“Wrong” (John Baldessari)

 

“I love the idea that somebody would just say that this is right and this is wrong. So I decided I would have. . . a work of art that was wrong— which seems right to me” (Wrong). Under the influence of disciplined art, people often establish a system of rules or suggestions abundantly enforced nominally to make an art piece “right”. For photography, these rules may include The Rule of Thirds and The Rules of Symmetry. However, John Baldessari, a reputable conceptual photographer, questioned the traditional aesthetic beauty of art by exhibiting his “wrong” series in 1967. The most famous of this series depicts an image with extremely poor composition juxtaposed with the text “wrong” bellow the photograph(Yigruzeltil). This image refers to a chapter on composition in a photography techniques book; nevertheless, instead of following the compositing suggestion, Baldessari contrasted and broke all the rules followed with his composition of this “bad” picture. The irony of the word is what makes the image so appealing. In the version without the word “wrong”, the photograph only was demonstrated as an off-centered, ambiguous artwork of doing the wrong thing; however, when the word “wrong”  accompanies the photo, a subtle satire of the implied judgment of objective correctness is manifested. This depicts clearly how significant is context in an art piece and how it can entirely shape the piece’s level of profundity and make it an signficant art work.   Furthermore, an article from the website “The Archieve is Limited” states that John “Baldessari is interested in communicating his concept more than he is in creating something precious or unique. “The reason why this art piece is “undeniably seen as a work of art” is because of the concept and message Baldessari is conveying (John Baldessari). Clearly, Baldessari was trying doubt the needs of conforming to a conventional aspects of art or photograph. Why does a piece of artwork work have to be judged? With this in mind, he constituted this photograph “Wrong”, and with an context of breaking the traditional judgement of aesthetics on art, this “bad” picture can definitely be reputed as “good”.

 

 

MLA Citations:

Baldessari, John “Wrong” Photograph. Dragon’s Exchange, ISB, 22nd August 2024.
https://dx.isb.cn/dash/#/classroom/648607/sections/lesson/344114/page/344116/
edit, Accessed 22nd August 2024.

“JOHN BALDESSARI, Wrong [1966-1968], 2012 [LACMA print].” The Archive is
Limited, 16 Sept. 2012, www.thearchiveislimited.com/
john-baldessari-wrong-1966-1968/. Accessed 20 Aug. 2024.

“Wrong.” Los Angeles Country Museum of Art, collections.lacma.org/node/237769.
Accessed 20 Aug. 2024.

Yigruzeltil. “Wrong.” Wikiart, 17 Mar. 2013, www.wikiart.org/en/john-baldessari/
wrong-1967. Accessed 20 Aug. 2024.

 

 

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