Racist Countryside Art

[Vixen]

It's an art.... EXHIBIT. Including a little background and discussion is a normal part of that kind of thing these days.

If I went to a museum exhibit of Ford or Volkswagen cars of that era, yes I would expect at least one peice of signage to mention or discuss those points.

Nobody will make you read the signs.

What about the guy who founded IKEA; should all Billy bookcases carry a sticker saying, 'This is the all-time bestseller of an anti-Semite'?

In the context of art; people are stirred by English artist William Blake and a section even want to adopt his lines, 'Jerusalem' as the national anthem. But Blake was actually a socialist and would turn in his grave at a bunch of flag waving Tories wanting to appropriate his version of love of land but pointing at the social injustices. For example, the 'dark satanic mills'.

 

[Vixen]

To give a sense of the truth of LPlus' statement, or how completely ****** up the UK is becoming, Scotland is about to introduce a law that will allow anyone to be charged with a hate crime for "behaviour which is intended to stir up hatred against someone who possesses, or appears to possess, certain characteristics".


Under the new "Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act" merely stating in an internet post that a transwoman is actually a man, could get you charged with a hate crime under that new act. In effect, Scotland is criminalizing free speech. Its not a big step to go from banning free speech to banning free expression such as in art.

Appropriately, this new law comes into effect on April 1st.

The criteria should be that such a statement, which might be absurd to your eyes, is a hate crime if it causes psychological injury to the person on the receiving end.

 

[Vixen]

Some of their claims I do agree with. For example I do think that such paintings can and do for some people (as I’m one of them) inspire a “pride towards a homeland”. We have a wealth of art by British artists, I mean OK we don’t have a Rembrandt, but we have many, many artists that have created stirring works of British life. I’m not that keen on the Constables’ I’ve seen in real life, he’s no Turner, but his art is pretty.

Ah, but are such feelings ["......paintings of the British countryside evoke dark “nationalist feelings”.] necessarily 'dark'. Is it possible that not only far-right bounders and natives are moved by such scenes but anybody can be?

After all, painters paint whatever inspires them so if what inspires Constable also inspires the viewer, I am not sure why it is a 'dark feeling' or even a particularly 'nationalistic' one. It could be a local one. Someone in love with the Norfolk Broads or the Pennines or even the slagheaps of the Valleys.

 

[Vixen]

No, this is about you accepting the Torygraph’s biased version of what the museum’s claims are.

Well, there is a large part of the population that names Constable as their favourite artist simply because he's English. They know nothing about art but they know what they like.

 

[Roger Ramjets]

“Racist countryside art”, indeed.

6 degrees of separation?

Your attempt to link the museum itself to rural racism just shows how pervading it is, which makes their commentary even more relevant.

 

[Roger Ramjets]

Therefore such art must be isolated and labeled as the evil art that it is. Because we cannot have people looking at pretty natural scenes of their country, its to dangerous.

Nobody's stopping anyone from viewing these paintings.

What is the connection to "colonialism" though?

Come to New Zealand and you might see. The colonials came here and tried to turn the countryside into an English rural landscape, by cutting down the forests and burning the bush to make way for rolling hills populated with sheep and rabbits. The results didn't look pretty - unless you were English.

“Down to the sea in slips”: soil erosion in New Zealand

New Zealand loses between 200 and 300 million tonnes of soil to the oceans every year... This rate is about 10 times faster than the rest of the world, and accounts for between 1.1 and 1.7 percent of the world’s total soil loss to the oceans, despite a land area of only 0.1 percent of the world’s total.

The reasons for these rather worrying statistics are linked to both human and non-human factors. New Zealand’s mountainous terrain and maritime climate makes our hill country in particular more susceptible to erosion. But land management practices since the arrival of European settlers a century and a half ago have greatly exacerbated this susceptibility: forest clearance, particularly on hill country, grazing on steep slopes and over-stocking of unsuitable country have all contributed to accelerated erosion.

Since the 1980s, the market for sheep products (wool and meat) has weakened significantly, seeing the continued withdrawal of sheep farmers from hillcountry, and the move to forestry or, on flatter to rolling country, dairy farming (the latter of course leading to a whole set of other consequences).

And where did all that wool and meat go to? Why back to Mother England of course!

 

[Roger Ramjets]

Cuz Hitler painted it. Not reason enough?

Until a few days ago I would have wondered what you were talking about. But from previous research for this thread I already knew that painting was done by Hitler, so your attempt to trivialize it fell flat. I cannot look at it without being reminded of its connections to fascism and genocide. And that makes me wonder about the subject matter too.

 

[Roger Ramjets]

I think it better not give those filthy Normans any ideas about crossing the Channel and colonizing Angle lands!

