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Rus Bowden
Valued Member
Username: rusbowden

Post Number: 277
Registered: 03-2007
Posted on Friday, August 03, 2007 - 4:39 pm:   Edit Post Delete Post View Post/Check IP Print Post

In art, experience is truth, and there is no greater sin than to say, "I know I liked that novel when I first read it, but it can't be good because it's inconsistent with my theory of fiction, so I guess I won't like it anymore." That's the trouble with political art and politicized criticism: they start with theory instead of experience. I can't think of a more efficient way to make bad art.'
--Terry Teachout

from Books Inq.: Au contraire ...
quoted from About Last Night: Inconstant reader

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Furthermore:

Progressives must start recognizing the spiritual poverty of contemporary secular humanism and reexamine the way that liberalism too often now automatically defines human aspiration and human happiness in reductively economic terms. If conservatives are serious about educational standards, they must support the teaching of art history in primary school--which means conservatives have to get over their phobia about the nude, which has been a symbol of Western art and Western individualism and freedom since the Greeks invented democracy.
--Camille Paglia

from Arion: Religion and the Arts in America

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Frank Wilson's blog Books Inq., is open for comment on this subject, and references both the Camille Paglia and Terry Teachout articles. And comment preferred here within the forum is fine, certainly.

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Fred Longworth
Advanced Member
Username: sandiegopoet

Post Number: 1844
Registered: 05-2006
Posted on Saturday, August 04, 2007 - 1:39 am:   Edit Post Delete Post View Post/Check IP Print Post

Truth is more like a unicorn, something we can clearly picture in our minds -- and have heard about all our lives -- but have never actually seen.

Fred
Rus Bowden
Valued Member
Username: rusbowden

Post Number: 281
Registered: 03-2007
Posted on Sunday, August 05, 2007 - 8:10 am:   Edit Post Delete Post View Post/Check IP Print Post

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Following an in-forum response by Gary Blankenship, Charlene D. of Desert Moon drops a great comment into Frank's thread here:

Au contraire ...

And Fred Longworth comments at Wild Poetry.

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sue kay
Intermediate Member
Username: suekay

Post Number: 351
Registered: 11-2005
Posted on Thursday, August 09, 2007 - 5:23 pm:   Edit Post Delete Post View Post/Check IP Print Post

haha bump!

I consider myself conservative, and yes, I taught art and art history in primary school,(as well as college level). ......

The first was for love,(volunteer) the second for money. The primary school was 70% assisted lunch program.(poverty). So what is a conservative to with this evil need to teach art. The bottom line isn't what motivates. But it sure makes a great line. Thanks Gary for your perceptive comments. Do you actually know any conservatives? Or do you define everyone by the most extreme idiocy you can find? I know lots of "progressives" who are motivated to do good, and work very hard at it. I don't believe in command anything so we part company on methodology, but I would never question their commitment to bettering their world, or their hearts, because I know better.

Recently returned from a year in a conservative third world country, My approach was this: the truth is that the human need to create, design and colour one's world is universal. Methods and materials, are the tools. The artist's vision is the result. Why should I force my concept of art,or "truth" into this? Tits and ass are great subjects. I like life drawing, but it ain't all that, when "all that" is so stark that you are amazed at the impulse to create when survival is so uncertain......

Just my two cents. ( which invested wisely will yield.....)



regards

Sue
Gary Blankenship
Moderator
Username: garydawg

Post Number: 18277
Registered: 07-2001
Posted on Thursday, August 09, 2007 - 5:35 pm:   Edit Post Delete Post View Post/Check IP Print Post

I used to. I worked for the Navy with the military and that is about as conservative as you can get. Most of what know now are retirees disillusioned about the war - who might vote right if not for that. Mostly mugwumps with their wump hanging more over the right side than the left.

For me, conservatives stand for peeking in the bedroom, against science, for Leviticus, for bootstraps even when there are none...

Sorry, but they show me little except their anger at the government even when it is theirs...

Smiles.

Gary
Rus Bowden
Valued Member
Username: rusbowden

Post Number: 284
Registered: 03-2007
Posted on Thursday, August 09, 2007 - 6:12 pm:   Edit Post Delete Post View Post/Check IP Print Post

On Terry Teachout and Camille Paglia's ideas about "political art and politicized criticism":

sue kay and Gary Blankenship comment at Wild Poetry

And both Dragon and Beth Vieira delve into it at The Critical Poet

And Frank Wilson responds to Charlene D of Desert Moon at Books Inq.

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