The best of the worst Lego Ideas

[x105Black]

9 hours ago, parsom said:

And if you liked this project - check this one:

That one is fantastic!  Even better then the previous one.

[icm]

9 hours ago, parsom said:

And if you liked this project - check this one: (Narnia wardrobe)

Supported!  That's a fantastic build there.  Lots of good features, nicely detailed, not unreasonably large, stable enough to be built in all real parts, and with a family-friendly story and seasonal tie-in!  Good luck!

[anothergol]

2 hours ago, koalayummies said:

What is that thing? Is it made of food? Is it melting? Where is it from and whats the story?

It's those barometer-like statues that are supposed to change color according to weather. I believe that one is a dog on the body of a spider.
This other one does something to a cat.

https://www.avenue-de-la-plage.com/164-statuette-barometre

But yeah there's something very similar that's actually food (well, all sugar), as corny but STILL a thing every year in every family for christmas here:

Edited December 6, 2018 by anothergol

[parsom]

38 minutes ago, x105Black said:

That one is fantastic!  Even better then the previous one.

Thanks! Vote for it!

31 minutes ago, icm said:

Supported!  That's a fantastic build there.  Lots of good features, nicely detailed, not unreasonably large, stable enough to be built in all real parts, and with a family-friendly story and seasonal tie-in!  Good luck!

Thank you!

Edited December 6, 2018 by parsom

[Blondie-Wan]

On 12/6/2018 at 12:14 AM, icm said:

See, I just can't get on board with an outlook like that.  If you want to believe that successful projects you don't like are only successful because they're backed by organized pranksters or political organizations with which you strongly disagree, that's your choice.  Of course, I have no solid evidence to prove that such is not the case, but I think it's highly unlikely that Ideas is pervaded, infiltrated, etc., by the like.  Occam's Razor applies here - if a project gets 10,000 votes, the simplest explanation is that people like it. 

As for the question of technical merit in the Peru project, it's quite clear that the artists put a lot of effort into it.  No child would build such an intricate map of Peru on the back face, and the bold, simple lines and shapes on the interior back wall and inside front covers match the typical style of the non-Lego source. Furthermore, they created custom minifigure skins, which is not a trivial task in a digital build and render.  The interior design style is simple and blocky, yes, but not out of place for Lego.  The building style may be a simple, bottom-up brick build, with all studs exposed, but that doesn't mean it is totally without merit.  Not every Lego set, nor even every Ideas set, needs to use the most advanced building techniques.  What matters to me is that, relative to the building style the artists chose, they executed it well, with good proportions, good color blocking, and a layout that nicely displays each section of the build.  I did not expect the Wonders of Peru to pass the review, because of its relatively limited regional appeal and possible technical issues with keeping the walls and roof stable in a physical version, and, yes, because I've come to expect more complicated builds from Ideas, but I do not dismiss it as completely without merit, and a probable joke.

This, absolutely. 

 

Edited December 7, 2018 by Blondie-Wan

[anothergol]

18 hours ago, Blondie-Wan said:

How many people did you know who even knew of the project at all?

No one before it got 10k, but plenty once it made the news about the ones Lego had to pick from.

18 hours ago, Blondie-Wan said:

That assumes the project has no merits, which you have yet to demonstrate.

There's no technical merit to demonstrate to anyone who's at least an average MOCer. It's quite possible that it was built in a naive way on purpose, but that still doesn't make it a good build.
Artistical merits, I can't even argue because it's so subjective & one would find artistical merits in trash.

 

18 hours ago, Blondie-Wan said:

and upon a rather unpleasant denigration of folk traditions of entire peoples

So is this why you like it, because you're afraid to hurt a country? Or, like in the "art" industry, because you assume that people in that country are less advanced & thus that naive form of art moves you?

Again, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that peruvians find these ugly as well, and only make them for tourists. Belgium, like any country, has its own folkloric crap. NO BELGIAN knows about it, and yet, there are tourists who come here, see a couple of people dancing in weird disguises from another century (that, again, no belgian knows about), and they come back to their country thinking that "they have seen belgian folklore".

