I really think a lot of you have a limited understanding or appreciation for norms in the arts/creative fields. Many posters and viewers here are likely much more comfortable with strictly running content and whatever professional fields you may be involved with. But if you spend any time with artists, writers, comedians, etc. you would know that an idea/shoot like this is about as vanilla as an ”edgy” project will come. Obviously some of the comments were offensive but no one can legitimately lay that at the feet of the newgen founders.
So as for the photo shoot, which is all you can pin in them, you all really need to stop the pearl clutching. Saying that it’s so obviously offensive and merits an apology just makes it seem that you’ve never read/watched/consumed any media or art willing to push the slightest boundaries. There’s a whole genre of satirical art that presents far more disturbing ideas and visuals that requires you to think beyond your initial reaction/repulsion. To use examples you philistines probably know - do you think American Psycho glamorizes murder and assault? Does Lolita glamorize molestation? Or do they just use these shocking elements for some other purpose? It seems clear that the campers had the idea for or wanted to do this photo shoot. It is pretty obvious what references/inspirations they had for the photos. Some of your reactions imply that you're literally taking everything at face value to a degree that's shocking.
In all honesty, and perhaps a complicating factor, the photos aren’t very good! And that’s probably because most art made by 17/18 year olds isn’t that good. But the absolute worst thing for them to learn is that the consequences for trying a slightly subversive idea is the viscous condemnation from a bunch of uneducated puritans online. If you showed this at an art school, you’d hear plenty of critique over the execution of the idea but you wouldn’t be told that you should be banned from ever taking photos again. There’s obviously a massive disconnect between what many in the running world are ready to accept and understand and what would be totally non-controversial among the majority those who actually care about or understand contemporary art. By my estimation, that was one of the aims of New Generation in the first place. Something that I, for one, always thought was a good and worthwhile idea. It seems that a lot of you don’t want that sort of change. But if those involved in this can’t find creative freedom in the running world, I hope they won’t let this incident turn them away from art more broadly.
Oh, give me a break with this condescending B.S., person who is most likely affiliated with New Gen.“You have a limited understanding or appreciation for norms in the arts/creative fields”?
First of all, it’s not really all that hard to “understand” what the photos are doing: They’re deliberately provocative, and the kids shooting the photos are doing a thing that kids do, which is making “offensive” jokes under a thin layer of irony. As one of the early posters who attended the camp said, they were trying to make each other laugh — this is shock comedy. These are teenagers. It’s not complicated. As "art," it's pretty shallow.
But second, anyone who’s ever been to art school would know to expect a lot of interrogation about the fact that all the violence in these photos is being done to women. And sometimes it is being done by men. And the person who made the art would then need to defend that. And the absolute worst way to defend it would be by attacking the critics.
But suppose we set all of that aside. Teens being teens and all that. Fine. Whatever. Trying to throw up an art-school smokescreen like you just did distracts from the actual problem here:
It’s frankly more than a little weird that the twentysomethings of New Gen are (a) supervising these shenanigans, (b) endorsed their publication, and then (c) went into attack mode when someone had very reasonable concerns about the violent content of the images. That's the problem. Not anticipating that reaction is a pretty shocking failure of judgment by Ben Crawford & Co., but given some of the content of previous New Gen videos detailed in this thread, one could argue there’s a pattern of these failures.
I get the gist of what New Gen is trying to do: They want to make young athletes social-media savvy and learn to promote themselves so they can participate in the cultural conversation and get brand deals and all that exhausting crap that athletes have to do to make something approaching a living nowadays. And they think being a bit "edgy" "shakes things up" and it "good for the sport" on some level I've never quite heard them articulate beyond those catchphrases.
What I’d argue after this little blowup is that New Gen is not dong a very good job of arming these young athletes for success. Any social-media savvy person would have anticipated that an empty provocation like this would result in some blowback. Especially a social-media-savvy person in a mentorship role.
