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Post your searing hot takes

me and my siblings were explaining to my brothers step daughter pickles (cus she loves em so much - who doesnt?) are just seasoned cucumbers and she after her shock was like "then cucumbers are the best!" (because she likes cucumber salad lol)

im going with her being right, cucumbers are the best (- and potatoes).
 
Return of the king. Post takes that are unpopular in this thread.

I shall now kick this off with a batch of my own:

-The Android Saga fuckin blows. To me it's bar none the most overrated arc in all of Dragon Ball filled with forced tension, character assassination (since when the hell was Gohan a pacifist? Also the Cell senzu is Goku's all-time low point as a character, people bitch about "stupid Super Goku" but his worst points don't even compare) and several major plot holes with the powercreep totally spiraling out of control being the rotten cherry on top of the shit sundae. There's good stuff in here, namely Imperfect Cell (Semiperfect is garbo and Perfect is just meh) as well as introducing Future Trunks and 17 although even that gets a massive asterisk since their actually cool moments didn't come until Super.

-On that note, Super > Z. Yes, even with Anime Resurrection 'F' considered. To me while half of Z are timeless classics in Saiyan and Namek arcs the latter half drags it down so, so hard. Meanwhile with Super as alluded to earlier anime F is the only arc I genuinely hate with everything else ranging from pretty nice albeit with caveats (ToP) to god tier (Broly). This show and OG DB are da kings baby

-Vanilla ice cream > chocolate

-2D Zelda > 3D Zelda. I've tried to actually complete Ocarina of Time 3D a few times and I never get very far before losing interest. Meanwhile I recently completed Link Between Worlds and had a blast. I think I just prefer the tighter world/dungeon design with the pseudo open world elements. Also young Link is an absolute chad and a good boy
 
"Modern art" gets an unfairly bad rap.

*vague idea but I hope you get what I mean. that abstract art people often say isn't real art. also i'm just calling it "modern art" for brevity and not making blanket statements on all modern art / abstract art

To me, art succeeds or fails through its ability to deliver a meaningful message. Modern art is plenty capable of this, it just relies on different "languages" for its message that many people don't understand or don't care about. Think about how you interpret words and ideas differently to understand a poem versus a novel, for example. Many people spend 3 seconds looking at a piece of modern art and decide it has nothing to say. They don't think about their own hastiness in analyzing a piece, or their own limitations in understanding its messaging language, but assume the piece and artist are to blame. Or they've been told that modern art is fake and adopted that position without thinking it through. When you give modern art a real chance, you can often interpret meaningful messages, just as any other form of art.

Screen Shot 2024-09-22 at 3.00.25 PM.png


This was a piece created to make fun of modern art, but I actually like it just, as a piece of modern art in its own right. The gloomy drab blues, greys, and purples superimposed on a bright, happier color set provides a playground for interpretation and drawing meaning from. The piece almost challenges you to find a center of gravity (a default place to focus your eyes) - the purple cluster is centered a bit towards the bottom right, the blue-green cluster centers closer to the middle but is imposed upon by the purple. The eye-like pattern binds the two in the center and purports to structure the piece, but centering on it leads you to focus on a gloomy muddied set of three gloomy colors, shifting your attention away from the brighter parts of the piece. But yet the bright parts remain. For these reasons, the center of control feels almost subjugated to the whims of surrounding periphery, giving it an 'illusion of control' quality. Like the eye (and whatever person or being it represents) wants to keep its colors subdued but can't control little pockets of light jutting from the outsides.

That's just a start – I could write pages of meaningful analysis if I really sat down and thought it through. You wouldn't have to agree with it or draw the same interpretation, but I wouldn't be BSing random letters and ideas on a page–I'd be using the art as a tool to understand a message. It's almost like a puzzle, but with subjective pieces instead of objective physical ones.

A big reason why i find modern art interesting is how it's so accessible to anyone! There absolutely is modern art that displays a high level of artistic craft and technical expertise, but you don't need these things to create something really interesting. The piece I include here was made with no conscious interest to make or engage with modern art, and yet it succeeds! There are ways I think it could be improved, sure, but if those conditions can create a meaningful modern art piece, surely you can, too!

Good video that directly responds to many common arguments against modern art.
 
"Modern art" gets an unfairly bad rap.

*vague idea but I hope you get what I mean. that abstract art people often say isn't real art. also i'm just calling it "modern art" for brevity and not making blanket statements on all modern art / abstract art

To me, art succeeds or fails through its ability to deliver a meaningful message. Modern art is plenty capable of this, it just relies on different "languages" for its message that many people don't understand or don't care about. Think about how you interpret words and ideas differently to understand a poem versus a novel, for example. Many people spend 3 seconds looking at a piece of modern art and decide it has nothing to say. They don't think about their own hastiness in analyzing a piece, or their own limitations in understanding its messaging language, but assume the piece and artist are to blame. Or they've been told that modern art is fake and adopted that position without thinking it through. When you give modern art a real chance, you can often interpret meaningful messages, just as any other form of art.

