I get it, But I don’t get it…

Thomas Pavitte
Jul 27, 2017 · 4 min read

I’ve recently been really enjoying the new Podcast series — A Piece of Work, with Abbi Jacobson. It’s a 10 part series in partnership with MoMA (The Museum of Modern Art) where Abbi and friends dive into the challenging world of contemporary art and try to understand how they feel about particular pieces.

A Podcast seems like a strange medium to engage people about art, but I have found it to be a really interesting way of sparking my interest in the works that they feature.

I like the idea of hearing Abbi and her friends experiencing the artwork and hearing their feelings about them. It’s interesting to hear them describe what they see and for me to create an image of what the artwork looks like in my head. I always find myself wanting to google the pieces at the end and see how close my mental image was.

The first episode that I listened to was about monochromatic works of art. See below for the link.

One of the pieces that they viewed was Yves Klein’s Blue Monochrome, painted in 1961. Yes, it’s just one single colour.

Here it is.

Yves Klein, Blue Monochrome, 1961. Dry pigment in synthetic polymer medium on cotton over plywood, 6' 4 7/8" x 55 1/8" (195.1 x 140 cm) (The Museum of Modern Art, New York. The Sidney and Harriet Janis Collection. © 2017 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris)

Yves Klein became famous for his monochrome paintings and was especially obsessed with this particular shade of blue. He went to quite extreme lengths to get this specific shade that meant so much to him. He produced dozens of these paintings with one of them, IKB 92, selling for $9,264,400 at Sotheby’s London in 2015.

Abbi views this artwork with her friend, Questlove and they discuss how this particular piece makes them feel. Being a musician, Questlove hears a sound when he looks at it — a B flat. Abbi feels a sense of calmness. They also are interested in the texture of the paint that was applied by a roller. Overall, they are completely absorbed by the piece and find that it touches them on a very deep level.

I feel a bit cynical about all of this. I wonder about the psychology of it all. Are these sorts of feelings kind of like how a placebo sugar tablet works? By going to one of the most famous galleries in the world and knowing that you are going to see something of great value, is there an expectation that you have to like whatever you see?

Perhaps it’s just one of those things that you need to experience by seeing it in person. I agree that it’s a nice shade of blue, but I don’t think it’s of much more value than that. I’m sure at the time it was painted by Klein, it was a very new thing to just have a painting of one solid colour. I can appreciate its history and the thought behind it, but I do feel that it will always just be a nice shade of blue.

It almost bothers me that work like this can achieve this absurd dollar value and be thought of as a masterpiece. But then again, I’m reminded of a quote by one of my favourite artists.

“Art is what you can get away with.” — Andy Warhol

The point of art is to make you feel something. Someone looking at it that loves it is has just as much value as someone that hates it. I don’t think i’ll ever understand the value of the Yves Klein monochrome paintings. I’m quite happy to be in the crowd that looks at it and just sees blue.

But for those that do see a magnificent piece of artwork, let me know what you think of my piece below. It’s a shade of my favourite colour. Let me know what it makes you feel and please email me for details on how to purchase it.

Thomas Pavitte, Green monochrome 2017. Digital image, 1066 pixels by 1066 pixels, #20cb9d

Thanks for reading! Please feel free to connect and get in touch with me about anything and everything: thomas@thomasmakesstuff.com | www.thomasmakesstuff.com | Instagram | Facebook | Twitter

Thomas Pavitte

Written by

Author of the 1000-Dot-to-Dot book series and Querkles Colouring in book www.thomasmakesstuff.com

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