Post #628162 by bigbrotiki on Fri, Mar 9, 2012 7:54 AM

On 2012-03-09 02:50, swizzle wrote:

Just because one, or some people, say it must be a certain way, doesn't make it so. This is not law.

I feel you are addressing me here, so: To me, for new Tiki art to contain visible elements of Oceanic art and mid-century Tiki is not some kind of "law", it is just common sense, as in my old saying "If it says Tiki on it, it should have Tiki in it" - if it doesn't, it ain't. What is there to argue about? :)

On 2012-03-09 02:50, swizzle wrote:
This is an individuals take on something that is completely made-up with to begin with.

I have to disagree here. Yes there are some examples of that in the mid-century, but they are funny exceptions. Not enough to make "completely made-up" the motto of the art form, though. WHY is original mid-century American Tiki art cool, what makes it unique? The fact that the artist A.) did not simply copy ancient Polynesian carvings, and then B.) gave them their own touch, adding modernist or cartoony elements of the time. However, they were still recognizable as POLYNESIAN (or Oceanic) idols. They could not be mistaken for Hobbit monsters, wood sprites, or "whatever" ethnicity folk art.

Some/most/all might say that about my work. I really don't care. I KNOW that there are people out there that do like my work.... As it is enough for me to see artists on this site who 'I' think have created work that really is 'art', and how small the percentage of relation to the Polynesian/Oceanic arts and to midcentury American Tiki it really is, is irrelevant to me.
I like, what i like. And whether or not my 'opinion' fits in with someone elses idea means nothing to me.

You seem to argue from a defensive position here, which as far as I am concerned, is unnecessary, because when I look at your mug variations, they seem to lie somewhere in the tradition of what Tiki mug makers did in the mid-century.

And your last part of your argument is totally correct for ANY artist. Of course anybody is absolutely free to create whatever, have it liked by people, and declare it as art. Who could ever deny them that? But IF that art piece would not have anything (or just 1%) of Tiki in it, why insist to label it such? I am not putting down some law here, what I am saying seems like an objective fact to me, a logic that exists, beyond right or wrong. :)

Where the matter of subjective OPINION comes in is more also where the matter of PERSONAL TASTE comes in: There are some Tiki works out there that I am "not partial" to because they're not my personal taste. But if they clearly contain elements of the Tiki genre, I would not claim they are not "Tiki". Maybe I would say they are not "enough" Tiki, or tacky, or, my most common complaint, too cartoony. :)

But all this only touches onto a recent realization I had, brought on by Kokolele, that I still have not had time to fully formulate yet.