The Controversy Over Barnett Newman’S Voice Of Fire
During 1989, Barnett Newman’s Voice of Fire was purchased by National Gallery of Canada for $1. 8 million Canadian Dollars. Currently, it is located in Ottawa for the public to view. It is 18 foot long when measured vertically, the painting is made up of three equal vertical lines, the inner line is red and the outside of the painting is blue. Newman’s abstract expressionism and the galleries decision to purchase it was not well received and caused a lot of controversies. Some people consider the work shows great contingency, tone and composed detail with the intention of communicating a sense of locality. However, most of the general public is oblivious to this and deemed it simple and a careless way to spend taxpayer’s money.
The controversy of the painting was able to stay in the media for two months and was much talked about throughout the country. The chair of the House of Common Standing Committee on Communication and culture, Felix Holtmann gave his opinion during a 2011 interview with Blacklock's publisher Holly Doan that he wasn’t impressed with the galleries decision purchasing a painting that nobody wanted due to the fact that Western Canada was near starving due to the economic conditions. With the enormous attention from the media, the National Galleries staff had to justify the purchase and they expressed that the painting was in fact an exquisite piece and it represented modern abstract art.
On the level of society, I myself believe it’s hard to justify the dollar value purchased for this piece of modern art considering that the economy was not doing so well during this time and the country was suffering a recession. Additionally, I suppose that this piece just doesn’t have the ability to communicate to most individuals and seems to be vague and redundant, the scale and colors are interesting but it just does not compensate for the lack of thought. Also, I have no doubt that Newman was trying to attempt to make this piece more free and accessible to everyone but however it alienated itself from the common man. However, at the same time, I am not qualified to judge any artists work on the level of artistic expression because art is supposed to push boundaries, which perhaps that was Newman's intent with this piece of work.
In comparison to other Canadian art such as the Infinite tire sculpture constructed by Douglas Coupland, it was very well received than the Voice of Fire. Even though the Infinite Tire seems to be simplistic just as the Voice of Fire but at the same time was able to show complexity. The 18-meter long sculpture is made of 18 tires stacked on top of each other but when looking up at the sculpture from the base, the stacks appear to be stretching off toward a distant vanishing point in the sky because of the decreasing size of the tires. I believe that the tires were better received because the intricacy level of the work and the general public is able to view the effort put into it and when it came to the Vision of Fire the public have viewed it as “simple” and something they would be able to achieve at home.
In conclusion, if the price of the painting of the Voice of Fire was not funded by the taxpayer's money I believe it wouldn’t have been so controversial or perhaps the price tag wasn’t ambiguous it would have been better perceived.