You might be interested to know that Constable's paintings were very popular in France. If created a few centuries earlier they might well have given those filthy Normans ideas.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

Constable also lived in "interesting times". While he was painting, some of the damned colonials decided they would throw tea-chests in Boston Harbour ...

'Interesting' times is right.

Slavery and the British transatlantic slave trade


During this time Constable was being heaped with praise for his romantic paintings of idyllic British rural life, as dramatic a contrast as you can imagine.
...
The truth is, the 'idyllic' countryside that Constable painted was propped up by the slave trade. Once you know this, his paintings take on a darker tone. Of course if you are ignorant then you won't see it, which is why the gallery is pointing it out.

This may seem like nitpicking but it simply isn't factual. Constable wasn't painting idyllic landscapes while Boston was in uproar over the Tea Party as he hadn't even been born yet. None of his famous landscapes were painted until years after the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade.

 

[Orphia Nay]

6 degrees of separation?

Your attempt to link the museum itself to rural racism just shows how pervading it is, which makes their commentary even more relevant.

It seems like you’re vehemently agreeing with me.

 

[Darat]

Do you accept the museum's claims about British landscape art?

When I know them, I'll be able to answer that better, at the moment all we have is some disjointed words, and a few sentences. ETA - see also see my post about how they do stir pride in me for my homeland.

 

[Hercules56]

When I know them, I'll be able to answer that better, at the moment all we have is some disjointed words, and a few sentences. ETA - see also see my post about how they do stir pride in me for my homeland.

Does it stir hatred and bigotry against foreigners in you?

 

[Darat]

Does it stir hatred and bigotry against foreigners in you?

Does what?

 

[Lplus]

Does what?

The pride for your homeland stirred in you by the landscape paintings you admire. But then you knew that anyway didn't you...

Frankly I don't find landscape paintings stir pride in me for anything at all. Maybe a wish to be able to stand there and look and the scenery for a while, but that's about it.

 

[Darat]

The pride for your homeland stirred in you by the landscape paintings you admire. But then you knew that anyway didn't you...

Are we talking about what the museum has displayed at its galleries? Or are we talking about a few words and a sentence or two from an article in a newspaper about an interview in another newspaper? We haven't yet been shown they are one and the same.

I've checked and I should be able to take photos in the galleries so I will do so and paste them here so we can see what the museum has written in its labels etc.

Frankly I don't find landscape paintings stir pride in me for anything at all. Maybe a wish to be able to stand there and look and the scenery for a while, but that's about it.

I do rather vainly consider myself an amateur artist, and when I look at artwork I will often look at the techniques and so on, but I will always try to look at it as a piece of artwork, and like I said I do find myself having pride in my country for producing such brilliant art and artists.

 

[Lplus]

Are we talking about what the museum has displayed at its galleries? Or are we talking about a few words and a sentence or two from an article in a newspaper about an interview in another newspaper? We haven't yet been shown they are one and the same.

I've checked and I should be able to take photos in the galleries so I will do so and paste them here so we can see what the museum has written in its labels etc.

Nope, we're talking about the landscapes you've already seen and stated in a previous post that they engender a sense of pride in your homeland...

I do rather vainly consider myself an amateur artist, and when I look at artwork I will often look at the techniques and so on, but I will always try to look at it as a piece of artwork, and like I said I do find myself having pride in my country for producing such brilliant art and artists.

Though that may not be quite the same thing as having pride in the landscape being portrayed - technique and ability as opposed to subject.

 

[Hercules56]

Does what?

The art work you discussed. Does it make you feel a sense of nationalism and bigotry towards foreigners?

 

[Darat]

The art work you discussed. Does it make you feel a sense of nationalism and bigotry towards foreigners?

Nope.

Any chance you'll be backing up your claims?

 

[Lithrael]

OK once again.. you understand we stand that's a vacuous observation, right? You don't know if the comment is valuable or cuckoo...till you've read it. So you have to read it to have any opinion at all. Are we going too fast?


OK once again.. You're not really saying anything. Yes, you can ignore super weird signage put in exhibits. You could sit there quietly never thinking of them again. All well and good.

But this is a discussion forum. We discuss ****, including super weird signage. It's kind of what we do. OK once again.. Are we going too fast?

That line of posts was in reply to

The big here is the distracting sideshow about the gallery itself and it's apparent positions on itself. This is taking away from appreciation of the works, IMHO.

so I was sharing my feelings about how I feel museum signage affects my appreciation of the works. How humble of an apology would you like, for my not discussing the content of the signage in those particular posts?

 

[Lithrael]

And is the suggestion that images of the British countryside invoke nationalist feeling a weird axe to grind?

I don't think it's a SUPER weird axe to grind, but I do think whoever wrote the copy on the one sign we've seen quoted, stated their case in more concrete terms than was beneficial for expressing their point of view. But I don't know if it was rhetoric, so I'm not sure if that was intentional or not.