Let me google-image "belgian folklore" for a laugh. What is this? I don't know. Looks like crap to me, and I wouldn't feel insulted if someone said it was crap. I don't think it's made for belgian, or if it is, it's a pretty local thing.

Now, there is something VERY typical to Belgium (& Holland, Germany perhaps?), that truely is folklore, which happened yesterday, and probably like every year made the news all over the world. But I won't say why, I will just point to this MOC (which DOES have technical merits, btw) I saw 2 days ago. This is one that Lego would NEVER dare to do. My point? Sometimes there's folkloric stuff that you just can't defend.
It just makes me laugh that there's this thing purely made for kids in a small part of the world, that would not even pass Lego Idea's submission filter.

 

18 hours ago, Blondie-Wan said:

Remember a while back, when a brick-built figure of Perdue Pete made it to review? I’m no sports fan and a college sports mascot like that holds zero appeal for me, but I totally get why others might want it, and I don’t need to go around bemoaning their support of it.

I just saw it. It's another horrible bottom-up brick build that could have been made so much better. But here it's different, the people who vote for it, are voting for their team, just like people who vote for a crap build around a license, are actually voting for the license (& perhaps rightfully so, considering Lego generally redesigns the project anyway).

Anyway, for me there are only 2 explanations: trolls or peruvians. It may simply have made TV news in Peru and there, easy 10k, out of 32 millions peruvians. There are many examples of Ideas projects that made 10k overnight because they made the news somewhere.

Edited December 7, 2018 by anothergol

[koalayummies]

8 hours ago, anothergol said:

Artistical merits, I can't even argue because it's so subjective & one would find artistical merits in trash.

Yeah anyone who's taken a halfway decent art class knows how true this is. 'Artists' displaying literal feces and other bodily fluids as art museum exhibits. Shock art. Shart.

[jimmynick]

14 hours ago, anothergol said:

There's no technical merit to demonstrate to anyone who's at least an average MOCer.

One might say there's no technical merit to the Minecraft sets, but the Idea was popular and it passed review. Not only that, but there's an entire line of Minecraft sets, so clearly technical merit has little to do with the success of a project.

14 hours ago, anothergol said:

So is this why you like it, because you're afraid to hurt a country? Or, like in the "art" industry, because you assume that people in that country are less advanced & thus that naive form of art moves you?

No, it's because you are so generally dismissing the artistic efforts of an entire country based on one example, which is unfair to the entire country. To name one example: if I don't like "Fountain" by Marcel Duchamp, does that mean that the ouvre of French art is worthless? If I don't enjoy the taste of Chimay, does that mean Belgium has no real culture? Of course not.

Consider your example of garden gnomes; they are incredibly kitsch, but the kitsch comes with a certain warm or loving feeling. In fact, I think a sculpted garden gnome in LEGO might be fairly amusing, even though I would not put one outside my house. That aside, folk art is not all bad, but it is not all good either. I don't like bluegrass, haggis, or Morris dancing, but if ten thousand users on Ideas support one of those things, then it would deserve a fair shake. Just like Wonders of Peru.

Who are you to say that Zwarte Piet is true folklore and these tableaux from Peru are not? Maybe it's the eurocentrism talking.... You are trashing the very idea of the project based purely on your own assumptions and biases. See below:

14 hours ago, anothergol said:

Again, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that peruvians find these ugly as well, and only make them for tourists.

You have no evidence for this claim. Going to google with the words "ayacuchano" or "retablo" indicates that this is actually folkloric tradition going back 500 years, and not just tourist tat.

14 hours ago, anothergol said:

Anyway, for me there are only 2 explanations: trolls or peruvians. It may simply have made TV news in Peru and there, easy 10k, out of 32 millions peruvians. There are many examples of Ideas projects that made 10k overnight because they made the news somewhere.

I quite like the Wonders of Peru based on aesthetic considerations. Does that make me wrong? I don't suppose anyone is going to convince you, founder of a thread dedicated to slating submissions from children and projects that are purportedly low-effort, that you are anything but the mightiest arbiter of taste.