View attachment 671280

This was a piece created to make fun of modern art, but I actually like it just, as a piece of modern art in its own right. The gloomy drab blues, greys, and purples superimposed on a bright, happier color set provides a playground for interpretation and drawing meaning from. The piece almost challenges you to find a center of gravity (a default place to focus your eyes) - the purple cluster is centered a bit towards the bottom right, the blue-green cluster centers closer to the middle but is imposed upon by the purple. The eye-like pattern binds the two in the center and purports to structure the piece, but centering on it leads you to focus on a gloomy muddied set of three gloomy colors, shifting your attention away from the brighter parts of the piece. But yet the bright parts remain. For these reasons, the center of control feels almost subjugated to the whims of surrounding periphery, giving it an 'illusion of control' quality. Like the eye (and whatever person or being it represents) wants to keep its colors subdued but can't control little pockets of light jutting from the outsides.

That's just a start – I could write pages of meaningful analysis if I really sat down and thought it through. You wouldn't have to agree with it or draw the same interpretation, but I wouldn't be BSing random letters and ideas on a page–I'd be using the art as a tool to understand a message. It's almost like a puzzle, but with subjective pieces instead of objective physical ones.

A big reason why i find modern art interesting is how it's so accessible to anyone! There absolutely is modern art that displays a high level of artistic craft and technical expertise, but you don't need these things to create something really interesting. The piece I include here was made with no conscious interest to make or engage with modern art, and yet it succeeds! There are ways I think it could be improved, sure, but if those conditions can create a meaningful modern art piece, surely you can, too!

Good video that directly responds to many common arguments against modern art.
I think that part of the problem is that modern art often relies more on external context to be properly appreciated than more traditional forms of art, and a lot of people seem to think that relying on external context to this extent is somehow cheating. A lot of the derision of modern art online is based on mocking the notion that the artist meant to say anything with a piece that might not be immediately obvious from looking at it. I don't really understand this mentality, personally. My view is that you should use any external context that enhances or deepens your appreciation of a work.
 
I think that part of the problem is that modern art often relies more on external context to be properly appreciated than more traditional forms of art, and a lot of people seem to think that relying on external context to this extent is somehow cheating. A lot of the derision of modern art online is based on mocking the notion that the artist meant to say anything with a piece that might not be immediately obvious from looking at it. I don't really understand this mentality, personally. My view is that you should use any external context that enhances or deepens your appreciation of a work.
That's an interesting set of ideas. If anything, I often find traditional art more reliant on external content for me to interpret more from it, but I'm quite willing to believe that's more me-specific. At any rate, I agree that it shouldn't matter, and that getting deeper interpretations is the goal, irrespective of whatever else. I think their framing of 'external context' is not very thoughtful like, there's so much language that traditional art can rely on, but people may not pick up on because they already happen to know it–e.g. the Mona Lisa and the language of body language. In turn, (speaking to the crowd not you, who already knows this), this idea of external context versus "internal" context may be very arbitrary.
 
I think the biggest problem with modern art is that, whilst the focus on the emotions that are envoked in the spectator of it instead of technical skill is very liberating, it also opened the door for an immensly effective way to launder money

Art gets more attention the more monetary value it entails. And nice modern art usually doesn't go for much, whilst modern "art" that's produced to clean up trails goes (obviously) for a lot
 
I think the biggest problem with modern art is that, whilst the focus on the emotions that are envoked in the spectator of it instead of technical skill is very liberating, it also opened the door for an immensly effective way to launder money

Art gets more attention the more monetary value it entails. And nice modern art usually doesn't go for much, whilst modern "art" that's produced to clean up trails goes (obviously) for a lot
I don't see why this should influence our opinion of the art itself. Rich people use whatever means available to them to launder money and avoid taxes, and I hardly think you can hold any artists responsible for taking big sums of money in such cases.
 
I don't see why this should influence our opinion of the art itself. Rich people use whatever means available to them to launder money and avoid taxes, and I hardly think you can hold any artists responsible for taking big sums of money in such cases.
it shouldn't but it's the reason why modern arts image is subpar. The stuff that's low-effort, made to launder money is what led to the bad image
 
it shouldn't but it's the reason why modern arts image is subpar. The stuff that's low-effort, made to launder money is what led to the bad image
I think you're putting the cart before the horse. Plenty of stuff is used to launder money, but your framing of "the stuff that's low-effort and made for that purpose" assumes and reveals what I think is the true issue people take with modern art. They think their kid could make it. They think it's low-effort, as you say, and bad, lacking any value outside laundering. If they thought it was fine on its own merits, the laundering would be a footnote, I think.

I've addressed the value part, so I'll take on the "low-effort" part. The "low-effort" label is often just an incorrect fact and a mistaken assumption. Sometimes things look easy and are not, and modern art pieces often fall under that umbrella. The reason a piece is hard doesn't even have to be "thinking hard about how exactly to arrange colors and designs and conceptualize a message". Sometimes the actual technique and artistic craft is much harder than it seems.

