2009.12.06 07:00 - The Art of Using the Mona Lisa

The Guardian for this meeting was Adams Dubrovna. The comments are by Adams Dubrovna.

Wol Euler: hello adams
Adams Dubrovna: Hdello Wol. How nice to see you here :)
Wol Euler smiles
Wol Euler: I see you're sporting the team colours today.
Adams Dubrovna: team colors?
Wol Euler: the t-shirt
Adams Dubrovna: ahhh. not colors but yes, the team. ack
Adams Dubrovna: they have a presence here in SL
Wol Euler: I'll have to go and see it, perhaps I'll recognize the buildings
Adams Dubrovna: Yes, on one of the sims you will :)
Adams Dubrovna: They are planning to add the building I work in and then...
Adams Dubrovna: we are going to do a secular version of the Sacred Art Museum exhibition
Wol Euler: cool, good idea.
Adams Dubrovna: Yes, it is an exciting development
Adams Dubrovna: Hello Vendy :)
Wol Euler: hello vendy
Vendy Walpole: Hello Wol, Adams
Adams Dubrovna: Having fur is a good idea with the changed climate here
Wol Euler smiles. I love that av, Vendy.
Adams Dubrovna: yes, very cute :)
Vendy Walpole: Glad you think as me
Vendy Walpole: I love fun
Vendy Walpole: :)
Vendy Walpole: and humour
Wol Euler: hello eliza
Adams Dubrovna: Good morning Eliza :)
Vendy Walpole: Hello Eliza
Eliza Madrigal: Hello Wol, Adams, Vendy :)
Eliza Madrigal: Very cute, Vendy :)
Adams Dubrovna: Is there anything any of you would like to talk about?
Vendy Walpole: grins
Vendy Walpole: thank you
Eliza Madrigal: "Life is wonderous, as it is"
Wol Euler: agreed.
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Vendy Walpole: yes, even these virtual snowflakes are wonderful and so calming
Eliza Madrigal: hm, yes there is a calming effect about them... just falling falling
Vendy Walpole: with no sound at all
Eliza Madrigal: easy
Wol Euler: sound-swallowing, actually, I love the silence of a snowfall
Eliza Madrigal: Ohh.... a softeness and buffer
Eliza Madrigal: yes quite nurturing
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Yakuzza :)
Wol Euler: hello yakuzza
Vendy Walpole: Hello Yaku
Adams Dubrovna: Hello Yak :)
Yakuzza Lethecus: good morning, day everyone
Eliza Madrigal: Thanks ya, good to see you
Yakuzza Lethecus: silent session again
Yakuzza Lethecus: when there is snow in the circle, shouldn´t the well be a fireplace ? :)
Eliza Madrigal: That would be nice :)
Vendy Walpole: oh would like that
Wol Euler: oh, I just noticed that the ice on the pool is receding! The circle of open water was much smaller before.
Eliza Madrigal: a great effect, that
Eliza Madrigal: details mean so much
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Wol Euler: indeed
--BELL--
Eliza Madrigal: And speaking of details, how is the museum coming along Adams? :)
Eliza Madrigal: I'm holding myself from walking through, until it opens
Vendy Walpole: will it be open soon?
Adams Dubrovna: Hard to say how it is going, I am working hard on it
Adams Dubrovna: It opens December 14 at 11:00 am SLT
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Vendy Walpole: soon :)
Adams Dubrovna: lots to do yet
Wol Euler refrains from looking at the calendar
Adams Dubrovna: one week and a day Wol :)
Wol Euler: indeed
Vendy Walpole: does this date have some special meaning?
Agatha Macbeth: Hello, everyone alright?
Wol Euler: hello agatha
Yakuzza Lethecus: hello agatha
Adams Dubrovna: no, it is a compromise of people's schedules who worked on it
Vendy Walpole: Hello Agatha
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Agatha :))
Adams Dubrovna: Hello Agatha
Vendy Walpole: I've been inthere, must admit and like the photos
Adams Dubrovna: I havene't met you Agatha, have you been here before?
Agatha Macbeth: Yes, a few times
Adams Dubrovna: nice to meet you :)
Agatha Macbeth: God its getting dark already!
Agatha Macbeth: Have 2 put the lights on
Wol Euler: yeah
Wol Euler: hello zen
Adams Dubrovna: Hello Zen :)
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Zen :)
Vendy Walpole: Hi Zen
Zen Arado: Hello All
Yakuzza Lethecus: hi zen
Agatha Macbeth: That's better I can see the kb now
Eliza Madrigal: Wow, I didn't know one could separate the IM and chat windows into two... wow
Agatha Macbeth: Hi Zen
Eliza Madrigal made a mistake and a discovery :)
Vendy Walpole: how that?
