Chimpanzee’s Photographs Set to Fetch Over $100,000 At Auction

[daveleo]

Comes my next life, I want to be stupid and rich, like these people are.

There must be a graph somewhere of stupidity versus bank account, huh !

 

[daveleo]

Are they aesthetically pleasing? Then who cares how or who or what took them?

Let's give our closest primate cousin a bit of slack 🙂

It's NOT the monkey that's the fool ! !

 

[DougFord]

Anyone know where I can rent a monkey costume?

I've heard'em say that that's a beginners mistake. You buy the monkey, out right, up front.

 

[meanstreetshooter]

Some one had too much vodka.

 

[icebear]

Here are some photos my 2-year old daughter took with my old Canon SD500 point and shoot. Woo hoo... I'm gonna be rich! And there are probably 50+ more where that came from!

I think they really challenge the notion of how we view art 🙄
/quote]

Positively the inspiring early works of a great artist, the randomness of the subjects and playful introduction of bokeh prove the extraordinary potential. You should contact Sotheby's right away.😉 😀.
But enough kidding, keep your daughter's interest in photography alive. And save her early shots.

"Art is what you can get away with" Andy Warhol

 

[Harry Caul]

I had those abstracts (plus about 50 more as I said!) set aside as I plan on putting together a little book each year for her. She loves snapping away with my old P&S... all the better that the flash usually goes off for each shot. When she is outside she just jams on the button and doesn't realize that it's taking photos because the flash isn't needed. In her defense she just turned 2 a couple months ago 🙂

She actually started on my Oly OMD. The touch to focus/shutter is fantastic and super intuitive for her! Somebody should have given that monkey one...

 

[Jamie Pillers]

If you and your daughter can develop an iPhone app that creates these kind of images, you two could be MILLIONAIRES!!

Here are some photos my 2-year old daughter took with my old Canon SD500 point and shoot. Woo hoo... I'm gonna be rich! And there are probably 50+ more where that came from!

I think they really challenge the notion of how we view art 🙄

 

[Jamie Pillers]

His photos look just like many other masterpieces one can see daily on social media... Perhaps, he should get a Nobel prize ...

....Pulitzer?

 

[Jamie Pillers]

I'm predicting a new Olympus art filter before the end of summer... "MonkeyWork". Don't forget, you heard it here first.

 

[David W.]

Please, look up Komar and Melamid. They are world famous artists - hence the price. Cheers.

 

[SausalitoDog]

Don't blame the MONKEY !

 

[Keith]

Yeah well ... eventually Mikki will get a DSLR, learn how to use photoshop and his career will be over. Another victim of the digital tide ... so sad! 🙁

 

[Harry Caul]

Please, look up Komar and Melamid. They are world famous artists - hence the price. Cheers.

That actually makes more sense if these are essentially the tangible output from a performance art piece.

And if they are conceptual artists, their use of a monkey is probably a none-to-subtle comment on where photography was heading (circa 1998, when these were done). I've heard of many stories of people predicting the iPhone. But this is the first I've heard of someone predicting the average iPhone user 😉

 

[Keith]

And I read somewhere recently that the press photo of the year is about to be shown the door because someone has monkied around with the image in photoshop!

I rest my case!

 

[jordanstarr]

...I imagine they're collecting to ride a wave of what is to come. Collectors don't necessarily like what they buy, but see it increasing in value over time. Kind of like a status symbol: "I own the first photograph ever taken by that famous chimpanzee photographer". I don't think they're "dumb" per se -they're just playing the market of art.

 

[p.giannakis]

I find this auction/collectors culture annoying at a some level. I am thinking about the positive impact this amount of money would have had in parts of the world where they don't even have water to drink.
Anyway....

 

[Gabriel M.A.]

I wouldn't expect any less from collectors.

I'm sure this will come back to haunt me when I try to sell them my "Shakespeare Sonnets Interpreted By A Thousand Monkeys"™

 

[jsrockit]

Reminds me of a Beavis and Butthead episode... Dude, a Reward. 😉

Plot:

"The guys are in a park and Butt-head is eating a burrito and Beavis wants a bite. So he takes it and runs away while Butt-Head chashes him then they land in a bush and beat up each other. Then Beavis finds a bag full of cameras they take some pictures of their their butts and their "captains." Then, Butt-Head finds a card that says there is a reward if lost. So the duo goes to the owners house to collect the reward and the owner thinks they're fans of his work, but when he finds out they just want the reward, he throws the money on the ground, calls them names, and they collect it all. Then at the owners art show, the photographer hangs up all the pictures that Beavis and Butt-Head took which amaze the other artists."

 

[daveleo]

My cat just walked on the keyboard. She typed

Hbgytuftrdcgbjnkokbfrdxsefgbhnjjknjnbt&%65yvfr

Send me $50 and I'll send you a signed and numbered copy.
For $75, I'll let her keyboard a message just for you.

 

[greyelm]

Am I missing something, those pictures were taken by an ape, where are the monkey pictures?