Edited December 8, 2018 by jamesn

[anothergol]

12 hours ago, jamesn said:

No, it's because you are so generally dismissing the artistic efforts of an entire country based on one example, which is unfair to the entire country

wait what? I dare to hope that art in Peru's isn't limited to those abominations. In fact, if I google-image for "peruvian art", I have to scroll down some pages before seeing one of this crap, the rest is pretty nice, there's even a nice piece of street art at the top (edit: not actually peruvian).

12 hours ago, jamesn said:

Who are you to say that Zwarte Piet is true folklore and these tableaux from Peru are not?

They both are, where have I said the opposite?

12 hours ago, jamesn said:

You have no evidence for this claim. Going to google with the words "ayacuchano" or "retablo" indicates that this is actually folkloric tradition going back 500 years, and not just tourist tat. 

I have no evidence, which is why I wrote "I wouldn't be surprised". And the fact it's an old tradition, is a hint that it's for tourists. But if the people working on these also have them in their house, well then I stand corrected.

12 hours ago, jamesn said:

I quite like the Wonders of Peru based on aesthetic considerations. Does that make me wrong?

that at least makes you weird. But I also believe you wouldn't put one in your house, and that it's more about political correctness.

Edited December 8, 2018 by anothergol

[parsom]

1 hour ago, anothergol said:

that at least makes you weird.

You have some childhood trauma for folk art or what? I understand this, growing up with garden gnomes can be traumatising...

[JJ Tong (zfogshooterz)]

15 hours ago, koalayummies said:

Yeah anyone who's taken a halfway decent art class knows how true this is. 'Artists' displaying literal feces and other bodily fluids as art museum exhibits. Shock art. Shart.

Same here too. I was browsing an art site (I can't remember the name) for some research and I can't believe they would consider a mess of a smashed up clock as art. Still, I would guess what you saw was way worse.

Edited December 8, 2018 by JJ Tong (zfogshooterz)

[anothergol]

I think that what counts as art nowadays (well, for over a century actually, and sadly) is the story behind, or the motivation, or message, or the artist himself, while the piece of art itself has just become an accessory.
The last popular one was Banksy's "girl with balloon" auction. The "painting" isn't that bad, it's not ugly, it's just kinda generic. The specific painting that was auctioned is even more generic since it's just one representation of it. The self-shredding event, that was the art. And I must admit it was interesting enough, but it makes the "painting" itself just a small accessory in this "artistic event". And owning it isn't any different than owning some dust from the moon, the object itself has no intrinsic value, it's the story behind that has.
And back to the thing of Peru, I would have understood it better (but still wouldn't have agreed with it) if it had been this form of "art". Abusing Lego Ideas, THAT would pass as modern or contemporary art. Would still be a joke, tho.
 

But I prefer to call art the one we see every day in movies, videogames or "toys".

1 hour ago, JJ Tong (zfogshooterz) said:

Same here too. I was browsing an art site (I can't remember the name) for some research and I can't believe they would consider a mess of a smashed up clock as art. Still, I would guess what you saw was way worse.

If you haven't already, check the several "modern art or children's drawings" online quizzes, it's funny.

Edited December 8, 2018 by anothergol

[Blondie-Wan]

I don’t get why you’d think the fact a folk art tradition goes back centuries makes you think it’s for tourists. Do you think Peruvian peoples were courting tourism 500 years ago?

At any rate, it's true I can’t speak for the submitters, but I can speak for myself, and yes, I genuinely liked the project. I’d have been happy to have gotten an official set from it.

[anothergol]

33 minutes ago, Blondie-Wan said:

I don’t get why you’d think the fact a folk art tradition goes back centuries makes you think it’s for tourists. Do you think Peruvian peoples were courting tourism 500 years ago?

Simply because we have similar things here. And I've never said that it was for tourists 500 years ago.

But hey, I was just guessing. So now let me fact-check it:

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowTopic-g294314-i3023-k4552965-Buying_a_retablos-Cusco_Cusco_Region.html

-"I will be in Peru next week and interested in buying a nativity scene retablos. Are they found in the markets?"