Wol Euler: :)
Wol Euler: as so often in life.
Vendy Walpole: I do not know about it yet
Eliza Madrigal: Indeed :)... Vendy there is a little arrow box in the corner of the chat box... interesting
Eliza Madrigal: I'll be back in a few minutes...
Adams Dubrovna: little arrow?
Vendy Walpole: hmm
Wol Euler: at the top right, an orange arrow inside two nexted orange boxes
Wol Euler: left of the grey "x"
Adams Dubrovna: what does it do?
Wol Euler: try it and see :)
Agatha Macbeth: afk again
Wol Euler: as pema would say
Zen Arado: Ah I didn't know about that either :)
Vendy Walpole: ok, see now
Vendy Walpole: thank you
Zen Arado: someone posted me a link on Facebook to a sries of videos on the commodification of art (on Youtube
Zen Arado: by Robert Hughes
Agatha Macbeth: Back again, I'll get sorted in a minute
Zen Arado: anyone interested?
Wol Euler: plesase
Wol Euler: -s
Zen Arado: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EbQ0G...eature=related
Vendy Walpole: yes, please
Wol Euler: ty
Zen Arado: he thinks it started with the Mona Lisa tour of America in the 60's
Wol Euler: I must admit that my bullshit detector starts pinging when I see a comment like "Finally an art critic with sense"
Agatha Macbeth: :)
Adams Dubrovna: :)
Zen Arado: there isn't too much sense in the modern art market I think
Zen Arado: more money than sense :)
Wol Euler: more or less so than in the modern stock market? (just as a comparison)
--BELL--
Zen Arado: good analogy Wol - I think his point is that art shouldn't be seen as investment or subject to shrewd marketting
Agatha Macbeth: Right
Adams Dubrovna: Rubens was a good marketer
Wol Euler: true, ideally. Just ideally the stock market would evaluate companies on the basis of their products and performance
Adams Dubrovna: just an example
Adams Dubrovna: nothing really new about this
Wol Euler: mmhmm, not to mention Dali
Wol Euler: who was an outright fraudsman
Zen Arado: yes but not on the modern scale of millions of dollars?
Adams Dubrovna: art has often been a commodity in the past too
Adams Dubrovna: Part of the problem is the term "art"
Adams Dubrovna: if it is art it transcends all that
Adams Dubrovna: otherwise it stays a commodity
Adams Dubrovna: maybe much like our practices
Zen Arado: he was quite critical of Warhohl
Adams Dubrovna: how we transcend the distractions
Zen Arado: Hirst
Zen Arado: many of the artists got very little of the huge profits
Wol Euler: mmhmm
Zen Arado: the dealers got it all
Adams Dubrovna: I am not sure where you are going with this thread zen
Zen Arado: just musing
Zen Arado: I agreed with most of what he said
Zen Arado: but happy to hear alternatives
Agatha Macbeth: Ah she's back
Wol Euler: wb eliza
Yakuzza Lethecus: isn´t value in general socially constructed ? company´s as well as art and people pay what they think it´s worth at the specific time, so only the dealers try to get the value up over time ?
Zen Arado: wb Eliza
Eliza Madrigal: Thank you :) Apologies
Agatha Macbeth: Hello again :)
Vendy Walpole: wb
Adams Dubrovna: wb
Zen Arado: value is the key word
Wol Euler: my problem is that this conflates two issues that IMHO should be kept separate.
Wol Euler: the aesthetic intrinsic worth of a piece of art, measured by the joy it gives you or its place in the history of art
Wol Euler: (trying to avoid the word "value")
Wol Euler: and the price at which it is sold or insured
Wol Euler: three things: and the process by which that selling happens
Adams Dubrovna: greed
Agatha Macbeth: Yes
Wol Euler: the process of selling *needs* dealers because painters are busy painting and sculptors are busy sculpting
Wol Euler: if Damien Hirst had to put down his scalpel every time somebody was curious to see some of his work, he would never produce any work
Zen Arado: many went to see the Mona Lisa for a minute or so just to say they had seen it
Agatha Macbeth: Mmmm
Vendy Walpole: please excuse me, I have to go, RL calls, time for lunch
Adams Dubrovna: bye Vendy
Zen Arado: bye Vendy
Vendy Walpole: Bye all
Eliza Madrigal: Bye Vendy, nice to see you
Agatha Macbeth: Tata Vendy
Wol Euler: true, sadly true. The Louvre is full of marvellous paintings that most tourists wold never think of looking at.
