kitsch

Imagine a line bounded at the far left end by sensation and at the far right end by sentiment. Kitsch lives entirely on the right side. This zone includes all varieties of sentiment no matter how mediated by any variety of tropes [ irony for example ]. Most art lives here - from Jean-Léon Gérôme and Lawrence Alma-Tadema in the 19th century to figures like Pierre Bonnard in the early 20th century and Jeff Koons and Frank Stella in the late 20th century.

Stalin ( in a military context ) is quoted as remarking 'quantity has a quality all of its own' - in judging kitsch its kind of the same in that it reveals. For example, works taken individually in the case of say, Alma-Tadema, Anselm Kiefer, Jean-Michel Basquiat, to name but a few can be rather charming. However, taken in larger exhibitions of multiple works, it quickly evaporates, leaving a kind of nausea. Never happens in the case of guys like Picasso, Matisse, Beuys, Palermo.