JG Ballard on Art

J.G. Ballard's (author of "Crash" and "High Rise") makes this comment on the ability of the avant-garde to shock. Consider the fact that a simple abstract painting 100 years ago could cause a riot in the streets!

"I've often thought that the whole notion of the 'avant-garde' has vanished. The nearest you get to that is a sort of 'designer' avant-garde offering a stylized rebelliousness ... a kind of Perrier avant-garde that's homogenized and made palatable for the weekend consumer.""Today if you want to be the equivalent of the pioneering artist of the 1880's -- if you want to be a Gauguin of the present day, you might actually go and buy a gun and shoot Margaret Thatcher and Princess Di! Its no longer enough to think in terms of changing the world through arts anymore. The arts are a form of purient entertainment." (from interviews with Mark Pauline. 1980's)