Thursday, July 25, 2013

A MUSEUM OF FUNNY ART

Every once in a while I mull over the idea of a Museum of Funny Art.


I don't think most museums should give themselves over to this type of thing. Art has been trivialized enough in our time...I'd hate to add to that. But a museum that shows nothing else but funny, well...that's different. Funny art belongs in a funny place. 

What would hang in such a museum? That's a tough one. Everyone has their own idea of what's funny and what's art.


Then there's the question, do all funny things belong under the same roof?  Take this  drawing (above) by John K...it's hilarious and skilled, and certainly deserves to be in a museum...but what kind of museum?  

Some would argue that it belongs in a seperate museum of comics or animation art. That's because the best comic art of the last century is so uniquely effective at getting a laugh that it would reduce the impact of every other art form in the museum.   

Yikes! Is that what the future holds for museums? Is contemporary funny art destined to be parceled piecemeal to various niche collections?


Lots of people can't imagine contemporary funny artists sharing a wall with funny artists of the Eighteenth Century like Gillray (above).


Once you've seen Gillray you can't think of the 18th Century the same way again. Here (above) he parodies the women who wore thin dresses and insufficient petticoats in his time. Now I understand why hoopskirts became popular. 


I don't doubt that Gillray would be delighted to know his work shared a wall with our own Basil Wolverton (above).


I think this large painting of Marylin is funny but I have friends who might disagree. 


Animation could provide lots of funny material, but much of it would have to be derived from frame grabs. The originals don't exist. Is it proper to hang frame grabs on a museum wall? I don't know. 

  

6 comments:

Unknown said...

Your most ingenious idea yet! Ignorance and funny stupidity are the most overlooked aspects of our society that aren't cherished enough in my opinion. I don't like pretentiousness either and I think your idea would remind a lot of people that art can have a silly side too.

Joshua Marchant (Scrawnycartoons) said...

It's be a hard line to draw between funny art and comic/animation art since so much of it is funny.
Milt Gross is a very funny artist but people might say he belongs in a comic strip artist gallery.
But I'm certain there's plenty of old and modern art that is meant to be funny that would fit.

I wonder what kind of a building would house all this funny art? No doubt you have some ideas on funny architecture?

Eddie Fitzgerald said...

Joshua: Funny architecture? Sure, the second picture from the top. Acually that building isn't funny, just the dog beside it.

Sarah Renae said...

Would the landscape be funny, too?

zillustration said...

i remember the Borofsky exhibit at the Philly Museum of Art in the early 80s had quite a few video elements involved. I don't think screen grabs are out of the question. However, I have heard critics state that humor has no place in art... i don't get that.
http://www.borofsky.com
check out his site region called installations. Oh.. and Ballerina Clown is pretty silly on its own.

Ingeborg said...

This is cool!