Cranky and ranting: the Wheel of Change Tarot

magpie9 said:

Bad Art is Bad Art, Bacon (& Sausage) aside. We're not talking about some non-pretty girl with a great personality or grace in every movement; we're talking about badly drawn FACES, in a deck where most of the Art is very well done.

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Still, that's just an opinion. I think you're missing the point.

No matter, I like it and don't think there's anything wrong with the art or book, and that's my opinion.

magpie9 said:

Bad Art is Bad Art, Bacon (& Sausage) aside. We're not talking about some non-pretty girl with a great personality or grace in every movement; we're talking about badly drawn FACES, in a deck where most of the Art is very well done.

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OK, regarding one strand of thought I see in this thread:
"Bad" art is a personal opinion and nothing more. Likewise "good" art.

Frankly I have never found a deck where I actually like how the faces are rendered. I have over 200 decks. I do not believe there is any such thing as universally good or bad, everything is a matter of cultural indoctrination, especially when it comes to something as subjective as artistic style. What makes a good face, the ability to render it accurately? Well, go take a photograph then.

Regarding another strand of thought:
Frankly I like decks where the book actually states where the person is coming from. I might not aree with their morals, but every single deck out there is made of the beliefs of its maker, and I appreciate when the author is upfront about those beliefs. Decks are inherently a vehicle for a system of belief. The user's, but also the creator's.

But then, I'm in the collecting as much from an anthopological standpoint and art historical (Note NOT "artistic", that's cultural, subcultural, personal subjectivity) as much anything else.

Another strand of thought running through this thread:
To be a bit cliche--pearls are created by the sand irritating the oyster. Pearls are beautiful, but they are essentially a form of scar tissue that we like to wear around our necks. How can we form ourselves without having something to form it against? You don't like it, fine. It provides something to contrast your personal values to. Therefore its a good thing. We're nothing without those things that we identify ourselves against--i is that which creates and elaborates on individuality.

And I need to listen to my own words more often and take power from them (lately I've been a bit too whiney about the things I don't like in life...). (I'm also in an arguing debating mood so my tone is a bit more confrontational than I intend about everything today...the spirit in which this is intended is more gentle than the bitchy voice its conveyed in, but gentle words aren't coming to me right now...)

Yote

Very interesting post, Yote. That's a wonderful thought about the pearl born or irritation in the oyster. It is true that we learn more about who we are from brushing up against who we are not.

Re: art being bad or good -- it is politic and culturally sensitive today to say noone's art is better than any one else's; today we favour a multicultural perspective (I think some call it cultural relativism) which of necessity dissolves any criteria for good and bad in art. (I have long suspected that Cultural Relativism is hiding patronising condescension in its basement )

However it is still possible to say something is "good" or "bad" in the context of a defined artistic discipline. I think Magpie is talking about unskilled drawing.

It's true that faces in tarot cards have a long history of sucking. Beginning with the Thoth -- somewhere I have a whole thread about the faces in the Thoth. Maybe we need undefined, or even absent faces into which anyone may project whomever they want?

firemaiden said:

However it is still possible to say something is "good" or "bad" in the context of a defined artistic discipline. I think Magpie is talking about unskilled drawing.

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Yes, I was, and in that context, blurry faces in otherwise beautifully detailed work. I can't imagine how anyone managed to miss my point.

magpie9 said:

Yes, I was, and in that context, blurry faces in otherwise beautifully detailed work. I can't imagine how anyone managed to miss my point.

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Perhaps we're all reading too fast?

As someone who has (unfortunately) some experience with watercolor :ahem: - it seems to me that the blurry faces indicate that they were worked over too many times. That's hard on the paper.

Okay - here we go, I finally found the thread I was looking for... Faceless Art: Spawned in Slime?"

sravana said:

Perhaps we're all reading too fast?

As someone who has (unfortunately) some experience with watercolor :ahem: - it seems to me that the blurry faces indicate that they were worked over too many times. That's hard on the paper.

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Good to know, sravana---I bet that's what happened.

firemaiden said:

Okay - here we go, I finally found the thread I was looking for... Faceless Art: Spawned in Slime?"

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Wow! Amazing thread...thanks, FM!

Haha it's so interesting to read these posts about "good" and "bad" art, when a few threads over people are speaking reverently about the clunky "art" that passes for the Mythic Tarot ;-)

Shade said:

Haha it's so interesting to read these posts about "good" and "bad" art, when a few threads over people are speaking reverently about the clunky "art" that passes for the Mythic Tarot ;-)

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Now *that's* hilarious!