How important is the power to shock? Does art still possess that power?

The main thing that shocks me about art is the amounts of money paid to Hirst, Emin, etc... and the amounts of money people are prepared to pay for their stuff.

There will always be some taboos to break.
I think it is still possible to make art (and by art I am assuming you means all the arts) very powerful, whether that be emotional or nostalgia.

Can it shock anymore? I'm not too sure about that.

I agree, Stan but isn't it sad that artists are only making headlines these days because of how much money there art costs or because they've won some meaningless prize. When will we see artists making headlines because they're doing something genuinely
daring or inventive.

I find contemporary culture deeply dull and I long to be invigorated by art the way that I used to be as a young person.

Shep5377. To some people it doesn't matter much, I know but I really want a sense of direction in my writing. I want to know what I should be writing in the 21st century. I keep rehashing the past because I don't really understand the age I'm living in or how to write anything new. I feel like I'm stuck in a rut, creatively.

Essentially, I would like to push atleast one boundary but I don't know what todays boundaries are.

'I really want a sense of direction in my writing. I want to know what I should be writing in the 21st century.'

The hours (years?) I wasted over the same thing, well-wisher. I thought 'If I'm a writer, I should be able to write anything at all'. I tried scripts, poetry, stories, articles - all the time striving for a voice. All the time, too, that 'I must get published' thing was sitting in my head like a canker, holding me back. I was looking for the commercial angle in things and ignoring the truth of what I really wanted to write.

In the end, I had to shut off from all that and do what I enjoyed, even if it wasn't commercial, cutting edge, boundary-pushing or whatever. And that's when I found the voice I wanted to use, and have used it ever since, more or less.

Which is probably no help at all... but I know where you're coming from, mate. What you 'should' be writing is... sorry, I know it sounds trite... what you want to write! No one's demanding it of you. The world isn't waiting. Just write regardless.

Stan. I've already been down the route of writing what I enjoy writing but this is a new century.

When I look back at the 19th and 20th centuries
I am constantly amazed by the 'pioneer spirit'
that existed in every field of human endeavour
but I don't see that same spirit in the age
that I'm living in, except within Science and
Technology and commerce but what about the arts
or Philosophy?

Perhaps I just can't see the artistic pioneers of this decade or maybe they just haven't become famous yet. If you could point some out to me then it would be greatly appreciated.

BTW,

Thinking about Damien Hirst, his diamond covered skulls and pickled cows; isn't he surely saying
to everyone, "Look I'm flogging a dead horse. I'm selling something dead and getting paid a fortune for it". I think its just going over the head of
everyone who claims to 'understand' his art. He's taking the piss and he knows it.

I can't think of any artistic pioneers, either - not in the same way people like Truffaut, Warhol, the Beats, The Beatles, etc were. Maybe that's because I'm not really looking, though. I suppose my main cultural interest is film, and only occasionally there does anything genuinely powerful and worthwhile come out - mainly from indies. The studios go for the safe-bet fodder (as, probably, do many of the publishing houses). I can't believe that Ridley Scott, a director I always admired, has produced such a mash-up as Prometheus. Jim Jarmusch has always been my favourite film-maker. He has, I think, a genuinely original vision - and he doesn't go for the lowest common denominator. His best films grow on you. His most recent, The Limits of Control, might also be worth a look for you if you've not come across him before. Coffee and Cigarettes, Ghost Dog, and Mystery Train are other favourites of mine.

I'm with you on Hirst. Hari Kunzru wrote a piece about about him in The Guardian which you might like to read if you missed it. I think he's about right.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2012/mar/16/damien-hirst-art-mark...

As for writing - I think, again, some of the best of it now is to be found in the independent sector. Self-publishing writers, producing stuff that the big boys aren't interested in or are too scared to take on. That's the beauty now of computer technology and the internet. You can get straight to an audience, and print it yourself at home. I read more internet-based writing now than anything else. Can't remember the last time I bought a book.

I'm trying agents with my novel, but I don't expect anything. I have a friend in Devon with a small publishing business, and he's said he'll publish it, so I'll go with that. It won't be a big print run, and it probably won't make any money - but it'll be out there. If not for him, I'd probably self-publish, then leave it to word of mouth. Bukowski went down the 'small-run' route, publishing his little chap-books through his friend's small outfit, and building up his reputation that way.

Here's a test that every artist will jump at.

You hire a huge warehouse. Inside you put many different objects. There might be an unmade bed and an unridden bicycle. An unwashed ferret. An untold misery? An unwanted horseradish.

There will be many piles of many types of brick, some carefully arranged by artists, others stacked by builders.

There wil be a skip full of assorted dead animals.

