Week 5

George Condo

Abstracted Figures, 2011

Acrylic, charcoal and pastel on linen

68 x 66 inches

Good afternoon, class. 

    I read and enjoyed your responses to last week's "Son of Satan," some of which I'll transcribe here (edited for brevity, grammar, spelling):  

• The story sounds real to me, like something we might hear anywhere, the news, social media, from friends. Violence is one of the worst things that will effect your kids [. . .]
• Kids pick on other kids that they believe can't help themselves.
• The ending didn't make much sense because it sort of just, ends, [. . . ]
• Many children tend to follow the leader, or one they aspire to [ . . .] a critique of the herd-like nature of humanity.
• [. . . ] the epitome of the pack mentality that is common among the disenfranchised youth of this country. It shines a light on how easily a simple grievance can escalate into something more severe [. . . .] many young men lack the ability to force the consequences of their actions, blinded by their desire to live up to false notions and reputations shared and encouraged by their peers.
• The jury and executioner are one in the same. The sound leader was punishing his friend for lying, something he had done several times. [Later, father and son] threaten each other's life, showing that the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.
• Morality and ethics come into play to show that people's behaviors and actions have consequences.
• Cruel.

In a an essay by the novelist Stephen King, famous horror story writer, he says the following:  

"I think we are all mentally ill; those of us outside the asylums only hide it a little better–and maybe not all that much better, after all. We've all known people who sometimes squelch their faces into horrible grimaces when they believe no one is watching, people who have some hysterical fear–of snakes, the dark, the tight place, the long drop . . . and, of course, those final worms that are waiting so patiently underground.

"When we pay our four or five bucks [. . .] in a theater showing a horror movie, we are daring the nightmare.

"[. . . ] To show that we can, that we are not afraid, that we can ride the rollercoaster[ . . .] the special province of the young.

"The fun comes from seeing others menaced–sometimes killed. 

    The socially constructive emotions draw positive reinforcement; we want civilization–"love, friendship, loyalty, kindness."  Indeed, we do.

Emma Wynn's "Bones" features an archetypal figure known in the literature of folklore and myth as the crone or hag.  She is an embodiment of the horror we attach to old age, and death.

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Darkness, irrational fear, cruelty–they exist, and bedevil us.  Art, at times, serves to show us the whole "ugly" picture.  Which brings me to the readings list.  We have not got to all that I have posted, but we will push on. Today we will cover "The Found Boat," and perhaps "The Last Leaf," by O. Henry, a story about the life of artists in early 20th century New York, Greenwich Village.

I will give in handout form "The Portable Phonograph," a post-apocalyptic story in which the phonograph, which,  of course,  plays music, symbolizes all the grace and civility and beauty to which humans aspire. 

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