Please recommend books to make me see "modern art" in a new way

Please recommend books to make me see "modern art" in a new way.

>Walking through MoMa in NYC
>Oh look, a pile of mangled street signs on the floor
>Oh wow, a white canvas painted white by a white woman
>Oh look, garbage painted black (not exaggerating)
>Oh gee wiz, a fucking green carpet hanging from a wall.
>Oh look, a bunch of nails in a bag
>My oh my, is that a few gallons of mud water in a jacuzzi?

Fucking Jesus Christ. The only stuff in that entire museum not worth burning is the post-impressionist exhibit and the Magrittes.

Show me the light.

Does the MoMA still have the Picabia collection up?

What you are describing is post-modern art. My secret to its enjoyment is trying to appreciate just seeing some crazy stuff. Where else are you going to see a jacuzzi filled with mud?

it's great to walk through for a laugh.
there was a great thread on this, it was regarding the fashion industry as a whole, and some of the ridiculousness that came out of it.
i was a staunch believer that art has been torn down by post-modernism, but i was somewhat convinced by the passion behind certain aspects of the opposing argument. the idea wasn't to astound with aesthetics, the pursuit of beauty, but rather as set pieces for a story to be told or perspective. in a way, modern art has changed that garbage painted black into an interpretation, a story starter, a literal coffee table book. it's no longer pursuing truth or beauty. those things have become overwhelmingly dull in a world where abstracts have been deconstructed into meaninglessness. instead, we want provocation, perspective, a thread of conversation or complex ideas.

i don't necessarily agree with the direction that leads, it feels to me personally as cheapening art, but i had to change my opinions on art to understand it better. i look at art as a communication, instead of mimicry. all art would be mere mimicry if it weren't for this transformation. all art is merely a shadow of god's ideal. that may be something of a ridiculous proposition, but it helps me to accept a more reasonable pursuit for art. the attempt to communicate is something so powerful that it could never have a limit to its manipulation of the world around us. naturally that even applies to garbage on the floor that's been pissed on by a bum and sprinkled with lotus petals. if you look at it as communication it makes sense. the other way it helps is to ensure you know that they have nothing to communicate but bullshit. empty minds will still lack the ability to confer a message through shitty art. it's a question of equity i guess, is one man's art equal to another? is the deconstruction of painting or sculpting an attempt to even the playing field? if so, why is it that something inert as a trash bag when held by a man with a message, and placed in such and such a way, can transcend the trash bag of another man? because art is itself cannot be deconstructed into meaninglessness, and value can be found in it despite attempts otherwise to cheapen and destroy.

Mud wrestling at my step-dad's house

I guess if you "don't get it", you will never "get it". Some people are born incapable of appreciating art. Oh well, the world needs janitors.

henry darger was a janitor, actually.

Hmm, uh yes, I actually knew that, I was using clever double-talk ironically...Yes, that's what I was doing.

>you're a philistine if you can't appreciate deep works of art such as mud in a jacuzzi

There's nothing deep to "get" about post-modern art. If you think it's something deep and profound that you need to be cultured to understand, you're the definition of a pseud. I see no redeeming qualities in this literal garbage. It's all talentless art done for shock value and "lol look at how cultural and politically aware I am." I don't like how modern art started breaking from tradition so drastically, but I still appreciate a lot of it. Kandinsky was an absolute master.

Correct, I'm glad we're on the same page.

>be me
>go to your home
>knock on the door and say: "I'm an artist and I'm going to make art today"
>kick the door anyhow
>dash to your bathroom
>shit in your bathtub
>charge you $500,000 for it
>really makes you ponder
>another glorious piece of art has enriched the world today!

y/n?

>There's nothing deep to "get" about post-modern art...
That's like saying there is no significant difference between a box of wine, and a nice bordeaux.

It is always interesting, however, to see how the lower crust tries to rationalize his inferior taste, while mocking the cultured. Let me guess...You read detective novels and think you're Veeky Forums, right?

