35-414: A critic is a person who communicates an assessment and an opinion of various forms of creative works such as art , literature , music , cinema , theater , fashion , architecture, and food. Critics may also take as their subject social or government policy . Critical judgments, whether derived from critical thinking or not, weigh up a range of factors, including an assessment of the extent to which
70-515: A brain tumour in 2003. Their son, Danton, Hughes's only child, was named after the French revolutionary Georges Danton . Danton Hughes, a sculptor, committed suicide in April 2001; he was found by his partner, fashion designer Jenny Kee , with whom he had been in a long-term relationship. Robert Hughes later wrote: "I miss Danton and always will, although we had been miserably estranged for years and
105-436: A critic's influence is enhanced by subsequent reworkings such as the operatic versions of Beaumarchais's play ( The Barber of Seville ) by Rossini and ( The Marriage of Figaro ) by Mozart . August Ahlqvist , a Finnish professor and poet, who highly admired J. L. Runeberg , the national poet of Finland, gave very negative feedback to the entire literary production of the author Aleksis Kivi , when Kivi presented content of
140-581: A critic's job to be right or wrong; it's his job to express an opinion in readable English." Schonberg was the first music critic to receive the Pulitzer Prize for criticism. Daniel Mendelsohn described the equation of criticism for critics as knowledge + taste = meaningful judgement . Restaurant critic Terry Durack explained that from a critic "you hope for a thorough, objective and legitimate discussion" that puts "opera, art or book into context, so that it adds to your own body of knowledge"; in
175-615: A range of theoretical positions . For instance, they may take a feminist or Freudian perspective. Unlike other individuals who may editorialize on subjects via websites or letters written to publications, professional critics are paid to produce their assessment and opinions for print , radio, magazine, television, or Internet companies . When their personal opinion outweighs considered judgment, people who give opinions, whether on current events, public affairs, sports, media or art are often referred to as "pundits" instead of critics. Critics are themselves subject to competing critics, since
210-600: A time in Italy before settling in London in 1965, where he wrote for The Spectator , The Daily Telegraph , The Times , and The Observer , among others, and contributed to the London version of Oz . In 1970 he was appointed art critic for TIME magazine and moved to New York, where he soon became an influential voice. In 1966 Hughes published a history of Australian painting titled The Art of Australia , still considered an important work. Hughes wrote and narrated
245-568: The University of Sydney . At university, he associated with the Sydney "Push" – a group of artists, writers, intellectuals and drinkers. Among the group were Germaine Greer and Clive James . Hughes, an aspiring artist and poet, abandoned his university endeavours to become first a cartoonist and then an art critic for the Sydney periodical The Observer , edited by Donald Horne . Hughes
280-410: The 20th century". Hughes, according to Adam Gopnik , was drawn to work that was rough-hewn, "craft attempted with passion." Hughes's critical prose, vivid in both praise and indignation, has been compared to that of George Bernard Shaw , Jonathan Swift and William Shakespeare . "His prose", according to a colleague, "was lithe, muscular and fast as a bunch of fives. He was incapable of writing
315-589: The BBC eight-part series The Shock of the New (1980) on the development of modern art since the Impressionists . It was produced and in part directed by Lorna Pegram . It was accompanied by a book with the same title. John O'Connor of The New York Times said, "Agree or disagree, you will not be bored. Mr. Hughes has a disarming way of being provocative." Hughes's TV series American Visions (1997) reviewed
350-438: The New proved to be a popular and critical success: it has been assessed "much the best synoptic introduction to modern art ever written", taking as its premise the vitality gained by modern art when it ceded the need to replicate nature in favour of a more direct expression of human experience and emotion. Hughes's explanations of modern art benefited from the coherence of his judgments, and were marked by his ability to summarise
385-535: The Wikimedia System Administrators, please include the details below. Request from 172.68.168.237 via cp1104 cp1104, Varnish XID 177503304 Upstream caches: cp1104 int Error: 429, Too Many Requests at Thu, 28 Nov 2024 05:33:48 GMT Robert Hughes (critic) Robert Studley Forrest Hughes AO (28 July 1938 – 6 August 2012) was an Australian-born art critic , writer, and producer of television documentaries . He
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#1732772027945420-427: The context of a restaurant criticism, this means it is "not about me liking it or not; it's about me helping you decide whether you are going to like it or not." Rothko's dilemma was that he wanted to employ the vocabulary of symbolism – the palpitating indeterminate space, the excruciatingly refined colour, the obsession with nuance, the presence of Mallarmé's "negated object" – to render
