[torrance]

The same could be said of a lot of modern art: it is heavily influenced/driven by the critics, not the enjoyment/pleasure/surprise of a more general audience (who just don't "get" it). There's a feeling that a refined taste is by definition not a popular taste, or even a learned taste, but instead must be exclusive to art and music schools.

I mean sure, I get that your atonal poem breaks with traditional tonality etc etc, and maybe on some intellectual level that is (was) a fresh move, but I don't _enjoy_ it, no matter how hard I've tried.

[brodo]

First of all, modern art is art of the modern age which started after the middle ages. If you are not into depictions of Jesus, saints or medieval nobles you like modern art. Contemporary art is what you are complaining about. In that space, the works that are successful do not look like the ones from 100 years ago. That’s just how the world works. You can still do an oil painting of a sunset and put in into a golden frame. It will not be put into a contemporary art gallery though, because chances are that someone 200 years ago did it better and you can just go to the next museum (or just a different part of the same museum) and view it there. A Beatles cover band also does not make it to the top of the charts. But there is a community of people who like contemporary landscape paintings done in a traditional style. They are just not the main stream. Same as you can go to a concert of a Beatles cover band. It’s not that contemporary art is bad. Most people just don’t spend the time to find the stuff they like.

[goosedragons]

Modern art doesn't start until the 19th century. Picasso is also considered a "modern" artist despite being quite different from oil paintings of sunsets. Colloquially people can also use "modern art" to refer to art made today because the word "modern" means essentially present day. It's only people in the "know" that are going to distinguish between Modern Art and Contemporary Art vs. modern art.

[alxlaz]

> Most people just don’t spend the time to find the stuff they like.

Which is particularly surprising considering that there appear to be like twenty contemporary artists whose paintings are neither random paint splatters, nor monocolor canvases, so you don't even have to spend that much time looking!

[mantas]

It feels like extravagant(?) contemporary art is not mainstream either. Just a niche that happens to be preferred by critics/specialists/etc. While most people seem to prefer classic stuff from older times.

[bowsamic]

I'm not sure about this. I don't know anything about modern art or the critique of it, but every time I've been to a modern art exhibition I've been far more engaged than any national gallery. Looking at a crushed up car upturned on its side in the MAMAC at Nice was far more interesting and engaging than seeing 100 Baroque oil paintings. If you gave me the choice between seeing some weird modern art exhibition and some gallery of classical art it would take a lot to convince me to choose the latter.

That said, when seen on a screen on a computer, I think it can be the opposite way around. I guess a lot of modern art only feels right in person, since many of them have 3D elements or are very contextual.

[JackFr]

> Looking at a crushed up car upturned on its side in the MAMAC at Nice was far more interesting and engaging than seeing 100 Baroque oil paintings.

I couldn’t disagree more, but as it’s said, there is no accounting for taste. My problem - and I get that it’s my problem - is that I don’t see the crushed up car as art. It’s a gimmick, a sideshow, a lark.

Within the visual arts I want to see something which both demonstrates the mastery of a technique and captures the artist’s understanding of the world, the human condition, etc. With the crushed up car, if I squint my eyes I get the second part, but as to the first part, the only mastery I see displayed is hucksterism.

[bowsamic]

I’ve never found my enjoyment of art to be related to the mastery put into it. In fact I generally enjoy art more if I know it was made quickly and easily. I think it’s boring to become a masterful artist, compared to having less skill and “accidentally” making something engaging. I have no interest in technique or mastery, it is a turnoff for me, and it’s boring

[zasdffaa]

...because it's about the person critiquing, not the art. Their image of themselves in the eyes of others, not the art. The art is simply a stepladder with which to raise themselves up.

There are many honorable exceptions, and they are well worth talking to when you find them (you'll disagree but you will learn something) but many more who claim to like it because they fear what they might be seen as if they don't.

I'll note that IME those who know most about art and genuinely love it are least willing to put up a facade.

[odessacubbage]

next to none of the artwork produced from the medieval times through the 1900s was ever intended for a general audience, it was either commissioned to the tastes of a patron (usually the church or or a wealthy aristocrat) or was produced for the salons of high society, and by extension, the critics. outside of civic works or those dedicated to kings and empires, the entire idea of art as a trust to be kept for the people is a relatively modern invention. art for popular consumption exists in the form of mass media and commercial art and, broadly speaking, this is where the working artists who are interested in representational beauty and -tonality still reside.

[_trampeltier]

For me, from outside, it seems modern art is primary an investment. Of course artist create wonderful pictures, sculptures .. whatever these days.

Also if you are an artist, you are self employed. So you are not just artist, you are CEO, CFO and everything too.

[geysersam]

Others say we only have popular culture, driven by profit hunger. Each to their own.