Battle
- BATTLE - A computer painting, one of fifteen pictures, unused, that I submitted to the editor of Wildside Press for "The Weird works of Robert E. Howard".
While working on this picture I took a coffee break and browsed through a fanzine. I came to a letter written by SF writer Charles L. Fontenay and read that he liked to paint in oils now and then as a hobby. One day he read in his local newspaper about an art contest being held at the Civic Center. And since he was dubious about such contests, he decided to put the judges to a test; He stretched the rag that he used to clean his brushes with, over a board, framed it, and entered it in the contest. His "work of art" won 3rd prize in the "Best Modern Art" category.
Doesn't that tell you something about the world of modern art today? When you look at a picture of a painting in a book of modern art and it appears to be a picture of splattered paint, and the describing text uses esoteric words like, "this painting is filled with accurate value vibrations," or perhaps, "having a dynamic surrealistic resonance," or "the artist's work represents the new world of vortextual happenings going on today," do you really understand what they are doing to you?
I used the word "esoteric" above because it means; "words that are designed to be knowledge by pseudo-intellectuals, understood only by a small, specially initiated group". The "group" includes the art dealers and art critics who, over a few generations, without any kind of organized conspiracy, have nevertheless influenced the art world with "imaginary" values. And with their "imaginary" values they are able to make the rest of the world believe that a formerly acknowledged crude work of art that no one would consider buying, is actually a great work of art, worth millions.
I never accept anything told to me, at face value. I owe it to myself to learn the truth. I am astonished at how many times critics, politicians, teachers, and friends have told me things that I later learned were not true.
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