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Boy Sticks Gum on $1.5M Painting

Ugh, I can't stand gum. Absolutely disgusting stuff. It's one of my biggest pet peeves :mad:
 
They say he took a piece of Wrigley's Extra Polar Ice gum out of his mouth and stuck it on Helen Frankenthaler's "The Bay,"
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It's all about product placement these days...
 
Awww, the poor painting.

Seriously though, if you don't want people to touch something, make it harder than that...some of these museums have billions of dollars of stuff in touchable places...at least put a gate so you can't get close enough to it.
 
ITASOR said:
Awww, the poor painting.

Seriously though, if you don't want people to touch something, make it harder than that...some of these museums have billions of dollars of stuff in touchable places...at least put a gate so you can't get close enough to it.
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True, but I think I'd rather take the (rare) risk of something like this than have paintings behind glass or miles behind a barrier when you can never see it properly, which in my opinion is almost disrespecting the artist by not letting anyone see their painting properly.

Then again, that's perhaps why people don't trust me with paintings worth billions of dollars....:p
 
dietcokevanilla said:
Ugh, I can't stand gum. Absolutely disgusting stuff. It's one of my biggest pet peeves :mad:
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Is it the texture or something? It comes in different flavors you know. :p
 
ITASOR said:
Awww, the poor painting.

Seriously though, if you don't want people to touch something, make it harder than that...some of these museums have billions of dollars of stuff in touchable places...at least put a gate so you can't get close enough to it.
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They should NOT have to keep it out of reach. Museums would not be nearly as enjoyable if you had to look at something 50ft away or in glass (which some pieces are in). This kid deserved his suspension and it should be left at that. They will be able to clean it and he will learn his lesson.

Why was he chewing gum anyways? When I was his age we were not allowed to chew gum during school.
 
aloofman said:
If it's the painting is abstract enough, no one will notice the stain anyway, right?
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Right.

How does something like this get appraised at $1.5MM?
 

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Eh, after a while, paintings become famous merely because of the artist that painted it. Interesting piece nonetheless.
 
iMeowbot said:
Right.

How does something like this get appraised at $1.5MM?
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I should have been an art critic. If someone disagrees with you, you can just call him an uncultured moron. :rolleyes:

I'm guessing that the museum makes a wild overestimate because it's in their interest to say it's valuable. You really only find out its value when it gets sold, in which case it's whatever someone is willing to pay for it, including bored rich people whose house has a disconcerting amount of empty wall space. Come to think of it, you could pretty much describe a museum that way too! :p
 
A lot of 1960s "artwork" could have been improved by the careful placement of chewing gum. In fact, there were pieces made using chewing gum. :D

So, my question is--is the artwork better or worse after the gum? :p
 
iMeowbot said:
Right.

How does something like this get appraised at $1.5MM?
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Because people want to own beauty.

It certainly impressed this kid enough to make him want to interact with it ...
 
iMeowbot said:
...but The Bay more closely resembles the aftereffects of a spilled water cup.
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...and it turns out that it looks like spilled paint because that is exactly what it is. The value comes from a) the name "brand" and b) acrylic paint was still relatively novel in 1963.

[ugh, editing disaster there; I'll re-add the other valuable artworks because they're so important:

Indelible Angst: watercolor on random card stock by a four year old


and Isle of Produce: more watercolor on random card stock, made out of sheer silliness

:p ]
 
The piece has a lot do with shape and what shape evokes. I can imagine the kid playing with the gum in his mouth, feeling an evocation of shape and wondering how that compares to what he's looking at.

My guess is that this kid was not making an aesthetic judgment but playing with ideas of shape, body and world ...
 
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