Why do people like Picasso so much?

Picasso is as important to art as Da Vinci or Michelangelo, you just have to understand why he painted like he did.

Picasso was important for three different reasons:

In art, his re-thinking of the rules of perspective changed the way that artists looked at the world. Picasso saw that although we can only see one side of an object the other sides exist at the same time - so he painted them. He also had fused African tribal art - notably masks - with his art, creating a new visual alphabet.

But arguably his greatest significance is his response to the first aerial bombing of a civilian population in times of war, the flattening of the city of Guernica in Spain. He painted the extra-ordinary work, Guernica, a huge, mostly grey, black and white, painting full of symbols, metaphor and metaphors for suffering. He removed it from Spain, and refused to let it back into the country until democracy was restored, after the Fascist General Franco had won the civil war in 1939. It finally returned to Spain in 1992.

The painting is a visual reminder of the horrors of war, fascism, and the suffering of ordinary citizens.

The third reason is that he made the artist like a rock star, he ushered in the age of celebrity artist. No longer did artists feel like they should be struggling in a shabby garret in Paris, they could socialise with kings, princes and models. They could feel at home in Monte Carlo or in New York high society, and they could advertise products in magazines, on television and in the cinema. Andy Warhol, Damian Hurst and even Banksey have become household names because Picasso realised that the artist themselves can be the art.

Picasso's influence is enormous - not just because of his works, and some are just sublime - like Weeping Woman or some of his Marie-Therese series - but because of this re-invention of perspective and how an artist views the world, and how the World views the artist.

See:

The Shock of the New by Robert Hughes and

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=WEpc5tPgCU8C&pg...

On Pollock, you have to view his works like jazz music - once you get the rhythm, then you can appreciate his works.

I feel the same way about Jackson Pollack. However, after seeing some real Picasso's up close I have to admit that he is the real deal. And you've obviously only seen a select few of his paintings. His pencil drawings are amazing. They have an entire section of his stuff in an art museum up in new york. I saw both his and pollacks work. Pollack = shyte. Picasso = Legend.

If you view art as "pretty pictures" then you obviously don't get art.

First of all, Picasso pretty much invented the collage. Secondly, he is not just a cubist painter. Have you ever seen his paintings from his Blue or Rose period? They are absolutely beautiful and highly centered on emotion. Also, he was able to paint in photo like quality, completely realistic. To be able to abstract the body like he did requires intense knowledge about perspective and proportion. That is the difference between his paintings and drawings, and your nephews.

On Pollock, he was an 'action painter' from the abstract expressionism movement. The non-figurative approach to their works meant that the art is open to interpretation where there are no concrete subjects, but a strong emphasis on emotional content and the sensuousness of the paint. This concept relates to that of ‘’The Sublime’, with the view that art is nonrepresentational and chiefly improvisational . The Abstract Expressionists were largely influenced by the Surrealists, with their concepts of the subconscious, which offered complete freedom of expression, unhindered by the principles of perceived reality, and biomorphism, where abstract forms allude to, or evoke a feeling of forms from nature.

If you don't understand the ideas, you don't understand the art.

Neither Picasso or Steve Jobs originated that idea. Credit goes to TS Eliot “Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different” (Tradition abd the Individual Talent, The Sacred Wood, published in 1921)

My sister is an artist and always looks for something deeper in the subject than what's on the surface, and it's reflected in her paintings. Sometimes one can like art without understanding the artist's perspective, maybe just because it appeals to their senses or emotions.

Picasso is and was garbage. I would burn his garbage works and all copies and facsimiles and descriptions of them so people no longer have to worship these steaming piles of garbage. People, especially the art fart sniffing types, are losers and hold modern artists to the standards of idiots and con artists from the past. Brâncuși is another trash peddler. I would burn the MOMA down as well.

Art isnt always about how difficult it is to make. I dont even know what the true definition of what it is because there are so many different definitions. Picasso was so amazing because, if you think about it, he was really the only person of that era to do that kind of art. I mean sure, its easy to create, but its the idea of it is what makes it so magic. Piccaso saw the world differently, and broke the rules of traditional art. Even though somer people think it looks ugly, I think its actually really pretty.

I consider him to be the first modern artist d-bag. I think all of these "abstract" artists are pathetic wastes of life. They try and convince us that there art is only for intuitive viewers and people will pretend to understand the artists "message" just so they can feel as if they are better than everybody else. They are incredible tools and they need to go away.

you know, they have these things called cameras. you can take pictures with them. the images produced by them can be representative of the human optical representation of the world, if that is all you are into.