In someone's home, what kind of art would give you pause or weird you out?
Bit by bit, I’m decorating my apartment with an odd assortment of things from a friend’s photography to autographed pictures of my favorite Star Trek actors to the odd thing I pick up from work.
Since I’ve been thinking about this a lot, I’m curious as to what kind of art would make my fellow Jellies go, “Huh, that’s strange,” or “Whoa, wasn’t expecting that,” or even ” What the hell? Who would put that in their house?”
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Being in the apartment business I have seen it all. The one that creeped everyone out was the apartment that had all sorts of porn, S&M, and demonic art EVERYWHERE except the betroom, which was decorated in a girly angel motif.
Yeah, like @Judi, I think a lot of porn or sexual art on the wall would really bother me. However, just the fact that there is a lot of art would be unusual. Lovely, but unusual. Also, if the art was bad, it would be bothersome.
It’s usually not the artwork itself, so much as how out of place it seems in that person’s apartment. For example, my mother has this one abstract painting that really always reminds me of the fiery depths of hell. The rest of her place is decorated in a very feminine, Victorian, wow that’s a lot of mauve kinda way (much like the office of Delores Umbridge in Harry Potter), so it seems really out of place – especially since she tries so hard to make things extra cheery and bright.
But if you’ve seen that Friends episode where Phoebe creates some weird art thing with people coming out of the frames, that. That’s my line. That’s the creepy point at which I’m less comfortable in your home.
There is home down the street from us, where the home owners clearly collect art. My husband, son & I have all agreed on one thing: None of us could live in a home with a large, realistic looking statue.
My husband has to work at a client weekly that houses much art like this. His words not mine…“It’s just too creepy”.
EDIT: The peole have small children, too. My son said, “I’d never want to walk to the kitchen to get a drink of water at night” the statue in their open concept dining room
For me, it is not art that freaks me out. It is people that have huge pictures of themselves everywhere. I like seeing pictures of people with their family, etc, but not just them, alone. Also, I know this one lady who has a whole wall devoted to pictures of her pets. She has a picture of her Yorkshire Terrier that is about two feet large. It is like five times the size of the actual dog.
As @Judi said, the demonic art would really get to me. I don’t understand why someone would want to surround themselves by something representing such evil.
Art that is shocking or surprising and elicits a “who the hell would put that in their house?” reaction in me usually means that the person is interesting, or interesting enough that I am not completely bored already. I have been to houses that feel like anyone could live there. Bland, pedestrian “art” purchased at a mall store is going to be more shocking and disappointing for me once I take in what I am seeing.
My Husband love Miro and I appreciate him in a museum, but he creeps me out and I don’t like him in my house. His work is supposed to go to some primitive depths, and I say, “Yes, it does bring out something primitive in me and it’s not pretty.” I have relented some, we have a few pieces, but he’s not allowed in my bedroom.
Wayang dolls creep me out.
The only thing that I ever truly objected to was a nude self-portrait in the dining room. Put me off my dinner.
Other than anything on velvet, I would not care for stuff that’s mismatched with the rest of the art or something depicting cruelty and pain.
Nothing, it’s their house :-/
I don’t judge art, I try to appreciate it.
I don’t like to look at “art” depicting cruelty or abuse.It sickens me.
Art that is purposely created to shock is just irritating.
[Possibly NSFW] I think this would creep me out
I think cannibalism art. Where a person is eating someones torso and then that person is eating another persons leg and then a third person is eating the second persons head and its all just a coiled mess.
Creepy babies dressed like flowers and veggies and such.
Posters from Teen Magazines and printable coloring sheets my friends and I have. Tacky.
Anything with a violent theme or very sexual. When I say sexual, I mean the sexual act, not just a sexy painting or drawing of a man or a woman. I also don’t like artwork that distorts the human form in a grotesque fashion, but abstract and cubism can be ok.
Huge paintings of themselves in fantasy-style settings. Life-size, freestanding humanoid carnival figures (especially in corners).
I think I might be fine with pictures of cruelty, so long as it seemed poignant. I’m thinking like this or this or this. Basically, if it graced the cover of a magazine like Time or Life, or won someone a Pulitzer, then I’m totally fine with it.