If I was a parent of one of these kids, or a brand throwing resources and endorsements at New Gen, I’d be saying “What the f***?” pretty loudly at this point. The kids at your camp are your charges, not your friends. Do better.
* BTW, this isn’t the first time this sort of woman-punishing imagery has turned up in a New Gen camp's class materials. At 17:47 in they’re using an image of Emma Abrahamson tied to a chair at an example of “so bad it’s good” content, which is just … odd.
The coolest running camp ever to exist. Special thanks to On for making this a reality for the second year in a row. -New Generation Track and Field Camp, Sp...
Oh, give me a break with this condescending B.S., person who is most likely affiliated with New Gen.“You have a limited understanding or appreciation for norms in the arts/creative fields”?
First of all, it’s not really all that hard to “understand” what the photos are doing: They’re deliberately provocative, and the kids shooting the photos are doing a thing that kids do, which is making “offensive” jokes under a thin layer of irony. As one of the early posters who attended the camp said, they were trying to make each other laugh — this is shock comedy. These are teenagers. It’s not complicated. As "art," it's pretty shallow.
But second, anyone who’s ever been to art school would know to expect a lot of interrogation about the fact that all the violence in these photos is being done to women. And sometimes it is being done by men. And the person who made the art would then need to defend that. And the absolute worst way to defend it would be by attacking the critics.
But suppose we set all of that aside. Teens being teens and all that. Fine. Whatever. Trying to throw up an art-school smokescreen like you just did distracts from the actual problem here:
It’s frankly more than a little weird that the twentysomethings of New Gen are (a) supervising these shenanigans, (b) endorsed their publication, and then (c) went into attack mode when someone had very reasonable concerns about the violent content of the images. That's the problem. Not anticipating that reaction is a pretty shocking failure of judgment by Ben Crawford & Co., but given some of the content of previous New Gen videos detailed in this thread, one could argue there’s a pattern of these failures.
I get the gist of what New Gen is trying to do: They want to make young athletes social-media savvy and learn to promote themselves so they can participate in the cultural conversation and get brand deals and all that exhausting crap that athletes have to do to make something approaching a living nowadays. And they think being a bit "edgy" "shakes things up" and it "good for the sport" on some level I've never quite heard them articulate beyond those catchphrases.
What I’d argue after this little blowup is that New Gen is not dong a very good job of arming these young athletes for success. Any social-media savvy person would have anticipated that an empty provocation like this would result in some blowback. Especially a social-media-savvy person in a mentorship role.
If I was a parent of one of these kids, or a brand throwing resources and endorsements at New Gen, I’d be saying “What the f***?” pretty loudly at this point. The kids at your camp are your charges, not your friends. Do better.
* BTW, this isn’t the first time this sort of woman-punishing imagery has turned up in a New Gen camp's class materials. At 17:47 in they’re using an image of Emma Abrahamson tied to a chair at an example of “so bad it’s good” content, which is just … odd.
at 18:45 in that vid the song lyrics are "the preachers say we're made in the image of lord, to which I reply, even a murderer? Even a wh*re?" and right after 'wh*re' it cuts to a girl running in a sports bra
Oh, give me a break with this condescending B.S., person who is most likely affiliated with New Gen.“You have a limited understanding or appreciation for norms in the arts/creative fields”?
First of all, it’s not really all that hard to “understand” what the photos are doing: They’re deliberately provocative, and the kids shooting the photos are doing a thing that kids do, which is making “offensive” jokes under a thin layer of irony. As one of the early posters who attended the camp said, they were trying to make each other laugh — this is shock comedy. These are teenagers. It’s not complicated. As "art," it's pretty shallow.
But second, anyone who’s ever been to art school would know to expect a lot of interrogation about the fact that all the violence in these photos is being done to women. And sometimes it is being done by men. And the person who made the art would then need to defend that. And the absolute worst way to defend it would be by attacking the critics.