455-556: The critic will read the book before writing a notice of it. We do not even expect the reviewer of the book will say that he has not read it. No we have no anticipations of anything unusual in this age of criticism. Satirical comment about potential criticism by Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner in their Preface to the American Edition of their co-authored novel The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today . Art criticism Too Many Requests If you report this error to
490-499: The critic. In architecture and food criticism , the item's function, value and cost may be added components. Critics are publicly accepted and, to a significant degree, followed because of the quality of their assessments or their reputation. Influential critics of art, music, theater and architecture often present their arguments in complete books. One very famous example is John Ruskin 's Seven Lamps of Architecture and The Stones of Venice . Critics may base their assessment on
525-523: The essential qualities of his subject. Whether positive or negative, his judgments were enthusiastic. He championed London painters like Frank Auerbach and Lucian Freud , helping to popularise the latter in the United States, and wrote with unabashed admiration for Francisco Goya and Pierre Bonnard . By contrast Hughes was dismissive of much postmodernism and neo-expressionism , of painters like Julian Schnabel and David Salle , as well as
560-540: The final critical judgment always entails subjectivity . An established critic can play a powerful role as a public arbiter of taste or opinion. Also, critics or a coordinated group of critics, may award symbols of recognition. The word "critic" comes from Greek κριτικός (kritikós) 'able to discern', which is a Greek derivation of the word κριτής (krités) , meaning a person who offers reasoned judgment or analysis , value judgment , interpretation or observation . Early English meaning of criticism
595-417: The greatest art critic of our time and it will be a long while before we see his like again. He made criticism look like literature. He also made it look morally worthwhile. He lent a nobility to what can often seem a petty way to spend your life. Hughes could be savage, but he was never petty. There was purpose to his lightning bolts of condemnation". Hughes and Harold Hayes were recruited in 1978 to anchor
630-632: The history of American art since the Revolution . Hughes's documentary on Francisco Goya , Goya: Crazy Like a Genius (2002), was broadcast on the first night of the new British domestic digital service , BBC Four . He created a one-hour update to The Shock of the New , titled The New Shock of the New , which first aired in 2004. He published the first volume of his memoirs, Things I Didn’t Know , in 2006. Following his death, Jonathan Jones wrote in The Guardian that Hughes "was simply
665-417: The item under review achieves its purpose and its creator's intention and a knowledge of its context. They may also include a positive or negative personal response. Characteristics of a good critic are articulateness, preferably having the ability to use language with a high level of appeal and skill. Sympathy , sensitivity and insight are also important. Form , style and medium are all considered by
700-630: The late 1990s, Hughes was a prominent supporter of the Australian Republican Movement . Australia: Beyond the Fatal Shore (2000) was a series musing on modern Australia and Hughes's relationship with it. During production, Hughes was involved in a near-fatal road accident. Hughes met his first wife, Danne Emerson, in London in 1967. Together they became involved in the counterculture of the 1960s , exploring drug use and sexual freedom. They divorced in 1981; she died of
735-508: The new ABC News (US) newsmagazine 20/20 . Their only broadcast, on 6 June 1978, proved so controversial that, less than a week later, ABC News president Roone Arledge terminated the contracts of both men, replacing them with veteran TV host Hugh Downs . Hughes's book The Fatal Shore followed in 1987. A study of the British penal colonies and early European settlement of Australia , it became an international best-seller. During
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#1732772027945770-420: The pain of his loss has been somewhat blunted by the passage of time". Hughes was married to his second wife, Victoria Whistler, from 1981 until their divorce in 1996. In 1999, Hughes was involved in a near-fatal car accident south of Broome, Western Australia . He was returning from a fishing trip and driving on the wrong side of the road when he collided head on with another car carrying three occupants. He
805-618: The patriarchal despair and elevation of the Old Testament. Criticism doesn't get sharper, or more sensitive, or more deeply sympathetic to the object, than that. Robert Hughes (critic) on (artist) Mark Rothko Social and political critics have used various forms of art to express their criticism, including literature and music. Pierre Beaumarchais , for example, prior to the French Revolution , used his play The Marriage of Figaro to denounce aristocratic privilege, and
840-466: The peoples social life in the form of rude realism instead of romanticism . Among the most famous social/political criticism in literary form are Jonathan Swift's satire Gulliver's Travels and George Orwell 's satire Animal Farm . Some political critics, such as Ai Weiwei use visual art as their medium. Throughout history, political critics have faced higher risks, including the risk of imprisonment or death. Several websites have developed for
