Wednesday 17 October 2012

The Cricketer's Guide to Modern Art

Modern art and cricket are uncertain bedfellows. Fantasy Bob has attempted to do his bit by introducing his world wide readership of 3 to the works of a wide range of artists, but still his readership is bemused.  They know what they like, but is reverse swing or the scoop art?

Fantasy Bob understands their plight – modern art can be confusing with, as John Lennon had it, Thisism and Thatism ism-ing all over the place. So to provide a little light in the darkness, Fantasy Bob has prepared this cricketer’s guide explaining the more significant movements in the modern art world.

Expressionism – Expressionist cricketers used vivid colours and abstracted forms to create spiritually or psychologically intense works focussing on depictions of war, alienation, the modern city and the use of strong and expressive language in response to umpiring decisions.

Abstract Expressionism – Cricketers in New York after World War II created a new style fitted to the post-war mood of anxiety and trauma. They were committed to an expressive art of profound emotion and universal themes, embracing spatial ambiguity, colour fields, gestural abstraction and the use of strong, abstract and expressive language in response to umpiring decisions.

Constructivism - Constructivist cricketers emerged in Revolutionary Russia and celebrated 'art as machine,' emphasising space, construction, and industrial materials. While they occasionally constructed strong language in response to umpiring decisions, their works were more influenced by a fascination with the heavy roller.

Minimalism - Minimalist cricketers emerged in the 1960s in response to the excesses of Abstract Expressionism. Minimalism has inspired many lower league cricketers to eschew such excesses as scoring runs, taking wickets or doing anything meaningful in the field while still being able to make use of minimal but strong language in response to umpiring decisions.

Cubism – Cubism may well claim to be the most important 20th Century movement. Instead of depicting objects from one viewpoint, the cubist cricketer depicts the subject from a multitude of viewpoints to represent the subject in a greater context. However, on the whole cubist cricketers have found that playing pace bowling from a multitude of simultaneous viewpoints of square leg and deep mid off has not been particularly successful. It has caused, amongst other things, confusion in running between the wickets leading to the use of strong language from multiple viewpoints in response to umpiring decisions.

Dadaism - Dada emerged in the early 20th century and scorned bourgeois conventions to celebrate random chance, and the deliberate provocation of outrage. Its randomness has found its highest expression in the 21st Century in Fantasy Bob’s approach to captaincy of the All Star Carlton Fourth XI which regularly inspires outrage without making use strong language in response to umpiring decisions.

Fauvism – in the early 20th century these cricketers were labelled les fauves or wild beasts. They favoured vibrant colours and wide and sweeping gestural strokes across the canvas. Fauvist cricketers combined wide and sweeping gestures with their use of strong language in response to umpiring decisions  

Conceptual Art – this has nothing to do with cricket - it's just crap.



2 comments:

  1. Some interesting comparisons there but which would FB prefer - Jackson Pollock or Graeme Pollock?

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    1. FB previously considered the cricketing skills of Jackson Pollock but in comparison with modern artist Shaun Pollock. Graeme Pollock's work belongs to the classical tradition. http://fantasybob.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/pollock.html

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