Do you get the concept?

[Cynical Ninja]

In 1917 the former painter and chess player Marcel Duchamp took a porcelain urinal from the male toilets of a bar signed it “R.Mutt” and attached it to a wall in an art gallery.

He said “retinal art” or art for the eyes was dead and art for the brain was the future, Ta dah! Conceptual art is born! Do you get the concept? Or do you think he was taking the piss?

[Duchess]

He shared the same concept as P. T. Barnum.

Har Har

[Cynical Ninja]

So do you think all conceptual art is the preserve of those easily deceived and deluded?

[Duchess]

No, I can't go quite that far. It's such a personal thing, like taste and attraction but it's goddamn weird if someone is viewing an urinal as art because someone has told them that it is. Maybe my problem isn't so much the art but people who are so easily led.

[Cynical Ninja]

I watch the Turner prize every year, its a yearly conceptual art prize in the UK. And many of the entries baffle me but there is a few where I think “that's a clever idea”.

I can remember a female artist filling a house with concrete then smashing down the exterior of the house to leave a solid concrete structure of the interior of the house. It was called something like “solid emptiness” and I thought that was a decent enough idea.

Another entry was rows of rice piled up with neon strip lights lying inbetween. According to the artist it was something to do with world hunger but the more she talked the more I thought to myself “this is complete bollocks”.

So I don't really know about conceptual art.

[crash]

So I don't really know about conceptual art.

No, actually, you do. From what you have written, you understand the concept of conceptual art as a whole, but you may not understand or appreciate some if the concepts of individual pieces.

I think that is similar for a lot of people, and what brings conceptual art into its own. As for the guy with the urinals, well, there'll always be those special people who want to jump on the latest trend bandwagon; you could sell them air pockets, if you made it trendy first.

[Cynical Ninja]

I think because conceptual art is supposed to appeal to more than just the eye its probably down to individual interpretation.

The solid concrete house interior appealed to my personal imagination, the piles of rice and neon striplights didn't.

I really liked Damian Hirsts shark suspended in formaldehyde because when you first see it it makes a huge impact and not just visually. Whereas Tracey Emins bed covered in rubbish was, to me anyway, a bed covered in rubbish.

Some people may look at duchamps urinal and think “anyone could have done that” but the point is they didn't though. To me that's the innovation, its the concept and the idea not the technical artistic execution.

Fuck me this is getting deep, I need to have a nap.

[Maggot]

And I thought nobody would understand my condoms on cow udders thing.

[HairOfTheDog]

I set my pet rock in the middle of a sweet roll once and proudly displayed it on the kitchen counter.

My dad got it immediately, but no one else did.

Conceptual art is sometimes so banal that it flies over the heads of the majority.

[Duchess]

I set my pet rock in the middle of a sweet roll once and proudly displayed it on the kitchen counter.

Rock-n-Roll?

[HairOfTheDog]

I set my pet rock in the middle of a sweet roll once and proudly displayed it on the kitchen counter.

Rock-n-Roll?

Yeah.

Brilliant, right?

I wasn't stoned at the time. But, in my defense, I was only in second grade.

[ramseycat]

I set my pet rock in the middle of a sweet roll once and proudly displayed it on the kitchen counter.

Rock-n-Roll?

Yeah.

Brilliant, right?

I wasn't stoned at the time. But, in my defense, I was only in second grade.

[aussiefriend]

My first love was a sculptor, he knows about all this shit.

[username]

I guess it has its place but I prefer art for beauty. Nothing pretty about a urinal. I guess I wouldn't balk at visiting a conceptual art exhibition but I probably wouldn't be buying anything for my house.

[username]

Thinking about taking my dog out last night and how much I adore her, I could see a painting of me collared and leashed up while I drag my dog behind me with her holding on for dear life. Fitting.