But suppose we set all of that aside. Teens being teens and all that. Fine. Whatever. Trying to throw up an art-school smokescreen like you just did distracts from the actual problem here:
It’s frankly more than a little weird that the twentysomethings of New Gen are (a) supervising these shenanigans, (b) endorsed their publication, and then (c) went into attack mode when someone had very reasonable concerns about the violent content of the images. That's the problem. Not anticipating that reaction is a pretty shocking failure of judgment by Ben Crawford & Co., but given some of the content of previous New Gen videos detailed in this thread, one could argue there’s a pattern of these failures.
I get the gist of what New Gen is trying to do: They want to make young athletes social-media savvy and learn to promote themselves so they can participate in the cultural conversation and get brand deals and all that exhausting crap that athletes have to do to make something approaching a living nowadays. And they think being a bit "edgy" "shakes things up" and it "good for the sport" on some level I've never quite heard them articulate beyond those catchphrases.
What I’d argue after this little blowup is that New Gen is not dong a very good job of arming these young athletes for success. Any social-media savvy person would have anticipated that an empty provocation like this would result in some blowback. Especially a social-media-savvy person in a mentorship role.
If I was a parent of one of these kids, or a brand throwing resources and endorsements at New Gen, I’d be saying “What the f***?” pretty loudly at this point. The kids at your camp are your charges, not your friends. Do better.
* BTW, this isn’t the first time this sort of woman-punishing imagery has turned up in a New Gen camp's class materials. At 17:47 in they’re using an image of Emma Abrahamson tied to a chair at an example of “so bad it’s good” content, which is just … odd.
Can’t wait for Ben Crawford to drop a newgen vid on YouTube in a month from now as if this whole debacle never happened. Would be amazing to see the guy behind newgen actually own up to this issue and speak on it. Have some humility and realize where you messed up instead of continuing to be a creepy, insensitive bunch of men who facilitate parties and promote crude behavior for high schoolers.
I really hope some repercussions come out of this whole thing and we don’t seriously just see newgen acting exactly the same going forward and everyone just continuing to allow it. This is not ok
I don’t disagree with any of your criticism related to the project being shallow, the influences being muddled (still, clearly based on previous teen movies and tv), and their responses being unsophisticated. My point was that’s completely understandable when artists of this age start trying new things. And it’s also totally normal for young artists to want to deal with difficult subject matter but be completely clumsy in the execution. Of course they’re not Nabokov or BEE, no one thinks they are. But this is how exploration ought to begin. The fact that the photog and models were all friends is about the safest way to do a project like this - much better than hiring people to pose or soliciting classmates who don’t have any input etc.
And regarding this derogatory comments left by some of the kids - obviously that’s horrible. But I truly don’t think that can be blamed on the counselors. These kids are probably assholes online year round - their parents or teachers are much more “responsible” for them acting this way. Unless you believe that these kids learned all of their social instincts from this 7 day camp.
My take is still that new gen was providing a pretty permissive platform for them to pursue their own artistic projects and that’s good. It’s not the job of art mentors to police content. They tried something and it largely failed. But the extent of some of the criticism on this site and on instagram goes well beyond pointing this out. Their failure does not go nearly as far as many seem to want it to.
Why would their teachers be responsible for what kids choose to do outside of school and on social media?
Yes, thank you! Imagine if every artist took it personally whenever the pearl clutchers came after them. There would be almost no good art! There would be no horror movies, no crime dramas, no action films, no gothic style paintings. As Hollywood (especially Disney right now) is showing us, trying to sanitize art and pander it to the most sensitive and politically correct is not a good recipe for creative work.
I also don't quite understand why people are trying to read so much into the pictures either or analyzing the "message" it sends. I don't think there was much meaning behind it at all, it was probably more about the aesthetic appeal, which is consistent with New Gen's postmodern style that is popular among young people these days. This just seems like a mob of angry pearl clutchers trying to find witches to burn.
New Gen: Aesthetically pleasing postmodern y2k bullying photography
Gen Z is a nervous wreck, freaks about everything. Bullying this and that, sexual assault this and that, misogyny this and that.
