This is a fabulous book, explaining in a clear but philosophical manner the crisis modern art finds itself in.
If you've ever wondered WHY so much of modern art is ugly, offensive, boring, text-and-technology driven, then here's the book for you. If you worship at the altar of Pop Art, then you shall be discomfitted. And you shall squirm as the author analyzes the core meaning behind the art of icons like Duchamp (even Courbet), and what this anti-art-street-art-spectacle-art has led to(it all seemed marvelous at the time). But never fear, there seems to be hope at the end of the tunnel (end of book), though the examples of paintings by the New Old Masters left me a bit cold....(if this is our hope, then.....). Kuspit is fair, and generous in his list of what he considers "good" art to be. He gives Abstract Expressionism its due, as well as speaking the very word "beauty." I applaud Donald Kuspit for laying it on the line - the Emperor Has No Clothes. We have observed for years that modern painting, more than any of the other art forms (music, poetry, dance, literature) has painted itself into a strange, dull corner. It seems, for a host of traumas and reasons, unable to address the spiritual.
