What is art?
This question came up in Quora, and there were as many different answers as there were respondents. 'what is art' should be defined in all discussions of art, but never really is.
I understand art as an expression of human consciousness, and art work as information about the artists consciousness. Art as an expression of human consciousness is broad enough to capture all art ever made - cave paintings to present.
I wonder what others think of this definition? Can you find fault with it?
Any input would be appreciated. Thanks
I understand art as an expression of human consciousness, and art work as information about the artists consciousness. Art as an expression of human consciousness is broad enough to capture all art ever made - cave paintings to present.
I wonder what others think of this definition? Can you find fault with it?
Any input would be appreciated. Thanks
Comments (650)
In theory, saying it's at the peers discretion, limits art. I have thought this through now...
How successful it is at evoking the intended reaction determines how good the art is.
I would extend that to include the artist's subconscious as well.
Presumably derived from the Latin ‘Ars’,
1. Art, skill
2. Craft, power
According to Oxford Dictionary,
1. “Creative works produced by human beings”
The recurring thought is that art proceeds an act of creation.
The following terms elaborate categories of art:
‘Fine Art, Artwork, Black arts, Language arts, Liberal arts’.
The alternate meaning for art is perhaps that of a skill or specified hobby; one attained by means of practice such as with:
‘The art of forgiveness, the art of war, the art of memory’.
Webster’s 1913 Dictionary provides an older perspective, with art being defined as:
1. “Systematic application of knowledge or skill”
2. “Production of Imagination, taste, beauty, elegance”
We are all aware how artwork takes up many forms. Art is not monolithic nor is it set in stone as to what exactly classifies art.
‘Poetry, music, dance, sculpture, body modifications, genetic alterations, landscaping, architecture, food, film, games, experiential drugs, entertainment.’
Stimulus and effect is the common theme within these mediums.
Irregardless of whether it be taste, touch, smell, vision or hearing; so long as it can be experienced.
Inform me If I am resorting to logical fallacy, although It seems that artwork is inherently dependent on human faculties/cognition. Nevertheless, considering the vastness of our universe, non-human senses would allow for existence of new art completely alien to us, the extent of which, depends on the planetoid and its inhabitants. Presently we are aware of innumerable animal species possessing extrasensory capabilities, for example:
* Birds have the ability of ‘magnetoreception’. They are able to perceive the Earth’s magnetic field and thereby navigate correspondingly.
* Electroreception: The ability to detect electric currents, demonstrated by sharks and platypi.
* Echolocation in bats and cetaceans is basically a built-in sonar system.
* The ability to view infrared thermal radiation.
What would it be like to see colours invisible to the human retina? What would it feel like to perceive sonar and to ‘hear’ radiation? If senses were to be extended, these inspirations for art creation would be inexplicable.
I would also like to examine the distinction between man-made creations and natural creations.
Could one consider a waterfall or natural phenomena such as the Aurora Borealis as art? I have never witnessed such a comparison before, perhaps artwork is only attributed to manmade creations? If a beaver builds a dam or a colony of bees build a hive, can these creations be prescribed as works of art? Perhaps in a romantic sense we may marvel at animal creations, admiring their beauty and artistic value, but much like any opinion, art is subjective.
Where do the lines blur between art and non-art?
Taxonomization is useful to understand diversity of arts, but when humans denounce certain art expressions, does this not defeat the purpose of art as a concept of free, unregimented, unstructured personal expression? Should art have no bounds, no borders?
As for a form of communication, art serves a practical purpose whilst imagery and pictures do qualify as a homonym for language.
Aesthetic value can be transmitted through art, but if something is considered vile, some may not consider it to be art.
Art does not exclusively promote positive emotions such as wonder, amazement and joy. Art may also provoke emotions of bewilderment, mortification, terror, disgust, contempt and envy.
Examples: Explicitly pornographic art may arouse divisive emotions under public scrutiny - everything from lust to repugnance.
* Violently gruesome art may be controversial but there are certainly those whom cherish a certain artistic quality to these works.
* Art that is designed to amuse or repel the viewer such as a canvas painted using bodily fluids, a toilet seat lid on exhibit, or a rotting cadaver.
Seems a respectful boundary to follow.
Is there a correct or incorrect way to interpret art or is it based on a causal origin by the artist?
Assuming one can dictate the history or purpose of someones else’s arts seems a rather ostentatious endeavour. The original creator most likely possesses the greatest quantity of empirical knowledge concerning their creation, although the concept of originality is interesting because one could purport that all art is the product of what came before it, and art is eternally in a state of transformative flux, building off the back of predecessors, but this seems to apply to much more than just art.
Quoting Colosseum
Exactly, that is why I brought the topic up here.
It is also frustrating for an artist because their intent and purpose is so often misconstrued. Also anybody can produce valid art, but not many can really understand it, and i think this is due to the definition of art being so vague. Almost all that Colosseum mentions is an exploration of human consciousness. Art really is a conversation about consciousness. So a definition of art should, I think, direct the focus on human consciousness.
@Punshhh and Colosseum bring up the notion that a definition of art might create a sort of intellectual totalitarianism over creativity, and I thank them as that did not occurred to me, hmmm, I think this would be mitigated by allowing art the freedom of consciousness, but it deserves further reflection.
Consciousness is everything, everything is construed into consciousness. That which is outside of consciousness is blank until it enters consciousness ( thanks @tim wood )
What is amusing about those 'what is art, what is not' discussions is that they are really consciousness vs consciousness discussions.Human consciousness seems to need to propagate itself. It needs to be validated through communication, and art is one form of this. Posting in this forum is another! When one consciousness agrees with another we call this reality.
When you create art you are giving me information about your consciousness, and subconsciousness Thanks @jgill. You tell me how you understand art by showing me what you use it for. You give me an insight into your intelligence, your intent, your sympathies, your talent,your demographic,your politics,your spiritual beliefs, etc, etc. A whole bunch of information which I have to interpret with my consciousness. The process reminds me of a conversation.
@Punshhh reminds us that historically it is artists who define art by expanding on it, but I am an artist, and like Marcel Duchamp bestowed the status of art onto a urinal, I now bestow the status of art on to this thread :)
It seems to me there is enough information to define 'what is art'. At least for myself, but I am only one consciousness. For the definition to become reality there needs to be wide consensus, and this seems a good place to start.
So far I've got: Art is an expression of human consciousness, and art work is information about the artists consciousness and subconsciousness. - thanks@jgill
A variation might be: Artifact of human consciousness - thanks @unenlightened
If you have a better way to encapsulate it, or have other things to add please do.
This could be interesting - we may define art on this thread for the rest of time.
PS: I cant see that human art would be constrained by this widest of possible definitions - human consciousness, but it would be refocused, in one way for the better, but there may be unforeseen negative consequences - is focus restraint?
To allow art to remain as is, is to maintain the cultural status quo, to change art is to challenge the cultural status quo.
This used not to be a question very much. The problem with consciousness based definitions can be seen in many art galleries - a small pile of rubble, or a banana taped to the wall is art because it is done consciously by an artist. It's depressing, and the reason is the triumph of physicalism. For physicalists, man is part of nature and art is part of nature and so the distinction between artificial and natural collapses.
One needs God, or the spiritual to maintain the distinction, a triumvirate of man, god, and nature is more stable, and allows that mere consciousness is not enough for art, it needs a spiritual dimension. So chuck out the rubble and the bananas, and insist on your art being on more than a mere physical level, and more than just an idea someone had.
(For those with an allergy to religious language, one might frame the triple as material, informational, meaningful.)
I think the answer to this question is complicated and is perhaps an evolution within society. The main problem I have with the way art is interpreted is the role of the critic, the critic has traditionally dictated what is good art, what is bad art and what constitutes art. This has the consequence that artists who are creative and skill based people feel they have to try to conform in some way to validate their work.
This still occurs, although modernism and post modernism has challenged this. To some extent the artist has fought back and the critics have stepped back and allowed anything to be good art and Art.
However, is it ok to interpret art incorrectly? I think so.
Unless, per se, there is a greater judge, who thinks 'no, it means this in it's best light', then the artist's meaning loses it's credibility. Perhaps, it's a matter of judgement.
Defence: art is supposed to transcend culture - transcend the time and place in which it was created, and speak to the ages. Therefore knowledge of the culture in which it was created should not be essential to recognising it as a work of art (if it was, then it would not be speaking to the ages, and thus would not be art). As such simply digging the item up and viewing it while ignorant of the culture in which it was created should provide a fairly reliable (though not perfect) guide to whether we're dealing with a work or art, or something else.
Obviously Rembrandts would pass this test. And Van Goghs, and Picassos. But Damien Hirst's shark in a tank? No, probably not - they'd just think it was a shark in a tank.
The test is not perfect, because the archaeologists will themselves be members of a culture and that culture may have affected their judgements about what is and is not art. But they will be aware that they are members of a culture to which the dug-up item's manufacturer did not belong, and so this should - in the main - operate to prevent them from applying their cultural aesthetic norms to the product they've uncovered.
Thus what I shall call the 'archaeologist test' provides, I think, a fairly reliable test of whether we're dealing with art or something else. And we can apply it as a thought experiment - we can ask of a work we are looking at "if an archaeologist dug this up, would they classify it as 'art'?" And if necessary, of course, we could actually run the test by simply burying the said work in a field and then asking some contemporary archaeologists to investigate the field and see what they subsequently classify it as.
Art = The suitably technical, creative, and intentional embodiment of aesthetically engaging thought or emotion in any publicly accessible medium.
There are five necessary and jointly sufficient conditions:
1. The activity is intentional
2. The activity is suitably technically demanding
3. The activity is suitably creative
4. The product exists in a publicly accessible medium
5. The product primarily embodies aesthetically engaging thought or emotion (or some combination of the two).
The archaeological test seems to exclude any kind of ephemeral or performance art that has not been captured by some durable medium.
To expand the discussion a bit, I have written many math programs over the years in connection with my interest in infinite compositions of complex functions in the complex plane. In another forum (now deceased) there was minor controversy over whether imagery produced from this mathematics - and virtually unpredictable - was a kind of art, like fractals. One prof of anthropology insisted the imagery was indeed art, a product of my subconscious, and thus influenced my mathematical discoveries or creations below my levels of awareness.
Form your own judgments. What do you think? :
https://www.coloradomesa.edu/math-stat/documents/CoupledContourSystems.pdf
https://www.coloradomesa.edu/math-stat/documents/AWeakEmergenceNote%20.pdf
@Bartricks @Punshhh You both seem to have a beef about who gets to decide what is art. Can you see how if you had a definition of what is art would empower you? Can you see how lack of a definition of what is art dis-empowers you ?
The problem with giving necessary and sufficient conditions for something that answers to a concept that has not been created by stipulation is that it is only a matter of time before counterexamples emerge (or the definition turns out to be circular - defining art as 'that which is art').
For example, take 'intentional'. What if my intention is just to make money? Does that mean that what I produce no longer qualifies as art? Or do we have to refine the intention so that it is an intention to produce, well, a work of art? (In which case we have circularity).
Or take technically demanding - what about a van Gogh? They're not particularly technically demanding, yet they're works of art. And what about those for whom drawing and painting accurately is not demanding - such as, say, John Singer Sargent (he could just sit down and bang out a breathtakingly accurate and spirited charcoal portrait in just a few minutes - it was his party trick)?
What about a work of art that is not creative, but brilliant nevertheless? Again, like a John Singer Sargent portrait?
As for 'publicly accessible medium' - well, what about a Rembrandt that has been painted on a material that disintegrates if anyone looks at it? Surely it is still a work of art, even though no-one can access it.
As a hypothetical I think there might be some worth to such a test, but I might stipulate that the hypothetical archeologist needs to be of a certain mindset and cultural background. An archeologist who comes, say, from a culture in which art does not exist or only exists in certain forms may not be able to appreciate other culture's art without that being a demerit on the found art per se.
But it also poses an epistemological dilemma: how can we ascertain what such an archeologist would say of our art? It seems that then we get back to square one, in which we have to forumalte some objective criteria for distinguishing art.
I don't follow your point. Why would it not be a good test?
We just use contemporary archaeologists and either see, or imagine, how they might classify what we're looking at if they dug it up. That way we see what the reason of an impartial - or maximally impartial - investigator says about the product.
It can be applied to modern pieces of art. We just imagine that an archaeologist digs it up and that it gives every sign of belonging to an earlier age, and then we see how they classify it.
So, Tracey Emin's bed probably wouldn't pass this test, whereas a contemporary landscape painting would.
Intentional refers only to the objective that it was my intention to create art. Other intentions are not excluded and it is very possible that one can misidentify art, as has happened in the past when people have thought the fire extinguisher in an art gallery was part of the exhibit.
Suitably technically demanding is a pretty low bar. You can get stricter about it when distinguishing good from bad art, but as long as shapes and colors are employed in some manner through which we can ascertain some kind of communication, that's all that is necessary.
And the audience of an art piece can be an audience of one: the artist. It can be more, but not less than that.
But again, on what basis do they decide this?
Oh, and Van Gogh was one of those who "learned the rules to break them" types. I think that some of his work looks a little childish, but apparently his technique was educated and sophisticated.
So it is circular - you've referred to the concept under analysis. The word 'art' needs to be removed, otherwise the definition is circular.
Quoting Artemis
My point, however, is that either 'suitably' means just 'so-as to qualify as art' (in which case it is circular) or we'll have counterexamples. Much art doesn't require much technical ability at all to create.
Take a van Gogh, such as night sky over the Rhone. It is unquestionably a work of art (and a very great one). But it is not very technically demanding. And compositionally, it is a copy of a Japanese print. Yet it is a work of art.
Quoting Artemis
What if Rembrandt just imagines a work of art, but doesn't paint it on anything? Is the imaginary painting a work of art? Surely not.
No, not really. First, one does not need to know anything about Van Gogh the man in order to be able to recognise his works as artworks (indeed, very great ones).
Also, he was almost entirely self-taught and was never a great draughtsperson. His technique is not educated or sophisticated - it is very original and distinctive, but it is not very sophisticated and not the product of a formal education.
Ive never seen anything like that before. Its very impressive. You have a mathematical consciousness and my consciousness could not normally relate to mathematics, but translated into images I can start to understand it:)
I think ' art as an expression of human consciousness ' would still contain it.
If art had a definition you would have certainty about what your work was.
Quoting Bartricks
No, I don't think that makes it circular. It's not like saying a dog is a dog. I've added the stipulation that it has to be intended.
Quoting Bartricks
No it doesn't. Just needs to use shape and color in a manner to communicate some thought or feeling. Again, you can get more strict about good vs bad art.
Quoting Bartricks
I guess there would be an assumption that it must be manifest in the world somehow at some point, no matter how briefly.
Quoting Bartricks
Self-educated =/= uneducated. But the point is that apparently he did use techniques of color application and perspective that were sophisticated and sometimes innovative (though the latter is not a condition of art).
They see if it seems to them to answer to the concept of art.
We already have the concept of art. It doesn't come from definitions, rather we try and capture it using definitions - but the concept itself transcends those definitions.
We recognise art without definitions, then. It is therefore the height of silliness to allow a definition - which should always be provisional and open to revision in the light of real cases - to dictate matters.
Any age we live in will have its own ideas about what does and doesn't qualify as art. To overcome those and get closer to the pure concept, we can look to produces of ages whose ideas we are unfamiliar with. If something from that age seems to us to qualify as art then there's a decent chance that it is art.
Can a beautiful person be considered good art?
In the following scenario, a human has the best eyes; this human generates a lot of interest. Does good art mean more interest?
In any society it is theKing who decides what is art. We get a bit off topic if we define who the king currently is.
If we had a definition of art, it would be the @definition that decided what art is.
If we can agree on a definition of art in this thread then we take the power of what is art away from the king and give it to the definition. All it requires is wide consensus.
Intentions have content - so an intention to do what? If it is 'to make a work of art' then it is circular in the same way as 'a dog is something that thinks like a dog' would be.
If we remove the word 'art' from the content of the intention, then I'll wager we'll find counterexamples.
Quoting Artemis
So now you're abandoning the 'suitably technically demanding' as a necessary condition, for some work is not technically demanding yet seems nevertheless to be art. Why not just let 'seems to be art' be the evidence, rather than 'satisfying this definition'?
Quoting Artemis
But now you're revising or refining the condition in light of a counterexample. So we already have the concept of art - or have an awareness of it via our reason - otherwise how do we even begin to give a definition? And how do we test proposed definition, apart from by seeing whether things that appear clearly to those possessed of reason to be art, qualify according to the definition?
If that's correct, then we do not need a definition and can appeal directly to rational appearances instead.
But you don't seem to appreciate that overcoming the prejudices of the age is 'precisely' what my test is designed to do.
You also don't seem to understand that the concept of art transcends our definitions.
You don't need a definition to know what is or is not a work of art. Our attempts to define art are attempts to describe the contours of a concept that we already have. So, we don't actually need the definition.
I know a work of art when I see one, as do most people. Yet I have no definition of art.
Our understanding does not come from definitions, and a successful definition achieves nothing more than to give you back an understanding that you already had.
What my archaeologist example is designed to do is access a pure form of that understanding.
Thanks for replying, but by gaining control I would inevitably reduce the complexity of the imagery; I've tried, but with poor results. The subconscious has more latitude.
The discussion seems to have steamed up about hypotheticals.
Come on Bartricks and Artemis, take a look. It goes to whether art must be intentional. A real, concrete example!
We only have one way of recognising what is real and what is not: our reason. Our reason is our guide to reality. And it is via our reason that we recognise that some acts are right and others wrong; that some things are good and others bad; and that some things are art and others not.
It is 'definitions' that are human inventions, but it does not follow from this that 'that which we are seeking to define' is a human invention. We have not invented the concept of art, rather we are seeking to understand it. And we have to use our reason to achieve that understanding, for it is from our reason that we are aware of art in the first place.
The problem is that our reason is a faculty and as such it can - and often is - corrupted by the age in which we live (for to date no age has 'the truth' as its overriding goal, and thus any age will to some extent seek to corrupt the reason of its denizens so that their reason delivers verdicts conducive to achieving that age's goals).
How do we overcome such corrupting forces, given that they have operated on the very instrument we use to investigate reality?
Well, in the case of art we overcome it by burying putative works of art in fields and asking archeologists to dig up the field and then we see how they classify it, that's how!
So, some seem to think you only know something when you can define it, as if somehow reality were made of definitions.
I think we already have - via our reason - the understanding that the definitions are seeking to capture.
Intention to create something that is aesthetically engaging in some way.
Quoting Bartricks
I have not abandoned it. I'm pointing out that suitably technically demanding doesn't mean the same as highly technically skilled. It must meet some basic minimum of technicality, but for something to simply count as art, it need not be more than the skillset of a preschooler.
Quoting Bartricks
What is the content of the rational appearances to which we are appealing? That's what a definition tries to capture. You're right that we often intuit the definition, but that doesn't negate the existence of a definition.
What meaning? I agree with the , "know art when . . . " statement. Maybe that tells us art is only "definable" by one's subconscious? I'm not sure about your "reason" comment. Does reason lead to understanding in this context? I would guess not.
What if my intention is purely to make money - I couldn't care less if the work is aesthetically engaging, I just know that people like my drawings and are willing to pay me large sums of money for them?
Take Gainsborough. That was the case with him. He hated painting portraits - he didn't like them and wanted to paint landscapes - but he knew others really liked his portraits and that he could bang them out quite easily, so that's why he did them. But a Gainsborough portrait is clearly a work of art, despite him having no intention to aesthetically engage anyone by painting them.
Another thought here: the idea of a publicly accessible medium implies that people other than the artist must at some point have had at least the possibility of accessing the art (though it may or may not have been accessed), which entails some sort of manifestation in the world outside of Rembrandt's imagination.
He whether he liked his own art or not, he understood that they aesthetically engage others.
Is intention necessary? What of my images? Have you looked? You seem well versed in art matters. Please comment.
The way to prove your assumption is to find fault with the following definition:
'Art is an expression of human consciousness. An art work is information about an artists consciousness and subconsciousness'
Show me a work of art that dose not fit the description..
That's not necessarily true - take my Gainsborough example. He didn't like painting portraits, and so there's a decent chance that most Gainsborough portraits were painted by a grump who resented every brushstroke. But you can't tell that from the portraits plus it is grossly implausible to think that whether or not they qualify as art turns on whether we can reliably infer anything about his mental states from them.
It's art.
I'm tenative to move away from the definition, it's an expression of 'human consciousness', and am sticking with the Oxford definition (dare I say, not only human?).
If I wanted to express my consciousness, I'd do a black fill with small pink and white dots.
Well, unless he was obtuse somehow, it seems to me that he understood why his making paintings was making himself money, and so it seems to me he must've understood he was engaging others aesthetically.
If he was not intending any aesthetics, then it's not art and the aesthetic engagement the viewer has with his work is just that. It differs not at all from the aesthetic engagement a viewer has of a real sunset then in that regard.
But again, it's doubtful to me that he was that obtuse...
This one's on the house.
Your words aren't cheap my friend.
I have not looked yet, but from your description of it being a computer program with the unintended byproduct being aesthetically pleasing, I would say it was originally not art, just aesthetically pleasing math, but that anything you create now with the program with the intent that it should be aesthetically pleasing would qualify as art.
You are describing Gainsborough's consciousness.
Sorry I should post my understanding of consciousness .
It will take a while I type with two fingers.
So, the idea that it is essential to something qualifying as art that it report something about its creator's conscious states seems false. Some art may qualify in that way, but it doesn't seem to be either a necessary or sufficient condition.
Google isn't being helpful: can you give me a link or reference to how we know Gainsborough disliked his own art?
How else to differentiate between art and a sunflower or bird's nest?
But anyway, the fact is whether I am right or wrong about Gainsborough himself, it is implausible to think that whether we classify his portraits as art or not should depend on it.
We differentiate first, then we search for the basis upon which we differentiated. And so we know what is art prior to having a definition. Thus thinking that the business of understanding is the business of formulating and then living by definitions is a profound mistake.
Consciousness
We all have an understanding of ourselves and the world that we live in.
This understanding is consciousness.
Consciousness is a logical construct, influenced by psychopathology, and biology. It develops out of intelligence. Intelligence is a tool to solve problems. As we live life we need to constantly solve problems, eventually we develop an encyclopedic array of solutions to problems, and constructs of how things are and how they will be. This forms our understanding of ourselves and the world that we live in. This is consciousness. Consciousness allows us to venture forward to live life confident that what we expect to happen will happen. Without consciousness we would go forward completely in the dark, if at all.
Our understanding of ourselves and the world we live in underpins our personality. Psychopathology and biology influence our personality, but do not dominate it. We can not experience the world through psychopathology, or biology. We experience the world through our understanding of ourselves and the world we live in - our consciousness . Personality is consciousness in action.
Consciousness effectively is the world, as the world is not directly experienced but construed, so the world and experience always remain a construct in our head. We make constructs in our consciousness as a result of sense stimuli. We filter and construct the world in our consciousness. Our understanding of self and the world we live in is our entire world - our consciousness is our world. Nothing exists outside of it.
Of course much must exist in the world that we are not conscious of. This information is blank to us until it enters our consciousness.
Because we all must construct our consciousness out of solutions to problems personally experienced, and our experience is always unique, even identical twins develop a slightly different consciousness. Siblings brought up in the same environment can develop remarkably different consciousness. We all posses an imperfect, psychologically, and biologically skewed consciousness. Communication is necessary to orient ourselves in each others consciousness. When there is agreement, we call this reality.
Our consciousness is the only world we have. And we all have a slightly different consciousness, hence we live in slightly different worlds.
The most beautiful thing in the world is the knowledge that we can expand our consciousness by increasing our understanding of ourselves and the world that we live in, and thereby expand our world.
You are conscious right now, yes? That - that - is consciousness. It's a state of you - and you're in it right now. And you knew you were conscious before reading Piaget, yes?
It's wrong too - consciousness is not a logical construct. That makes no sense at all.
Art is a cultural mirror. Unconsciously or consciously it reflects, absolutely the state of the culture it springs from. When the trains of New York City appeared covered in loud, garish graffiti they absolutely reflected the chaotic state of New York City at the time. If art appears meaningless, if there is a glut of work that seems shallow and predatory, then so too the culture it springs from. These things spring simultaneously from the tidal flow of culture, as it happens.
Art has always been about culture. It’s always owned by those with time and money to invest in it and always managed by an elite, though they’re unaware of it’s real cultural significance because they’re removed from the world they live in.
No matter how bad art gets it will always be true. It’s a spontaneous opening up of time. What gives it further significance is that the elite, of any epoch, with their money and their ignorance, freeze it in time, as they do with everything, in attempting to own whatever they set their eyes on. Then it gains another value altogether about another type of culture. So, again, it still remains about culture, explaining further ideas about who we are.
First, you're confusing what causes something with what it is 'about'. Art is not caused by culture, but by artists, but even if it were caused by culture, that would not make it 'about' culture.
Second, what the hell is a cultural mirror?
Quoting Bartricks
Of course. But they themselves and their ability to project reflect instantaneously their time, which can only be cultural. Post WWll art reflected the trauma of the war, the tearing apart of reality.
Edit: that’s probably WWl, I think.
Quoting Bartricks
Art.
Past artists who changed the definition of art:
Van Gogh, Pollock, Lichtenstein, Postmodernism was imposed on art, performance, digital art, etc, etc
Definitions are created by owners, not artists.
Just false (and a bit gibberishy).
I still don't know what a cultural mirror is. And I don't know what this sentence means either "their ability to project instantaneously their time, which can only be cultural", but it did trigger my gibberish alarm.
What about a hermit - could he/she create art?
And that's false too.
So when you said "art is a cultural mirror" you meant 'art is art'. Well, I think we can all get on board with that.
Thanks. But you should look.
And you are correct that I had no intention of creating art; what began to appear intrigued me, however. And being intrigued I experimented with different mathematical concepts and formulae. What then appeared seemed to me to be art, but it differed little from what inspired the process. So, non-art the first "accidental" time, but art afterwards?
Whether or not I consider it art is of little or no consequence. I have enjoyed experimenting and seeing what appears. I have several theorems that predict convergence of the procedure at many points in the plane, but the "art" comes up when I avoid implementing the theory.
Quoting Bartricks
I’m interested to hear why it’s false and “ a bit gibberishly”.
Quoting Bartricks
And why is that false?
And some of what you said is false, because you went from what causes something, to what that thing is 'about', and these are not necessarily the same. For example, if I take a drug and it causes me to believe I am a god, then although the cause of my belief is a drug, my belief is not 'about' a drug - no, it is about me and my status as a god.
So you cannot validly conclude that art is 'about' X, even if every instance of art has X as a cause.
And many artists are philosophically minded and have written things about art, including trying to define it (though don't ask me for names).
Oh, okay. I thought that was in reference to art movements and not art itself. My mistake.
Quoting Bartricks
That’s not very sporting of you @Bartricks.
Although to be fair, Gauguin did own some art. So perhaps you're right. Only you're obviously not. So there.
"Art always responds in some way, and so the vantage points from which to observe it were polarized as well, which gave birth to a vast number of concurrent streams. Therefore, we can see the most obvious difference between the tendencies toward abstraction, suggested by the pro-democratic American high-culture, and the European post-war art, which fell under the slight influence of figuration and realism, propagated by the Soviet Union. And then, there was everything else in between: Pop Art, which employed aspects of mass culture (unlike Abstract Expressionism), Fluxus, as a Dada-derived anti-art nihilist movement, Art Brut or Outsider Art if you want, new realism in France, and all the other forms of realism, which emerged in Great Britain, Socialist Realism in the Russian Soviet Republic, etc. It seems that the post-war dunghill was a very fertile ground to start from, and lucky for us, some of the most ingenious artists were eager to make new history. Let’s see which of the paintings from this era of ambivalence and post-trauma could be the most pertinent ones, from today’s point of view, and take a quick survey of the most iconic artworks made in our recent history, in times of crisis which we cannot fully understand, but we could perhaps compare it to the crisis of our own."
When they changed the definition of art they brought culture with them. Culture allowed itself to be changed. It was receptive to the new definition, and so it adopted it.
The definition of art can be changed literally.
We are artists, so why dont we?
It requires agreement. We need to be deeply convinced that our definition is valid.
'Art is an expression of human consciousness. And art work is information about an artists consciousness and subconsciousness'
i am convinced the above definition is valid for all of time. If you understand consciousness as I do then I think you will agree.
It cant happen immediately.It will take a long time to adjust to this. This is a challenge to your consciousness - as all new art is.
I ask respectfully that all those who agree with the above definition put it at the top of their post, and those who are casually viewing also please.
I'm no artist but it sounds good to me. Perhaps, . . . information from an artist's . . .
I don't think it's a one way street like that. We have a definition of a cat, and we've decided on the basis of what cats are on a definition of them, but we've also come to understand that perhaps things we'd want to otherwise classify as cats are not in fact cats. Like foxes seem feline, but are not.
Yes.
And I will look tomorrow when I'm home on a laptop :smile:
How can it be more than those two things?
Quoting Bartricks
I don’t think that’s really a definition of anything. If you used that to explain art you’d have nothing. When artists talk about art they generally talk in an elusive manner. Not all of course. Picasso made many statement, but most of them are interesting more than explanatory. Francis Bacon did some long interviews about what he was doing. Once again very interesting but going nowhere in terms of defining ar, just his own process. Besides that many artists that we can name off the top of our head were extremely judgemental and dismissive of each other’s work.
In terms of movement definitions most of them have come from outside of the immediate art world, by that I mean the artists. It’s not as if artists actually called themselves Impressionists or Cubists. Those names were applied to them. Even though this has no direct relation to the definition of art itself it does give some idea of the ownership and consequent definition of art. My feeling is that those people are always catching up. So their definitions are usually constructed after the fact and received from others.
Quoting Bartricks
I’ll have another go at this.
Quoting Pop
I think it might be closer to the truth that artists, major game players, smashed definitions but never owned them.
Quoting Pop
Obviously from my posts I don’t go along with that. Artists don’t create culture and culture doesn’t allow itself to be changed by anybody. If art changes then it’s because culture has shifted. Culture creates art. But I don’t think there’s “new” cultures, just ones that have not had legitimacy up until then, even though it always existed. The art is one way of making its presence felt. Punk was not invented. That working class attitude was always there, it was just repressed and devalued by social mores and power bases.
Quoting Pop
I think there’s something there, because I believe that only humans produce art.
Quite possibly
In the 70s Malcolm Mclaren as a joke created a punk group - the Sex Pistols
Punk culture grew out of that.
Its not that simple, but everything cultural has a beginning. this thread might be one of them:)
Quoting Brett
What I meant was that their artwork is unconsciously formed by the temper of the times, which is cultural. I can’t imagine what else I could call the temper of the times. Work that is not of this sort is imitative of past movements and ideas. It’s not contemporary. Even art that seems to stand for very little except shock value may be said to represent attitudes in that society at that moment in time, therefore acting like a mirror or reflection. Maybe the art is not caused by the times but is an integral part of its manifestation.
Quoting Pop
Yes, because there was a vast working class, unemployed, disenfranchised, angry culture that existed, had their own cultural references and felt its relevance instantly. They had always existed. Malcolm Mclaren didn’t create them.
So an artists culture will be reflected in their art work.
Quoting Pop
Yes, and it was very imitative. So it didn’t really have the same roots or legitimacy as the UK or US. So like so much art it wasn’t a genuine reflection of culture, it was grafted on and then created its culture, which is not the same as events in the UK.
