many have done away with religion- this would lead one to assume that duchamp see's art as a social and ideological construct, by comparing it to religion and atheism i.e. lack of belief. and that something being seen as art or someone being an artist is something "purely artificial".

It should be noted that Duchamp both rejects certain elements of art expressed by his ready-mades, but also rejects art itself by stating he wants to get rid of it. PAB1990 (talk) 10:14, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

— Preceding unsigned comment added by PAB1990 (talk • contribs) 20:05, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

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