-"You will see them in gift shops and tourist markets. If you look at one in the Lima airport gift shops or at Larcomar Mall, it will be 2 or 3 times what you might pay in the Indian Markets. There are probably more places in Lima but you should see some at the big tourist markets in Aguas Calientes or Pisac."

There, fact-checked.
Looks pretty common, it's just basic tourism like you'd find in countries like Tunisia, where some are trying to make you buy stuff of poor quality purely made for tourists, & sometimes actually made in China. And then many tourists get back home and think that they have visited Tunisia, met tunisians, and bought tunisian stuff, while they were on rails in a tourism circuit, never visited anything outside the boundaries, and were forced to buy crap in shops purely designed for them.
Same in the US btw. I've been an on-rail tourist in Florida, and how boy the rails were so smooth... should I really conclude that there's aligator crap in every home in Florida? I doubt it.
And if you go to Paris, you come back with a plastic Eiffel tower made in China, perhaps you bought a beret, and visited le Moulin Rouge. Parisians don't give a shit about these toys, no one in France wears a beret, and le Moulin Rouge doesn't represent anything of the french's contemporary life. It reminds me of those episodes of the Simpsons that are around a foreign country, they don't look like that country at all, but like tourists see them.

 

Here's some street art in Peru, from Google image. Does that make it look like Peru is really about crap naive art? No, this is modern, Peru isn't the indian reserve you think it is, it's the modern world like everywhere (except north korea where access to the outside world is restricted).

Edited December 8, 2018 by anothergol

[jimmynick]

On 12/7/2018 at 8:06 AM, anothergol said:

because you assume that people in that country are less advanced

1 hour ago, anothergol said:

Peru isn't the indian reserve you think it is,

You are the one putting these chauvinist statements into other people's mouths. Naive art has nothing to do with race, ethnicity or nationality (or even skill), but instead reflects a lack of formal artistic education. Fortunately for the skeptics, people do like naive art include "real" artists like Gauguin, so one can't really say that naive art is artistically bankrupt.

Folk art, on the other hand, is very much tied to place but still has little to do with artistic skill. The issue here is that while those lovely Peruvian murals you've posted are indeed art (which is not to say these tableaux are not), they are not so uniquely tied to Peru as the ayacuchano concept behind the Wonders project.

4 hours ago, anothergol said:

They both are, where have I said the opposite?

You say Zwarte Piet is real folklore:

On 12/7/2018 at 8:06 AM, anothergol said:

that truely is folklore

This deliberately contrasts him with the other Belgian tradition in the same post, which you think is "crap". By extension, it seems that any art form you don't like cannot possible be real art, or real folklore.

2 hours ago, anothergol said:

I think that what counts as art nowadays (well, for over a century actually, and sadly) is the story behind, or the motivation, or message, or the artist himself, while the piece of art itself has just become an accessory.

the object itself has no intrinsic value

This is an interesting pair of statements. What does intrinsic value mean?

Let's take a look at the efforts of a Renaissance master. Take Leonardo's Mona Lisa. I could facetiously put it to you that the only intrinsic value of that painting is that I can burn it in a fireplace for warmth on a cold winter's night. People do value that painting, partly because it was stolen a few times around the turn of the 20th century. But let's look at another example. Consider the Last Supper, the fresco painted on the wall of a dining room in a monastery in Milan. Is it technically sound? No - Leonardo's pigment kept falling off the wall because he tried to tinker with the recipe for fresco-making, and it's an unmitigated disaster that required much restoration. What is the point of the fresco? It relates a Biblical story and connects the monks eating in that room with the story of Christ. The picture is an accessory to the connection of 16th-century Italy with Jesus. Nevertheless, the Last Supper is a masterpiece in the Western artistic canon. Unfortunately, I can't take it down from the wall and burn it.

The point is this: the message, the story, and the intention of the artist have been the backbone of art for millennia. The story of ayacuchano is just as valid as any in the art world. It's time to get over yourself.

Edited December 8, 2018 by jamesn

[Exetrius]

So, I just came to check what the fuss around here is all about.. 

