LIFE & CULTURE
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Is it art – or is it interior decorating?

When we acquire a painting surely we are asking, ‘Where could I put that? Where would it fit?’ And does it go with the sofa?

    • Art, no matter how striking or brilliant, is a mood board. The work is unimportant, what matters is that it creates an impression.
    • Art, no matter how striking or brilliant, is a mood board. The work is unimportant, what matters is that it creates an impression. PHOTO: UNSPLASH
    Published Sat, Jun 8, 2024 · 05:00 AM

    IS THERE, I wonder, anything worse you could say to a serious artist than that you bought their new painting because it worked well with your sofa?

    The whole project of modern art was, in a way, to escape the confines of the parlour walls. From Marcel Duchamp to Jackson Pollock, artists were smashing their way out of the frame, knocking art off its pedestal.

    The absurd, ad hoc sculptures of Dada appropriated everyday, mundane objects. The vast canvases of the abstract expressionists would not fit over a fireplace, and conceptual art remains a riposte to easy commercialisation and commodification.

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