Image source: photo by the artist
Reading Reflection written September, 2022
The way Dave writes is spicy, that intense all-electrifying heat that gives you a euphoric high; albeit not a flavour everyone would enjoy (or have the stomach for).
If you haven’t at least dipped your toe into the realm of art history, I don’t think you’d be able to appreciate this book in its entirety. Even if you’re a self-proclaimed art history addict like myself, if you’re not turned on by definitions then this book probably would be frustratingly incomprehensible.
To explore the concept of an ‘image’ (where people create things as a form of communication), gives birth to such an interesting concept of transactional relationships between the artist, artwork and the viewer. I wonder if other artists consciously think of art as a therapeutic institution? This book rips apart the archaic submissively-elitist term of fine art to reveal its transformation through to the ‘modern’ era. What ambiguous terms ‘contemporary’ and ‘modern’. It’s no surprise that current popular depictions of people in the art world are turtleneck-wearing eccentrics holding a glass of wine, speaking at each other in verbose terminology. I’d love to be in a social setting with Dave’s punchy art lexicon cascading throughout the room; I’d love even more to experience the live reactions of people drenched in his opinions.
Read this book when you want some art history porn. Read again and again when you feel like bathing in the depths of literal and figurative imagery.