Boktips 1.
Matthew Collings är en mycket trevlig bekantskap om du inte har läst något av honom förut. Han är författare, TV-personlighet med konstprogram, skriver i tidskriften Modern Painter och är själv konstnär.

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Product Description

Modern art today is a cow cut in half with a chainsaw, floating in a glass tank. A house cast in concrete. The London Underground map with all the station names changes - the Circle Line stations are comedians, the Northern Line stations are philosophers. A tent embroidered with the names of everyone the artist who set up the tent has ever slept with. But what does it all mean? What is Modern Art? Why do we like/hate it? Can anybody do it? Is it always modern? Who started it? In this refreshing and extremely accessible book Matthew Collings tells the story of modern art and our modern attitude to it. It combines hard information on major artists and movements - what really happened - with ordinary reflections: modern art is intimidating and unfathomable to many but Matthew Collings cuts through this barrier by asking all the kinds of questions many of us will have asked and been puzzled by. He will compare Goya to Duchamp and Picasso, Rothko to Yves Klein; he will look at the role of African tribal art in the rise of Modernism and Punk Rock in the rise of Post-Modernism. This will become a classic book of its kind, quirky, culty and great fun.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #29394 in Books
• Published on: 2000-07-06
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 271 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Matthew Collings has already established a reputation for himself as one of the most irreverent and original commentators on the contemporary art world, with his books Blimey! From Bohemia to Britpop and It Hurts: New York Art from Warhol to Now. With the publication of This is Modern Art, Collings has ordered an even bigger canvas to sketch his own uniquely original version of contemporary art today, which he sees as both increasingly popular but also at different points "glamorous, mysterious, sexy, soulful, macabre, gloomy, quirky, kinky and funny". Written to accompany the television series of the same name, This is Modern Art is an in-your-face guide to modern art from Goya's "Disasters of War" to Gillian Wearing's prize-winning video of the police. Along the way, Collings addresses the questions which have both defined and plagued perplexed responses to modern art, including its desire to shock, its questionable aesthetic value, its humour and its blankness. As it moves along in a style which is at times infuriating but always direct and funny, This is Modern Art points out how far we've come since Picasso and Matisse, reverses out of the cul-de-sac of postmodernism, waves the flag for New British Artists like Damien Hirst, Tracey Emin and Sarah Lucas, and ultimately leaves his audience with a streetwise, upbeat book on the abiding value of modern art. --Jerry Brotton

About the Author
Matthew Collings is an artist, art historian and cultural critic. He used to present The Late Show and presents on Channel 4 London's most important art prize, the Turner Prize. His first book, Blimey! on the London Artworld from Bacon to Hirst was extremely well received and the first book to be published by 21, the publishing company set up by David Bowie and Modern Painters.

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Customer Reviews

Breezy and informal introduction to modern art
Collings has a breezy writing style that exactly matches the way he talks on television during the Turner Prize or on one of his documentaries. It won't appeal to all readers, but if you've got a sense of humour about modern art (for example you found Craig-Martin's Oak Tree in the Tate Modern amusing), you'll definitely like this book. Collings isn't afraid to tell you that he doesn't really know what some pieces of art are about, or that he is only guessing. I've re-read this book several times, and I still enjoy it.

Something to get your teeth into
Collings' writing style will not be for everyone. He can be quite infuriatingly dense about some artists or concepts, and I found myself having to reread some sentences several times to see if it was 'just me'. It wasn't. On the other hand, most of the time he writes about art in a very accessible, and interesting way. His seems to be a fairly personal view, which is not going to suit anyone looking for an authoritative guide to art, but it is entertaining and thought provoking.
The paragraphs are quite clipped, and he just gets into his stride only to move to another subject or idea or artist, which when I was enjoying myself I found quite frustrating. I wanted more. This is not a particularly bad thing. I just found myself on Wikipedia a lot.
There are good illustrations, unlike some art books, and plenty of them. What could be a little challenging was him talking about paintings or works for which there were then no accompanying illustrations, which then sent me back to Wiki.
The potted history of the artists in the margins is a useful feature. I liked the way the book was broken up into manageable chapters and sub headings within chapters. The balance of prose to pictures was good. All in all a very satisfactory book given the dearth of affordable and useful books on what modern art actually is.

The Art Students New Bible
This is without doubt the best book on Modern Art available. Making the long-winded flowery drivel of the majority of art writers seem redundant, Collings has tapped into the current mind-set of the majority of young artists and provided an accessible but inteligent view of modern art. Collings vast knowledge and passion for his subject is reflected in the flippant way he can discuss it and his ability to see the 'highbrow' and 'lowbrow' on equal terms raises him head and shoulders above anyone else. A must read.