http://d.yimg.com/a/p/ap/20110421/capt.2e665b644fc04b2f84a8da97723b3135-8821b8d81c634297bbed008849760272-0.jpg?x=344&y=345&q=85&sig=wVHMettZn6g1E.nwjeiMOQ--



VIENNA (Reuters) – An Austrian museum has decided to return a valuable Gustav Klimt painting to the grandson of its original owner, a victim of the Nazis.

Klimt's Litzlberg am Attersee landscape is estimated to be worth 20 million to 30 million euros ($29.2-43.8 million) and is one of the museum's best known pieces.

"As painful as returning this painting is for the...collection, the province and all of Austria, I believe the Salzburg government must stay on the path started in 2002 and not allow itself to benefit from a criminal regime," Wilfried Haslauer, director of the Museum of Modern Arts, said on Thursday.

He was referring to a 2002 accord struck with Jewish organizations on returning assets that Nazis stole. The Salzburg government and parliament have to approve the move.

Experts commissioned by the museum determined that Georges Jorisch was the rightful owner of the oil on canvas painted in 1915. Jorisch is the grandson of Amalie Redlich, whom the Nazis deported to Poland in October 1941 and murdered.

The Gestapo confiscated the painting that Redlich had acquired in 1938. An art dealer bought the painting in 1944 and later swapped it with the museum for another work.

Jorisch's lawyer told Austrian radio his client would help fund an expansion of the museum as a gesture of gratitude.

(Reporting by Michael Shields, editing by Paul Casciato)

I am disgusted by this news. This painting belongs in a museum for all to enjoy, and not to the supposed heir of another jew victim of the evil Nazi regime.

In a museum, to be gawked at by the streams of American and Japanese tourists pulling their snotty-nosed brats behind them on a half-hour stop between MacDonald's and the local zoo, is precisely where works of art do not belong. When the sweetest fruits of a culture are put on display in the same sort of establishment that houses stuffed dodos and mummified pharaohs, one can only conclude that the culture is as dead as either.

Let us not forget that it was the National Assembly of the Glorious Revolution which first stuffed the Palais du Louvre full of the treasures plundered from the churches and estates to inaugurate the opening of history's most popular art museum. Shrine of the muses indeed! Tomb of muses!

In a museum, to be gawked at by the streams of American and Japanese tourists pulling their snotty-nosed brats behind them on a half-hour stop between MacDonald's and the local zoo, is precisely where works of art do not belong. When the sweetest fruits of a culture are put on display in the same sort of establishment that houses stuffed dodos and mummified pharaohs, one can only conclude that the culture is as dead as either.

But is it really? Do you truly believe that the high culture of Europe is irrevocably dead, never to rise again? I'd like to think that it has been rendered dormant by the liberal/egalitarian (temporary) victory and that there are those cultured few who would restore it if they but had the power to do so. It was not so very long ago that such a thing was tried ...

Do you truly believe that the high culture of Europe is irrevocably dead, never to rise again?

Yes.

I'd like to think that it has been rendered dormant by the liberal/egalitarian (temporary) victory and that there are those cultured few who would restore it if they but had the power to do so. It was not so very long ago that such a thing was tried ...

If you're referring to Yockey, Yockey was right and wrong. Right in his prediction, wrong in his vision of it. There's no evidence from history to adduce that this final phase of 'civilisation' leads to anything desirable from a 'racialist' perspective, for one. 'Imperium' is not something to be glorified. It is not something to be hoped for. It is a monster. It is the end. But all that Spenglerian hoo-ha aside, man has, to my knowledge, simply passed the point of no return. He is ever more disconnected from the living world. The spirit has triumphed. The soul is dead, the body dying. Culture is impossible at this time. Liberalism? Egalitarianism? Even the art of the Third Reich is lifeless to me.

If you're referring to Yockey, Yockey was right and wrong. Right in his prediction, wrong in his vision of it. There's no evidence from history to adduce that this final phase of 'civilisation' leads to anything desirable from a 'racialist' perspective, for one. 'Imperium' is not something to be glorified. It is not something to be hoped for. It is a monster. It is the end. But all that Spenglerian hoo-ha aside, man has, to my knowledge, simply passed the point of no return. He is ever more disconnected from the living world. The spirit has triumphed. The soul is dead, the body dying. Culture is impossible at this time. Liberalism? Egalitarianism? Even the art of the Third Reich is lifeless to me.

I've had a similar feeling of the futility of all of this (i.e., 'racialism', etc) for some time now, though I'd not thought it through to the extent you have. Just out of curiosity, what do you see as the end result of this trend - I am guessing extinction? It doesn't sound like something that is reversible.

