he erased de kooning

someone somewhere talked to me about some guy who did this :

in 1959, Robert Rauschenberg, a young thought not inconsequential artist, asked William de Kooning to participate in an art project. De Kooning, who was not only older and much more established than Rauschenberg, but whose works sold for considerably sums of money, agreed to participate and gave Rauschenberg what he considered to be an important drawing.

the drawing de Kooning selected was executed in heavy crayon, grease pencil, ink and graphite. Rauschenberg spent a month on the work, erasing it completely. then he placed the de kooning drawing in a gold leaf frame and hand-lettered the date and title on the drawing: "erased de kooning drawing, 1953". Rauschenberg had not only erased de kooning's work, but he had also exhibited the "erasure" as his work of art.

its things like these that makes us question what art really is. in my point of view, a piece of art needs careful consideration, a huge amount of time spent thinking of the message (if there is one) and another deal of time spent executing the plan. painstakingly of course.

so if that is the case, then surely the erased de kooning is a piece of art? if there is a solid reason to something then that something surely must be viable. a month spent on a piece is surely alot of time spent. it might be cheeky but for me i think its something.

then there is this other example :

this famous artist is walking along the beach. he is then approached by this curator who wants to display one of the artist's works in his gallery. so this artist guy looked around, picked up a piece of driftwood and goes "here you go. call it Driftwood".

so many things to ponder. so little space left inside.