Kunst

“What's that smell? It's art, says L’Oréal. Contemporary artists have consistently pushed the boundaries of what constitutes art but not even the most outrageous of the Young British Artists could have sold this one to Charles Saatchi. In the Dutch Supreme Court, the French cosmetics company L’Oréal has argued successfully that one of its fragrances should be copyrighted — in effect as a work of art.

(…) The art world smells a rat. It’s not the rotting corpse of one of Damien Hirst’s stuffed mammals but the sickly sweet smell left by the L’Oréal perfume at the centre of the latest aesthetic debate. The company’s copyright victory is likely to send the galleristas into a nose-spin. It’s about time too. We should be far more generous and less, er, sniffy, in our allocation of that overly mystified word, art. The idea of Britain’s loftiest art critics being let loose on Jade Goody’s new perfume Shh . . . is fragrance to my nose. However, attributing the name of art to everyday objects is hardly novel.

(…) The Burghers of Tate Modern paid £22,300 for a tin of faeces by the Italian artist Piero Manzoni. Holy Sh**!, you might say, and you’d be right with that price tag. We are a nation of artists (however challenged) and we should embrace that fact. See the beauty in your wellies. Put your hot-water bottle in a display case. Honour your iPod with an esoteric caption. Just don’t expect me to come and review it.”

Lees het artikel hier (The Times).