Just out of curiosity, what do you see as the end result of this trend - extinction?

On the most superficial level, I see it ending in a mass of parasites stripping down what little is left of the living earth in their insatiable lust for power. They call it 'progress'. That is the historical trend. What thereafter? Probably extinction. But the depths of life are unfathomable.

It certainly sounds likely when you put it in those terms.

If the Romantics were unable to stay the march toward the apocalypse, nobody is able. The noble, whatever their race, must sink beneath the waves of the growing mass of mankind. That is the gift of 'civilisation' to all.

Ever on chat?

Ever on chat?

Last time the damned thing did not work, although I think that was before my latest system software reinstall when everything was acting funny. I am going to be very busy the next couple of days because I've procrastinated on a couple of projects, the deadlines for which are looming very quickly. At any rate, I'll look into it when I have time and also I will PM you my email address as it has a chat built in.

Here is the source to the article ...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/us_austria_klimt

Although I was sure to properly quote and recognize the reporter and editor, which is usually good enough.

In a museum, to be gawked at by the streams of American and Japanese tourists pulling their snotty-nosed brats behind them on a half-hour stop between MacDonald's and the local zoo, is precisely where works of art do not belong. When the sweetest fruits of a culture are put on display in the same sort of establishment that houses stuffed dodos and mummified pharaohs, one can only conclude that the culture is as dead as either.

Let us not forget that it was the National Assembly of the Glorious Revolution which first stuffed the Palais du Louvre full of the treasures plundered from the churches and estates to inaugurate the opening of history's most popular art museum. Shrine of the muses indeed! Tomb of muses!


I'm an artist, and as a child I enjoyed going to art museums more than anything else. It was inspiring for me and I'm sure that it's inspiring for others too....

To hide all artwork in a private residence or collection is a complete shame and waste. Most artists would like their work to be appreciated by many, not a sole person.

I suppose if it bothers you so much you could just buy every painting that you deem worthy and shove it into a cold dark room to enjoy every evening...snickering to yourself about how the snotty little MceeeD's children of America & Japan won't set eyes upon the masterpieces(at least not in your lifetime).......

:rolleyes:

Maybe we should segregate museums for the benefit of the public. Before noon only mickey d's and jap kids can enter. After noon only whiny bitter old guys who can't get it up anymore may enter. That way everyone's happy.

That painting looks like a retarded kid in the 3rd grade painted it blindfolded with one hand tied behind his back.

Personally, I think paintings are supposed to look like photographs, but better, way better, more idealistic, romanticized.

Most if not all "art" today is bourgeois shit masquerading as talent in a cult like atmosphere.

And so the question is asked:

What is art?

Everyone will have an opinion on it. Although I enjoy some forms of art more than others, I can appreciate the work that has been put into others, even if I wouldn't have it in my own house....

I recently had a few pieces of my art juried into an exhibition where I won for an industrial abstraction I painted. Unfortunately the pieces that everyone liked(including myself) did not make the cut or win a prize.

http://a4.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/207254_206881539333021_100000335301679_674357_4223756_n.jpg
Self-Portait

http://a2.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc6/190262_194547353899773_100000335301679_593542_7743080_n.jpg
A rooster(Patrick) for my grandfather



It can be hard to understand just how much energy a person can put into a painting, and how devastatingly horrible it can be when your paintings do not fare well.

It truly is in the eye of the beholder. :)

Pearls before swine.

I'm an artist, and as a child I enjoyed going to art museums more than anything else. It was inspiring for me and I'm sure that it's inspiring for others too....

Yes, and we can all see the result thereof. Clearly you have never understood the art you encountered, or you would never have had the gall to pick up a paintbrush yourself and grace the world with your mediocre scribbles. When the audience is not elite, the performer is not elite. That is a rule. Once art is made plebeian it becomes plebeian. That is what we have today. And that isn't art, no matter how you fools choose to bicker over semantics. What Michelangelo created and what those like you create are not metaphysically related in any way whatsoever.

To hide all artwork in a private residence or collection is a complete shame and waste.

That democratic mentality is so ingrained in these plebs. Anything that isn't for the 'greatest happiness of the greatest number' is, as a matter of course, 'a complete shame and waste'. Why don't we just pass around every beautiful women to be gangraped while we're at it.

Most artists would like their work to be appreciated by many, not a sole person.