About the Wonders of Peru project: it instantly caught my attention and I simply get good vibes from the vibrant colours. And those minifigure designs are really neat! I think I read something along the lines of 'it lacks complexity'.. the lego Classic boxes lack complexity too. But those do make certain people happy, so no doubt that also for WoP there will be many happy fans. I personally wouldn't buy it because I expect it would be a very expensive box. Ideas sets are (relatively) expensive for me in general, honestly. Just my thoughts.

[icm]

I previously said I wouldn't continue to reply in this thread, but here's another post anyway - 

A few years back, I spent a couple years in Argentina.  99% of my time was spent with poor and middle-class folks well away from tourist zones, but I did make it to tourist sites and shops a few times.  Yes, the merchandise for tourists was somewhat exaggerated, but apart from the price and maybe the quality of the materials it really was pretty much the same as the folk art and local kitsch that real people had in their real homes.  As a man of English heritage who grew up in the middle of the United States, I can't claim any deep knowledge of Hispanic culture and certainly not of Peruvian culture, but based on my experience in Argentina I'm inclined to believe that these Peruvian retablos are at least "authentic" enough that real Peruvian citizens probably have them.  Maybe they don't come out all the time; maybe they're a seasonal thing; maybe the more jaded elements of Peruvian society dismiss them as tourist kitsch; but I doubt that they're nothing but a tourist trap.  By analogy, consider the tourist kitsch of Texas - it may be more displayed more prominently in the homes of wannabe Texans in other states, but that doesn't mean nobody in Texas puts a Lone Star flag on the wall or a King Ranch brand on the coffee table for decor.

OK, that's my two cents.  We can agree to disagree on the artistic merits of the Wonders of Peru; let's not make this a tempest in a teapot.

[anothergol]

2 hours ago, jamesn said:

Let's take a look at the efforts of a Renaissance master. Take Leonardo's Mona Lisa. I could facetiously put it to you that the only intrinsic value of that painting is that I can burn it in a fireplace for warmth on a cold winter's night. People do value that painting, partly because it was stolen a few times around the turn of the 20th century.

It doesn't matter, because it's not its only value. That painting isn't troll art, it's a portrait, and I admire the technique. I really don't care about the rest of its story, and yeah, its current monetary value is a joke. Glorifying Mona Lisa is a joke, but that doesn't change that it's originally a good painting (among millions of others).

2 hours ago, jamesn said:

The point is this: the message, the story, and the intention of the artist have been the backbone of art for millennia. The story of ayacuchano is just as valid as any in the art world. It's time to get over yourself.

Nope, it's only recent that art is created purely for that reason. Before that, value was given to art (or even not art) that was created for other reasons.
Can you really imagine a Pollock passing as "art" before the 18th century? Everyone would have laughed.

2 hours ago, jamesn said:

This deliberately contrasts him with the other Belgian tradition in the same post, which you think is "crap". By extension, it seems that any art form you don't like cannot possible be real art, or real folklore.

Well you assumed wrong. All of my examples were folklore, but only St Nicolas still applies to belgian people, everyone that is. Do peruvians decorate their house with those horrible things? I don't know, do you? Judging by what I can find, it doesn't seem to be the case.

1 hour ago, icm said:

Maybe they don't come out all the time; maybe they're a seasonal thing; maybe the more jaded elements of Peruvian society dismiss them as tourist kitsch

Ok, then it's similar to our horrible nativity scenes? Then I'm not that wrong comparing them to grandma's kitch statuettes.

Still, we had these under the christmas tree when I grew up. But my mother already knew it's ugly. It's just that it was the tradition, it was festive, maybe she was just doing it for the kids I don't know. But it doesn't change that it's equally ugly (well not even equally, because even the worst plastic one I found, still looked less childish than those peruvian things).
And I wouldn't find it insulting to hear "nativity scenes are ugly". Yes it's a cultural thing & not a tourists thing, yes they still exist, but yes they're ugly. It's just old corny festive stuff. Hell, there even exist passable modern versions of these.

Edited December 8, 2018 by anothergol

[icm]

6 minutes ago, anothergol said:

Ok, then it's similar to our horrible nativity scenes? Then I'm not that wrong comparing them to grandma's kitch statuettes.

