Modern Art
'ART' : a dramatist’s point of view
Guest columnist : David L. Paterson

One of the most successful plays of recent years is ART. It brought Yasmina Reza, its author, international fame, a Molière Award for Best Author, the British “Best Comedy of the Year” and Lawrence Olivier awards and a Tony Award on Broadway. It has been produced worldwide and translated into twenty languages. Aside from Reza’s qualities as a playwright, we can take this acclaim to mean that the play’s thematic spirit holds wide appeal for playgoers and critics alike.

is about the purchase of a contemporary painting. The play, however, centres on how this purchase affects the relationships of three friends. Serge has spent a fortune on the painting, a painting which is “all white.” His purchase stuns, then infuriates Marc, his friend of fifteen years. The third member of the trio is Yvan. Confronted with Marc’s account of the painting, Yvan does what he does best – sits on the fence as long as he can, fearing that, if he speaks his mind, more than one can of worms may be opened. And he is right! Recriminations, insults and, ultimately, fists fly. After all, suggests Marc, who in his right mind can believe an all white canvas can be ‘art’? Marc asks, “You haven’t bought this painting for two hundred thousand francs?” Serge, piqued, replies, “I might have known you’d miss the point,” to which Marc responds, “You paid two hundred thousand francs for this shit?” From there, it is mostly downhill until the end of the play. The three friends squabble. The white painting, or more precisely what it symbolizes in the orbit of artistic tradition, becomes a force which both alienates the three men and ultimately reunites them. In this sense, the white painting is a metaphor for change.

In a more general estimation, how is one to interpret the “white painting” which, in its own way, is the focus of ART. The story of art in the twentieth century revealed a number of artists who, at least for part of their careers, produced monochromatic paintings. Among these, Robert Ryman is perhaps the best known as a painter of “white on white” paintings; indeed, he must have served as some sort of model for Reza’s fictitious artist, Antrios. It is worth noting that, in the definitions of art for our time, the work of art has increasingly been categorized as an object rather than as a representation of an object, which is the more traditional view. In this context, a white canvas is a white object and the dilemma lies in the question – is it art only because the artist said it was art?

Such a predicament has always pitted the artist against the neophyte in the world of contemporary art. This has been the case no matter which period in the history of art we care to examine. Many works of art created during the past one hundred and fifty years have brought ostracism, even ridicule, to their creators. Monet, Van Gogh, and Picasso were all controversial; yet, when we look at their paintings in retrospect, we often fail to understand what all the fuss was about. The attitude of the public to the work of living artists has always tended to be conservative, yet most people will agree that the power of art has always been its ability to pull from the viewer a meaning – or meanings – which make sense to that viewer. If this is so, then this is what makes a “worthless” white canvas a painting, a work of art, something “beautiful and important.” It implies qualities in the painting beyond its whiteness. Like many other icons of contemporary art, white on white paintings or any of that general description, represent a threat to those, like Marc, who approach art from a more traditional point of view.

In 1989, for the sum of $1.8 million, the National Gallery of Canada approved the purchase of a large painting by the American artist Barnett Newman. The title of this work is Voice of Fire. The following description is taken from the web site of the National Gallery of Canada.

“Voice of Fire is almost 18 feet high and eight feet wide. Its form is clear and simple. It consists of three bands of colour which run to the upper and lower edge of the canvas. Each band is 32 inches wide. The red band down the centre was done first and is thickly painted with a number of coats of acrylic. It reflects cadmium red light very intensely. The red band is flanked by two identically colored deep ultramarine-blue bands. They are also painted in acrylic, but more thinly, so that the white ground reflects through a bit, giving them added luminosity with a slightly purplish glow. The blue paint has bled slightly onto the edges of the red. On all three bands the final coat of paint is brushed on directly and fairly evenly, giving the whole painting a sustained intensity of colour and surface. The bilateral symmetry of Voice of Fire confirms each viewer’s own upright stance in the world in a straightforward and comforting manner. Although simple in form, it is a complex painting that can convey a range of meanings for those viewers who are willing to slow down and approach it with an open mind. Voice of Fire is not an abstraction of something, nor does it refer to anything outside of itself. It is an objectification of thought – a concrete embodiment of Newman’s reflections on his existence and an acting-out of those reflections in paint on canvas.”

Marc doesn’t “believe in the values which dominate contemporary art. The rule of novelty. The rule of surprise.” For him, “surprise is dead meat.” Many people find themselves knowing “what they like” while being suspicious of those who question their judgment. Add to this the fact that a lot of adverse criticism of the “worth” of art comes as much from the monetary value placed on it as from the content, subject-matter or methods used in its creation. To conclude, consider the following exchange.

Serge: The painting is not white
Yvan: No, of course not. I was just saying.
Marc: You think this painting is not white, Yvan?
Yvan: Not entirely, no . . .
✭❁❒❃✚ ✡❈✎ ✴❈❅■ ◗❈❁▼ ❃❏●❏◆❒ ❉▲ ❉▼✟
Yvan: Various colours . . . There’s yellow, there’s grey, some slightly ochrish lines.
Marc: And you’re moved by these colours?
Yvan: Yes . . . I’m moved by these colours.
Marc: You have no substance, Yvan. You’re flabby, you’re an amoeba.
Serge: Why are you attacking Yvan like this?
Marc: Because he’s a little arse-licker, he’s obsequious, dazzled by money, dazzled by what he believes to be culture, and as you know culture is something I absolutely piss on.

When such sentiments collide, is it any wonder that friendship is at stake?

June 2004