Get rid of it altogether.
It isn't so much the artwork I dislike as the placement. Totally inappropriate as is the blue cock in London's Trafalgar square.
Artist Anish Kapoor has decried French "intolerance" towards art, after vandals attacked his vast vagina sculpture in the gardens of the Palace of Versailles. The provocative work – officially dubbed "Dirty Corner", but known popularly as the "Queen's Vagina" – was discovered damaged by yellow paint on Wednesday morning. …
1. The giant blue cock has gone.
2. What was wrong with it? How reverential do we need to be of our public spaces? It's only a sculpture, it's not like they painted all surrounding buildings red, white and blue.
Actually on the topic of the Queen's Vagina I confess the picture leaves me unconvinced,l but then it's only a picture - I suppose it could be better in person.
I would however argue that if you were sensitive on the topic of having your work vandalised, public sculpture design is not the job for you! People have been forever adding hats to, chopping noses off, otherwise miss treating (improving?) public art...
Versailles is fine art.
That large lump of whatever it is, is the vandalism. Yellow paint couldn't polish it.
Even if you think the sculpture is art or satire, you don't scribble the words of Orwell's 1984 over a Constable.
(But it still isn't art, its just rude pictures scribbled into a rather nice desk.)
It's high time the Yarty-Farties learned confrontational pieces making a political statement are not art.If you wouldn't live with it in your backyard it's not suitable in a public place, either.
I'd live with it in my back yard fine, so I guess that makes it suitable for a public place :)
Unless you are suggesting that only your opinion of what is suitable should be considered?
"It's high time the Yarty-Farties learned confrontational pieces making a political statement are not art."
I'd argue that they ARE art, but part of the art would be the responses - If you get confrontational, you had best expect reaction. Otherwise, you aren't, in fact, being confrontational - you're just being a wanker.
Simple rule of thumb I use. If you have to argue the case for something being "art", it almost certainly isn't.
I know someone who sees literally no value in "art", and thus classes all non-engineering, primarily aesthetic works as "a waste of time". If you were talking to them, your rule of thumb would define nothing as art. Which is certainly true from their point of view, but not necessarily from others.
Full disclosure: I think this particular piece is indeed a waste of time, but I'll defend the creator's right to call it art, and defend their right to claim any defacement is vandalism.
I really like Kapoor's art (not sure about the Orbital, though).
A vagina certainly isn't the first thing that springs to my mind when looking at Dirty Corner (Paris doesn't look too sure either): more like a portal to the underworld. I can imagine it could be very intriguing when viewed in situ.
There used to be a sculplture at Newport train station that looked like part of a venting system and until it was removed for maintenance work most people didn't know it was supposed to be an art piece. Maybe it's a trend I missed, stealth/ninja art, so artistic you don't even know it's art
"Or, if you believe the adverts on TV, blue"
It's the Queen's Vagina, so of course, being royal, it should be blue. And what the hell is it doing in France? Has the Palace been informed? Are the pesky French, not satisified with cutting bits off their own royalty, now doing it to ours?
Harumph! I demand an immediate cross-channel expedition to repatriate the Royal Pudenda!
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You are all incorrect.. a horrible travesty on this glorious day of pedantry: It's National Pedants' Day.
National Pedant's Day would be a day in honour of the National Pedant.
National Pedants Day would be a day concerning all of the pedants in the nation (possibly the one day they are in-season).
National Pedants' Day is a day in honour of all of the pedants in the Nation.
"Actually on the topic of the Queen's Vagina I confess the picture leaves me unconvinced,l but then it's only a picture - I suppose it could be better in person."
Agreed.
To be honest, to me this just looks like an art piece that makes some interesting use of light and shadow. (Other than the likely astronomical cost) I would have no problem putting this thing in my yard. If someone said "Hey, don't you think that looks like a vagina?" I guess I'd say "Well, I guess" but it's not the first thing that would have come to mind when I saw it.
So here's a link with images of exactly what the vandals did. Now I don't think this sculpture looks anything like a vagina, but if you do then this link isn't work safe either...
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-33189194
...because it looks like, er, um, you know, that thing that happens when, uh...
Regardless, it strikes me as less a case of raw vandalism and more a case of genuine (if vulgar) artistic expression.