If you think that any great artist ever cared what the plebeian masses thought of his work, and I do mean his, it only further shows your complete misunderstanding of art.

http://www.allpaintings.org/d/126484-1/Gustav+Klimt+-+Masturbation.jpg

http://www.gustavklimtgallery.com/images/gustav-klimt.jpg

lol

And so the question is asked:

What is art?

Everyone will have an opinion on it. Although I enjoy some forms of art more than others, I can appreciate the work that has been put into others, even if I wouldn't have it in my own house....

I recently had a few pieces of my art juried into an exhibition where I won for an industrial abstraction I painted. Unfortunately the pieces that everyone liked(including myself) did not make the cut or win a prize.

http://a4.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/207254_206881539333021_100000335301679_674357_4223756_n.jpg

Self-Portait

http://a2.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc6/190262_194547353899773_100000335301679_593542_7743080_n.jpg
A rooster(Patrick) for my grandfather



It can be hard to understand just how much energy a person can put into a painting, and how devastatingly horrible it can be when your paintings do not fare well.

It truly is in the eye of the beholder. :)

As an artist, do you not take into account the personal components that invoke an emotional response?

For example, should I make you a wooden box in a generic style from imported wood, would you feel as connected as to a box I were to craft from the trees in your backyard, featuring symbols that carry some significance, that stand for some values within your family or circle, something close?

When you understand why people react to 'art' and its cultural closeness, you begin to wonder just if the quality of emotions we feel at this international commercial art for the masses (read for dollars) today compare on any scale to the emotions of the past.

Pearls before swine.



Yes, and we can all see the result thereof. Clearly you have never understood the art you encountered, or you would never have had the gall to pick up a paintbrush yourself and grace the world with your mediocre scribbles. When the audience is not elite, the performer is not elite. That is a rule. Once art is made plebeian it becomes plebeian. That is what we have today. And that isn't art, no matter how you fools choose to bicker over semantics. What Michelangelo created and what those like you create are not metaphysically related in any way whatsoever.


If you think that any great artist ever cared what the plebeian masses thought of his work, and I do mean his, it only further shows your complete misunderstanding of art.

What made a great artist an artist? You probably would have walked right past V.Van Gogh with your nose in the air as he painted and twitched. Kicking a bit of dust on him as you scudded away.

You cannot make a valid argument for the 'great master artists' not wanting the masses to see their artwork. They were not these arrogant fools that would socialize and share the same ideals with the Elites of society.

It's simply your opinion Sandor, and around here it's no greater than anyone elses.

What made a great artist an artist?

Natural talent. The ability to recreate anything whether in paint or sculpture exactly as it appears to the human eye. Or create complex music that's beyond what most people can comprehend.


You probably would have walked right past V.Van Gogh with your nose in the air as he painted and twitched. Kicking a bit of dust on him as you scudded away.

As he should. Van Gogh wasn't a great artist.

You cannot make a valid argument for the 'great master artists' not wanting the masses to see their artwork.

Most great artists couldn't care less what the general public thought of their work.

“I pay no attention whatever to anybody's praise or blame. I simply follow my own feelings.” - Mozart

When the audience is not elite, the performer is not elite. That is a rule. Once art is made plebeian it becomes plebeian. That is what we have today.


Reminds me of this quote, and it's completely true.

"Mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself, but talent instantly recognizes genius" Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

That democratic mentality is so ingrained in these plebs. Anything that isn't for the 'greatest happiness of the greatest number' is, as a matter of course, 'a complete shame and waste'. Why don't we just pass around every beautiful women to be gangraped while we're at it.

Great analogy, christ. Your attitude reminds me of the character in Ayn Rand's book who flings a statuette out the window for fear someone unworthy will look upon it. There's some truth in what you're saying, but there's also posing and a good deal of exaggeration.


If you think that any great artist ever cared what the plebeian masses thought of his work, and I do mean his, it only further shows your complete misunderstanding of art.

Look at this list of Michelangelo's works: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_works_by_Michelangelo

Find one work on there that the 'plebeian' masses couldn't have understood, in terms of subject and treatment. It's the technique and technical skill that are beyond their grasp, not the subject or feeling.

Natural talent. The ability to recreate anything whether in paint or sculpture exactly as it appears to the human eye. Or create complex music that's beyond what most people can comprehend.


As he should. Van Gogh wasn't a great artist.

Aha, but it's your own personal view that Van Gogh was not a great artist. Most artists, even post-impressionist painters like Van Gogh, have basic training and can paint an apple to look realistic.

You can disagree as much as you like, but people have an emotional response to Van Gogh's artwork(a lot of people), even if they don't know his story. You can appreciate a technically great painting, but if the emotion is not captured, it becomes mediocre. If a pianist plays technically well but with no emotion, it becomes robotic....