 

[Thermal]

That line of posts was in reply to

What? No it wasn't. Click back. Your own quoted post that kicked this off was :

Originally Posted by Thermal View Post
I'm thinking that is unnecessary and takes away from the experience.

which was a sarcastic summation of the hyperbolic example I had just given, regarding off the wall political posturing in placards.

so I was sharing my feelings about how I feel museum signage affects my appreciation of the works. How humble of an apology would you like, for my not discussing the content of the signage in those particular posts?

Well that's what was being discussed. If you meant to respond to an entirely different post addressed to an entirely different poster, the quote feature is a stellar way to clarify that. Mind reading can get tricky.

 

[Hercules56]

Nope.

Any chance you'll be backing up your claims?

Which claims?

 

[Lithrael]

What? No it wasn't. Click back. Your own quoted post that kicked this off was (...) a sarcastic summation of the hyperbolic example I had just given, regarding off the wall political posturing in placards.

It looked to me like you were talking about opinionated signage's effects on the gallery viewing experience. In that post, as well as the other one I quoted. That's what I was responding to. When I said 'that line of posts' I was referring to ones about 'taking away from the art viewing experience' which was what I had thought was one of your points in both of the posts we've just brought up.

But this is getting very meta which is no fun for anyone to read.

 

[Thermal]

It looked to me like you were talking about opinionated signage's effects on the gallery viewing experience. In that post, as well as the other one I quoted. That's what I was responding to.

OK, then you were responding to a different post than the one you took the extra time to snip out and quote. Fine.

But regarding your initial thought: "OK, again.. you don't have to read the signs". How the hell would you know what to think about them if you haven't read them?

I personally look at the work standalone, to see what it does for me without info. Then I read the cards, who did it and when or whatever, and consider how it changes my view. But the management's political leanings are an annoyance to that end; their opinions don't interest me in how I respond to the works. Can you see how some might find your reply confusing?

 

[Lithrael]

OK, then you were responding to a different post than the one you took the extra time to snip out and quote. Fine.

It seemed to me that they both expressed the sentiment that I have been responding to.

But regarding your initial thought: "OK, again.. you don't have to read the signs". How the hell would you know what to think about them if you haven't read them?

Yes, that was glib and unhelpful of me, and more a reaction to what felt to me like the overall thread's theme of conflating 'sign exists' with 'they are shoving obnoxious opinions down our throats' (a stroppy reaction and not a uesful one since, as you point out, the sign has been read and the throat impinged, by the time the opinions have been identified) than anything you had just said.

I did go on to say other things after that.

Can you see how some might find your reply confusing?

Honestly, no, not particularly.

 

[Thermal]

It seemed to me that they both expressed the sentiment that I have been responding to.

Yet the context was different enough to cloud your meaning.

Yes, that was glib and unhelpful of me, and more a reaction to what felt to me like the overall thread's theme of conflating 'sign exists' with 'they are shoving obnoxious opinions down our throats' (a stroppy reaction and not a uesful one since, as you point out, the sign has been read and the throat impinged, by the time the opinions have been identified) than anything you had just said.

I did go on to say other things after that.



Honestly, no, not particularly.

The "unhelpful glibness" set the tone to change the interpretation of your reply. If you see that it was unhelpful and glib, you shouldn't have a great deal of trouble understanding the confusion.

But I think we understand each other now. Truce?

 

[Orphia Nay]

I've checked and I should be able to take photos in the galleries so I will do so and paste them here so we can see what the museum has written in its labels etc.

Great!

 

[Lithrael]

Yeah, I always forget changing horses inside a post can be a problem.

But I think we understand each other now. Truce?

Sure, sounds good. *handshake*

 

[Roger Ramjets]

This may seem like nitpicking but it simply isn't factual. Constable wasn't painting idyllic landscapes while Boston was in uproar over the Tea Party as he hadn't even been born yet. None of his famous landscapes were painted until years after the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade.

I was talking about those times in general. Constable was painting landscapes from 1802 to 1837. The painting shown in the article was done in 1820.

From my link:-

Anti-slavery campaigners lobbied for twenty years to end the trade and the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act was passed in Britain on 25 March 1807. It was declared that from the 1 May 1807 ‘all manner of dealing and reading in the purchase, sale, barter, or transfer of slaves or of persons intending to be sold, transferred, used, or dealt with as slaves, practiced or carried in, at, or from any part of the coast or countries of Africa shall be abolished, prohibited and declared to be unlawful’. Slavery was abolished in 1834 but in reality for many of those enslaved it continued until at least 1838 through apprenticehip schemes.

Abolishing the slave trade in 1807 didn't make slavery disappear in Britain.