The only thing that would really bother me would be if the walls were adorned with Thomas Kincaid paintings and/or the shelves were loaded with Precious Moments figurines.
There are a lot of paintings that are fine hanging in a museum that would strike me as strange in someone’s home. In general, paintings depicting any kind of unpleasantness or nudity would strike me as odd. Picasso’s Guernica is a great painting, but not in someone’s living room.
The paintings of Zdzisław Beksiński might tend to weird out visitors, though I quite like their sinister moods.
Gaming “trophies” like those decapitated bucks you see in gentleman’s smoking rooms.
Either that or dwarfs pinned to the walls with sealing wax.
This mannequin sitting on my BIL’s couch. I find it humorous since I’m familiar with the personality of my BIL, but if I happened to come across this at someones house I wasn’t quite familiar with, I would probably scratch my head and go hmmm?......
I’m pretty good with almost all forms of art.
I’m with Fiddle; Thomas Kincaid stuff makes me ill. Also what @tinyfaery wrote; Anne Geddes photography. People in various sexual positions? No thanks. I personally have 4 or 5 nudes in my place. Three in the living room. One on the bedroom. And, a nude 3D book from the 50’s. That’s cool. :)
(NSFW)
Nude1
Nude2
“Nude3”:
Skat related stuff would bug me.
Photos of them naked in public parts of the house. Those glamour photography shots that look NOTHING like them and they ask you to respond to. Those can be very awkward…
Crap. Not fast enough.
(NSFW)
Nude3
Nude4 (In my bedroom)
Nude book (In the kitchen. It’s 3D :))
Felt like sharing.
I went out with a woman I met on line. We’d hit it off in part because of our interest in the arts. She was a conservatory-trained artist. After dancing, she invited me, back to her apartment where she had one work of art hung on the wall. At 8×10ish portrait of a clown. I thought it must be a joke or a test or something. But, no, she said she just liked it. kind of down hill from there…
@Jude I love nudes in paintings/books/drawings. I have some of Norman Lindsay’s nudes (still to be framed) and I think the naked body is one of the most beautiful things in the world. I think that is real art.
People having blown up photographs of themselves naked placed in public places in the house as art works (might be okay if they were absolutely gorgeous I guess) I find a bit over the top (if it is placed in the lounge room for instance). In the bedroom…....... go for it.
I like the paintings you put up very much.
@Jude I found (NSFW nude) this artwork several months ago when looking for a new avatar. I immediately thought of you because I know you like antiques. =)—
@flutherother I wrote a paper for one of my art classes about the symbolism behind one of his paintings.
Fascinating answers! I think I’d have to agree with actively obscene stuff like overly sexual or violent stuff. An exception might be the occasional war or Holocaust photo.
What really irks me is when an artist’s home is completely filled with his/her own work. I would expect a few of the pieces in an artist’s home to be his/her own work, but when most of what you see is the homeowner’s work? That just smacks of arrogance to me. If the artist is a professional, however, I would expect more of the artwork to be the artist’s work. But, like I said, if the majority or even all of the work in someone’s home is their work, it just seems to arrogant to me.
@KatawaGrey My grandfather was an artist and his paintings were all over my grandparents apartment, i wonder if it is different if your SO is the one hanging the stuff up?
@JLeslie: I suppose it is different if it is at the preference of the family members living with the artist. It’s also different if there is not a lot of art. If there is only one or two pieces of art in each room and they are all the artists, I might think differently. However. if the whole place is just covered/filled with the artist’s work, it makes me wince.
@KatawaGrey It was everywhere LOL. My mom, growing up in that house, likes very little artwork or photos on the walls in her house. I loved being at my grandparents apartment and seeing all of his work, but I can understand why it seems odd.
I can’t think of many things that would weird me out – or at least not something general that comes to mind when I think of creepy art. I guess anything that really graphically depicts violence would bother me, but as it’s someone elses house I would probably just take it as a difference in taste.
I can usually ‘tolerate’ most art I suppose. Nudity doesn’t bother me, bad modern art doesn’t bother me too much. I don’t really like babies. Maybe baby-based art would make me cringe.
gigantic portraits of the owner, so narcissistic
I went into a house where the owner had a photo of herself on the wall which looked interesting and demanded a closer look. THe closer look revealed she was wearing NO knickers, awkward and quite disturbing.
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