It's the ability to convey emotion and skill through a medium that makes something great. Not technical skills alone.


Most great artists couldn't care less what the general public thought of their work.
Perhaps the most arrogant of artists could care less, but even they will be searching for acceptance when there is no bread on their table. Seeking acceptance is human nature, no one is above it.

Whilst in Firenze (Florence) in 1965, when I saw the statue of David, I exclaimed "how come his cock isn't covered up?"

And so the question is asked:

What is art?

Everyone will have an opinion on it. Although I enjoy some forms of art more than others, I can appreciate the work that has been put into others, even if I wouldn't have it in my own house....

I recently had a few pieces of my art juried into an exhibition where I won for an industrial abstraction I painted. Unfortunately the pieces that everyone liked(including myself) did not make the cut or win a prize.

http://a4.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/207254_206881539333021_100000335301679_674357_4223756_n.jpg
Self-Portait

http://a2.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc6/190262_194547353899773_100000335301679_593542_7743080_n.jpg
A rooster(Patrick) for my grandfather



It can be hard to understand just how much energy a person can put into a painting, and how devastatingly horrible it can be when your paintings do not fare well.

It truly is in the eye of the beholder. :)


The question is does it deserve to be EXHIBITED and PRAISED as some kind of MAJOR accomplishment the world has seldom known.

Does it deserve to have a building built for it by hundreds of craftsmen working thousands of hours to house a little square scrap of canvas hanging on a wall?

A major reason the "art world" even exists is because the extremely wealthy subsidizes it as a form of international currency among themselves. The value of a piece of art is virtually nothing until a rich man publicly pays thousands or millions for a one of a kind work of art, thereby giving the piece it's initial "value".

To reinforce this extreme economic value on such a valueless object, it must be praised, exhibited and worshiped by other people of value so that if the need arises it can be converted back into other more common forms of currency without losing any of its value. Whereas a dollar bill can lose it's value since so many can be created so easily, art being hard to counterfeit with so many experts watching, actually retains and even increases in value, making it a most desirable currency.

Now you understand why I said that the Gustav Klimt painting is unworthy of praise. That painting is basically a million dollar bill for the wealthy and the masses do not realize it, thinking it is merely art to which they can not comprehend because they are not sophisticated enough.

Art is a scam.

Yes, and we can all see the result thereof. Clearly you have never understood the art you encountered, or you would never have had the gall to pick up a paintbrush yourself and grace the world with your mediocre scribbles. When the audience is not elite, the performer is not elite. That is a rule. Once art is made plebeian it becomes plebeian. That is what we have today. And that isn't art, no matter how you fools choose to bicker over semantics. What Michelangelo created and what those like you create are not metaphysically related in any way whatsoever.



It seems that you have either apprenticed under Michelangelo or some other artist that you have accepted as a 'great'. Wow! Extensive knowledge about art, the world of art, paint, brushes, sculpture, technique, kings, queens, plebs, thieves, and more...

Sandor's Guide to The Galaxy and Beyond

Makes a great paperweight.

The question is does it deserve to be EXHIBITED and PRAISED as some kind of MAJOR accomplishment the world has seldom known.

Does it deserve to have a building built for it by hundreds of craftsmen working thousands of hours to house a little square scrap of canvas hanging on a wall?

A major reason the "art world" even exists is because the extremely wealthy subsidizes it as a form of international currency among themselves. The value of a piece of art is virtually nothing until a rich man publicly pays thousands or millions for a one of a kind work of art, thereby giving the piece it's initial "value".

To reinforce this extreme economic value on such a valueless object, it must be praised, exhibited and worshiped by other people of value so that if the need arises it can be converted back into other more common forms of currency without losing any of its value. Whereas a dollar bill can lose it's value since so many can be created so easily, art being hard to counterfeit with so many experts watching, actually retains and even increases in value, making it a most desirable currency.

Now you understand why I said that the Gustav Klimt painting is unworthy of praise. That painting is basically a million dollar bill for the wealthy and the masses do not realize it, thinking it is merely art to which they can not comprehend because they are not sophisticated enough.

Art is a scam.Interesting post, goes a long way towards explaining why something absurd like a Rothko exists.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Rothko

http://t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSpgC8Ih_Af72DZTVw-9IU0qsuiDHQj4v4ql3iGzxIwjkNrPtOPXGGA-KCX
http://www.tate.org.uk/images/cms/12619w_rothko_room2.jpg