“Regard all art critics as useless and dangerous.” (THE FUTURIST MANIFESTO)
My supplementary subject in my first year at university was History of Art. Also, I once genuinely attended an exhibition of paintings at the National Portrait Gallery by Cheetah, the ape from the original Tarzan films.
I think that these two things qualify me to be considered an expert on “art”.
(Incidentally, the Cheetah thing was a joint exhibition with the pop artist Peter Blake, who created the famous cover of Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts’ Club Band).
Anyway, I’m very much with the Futurists, aside from the fascism (”Will be glorify war – the world’s only hygiene – militarism, patriotism, the destructive gesture of freedom-bringers, beautiful ideas worth dying for, and scorn for woman.”) This is largely because of their disdain for art critics (I’m looking at you Jonathan Jones of The Guardian) and my feelings towards a particularly renowned critic from the nineteenth century, one John Ruskin.
Ruskin was what they used to call a polymath and was hugely respected until the early twentieth century, particularly in his support of the Pre-Raphaelites, but more in his controversial backing of – my favourite painter – J.M.W. Turner. whose reputation he apparently attempted to protect after his death by hiding any early paintings of naked French ladies.
Among my favourite paintings is Whistler’s Nocturne in Blue and Gold, the Falling Rocket, from 1875. An image of Old Battersea Bridge across the Thames, which I find beautiful in its use of dark colours, with shafts of light, its subject so banal compared to the likes of his contemporary Pre-Raphaelites’ bright oranges and greens, plus their concentration on classical and Shakespearean subjects, in works such as in John Everett Millais’s famous Ophelia.
John Ruskin doesn’t share my view of the painting, describing it in an article as Whistler “throwing a pot of paint in the face of the public.” Fearing for his livelihood, a struggling Whistler took the brave step of suing the mighty Ruskin for libel. The other things to like about Whistler are the fact he was friends with Oscar Wilde, that he was known for his witty company (”He loved to be the Sun around whom we lesser lights revolved…and in consequence no one was bored, no one dull”) and that he was thrown out of the U.S. Army, just before the Civil War, for being a smart-arse, at which point he moved to London.
Whistler’s credo was “art for art’s sake,” which much have rubbed up badly with the Victorian establishment. He and his fellow American, George Inness, founded the Tonalism movement, which used dark hues and mist in landscape scenes, which I think echoes Turner and pre-empts the later, half-sighted works of Monet (who he also knew), ahead of, say the beautiful but framed scenes of John Constable.
He was also the teacher of the American artist Walter Sickert, who many people believe was Jack the Ripper, murder fans. He was also the favourite artist of Doris Day, Calamity Jane fans (of which I am one).
To the court case.
Ruskin had expressed his dislike of Whistlers concentration on pictorial style, ahead of a truth to nature (in which case he would have hated modern social media). In truth, Whistler’s decision to sue was less to do with the offence he took and more to raise his public profile, along with the cash this may involve. This is a very modern case in other ways, almost tabloid-like in its star’s furious reaction to an article written about him, his need for publicity, up against a journalist’s right to criticise as he wished and cause his own controversy.
Ultimately, Whistler won the case, yet the judge awarded him a mere farthing as compensation, bankrupting him and forcing him to move to Venice to work for commission. Still, better than Battersea though.
For context on this, see various celebrities splashed across our current media: the Wagatha trial, anyone?
Alternatively, go to a gallery and judge for yourself.
Perpetual Now 
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