The Mona Lisa Curse (Parts 1-12)

This Documentary encompassed many of the things we have learned in this course to date...

Robert Hughes Most Important Quotes Parts 1-12: Regarding Opinion of Contemporary Art World and The Changes Which Have Taken Place 

Part 1

 "The entanglement of big money with art has become a curse on how art is made, controlled, and above all - in the way that it's experienced."d."

“Apart from drugs, art is the biggest unregulated market in the world, with contemporary art sales estimated at around $18 billion a year. (….) Boosted by regiments of nouveau riche collectors, and serviced by a growing army of advisors, dealers and auctioneers. As Andy Warhol once observed, ‘Good business is the best art.’"

Part 2

Hughes noted about the display of the Mona Lisa; “People came not to look at it, but to say that they’d seen it. (….) The painting made the leap from artwork to icon of mass consumption.” The postmodernist period of art as commodity and mass spectacle had begun..."

Part 3

 “In just a few years this would change, art as commodity would begin to take over from art as art.”

Part 4

“On the 18th of October, 1973, the Sculls auctioned off 50 works from their collection through Sotheby Park-Bernet, Inc. This was the first time a collector from that small contemporary art world treated their collection as an investment.”

Part 5

“American contemporary art as a serious ‘commodity’ was about to be born.” 

Part 6

“The consequences of such prices, was that art became admired, not through any critical perspective, but for its price tag. Auction houses were the new arbiters of taste.”

Part 7

“The way that art is experienced in these spaces has changed beyond recognition. The museum has adopted the strategy of mass media; an emphasis on spectacle, the cult of the celebrity masterpiece, art clocked through the blink of an eye or through the lens of a camera. But what it’s gained through an increase in these numbers, it’s lost in terms of freedom of access and availability to the eye and the mind.”

Part 8

“The Tate is a brand, the Louvre is a brand - is the Guggenheim a brand, I guess it is.”

Part 9

“I admired some of his work in the 60s and early 70’s, but he turned into a dull celebrity business man branded to the hairline. It was as good as printing dollar bills. The dominance of the art market has produced multiple Andys - global brands like Jeff Koons and Damien Hirst.”

Part 10

“appropriation” artist Richard Prince – a painting that sold for $7.4 million. Mugrabi professed; “We support these artists by promoting them, by buying them at auction, by buying them privately - you could say it’s a way of controlling it.”

Part 11

“Isn’t it a miracle what so much money and so little ability can produce? Just extraordinary. You know, when I look at a thing like this I realize that, so much of art - not all of it thank god, but a lot of it - has just become a kind of cruddy game for the self-aggrandizement of the rich and the ignorant, it is a kind of bad but useful business.”

Part 12

“If art can’t tell us about the world we live in, then I don’t believe there’s much point in having it. And that is something we are going to have to face more and more as the years go on; that nasty question which never used to be asked because the assumption was always that it was answered long ago - ‘What good is art?, What use is art, what does it do? Is what it does actually worth doing? - and an art which is completely monetized in the way that it’s getting these days, is going to have to answer these questions or it is going to die.”

Summaries and My Opinions on Part 1-12 

Robert Hughes the narrator of this documentary, has strong views on the contemporary art world and its over commercialization, most of them which I agree on.

In part 1, I agree that people focus less on the talent and beauty in the art that once was produced.  The love of art and appreciation of art that people used to uphold is no longer dominant and rarely present in the world of art. Money has taken over the art world and people are consumed in the profit and status their artwork they collect shows.  I personally would never purchase art based on the amount of money, the popularity of the artist, or for pure investment.

In part 2,  I also side with Hughes.  Mass media has completely distorted the importance of great artwork such as, the Mona Lisa.  I value how amazing that piece of artwork is and the talent it took to paint a portrait.  With contemporary artwork, many of the artist create a name and a brand with their names and lack the talent that used to be appreciated.  I don't find it interesting and beautiful to look at artwork that I feel like took no effort, time and talent and was just created to make money.

In part 3, "Hughes recalls his early days in the vibrant late 1960s art scene of New York, where he met and befriended the likes of Pop artist Robert Rauschenberg (1925-2008) and James Rosenquist (1933-)." Hughes discuses how after this period art changed for the worse.  The art world and the people within it only considered art a profit making investment.  I completely agree that this is a negative impact and in my opinion just like like many other aspects in society the art world has transformed into a market that appreciates money over beauty and meaning.

Part 4-8 "Hirst ’sculpture’ – a dead shark suspended in a tank of formaldehyde titled; The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living."  We had previously discussed Damien Hirst and I believe he is a negative impact in the art community.  He is I believe one of the artist that is in it only for the money.


In part 9-12 I agree with Hughes in that mass production of art has made it so the public lacks the appreciation of the original piece of art.  Mega-collectors and art dealers are making the art industry worse and worse.  They promote artists and increase how much money an art is worth.  They are negatively impacting the future of art.  




Mia Powers