On the starting gun, the artists will be released. By use of their special skills in perceiving things that are not accessible to others, they will locate all the arty corpses and reject animals dumped there by the abattoir. By the power vested in them by Arty Thrill, they will distinguish arty brick heaps from the pathetic imitations created by builders.

So far no artist, gallery owner, journalist or art critic has agreed to take part in my project. Probably because it would be laughably easy for them.

London An Austrian art lover has paid £100,000 to the curator of an art exhibition in South London - for a wheelie bin. The anonymous collector paid over the money to curator Bryan Quartermain after seeing the bin in an alleyway behind the exhibition hall. “I’d left the back door open to get some air in, so the bin was clearly visible” said Mr Quartermain. “He saw it as he was on his way to the Post Modern sculpture exhibits. We’d forgotten to put it out for the dustmen, so it was overflowing - mainly with food containers from the take-away and empty beer cans.” The buyer was apparently taken by the statements the ‘exhibit’ was making about concepts of utility and disposal in the context of contemporary materialist culture. “When he asked me for a price, I thought he was having a laugh. It was only when he got his cheque book out that I realised he was serious. I told him a hundred grand and he didn’t bat an eye-lid.” Mr Quartermain immediately reported the matter to the local council, which initially objected on the grounds of blatant misuse and misrepresentation of council property. “When they were told the price, though, they seemed happy enough for the sale to go ahead.” Mr Quartermain added. A council spokesman later confirmed that some of the money would be used to finance a new business promotion and development scheme in the area. “This is living proof that art and commerce can work to one another’s advantage,” he commented.

Tony Hancock (in The Rebel) - "You're all ravin' mad"

Actually. What the F*** is art?

I saw Chekov's The Cherry Orchard last month. Seemed alright to me.

Anything that aims to be overtly commercial gets what it deserves ('pop' music classics being used by corporations in tacky adverts for trashy goods are a fine example). Hirst / Emin? Well.

Why should art shock? It can, but it needn't.

Nothing shocks like a taser.

Art shows us something of ourselves. A mirror that makes us think, question, perhaps even realise that we were actually born and run around this planet with a spirit - sentient beings, not 9 - 5 robots.

Now.

Q. What injury do poets suffer from?

A. Tennyson Elbow.

PT's got it! You stand in front of the exhibit and it fires Tasers at you! Makes you look at crime in a whole new way.

Those things they use in ambulances to re-start your heart - scope for a bit of art there, methinks.

"Man the Perpetrator" - that's it! I've made my million! Taxi! Tate Modern, please. Keep the change.

Women can be Tasered too.

Most of the big artists have underlings doing their work (even the Renaissance painters and sculptors had them)so, Art is an industry. What would you describe as taboo? Pornography is now mainstream. Children are sexual objects in the eyes of corporations.

Art is dead... long live the artist.

Art is long, life is shite.

Sound of bubbles being blown in water...

That's very arty.

I think is because when some art is shocking the artist have created what is from truely in them minds and feelings and if they know other people will see it try to make it understandable to most other peoples minds or same emotions and theres not much can be shocking now exept most horrible things most artists would not bear to create and most people can not understand or empathise with, at first some of my old art was shocking is not anymore although to the right or wrong person could stay make thay mind jolt. It depends on the mental state of the mind it comes out of and the mind it goes into and how closely you look or read into the detail. Same as writing some is obvious and realistic, other is vague and twisted imagination and sortof hiding the truth tho to some who knows from in themselves would understand what is about and weather it is good or bad or happy or sad. I now do not want to shock people while still showing some honesty and truth about myself. I like that bin sale story Stan modern art eh.

I agree.

"I will make sense with a few reads \^^/ "

As all the best writers do, mate. Or, at least, the writers who are worth reading.

thanks Stan if that is to me too. FTSE100 I would do your test to clean and tidy, take care of the animals, stack the bricks by type, make some money, and once the warehouse is clean and empty paint it and have space for midnight motorbike dancing. By doing all this properly the first time I would have time to respond these comments in such thought as so.

Kahdai... that's sounds like a fantastic thing to do! Midnight motorbike dancing is something I've yearned for for many years...

you know- who mek the biggest/best tyre marks, donots, wheelies, silly stunts that usually shake my head at squids out on the road in tshirts do them, time and a place for that I shout, not that I can even balance on my own two feet- or ride that unridden bicycle- I would sell it to someone who will. Now a motor bike is more like home you can drift off with your head almost scraping the ground and no matter if your legs dont work just lean your belly/airbag :)

Ha ha... yes... I agree entirely... I do it all the time on my Honda...

Oh dear theres a time and a place you know when theres no one else about to tell you off or the TT lucky *ducks! I always wear a helmet tho.

"my old art was shocking is not anymore" - Kahdai

Do you mean visual art,Kahdai? Have you put any of it online? I would like to see it.