Meanwhile they listen to the most vulgar and violent "music", dress like slobs and harlots but are paranoid sexless live in fear generation ever.
Shiczoomers
This whole controversy in a nutshell. Sort of edgy photoshoot (it’s creative art guys!), an associate gets triggered, the creators of original “artwork” can’t handle the triggered criticism and go all in attack mode with insults even your racist uncle would be ashamed to say. And here we are.
In their Penn Relays vid Ben chooses one of Meek Mill's raps to play the bars "All foreign b*tches ménagin', f*ckin', suckin' and swallowin, Anything for a dollar, they tell me get 'em I got 'em" completely uncensored to play over a montage of high school kids trying on 'On' shoes and clothes, lol.
This, along with his weird obsession of filming kids eating food makes me thing Crawford is a groomer
In their Penn Relays vid Ben chooses one of Meek Mill's raps to play the bars "All foreign b*tches ménagin', f*ckin', suckin' and swallowin, Anything for a dollar, they tell me get 'em I got 'em" completely uncensored to play over a montage of high school kids trying on 'On' shoes and clothes, lol.
Always rubs me the wrong way when these content creators play that degenerate crap. Music is supposed to go with the scene right? So these content creators think of this music "f***in and suckin" when looking at high school girls and boys huh? Immediately turn that sh*t off.
These are some thought provoking points, thanks for sharing. I'm impressed a thread here can get to page 22 and still have a nuanced and interesting conversation.
One of my thoughts is that there's a difference between art and content. I see content as something that a creator produces for a brand (could be a business, a media company, or their personal brand) to send a message, portray a certain image, sell a product, or just get clicks. Sure, content can be art and art can be content, but as another poster mentioned, context matters. This isn't art school, it's content camp for teenagers.
It seems like a lot of the outrage is coming from the context. People don't want to support a brand that promotes bullying (especially when females are exclusively targeted). As other posters seem to say, if these photos were in another context and the artists were aiming to start a conversation, they probably would have been received differently. For a running camp with a teenage audience, this topic (presented in this way) doesn't fit or sit well.
5. This camp was sponsored by On. I'm sure On wanted to see creativity and fresh takes, but do we really think they expected the kids to tackle dark subject matter?
the thought of On reacting to this is freaking hilarious to me.
These are some thought provoking points, thanks for sharing. I'm impressed a thread here can get to page 22 and still have a nuanced and interesting conversation.
One of my thoughts is that there's a difference between art and content. I see content as something that a creator produces for a brand (could be a business, a media company, or their personal brand) to send a message, portray a certain image, sell a product, or just get clicks. Sure, content can be art and art can be content, but as another poster mentioned, context matters. This isn't art school, it's content camp for teenagers.
It seems like a lot of the outrage is coming from the context. People don't want to support a brand that promotes bullying (especially when females are exclusively targeted). As other posters seem to say, if these photos were in another context and the artists were aiming to start a conversation, they probably would have been received differently. For a running camp with a teenage audience, this topic (presented in this way) doesn't fit or sit well.
I don't think those pictures were meant to be sales content, I think it was a personal project by the camper in the picture.
This, along with his weird obsession of filming kids eating food makes me thing Crawford is a groomer
you weren't kidding about the weirdness of the festival of miles vid, geez. The morons taking photos egg the kids on to lick their lips, "give me another big lick" and dip their fingers in sauce to suck it off, literally saying "yeah get right in the camera while you suck". wtf
In their Penn Relays vid Ben chooses one of Meek Mill's raps to play the bars "All foreign b*tches ménagin', f*ckin', suckin' and swallowin, Anything for a dollar, they tell me get 'em I got 'em" completely uncensored to play over a montage of high school kids trying on 'On' shoes and clothes, lol.
Always rubs me the wrong way when these content creators play that degenerate crap. Music is supposed to go with the scene right? So these content creators think of this music "f***in and suckin" when looking at high school girls and boys huh? Immediately turn that sh*t off.
And liberal use of the “n” word in the new gen camp 22 video that was posted. Yikes