875-637: The purpose of compiling or publishing original critical reviews. Examples include Blogcritics , Rotten Tomatoes , and Yelp . According to A. O. Scott , chief film critic for The New York Times , everyone on the Internet is a critic. Some critics like Roger Ebert achieve iconic status in pop culture and become well regarded. The American film critics Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel collaborated and appeared on television sometimes agreeing on their review of cinematographic works; sometimes they would differ. Film critics may use star classification to qualify
910-609: The reviewed works. Characters depicting critics have been part of some movies, and have been represented in comedies, such as a food critic in the animated fantasy-comedy Ratatouille , and as an art critic in one of the initial parts of the anthology comedy film The History of the World Part I . People whose work is the subject of criticism have a full range of responses to it. For example, they may be appreciative, offended, distressed, encouraged, amused or nonplussed. We do not object to criticism; and we do not expect that
945-443: The vicissitudes of a money-fuelled art market. While his reviews expressed antipathy for the avant-garde , he was beholden neither to any theory nor ideology, and managed to provoke both ends of the political spectrum. He distrusted novelty in art for its own sake, yet he was also disdainful of a conservative aesthetic that avoided risk. He famously labelled contemporary Australian indigenous art as "the last great art movement of
980-514: Was aged 12. His mother was Margaret Eyre Sealy, née Vidal. His elder brother was Australian politician Thomas Eyre Forrest Hughes , the father of former Sydney Lord Mayor Lucy Turnbull , the wife of former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull . He had another brother Geoffrey and one sister, Constance. Growing up in Rose Bay, Sydney , Hughes was educated at Saint Ignatius' College, Riverview before studying arts and then architecture at
1015-459: Was also survived by two stepsons from his wife's previous marriage, Freeborn Garrettson Jewett IV and Fielder Douglas Jewett; his brothers, Tom and Geoffrey Hughes; a sister, Constance Crisp; and many nieces and nephews. When The Shock of the New was proposed to the BBC, television programmers were sceptical that a journalist could properly follow the aristocratic tone of Kenneth Clark , whose Civilisation had been so successful. The Shock of
1050-577: Was based mainly on the criticism of literature and it was in the 17th century that more general forms of criticism began. Cultural critic Clement Greenberg wrote that a good critic excels through "insights into the evidence ... and by ... loyalty to the relevant"; poet and critic T.S. Eliot wrote "a critic must have a very highly developed sense of fact ". In 1971, Harold C. Schonberg , chief music critic of The New York Times from 1960 to 1980, said that he wrote for himself, "not necessarily for readers, not for musicians. ... It's not
1085-508: Was briefly involved in the original Sydney version of Oz magazine and wrote art criticism for Nation and the Sunday Mirror . In 1961, while still a student, Hughes was caught up in controversy when a number of his classmates demonstrated in a student newspaper article that he had published plagiarised poetry by Terence Tiller and others, and a drawing by Leonard Baskin . Hughes left Australia for Europe in 1964, living for
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1120-553: Was described in 1997 by Robert Boynton of The New York Times as "the most famous art critic in the world." Hughes earned widespread recognition for his book and television series on modern art , The Shock of the New , and for his longstanding position as art critic with TIME magazine. He is also known for his best seller The Fatal Shore (1986), a study of the British convict system in early Australian history . Known for his contentious critiques of art and artists, Hughes
1155-662: Was fined A$ 2,500. Hughes recounts the story of the accident and his recovery in the first chapter of his 2006 memoir Things I Didn't Know . In 2001, Hughes wed his third wife, the American artist and art director Doris Downes . "Apart from being a talented painter, she saved my life, my emotional stability, such as it is", he said. After a long illness, reportedly exacerbated by some 50 years of alcohol consumption, Hughes died at Calvary Hospital in The Bronx , New York City, on 6 August 2012, with his wife at his bedside. He
1190-482: Was generally conservative in his tastes, although he did not belong to a particular philosophical camp. His writing was noted for its power and elegance. Hughes was born in Sydney, in 1938. His father and paternal grandfather were lawyers. Hughes's father, Geoffrey Forrest Hughes , was a pilot in the First World War , with later careers as a solicitor and company director. He died from lung cancer when Robert
1225-405: Was trapped in the car for three hours before being airlifted to Perth in critical condition. Hughes was in a coma for five weeks after the crash. In a 2000 court hearing, Hughes's defence barrister alleged that the occupants of the other car had been transporting illicit drugs at the time of the accident and were at fault. In 2003 Hughes pleaded guilty to dangerous driving causing bodily harm and
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