I guess I was under the impression from your post that if the item had
not been pulled and sent you looking elsewhere that you might have gone along
with the ride as they bid up COCB on Bruce's auction to $113.00 -- if you had,
in order to win it, you would have had to get closer to $115 or $120... maybe
more. Who knows how high the winning bidder was prepared to go? Just
speculation.
No, I had a self-imposed limit of
$70.00. I now rarely go into any eBay auction without some set
parameters through which I won't penetrate. Part of my learning
curve.
Don't know why you felt I was trying to "sermonize and pass judgment
about what is and what is not pleasing to the eye for the rest of us" -- I was
offering, as always, simply my own opinion on the matter. I thought that's
what we were doing here, talking about all aspects of movie posters,
exchanging opinions on same. Did I miss a memo?
You said, "Except for why CLAN OF THE CAVE BEAR is worth
even $60 bucks. That one still puzzles me... not really great "art" because
it's just a big photo blow-up of Hannah's face with warpaint. Artistic use of
a photograph, yes. But $60 bucks worth of artistic use... for a post-NSS 1986
poster for which there must be, um, a 'largish' inventory tucked away in
dealer vaults around the world? Oh well, no accounting for tastes... or the
prices that some people will pay regardless of current market value, as you so
clearly point out. Some of the other things we've seen going on in the last
few days makes $60 bucks look like the bargain of the
century."
I don't remember referring to the
COTCB poster as "Great art," but as "photographic art." While the poster
may stir up the KISS generation for you, it stirs quite different responses
for me. IMHO, the photograph is bold, it is wild, it is seductive, it is
most pleasing to the visual senses, it is simple in composition without
unnecessary clutter, it is clean, it conjures up prehistory, the blue eyes are
penetrating and mesmerizing, it is dangerous. Your statement above has
"inferential implicature." It implies that it is just an everyday
enlargement not worthy of any special notice. $60 being a proxy for the
'notice.' Well, you're allowed to have your opinion as all of us
are. But the implication that all or some of us don't know how to
spend our money on something we like is just unfair. No one has asked
you to spend that $60 on the poster to my knowledge.
What is art? One
definition has it that it is the creation of beautiful or significant things,
that it does not have to be innovative to be good. As such, COTCB
strikes me as photographic art. But when you reduce it to "just a big
photo blow-up of Hannah's face with warpaint," the message that you send to
art least some readers is that if we should think otherwise, or well, we are a
puzzlement. Hmm, when you think about it, a great deal of
movie poster art is blown-up photos of faces. By the way, please feel
free to find me this largesse of inventory on this poster. I have had no
luck doing so. I love that famous saying about architecture which I
think also pertains to posters, "Architecture is the art of wasting space
beautifully."
I think what I said was that I considered the design of the
poster to be a very artistic presentation, but not great art
(meaning "artwork" and perhaps I should have been more precise about
that) because the poster consists exclusively of a photographic close-up
of a face. As someone who made their living for a long time with photography
and video production, I personally can't accept something as simple and easy
to do as a tight close-up as "artwork" -- it can be a great image and very
"artistic" (and the one of Hannah on COCB really is... I like it), but to
me calling something great art requires the piece to be something where a
little more actual human inspiration, effort and time was
devoted to creating it than just getting in close with a good lens and
clicking the shutter. Of course, many others disagree with my feelings on
this -- you're never going to get people to agree on what is or ain't
art. By saying that you "can't
accept something as simple and easy to do as a tight close-up as "artwork" you
are throwing out a few generations of painters, photographers (Picasso,
Mondrian, Calder, Klee, Arbus, Bailey come to mind) who strove toward
simplicity of _expression_.
Same goes for the design of the MoviePosterBid website. Some have said
they really like it, others not so much. We went through a lot of different
design concepts -- some of them very cool, high design and graphic-intensive.
We decided that ultimately we wanted the actual movie posters being put up
for auction to be the "stars" of the site and therefore consciously
passed on all the ultra-cool designs and went with something very basic and
simple, but clean and (we hope) pleasing to the eye, but not distracting from
the movie posters themselves. Well, then its all "in the eye of the beholder" as they say. Some of
the great movie palaces of the past did not seem to detract too much from what
was up on the screen.
Have a great Holiday. I am
finished with this listserve until the New Year arrives. I need a rest
from all the bickering as well as the "reduced prices" ads.
Warmest regards to all,
Saul
-- JR
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, December 22, 2004
19:26
Subject: Re: [MOPO] A little story
about Major Poster Auctions
JR
I must say I'm not sure where you got the idea I was "probably prepared
to pay $120" for the COCB poster. That one eludes me. As for
Tom, I think he's been watching too much NOVA lately.
Jr, are you sure you want to be commenting about what is and what is
not robust design or art? Maybe you'd better take a look at MOPOBid's
web design. I mean the actual webpage design presentation, the
graphics. Is this your sense of design, your sense of evocative
imagery, your sense of good color matching and management? And you're
going to sermonize and pass judgment about what is and what is not
pleasing to the eye for the rest of us? Give me a break.
Saul
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