Still, we had these under the christmas tree when I grew up. But my mother already knew it's ugly. It's just that it was the tradition, it was festive, maybe she was just doing it for the kids I don't know. But it doesn't change that it's equally ugly (well not even equally, because even the worst plastic one I found, still looked less childish than those peruvian things).
And I wouldn't find it insulting to hear "nativity scenes are ugly". Yes it's a cultural thing, yes they still exist, but yes they're ugly. It's just old corny festive stuff. Hell, there even exist passable modern versions of these.

Fair enough.  I can accept you not liking WoP from that perspective, and so forth.  Like I said before, I'm not the greatest fan of that project either.  It was just the bit about assuming it's a bad-faith joke because ugly-tourist-folklore-kitsch that bothered me.

[parsom]

Natibity scenes are ugly? Maybe yours:

 

[jimmynick]

1 hour ago, anothergol said:

It doesn't matter, because it's not its only value. That painting isn't troll art, it's a portrait, and I admire the technique

This is just taking a subjective value judgment and pretending it is objective. Just like when you dismiss Wonders of Peru as the effort of a cabal of trolls, simply because you don't like it.

[anothergol]

4 hours ago, jamesn said:

This is just taking a subjective value judgment and pretending it is objective

There's nothing subjective here. Anyone, or anyone's child can paint a Pollock (& I maintain that Wonders of Peru looks like the work of a child). To paint something like Mona Lisa, you have to be trained. Real artists aren't just feeling things, they also studied and understood things.

Really that may be the difference between craftsmanship & art, or how people supporting abstract art are defending it. But in my book, "art" is craftsmanship, and what's generally called art is an imposture or mockery.

Would it be such a bad rule? Only call it art when a child couldn't have done it? Or only if it doesn't look like someone took some child's craft, and gave it a fake background or story?

5 hours ago, parsom said:

Natibity scenes are ugly? Maybe yours:

I don't like it, but I can certainly acknowledge good craftsmanship in there.

Here's one I like

 

Even Amazon had home decoration that's not corny & kinda cute

[x105Black]

12 hours ago, parsom said:

Natibity scenes are ugly? Maybe yours:

That's one hell of a castle.  I'd love to see that in LEGO.  No need for the scene at the bottom.

[parsom]

7 hours ago, x105Black said:

That's one hell of a castle.  I'd love to see that in LEGO.  No need for the scene at the bottom.

Well, it is a specific form of nativity called Kraków szopka. Here is another example:

 

I built something in this style few years ago:

 

[jimmynick]

15 hours ago, anothergol said:

There's nothing subjective here. Anyone, or anyone's child can paint a Pollock (& I maintain that Wonders of Peru looks like the work of a child). To paint something like Mona Lisa, you have to be trained. Real artists aren't just feeling things, they also studied and understood things.

Still you conflate advanced technique with good art in order to rationalize your biases. Let's look at some examples in the art world to challenge your biases:

• Tracy Emin is an English artist who eschews oil painting, etc. in order to focus on abstract art. She is highly trained, but I suspect you would denigrate her work as "crap";
• El Greco and Goya are fairly old artists who set themselves apart from the art world of their times with unique stylistic choices;
• Thomas Kinkade is an American artist who has become something of a meme because his paintings are highly detailed and painted with good technique, but his work is not considered "real art" because he commercialized it;
• Bob Ross didn't commercialize his work, but he did have a TV show in which he showed various painting techniques. You cannot deny that he has decent technique, but he is, like Thomas Kinkade, "not a serious artist".

Outside the world of art:

• Frank Lloyd Wright was not a formally trained architect, but he was very influential in that field and is one of America's favourite architects;
• Mozart wrote high-quality music when he was literally a child.

What can we say objectively about Leonardo's work? We can agree that he mastered the techniques of sfumato, perspective, and others, so he was a very skilled painter. We can agree that his techniques were influential on other artists, and here we can objectively say this is where Leonardo obtains some of his value. But we cannot say that La Gioconda is good artwork simply because you like it, just like we can't say Emin's My Bed is bad artwork simply because you don't like it.

As a side note, how do you feel about David Hockney (formally educated) and Francis Bacon (self-taught)?