Saatchi "devastated" by warehouse blaze

I don't suppose he's as devastated as his insurance company.
Looking on the bright side, most of the art destroyed can be recreated over the weekend by the artists concerned, or if they haven't the time, then by the students from some local school !!!!

Sounds like you don't think highly of Hirst, Lucas, Emin et.al.

Regardless of what one thinks of the artistic value of what these people create, it is sad that their art is destroyed.

Art is meant to provoke an emotional reaction as it is an emotional action. So everyone is entitled to their own opinion of it. But reducing it to local school students quality lacks respect for both the artist as well as the student.

Phoney, I totally agree for you. So I guess Maurits' question whether you don't think highly of Hirst, Emin etc. applies to me as well - I am happy to say: i don't think they deserve to be classified as artists at all. My local scam artist is more creative than they are.

But will Saatchi be accused of doing something old hat when he puts the ashes on display? Or will that represent that modern conceptual art has been recycling previous ideas for some time now and be a statement in itself?

Maybe Emin left her electric blanket on?

LOL Heather!!

I've got to disagree with you, Maurits. To me, ONE of the effects of art MAY be that it provokes an emotional reaction. But if that's the only thing it does (which I think sums up the main criticisms behind a lot of what Saatchi collects), then that's not enough on its own to make it art.

But maybe I'm just a philistine.

I suspect that any recent stuff by contempory artists won't be recreated as that would appear to imply that the art was meaningless and easily remade - and anyway it wouldn't be the same piece, even if it looked the same. I think art from the ashes would be quite symbolic, and something that is almost certainly going to be done.

Talking hypothetically here:

Suppose some hypothetical art has a very high current market value.

Suppose that same hypothetical art wouldn't expect to fetch such high prices in, say, 30 years time (eg. would Emin's Bed fetch a lot when the fashion for Young British Artists has long-since expired?).

Suppose a hypothetical art collector insured his collection of hypothetical art for the current market value, but wanted to protect his investment from the short-term popularity of such hypothetical art.

Would such hypothetical art collector be "devastated" at this sudden loss or would he crack open the Bolly?

Hypothetically speaking, of course! I would never suggest this sort of thing really goes on!

Yes, you are a bunch of philistines, and remember that it wasn't just Saatchi's stuff that was destroyed.

Strange, but I would have considered that the fans of pop-art would be more correctly described as philistines, rather than describing pop-art's detractors as philistines.

Doesn't philistine (in recent common usage) mean, effectively, lowbrow or anti-intellectual?

Person A considers the works of Monet, Picasso and Turner to be superior to Emin, Lucas and Hirst.

Person B considers the works of Emin, Lucas and Hirst to be superior to Monet, Picasso and Turner.

Is person A the philistine or person B? or are neither?