>books to make me see "modern art" in a new way.
It's not a book you need, it's LSD.

Seriously, Modern Art is for people to speculate around, not understand. One question leads to the next and so on. Preferably done in a circle with similar people so you can circlejerk. When you done speculating you may reach a concensus. All who agree on it is then to be considered "educated".

When modern art first developed, many people hated it. The Impressionists got their name because their artwork seemed unfinished and sloppy.

>I'm the cultured one ho ho ho

t. has not even finished the Bible once and can't understand religious references in Renaissance artworks

Did I hit a nerve? I must've hit a nerve. Oh, look, I've humiliated you in front of everyone. Run on home, little kiddo.

>Can't understand religious references
Debate me.

>The Impressionists got their name because their artwork seemed unfinished and sloppy.
Really? I was pretty sure it came from Monet's painting "Impression, Sloeil Levant"

The point of modern art (or at least one of them) is to try and move past and extend the boundaries of the previous generation of art and artists. What I find most interesting about this kind of "shit in a bag" is that it's not clear (to me) it's even possible to push past the previous generation any more. How do you extend the levels of abstraction and technical degeneration from the 20th century any further while still producing art at all?
It's terrible from the sense of visual appeal and it's not "good" art but it's interesting at least watching the postmodern batch of artists try to figure out where to go.
Sometimes, anyway. One of the nasty side effects of low-technique art being acceptable is that it's very easy to be a pretentious retard.

Weak banter. I'm really an artist btw, and I would unironically shit in your bathtub for money.

Yeah, I know. I was shitposting the whole time, I agree with you. I'm a musician and feel the same way about today's state of music.

I remember the fashion thread, it was good. Better than anything on Veeky Forums, at least.

>I was shitposting the whole time, I agree with you.
Damn, is this the power of post-modern shitposting?

Top shitposting tbqh. Are you talking about classical music or pop music?

>Randomly using a wine analogy
Yes, clearly everyone else is the pseud here.

>mocking the cultured
Not sure how you got that from my post. I'm actually defending the real cultured people, if anything: the people that appreciate and love traditional art for its mastery and furthering of culture rather than degenerating.

>I bet you read detective novels!!
Well no, I don't. But that would have absolutely nothing to do with this argument even if it were the case. I read far more actual literature than 99% of the people on this board, and most likely you, but you don't see me attacking everyone with differing opinions and trying to prove how much better I am constantly.

Once again, m8, this was me shitposting.

This is painful

>I was just pretending to be retarded
Yeah, I'm sure.

I'm an aspiring rapper, m8.

it was pretty good. i was a main aggressor of the thread, i was adamantly against the idea that some of the crap they were wearing was art. i at least was convinced otherwise, i think. it's a shame when some legitimately artistic people get enveloped in a cultural art world that's centered around capitalism and sarcasm and irony, so much so that any talent gets buried under something specifically undermining itself. it's probably a lot of why DFW killed himself, ultimately ironic and bullshit works that took what talent that was there and jeered it into submission and meaninglessness.

theres a good book called "what are you looking at?" which describes modern art fairly ok. what i loved about it was the author's enthusiasm for it and how the culture and people in the scene are sometimes more interesting that the art itself. there is stuff to "get". its ontological, so you have to understand the history and players in it, and the major philosophies surrounding before you can judge a piece as "good" or "bad" which actually limits modern art. now in post modernism the need for a derivative narrative disappears and a person can literally take a shit on the floor and call it art, and the argument of "is it good or bad art" disappears because it becomes irrelevant, the artist desired to express himself through shitting and this is the result. that doesnt mean that all post modernists will give the piece of shit a second glance or consider it tasteful. actually most post modernists will look at the tourists looking at the shit and consider the normie fascination the biggest success of the art (and really all art is only as successful as the amount of people that pay attention to it). /b is actually a great example of a postmodernist board, the shit that can be considered aesthetic there is proof that a culture can stream around anything including hate watching isis beheading videos and sissygasm gifs.