Wol Euler: bye vendy, take care
Adams Dubrovna: If lots of people want to stand around the mona lisa then leaves lots more room for people in other areas of the museum :)
Eliza Madrigal: haha
Zen Arado: :)
Wol Euler: yep
Agatha Macbeth: :)
Eliza Madrigal: wow, this topic is a bit of what I woke with this morning... the layers of meaning we add on to things... and then our practices here often a matter of seeing through, peeling back, and getting to essentials...
Eliza Madrigal: if an artist does that *while* they are working, I imagine it shines through....
--BELL--
Agatha Macbeth: I heard once that Da Vinci modelled the Mona Lisa on himself :)
Eliza Madrigal: in a kind of being to being way
Zen Arado: the emperor's new clothes
Wol Euler: David Hockney once said "most of my work starts with me wanting to play with colours" :)
Eliza Madrigal smiles
Agatha Macbeth: Couldn't any artist say the same?
Agatha Macbeth: I guess
Zen Arado: me too - but his end up better than mine :)
Agatha Macbeth: :)
Eliza Madrigal giggles
Wol Euler: they could, but perhaps wouldn't. Serious intentions and all that.
Zen Arado: though some more interested in forms and shapes I thiink
Agatha Macbeth: Yeah :)
Eliza Madrigal: Or just words run out... or seem clumsy... restricting....
Eliza Madrigal: my good friend started with a q-tip and a buttery yellow.... just playing with the kids :)
Zen Arado: someone told me it was a waste of time sitting here 'gazing at my navel' this morning
Agatha Macbeth: How come you don't move when you type Eliza?
Zen Arado: I should do something :)
Wol Euler: I hope you asked for concrete suggestions?
Zen Arado: hmmmm
Eliza Madrigal: I changed that under 'preferences' Agatha... so as not to frustrate others with my constant editing :)
Agatha Macbeth: Ah :)
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Agatha Macbeth: Didn't know you could do that!
Eliza Madrigal: Though, Pema said he sees dots when people type under this mode...
Eliza Madrigal: I don't see that
Agatha Macbeth: Me either
Eliza Madrigal: Hm
Eliza Madrigal: Zen... ARE you gazing at your navel when you are here?
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Wol Euler wonders whether there is anything anyone might *ever* do, that some other person might not consider a waste of time
Eliza Madrigal: Ohhh, brilliant point Wol
Zen Arado: don't thin so
Agatha Macbeth: Probably not! :(
Eliza Madrigal: people are great at deciding what others ought to be doing :)
Wol Euler: yep
Adams Dubrovna: :)
Eliza Madrigal: but it does open a conversation of time, sometime....
Zen Arado: yes someone told me studying philosophy was also navel gazing
Agatha Macbeth: Some people just like to put others down for the hell
Wol Euler: mmhmm
Wol Euler: or to feel that it brings themselves a little bit up, perhaps
Eliza Madrigal: like how most time, is in-between time...no matter how much one tries to control it
Agatha Macbeth: Maybe it 's cos they can't do anything as good themselves....
Eliza Madrigal: Ah, definitely that Wol... and it is fear....
Zen Arado: smae with meditation of course
Zen Arado: same
Eliza Madrigal: fear of stopping, slowing, allowing....
Agatha Macbeth: How so Zen?
Zen Arado: same criticism
Eliza Madrigal: "What's the practical use to society?"
Zen Arado: should DO something
Eliza Madrigal: Yes
Zen Arado: yes
Agatha Macbeth: :)
Wol Euler: I think many people see differences as an implied criticism of themselves
Wol Euler: if you don't share my belief, then you must be secretly denigrating it
Zen Arado: meditation is countercultural
Agatha Macbeth: Insecurity perhaps?
Zen Arado: said a speaker at Kannonji last night
Zen Arado: ppl prefer to distract themselves
Zen Arado: I think
Zen Arado: not face themselves
Zen Arado: but you can't tell them that
Agatha Macbeth: Yes, there is that
Wol Euler nod
Wol Euler: *nods
Eliza Madrigal: hm, yes and that is often the way of things too, Wol... often true, too :) Funny that there is such a long growing-up.... from the school yard differences, etc...
Agatha Macbeth: Twice!
--BELL--
Yakuzza Lethecus: meeting starting now ?
Eliza Madrigal: Zen, maybe it goes back to essentials, too... we often don't value what we don't see... takes new eyes in a way :)
Eliza Madrigal: Ah, thanks ya
Wol Euler: oh yes, thanks.
Wol Euler: sorry for the abrupt end, agatha :) duty calls.
Zen Arado: yes maybe Eliza
Agatha Macbeth: Bye!
Zen Arado: bye Eliza
Wol Euler: bye for now, enjoy your dark Sunday evening :)
Adams Dubrovna: No one is there yet, so no rush
Agatha Macbeth: Mmmmm!
Zen Arado: bye Wol
Adams Dubrovna: bye everyone :)