There was a painting in a Dutch museum called "Who's Afraid of Red, Yellow, and Blue." If you googled the name, you would probably think "Oh, I can make that in MS paint. It's just, uh, Red, Yellow, and Blue." But the simplicity is a mirage, and the very specific tones and effects (which a photograph won't perfectly capture, to be clear) required artistic craft. One reason we know this? The painting was vandalized, an expert tried to restore it, and many critics believe he failed. E.g. the following, from an NYT article: (Paywall Remover)

"One Dutch expert, Ijsbrand Hummelen, a member of a commission that examined the painting after the attack, said that Goldreyer, without consulting the museum, had overlaid acrylic paint onto Newman's original oils. He said the restoration had destroyed a shimmering, silky effect that the artist had achieved by the subtle juxtaposition of magenta and sienna, turning the painting into a mere monochrome."

The video I linked in my OP also covers this case, and the "low-effort" argument generally, in more detail.

E @ below: TRUE!
 
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i think modern art looks like shit and if art looks like shit then it is shit, therefore modern art is shit
You flaunting your lack of interest in engaging with the subject is weird and undignified, and it should stop. If you don't care about modern art, fine. Spend your time anywhere else. But I put myself out there for something I really believe in, and you're pissing in the pool for attention. This low-effort, shallow, pointless, faux-provocative take, which a billion people have said before, embodies everything that people like you claim to hate about modern art.
 
You flaunting your lack of interest in engaging with the subject is weird and undignified, and it should stop. If you don't care about modern art, fine. Spend your time anywhere else. But I put myself out there for something I really believe in, and you're pissing in the pool for attention. This low-effort, shallow, pointless, faux-provocative take, which a billion people have said before, embodies everything that people like you claim to hate about modern art.

This is how I feel about a lot of people talking about modern music, or as a writer (mainly poetry, myself) thinking it's hollow or somehow rooted in empty thoughts and materialism, etc.
I can promise you when I put my art down I pour just as much heart as my Mom who ran art guilds and did literally every form of art for over 40 years did, or her mentors/influences did however long before.
Sometimes you gotta look/listen from a different angle or just lay down your bias cus there is plenty artists be it music, film, art, etc still doing INCREDIBLE stuff, if you can't than that's on you, not the artist.
And tbf it's a lil unfortunate for the person being short sighted cus theres so much being done now that is so genre pushing and incredible.
 
I think you're putting the cart before the horse. Plenty of stuff is used to launder money, but your framing of "the stuff that's low-effort and made for that purpose" assumes and reveals what I think is the true issue people take with modern art. They think their kid could make it. They think it's low-effort, as you say, and bad, lacking any value outside laundering. If they thought it was fine on its own merits, the laundering would be a footnote, I think.
ok I think low-effort was the worst way to put it. Unambitious would be rather the word

I actually think that the differentation between effort and quality is one of the biggest strenghts of modern art. Sometimes, spending minutes on something will yield better results than spending hours or days. A good example is Tails gets Trolled. I can't imagine any panel in the comic took long to draw, but the emotions are so clear and palpable through every page, partly because it's simple

But you need the intention for something. Be it to envoke certain emotions or to make the spectator think. Unambitious art would be something that doesn't have an artistic intention and exists for purely monetary purposes

What I also meant by the money laundering argument is that, modern art that is ambitious often gets no attention from the media. Art that generates a lot of money always gets attention. So the exposure for most people to modern art is usually unambitious art that's mostly made for money laundering purposes

When you look at the most prestigious and best paid artists of our time, they're all involved in atleast some shady business
 
Ok, here is a real hot and serious take.


Tobias is my goat and I'll die on this hill, latios Darkrai and other awesome pokemon are used by him. This is a serious tournament he is attending, and his selection of mons seem serious to me, unlike many others who forget mons can evolve.

but somehow he still gets 6-0d by cynthia, damn you Tobias deserved to win!
Honestly, Tobias could be a super cool character if they gave him a backstory, like how he came to know Darkrai. Unfortunately, he's unlikely to ever return, especially now that Ash is gone, so that's extremely unlikely. (Not that Ash being gone is a bad thing, I love Horizons)
 
Honestly, Tobias could be a super cool character if they gave him a backstory, like how he came to know Darkrai. Unfortunately, he's unlikely to ever return, especially now that Ash is gone, so that's extremely unlikely. (Not that Ash being gone is a bad thing, I love Horizons)
Unironically I think Tobias' complete lack of backstory and general nature as an asspull to get Ash to lose makes him SO much more interesting than any other Pokemon anime character by complete accident. That and his vaguely fantastical design give off the vibe of a phantom trainer from who knows where, a man outside the confines of Pokemon battling as currently understood. I like to imagine a story where an older Ash tries to seek him out for a rematch only to go down a rabbithole of cultish runes and government coverups as nobody besides him seems to remember Tobias' existence, and in the end he still has nothing to show for it. Any official attempt to properly build up Tobias and give him a backstory would've undoubtedly been far too mundane for my liking (see: Alain).
 
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