Demise of Aesthetics in 20th cent. Australian Art.

 

The Demise of Aesthetics in 20^th cent. Australian Art.

The extent to which meaning has transcended aesthetics in the fine art of painting, may be traced to some extent to the incorporation of Art Schools into the University system. Universities by their very nature are not concerned with the teaching of technical skill, such activities  historically have been the task of Technical Colleges. Universities by their nature, place primary importance on theoretical and hidden meaning. Fine art over the centuries has attempted to amalgamate the two, originally through a master’s workshop, and later through the technical school.

Over the last few decades the emphasis has been on theoretical meaning of a piece of art work, regardless of any aesthetic content. Walk through any contemporary exhibition, and you are confronted with an array mechanical, brutal, and/or computerized imagery with little or no aesthetic appeal. It is little wonder that the general public has turned its back on contemporary work. I am not suggesting that fine art must be solely decorative, but art works should be meaningful in their own right, have appeal and not necessarily require written explanations for a viewer to have any understanding of the message. It seems to me, that western art schools have swamped the world with theorists, who more often than not, have little aesthetic talent, but somehow have taken control world art. Much of this discourse amount to little more than a constant stream of meaningless drivel, leaving the listener or reader, wondering what on earth the author was trying to say.

Questions needs to be asked , how can  individuals express themselves without mastery of the language required to do so. Art schools today place too much emphases on doing your own thing, and little on technic and aesthetic appeal. Many writers have suggested that this decline into the meaningless began with the advent of Pop Art of Andy Warhol, and the gaudy commercial imagery of western materialism, that this unleashed. Unfortunately many of these artists have moved through the system, and now find themselves teaching the next generation of artists. Although they themselves may possess the technical skills and aesthetic discipline required, many have failed to pass on these skills, instead giving their students  a free hand to do what they will, resulting in the current crop of either meaningless work, or images seemingly untouched by human hands. In fact, they have turned the fine art of painting into an industrial production line .Commercial technology has replaced human skill, resulting in very slick images of an impersonal nature.

Walk through any grants, or competition exhibition  and most work on display has little personal idiosyncrasy,  no defiant brush strokes, no sense of struggle, just  impersonal art work , often of an industrial nature with its obligatory statement about meaning. Where the visual art of painting goes from here is anyones  guess, but the current direction does not offer much hope.