The history of British slave ownership has been buried: now its scale can be revealed

The Slavery Abolition Act of 1833 formally freed 800,000 Africans who were then the legal property of Britain’s slave owners. What is less well known is that the same act contained a provision for the financial compensation of the owners of those slaves, by the British taxpayer, for the loss of their “property”. The compensation commission was the government body established to evaluate the claims of the slave owners and administer the distribution of the £20m the government had set aside to pay them off. That sum represented 40% of the total government expenditure for 1834...

The compensation of Britain’s 46,000 slave owners was the largest bailout in British history until the bailout of the banks in 2009. Not only did the slaves receive nothing, under another clause of the act they were compelled to provide 45 hours of unpaid labour each week for their former masters, for a further four years after their supposed liberation. In effect, the enslaved paid part of the bill for their own manumission.

 

[Trausti]

I was talking about those times in general. Constable was painting landscapes from 1802 to 1837. The painting shown in the article was done in 1820.

From my link:-
Abolishing the slave trade in 1807 didn't make slavery disappear in Britain.

The history of British slave ownership has been buried: now its scale can be revealed

Oh that's terrible. So what were all the other slavery states doing at that the time?

 

[arthwollipot]

Oh that's terrible. So what were all the other slavery states doing at that the time?

Which other "slavery states"?

 

[Lplus]

Which other "slavery states"?

Are you trying to say you think Britain was the only state involved with slaves?

 

[Hercules56]

-------The new signage states that pictures of “rolling English hills” can stir feelings of “pride towards a homeland”.

--------visitors are informed that “there is a darker side” to the “nationalist feeling” evoked by images of the British countryside.

--------It states that this national sentiment comes with “the implication that only those with a historical tie to the land have a right to belong”.



I wonder why anyone with an ounce of intelligence is taking such baseless, unverified claims seriously.

 

[Darat]

There is no "darker side" to "nationalist feeling"s?

 

[Hercules56]

There is no "darker side" to "nationalist feeling"s?

Where's the evidence behind this wild and baseless claim that paintings of rolling hills stirs feelings of nationalism?

Before this thread was posted, I never heard of such a thing.

 

[Hercules56]

There is no "darker side" to "nationalist feeling"s?

Ive been to many beautiful places around my country and state.

Seen many beautiful paintings of the USA.

Sensation of "I love america!! we're the greatest country in the world!! Pax Americana!!! Screw the foreigners!!!"???? Never in my life.

 

[Stout]

Ive been to many beautiful places around my country and state.

Seen many beautiful paintings of the USA.

Sensation of "I love america!! we're the greatest country in the world!! Pax Americana!!! Screw the foreigners!!!"???? Never in my life.

But somebody else might though. The go burn down a migrant hotel, or something. The gallery just thinks you should know that some people, obviously not you, might draw wrongthink inspiration from viewing a landscape. Just be wary of your fellow gallery goers, you never know who what might be thinking what. Stay safe.

So I suppose most people, like me have run across the North Face UK website as part of our journey into learning the correct way to view landscapes and, no doubt, you've all taken the free one hour diversity course offered there and earned your certificates and 20% discount.

I mean really, FREE diversity training. Who could pass that up? Then you could buy the correct corporate logo that "you're one of the good ones".

 

[Hercules56]

But somebody else might though. The go burn down a migrant hotel, or something....

With all due respect, I think that is some ridiculous speculation.

Someone may see a painting of pretty rolling hills, get pumped with nationalist extremism and go burn down a migrant shelter?

Do we really need to worry about and prepare for such psychotic insanity?

Has there ever been a case of someone committing such an atrocity after being motivated by pictures of grass and hills????

If such a thing did ever occur, I don't think it would be intelligent or rational to blame the art.

 

[Stout]

With all due respect, I think that is some ridiculous speculation.

I know eh? It could be part of a larger nationalism package and just push the viewer form seething on Twitter to doing something more drastic.

I think the whole thing is stupid. You think the whole thing is stupid so all that's left is to try and get inside the heads of people who agree that this sort of warning on a landscape is a god idea.

If it exists at all. It may be fake. The Torygraph and all.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...ttack-wrecks-irish-hotel-house-asylum-seekers

However, two councillors from the ruling Fianna Fáil party said government policy had inundated Ireland with refugees and driven people to take drastic action – a view once confined to fringe far-right groups.

 

[Hercules56]

I know eh? It could be part of a larger nationalism package and just push the viewer form seething on Twitter to doing something more drastic.

I think the whole thing is stupid. You think the whole thing is stupid so all that's left is to try and get inside the heads of people who agree that this sort of warning on a landscape is a god idea.

If it exists at all. It may be fake. The Torygraph and all.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...ttack-wrecks-irish-hotel-house-asylum-seekers

Man walks into museum, sees pretty painting of rolling hills in northern England, gets overwhelmed with nationalist extremism and decides to plow his truck into a Pakistani restaurant full of customers, killing 7 and injuring 15.

Clearly the art is at fault!!!!!