To the editors:
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WHAT IT ACTUALLY LOOKS LIKE! That is what separates 20th Century conceptual art from what we recognize as greatness in the arts of other periods and civilizations. We do not consider a particular medieval painting great just because its subject matter depicts the Madonna and Child. We do not consider it repulsive because it also includes the portrait of a wealthy, corrupt patron. We judge it, and may come to love it, because of how it actually looks. A historical work of art may even be a copy of an earlier masterpiece. It doesn’t matter. If a painting is beautiful, it has a value to us because of the way it looks.
This is not to question the perfect understanding and ecstasy which Mr. Camper experienced at the Warhol exhibit. But it is to question his understanding and experience with that body of work which over the centuries our civilization has accepted as Fine Art–works which embody a quality of life-sustaining beauty within their forms and compositions. These are qualities which may appear in everything from ancient Assyrian bas-relief to medieval Chinese calligraphy to Renoir and Picasso. The ecstasy of life within a form has nothing in common with Mr. Camper’s experience and the rest of conceptual art. It’s like the difference between the satisfactions and challenges of a marriage compared to the excitements, terrors and rapid mental gymnastics of a first date.
Fred Camper replies:
