ViennettaLurker t1_jea7iyp wrote on March 30, 2023 at 3:24 PM

Reply to comment by UngilUndy in You might like paintings more if you stop to read the gallery labels - people high in openness, and those with limited art experience, liked paintings more after reading information about the artist and their technique. by Litvi

I'm sorry but this feels super opinionated. Not to say there can't be pretentious artists statements, etc. But drawing an audience to specifically notable features, the artists intent, and so on, shouldn't be discouraged. And it shouldn't be too horrible to throw in some five dollar words.

People round these things up to 'pretentious' a bit too frequently in my opinion. Honestly your sentence isn't pretentious at all, maybe a bit garbled or clumsy but it would be a mostly fine starting point for what to look at and pay attention to.

UngilUndy t1_jedibqs wrote on March 31, 2023 at 5:50 AM

What about the example I gave communicates the artist's intent though? It's not a verbatim take but I've seen a good chunk of art labelled with such weasel words. The term "spacialities" in particular really annoys me as it is as good as saying "the work takes place in a place". To quote another response I got, it's pseudo-academic blabber.

ViennettaLurker t1_jeeclgb wrote on March 31, 2023 at 12:17 PM

Just off of my first impression I'd say it made me think to pay extra attention to the negative space in the piece.

I get the irritation. And specifically words like "spacialities" or "materiality" which often in many sentences could be rounded back down to "space" and "material" and more or less still be as functional in getting a point across.

But 'weasel words' is a bit much to me. I dont think these things are consistently deployed by people who don't know what they're talking about or trying to get away with something. And its only blabber in specific instances. Obscure word choice to the point of total confusion? Sure. Sentence density to the point of painful? Yes.

But it all means stuff. Something eyerolling like "working through a semiotic lens" is still useful as long as you're familiar with the word semiotics. And when you are familiar, that part of a sentence could actually replace a much larger 'ordinary' series of words. On its own, its not 'blabber'- it can mean something just fine.

And its not pseudo academic, either. Again, depending on the particular instance. A lot of these things are very strictly academic. What I may grant is that they are unnecessarily academic.

But for me at least, its all just industry talk. Its no less eye rolling to me than when people started tacking on "going forward" to every office conversation or for whatever reason we decided "color way" was such an urgent replacement for "color scheme" or (gasp) "color" in product descriptions. You hear industry talk of any kind and it can be easy for it to sit clumsily in your ear, and feel maybe a bit too extra from time to time.