@Yes, because there was a vast working class, unemployed, disenfranchised, angry culture that existed, had their own cultural references and felt its relevance instantly. They had always existed. Malcolm Mclaren didn’t create them.@Brett"
Malcolm Mclaren created the Sex Pistols and the culture was receptive to them and adopted them, which changed how the kids dressed and behaved, and danced, and what they listened to, and how they understood themselves - It changed their consciousness.
I think it works both ways - yes the culture had to be receptive to punk, and this was primed by their living conditions. Absolutely.
So would it be fair to say that art is almost an instantaneous artefact of a particular emerging culture, small or large.
So by that point it was no longer genuine, and in fact may have already been commercialised and made irrelevant in the UK. Generally, I feel, by the time the media and elites discover something “new” it’s already gone and all that remains is a commercial replica.
All this is to back up part of my position that art is like the ripples from a stone tossed into a pond.
Whats interesting to me is that culture was nevertheless changed.
Quoting Pop
They have no art, they purchase it.
Edit: however it’s still real and reflects them.
Quoting Pop
By art?
It has yet to be invented.
Yes, see my edit.
It may not be noticeable.
Edit: being a perfect replication of who they are, which is what?
Yes, art probably moves faster than anything. In a way they’re iconoclasts but they recreate in the process. Which is sort of a lose but nice definition.
But isn’t generational also cultural?
Quoting Bartricks
I think the work is only about the man. It’s only the man that makes his work important in terms of art. What I mean is that it’s his life and personality, the suffering artist, that’s behind the popularity of the work.
I agree that if the artist deems it art then it should be judged in that way, but there is also the audience who have their say, so we have the King.
There is a dynamic between the artist and the King, with culture as the medium?
I would say from the moment they became artistically interesting to you, you became an artist, however you were performing the same creative actions before as you were after you saw them as art. So you were creating art right from the beginning, while not recognising it as art.
As for defining what art is, this cannot easily be pinned down, or should it be pinned down, it is a cultural phenomena. We could go to great lengths to define it and yet that would be a great deal of talking and I doubt it would take us anywhere in particular.
What is more important if one is an artist is the art itself and the enjoyment of creating it and living with it. Also others sharing in that experience.
I agree with this sentiment.
Quoting Bartricks
I don’t know who said this, nor do I agree.
Art is a cultural artefact, but so is a car or mobile phone. So art is an artefact of a different nature.
There’s an obvious difference between a car and a Picasso. Cars are mass produced for a start, they’re also designed and built on a budget, they’re not the work on one individual and they’re also designed not to be iconoclastic but to calm and satisfy materialist desires of humans, not to mention that they’re entirely functional. Art as an artefact is none of these.
A modern painting or carving may create the most primitive of emotions and, removed from the earth by an archeologist, display the same response as a carving 1000 years old does. But that’s not likely anymore than a non-Christian can be affected by a silver crucifix, there has to be a cultural connection.
The cultural connection of art seems to run deeper and maybe more primitively than a car or phone. The most relevant artists occupy a very small place at the topic an isosceles triangle. Everything else is imitation or reconfiguration, and there’s a lot of it about. In trying to define art I don’t see any point in referring to that except to show what it isn’t. Can an artist channel a cultural period? Maybe, if they have what it takes: skill, perception, imagination, courage, audacity, an open connection to their unconscious mind.
It’s the process that counts for the artist. At the end a work of art may as well be a corpse, a stuffed reference to something that happened but has already gone. And the artwork is certainly not the experience of the artist. Art is an odd artefact because from the moment it’s made it’s over. Some art, like dance, comes and goes before your very eyes.
So there are two moments in the life of art; the making of it and the consumption of it. Outside of the artist all art is consumption, which in the end is consuming culture. That seems a bit shallow, but in the end it’s consumption of something, or maybe consumption’s not the right word, and nor does it contribute to a definition of art, because it would still have happened, even without an audience. So in some ways art’s a corpse.
There is an interesting test for what is art, coined by Grayson Perry, put your art work in a skip and if it has gone by the next day, it is good art, or art, if it stays for a long time, it is poor art, or isn't art at all.
Quoting Punshhh
Why are they artists?
There is more evidence every day about consciousness in animals and plants even!
But I'm trying to restrict this to Human Art.
Quoting Pop
There is no other art.
This definition can be invalidated by producing one artwork that dose not fit the definition.
Nobody has done this yet.
Quoting Pop
Then obviously art is human and only humans produce art.
They are artists because they are performing all the processes that human artists and viewers do, short of intellectual introspection and comment, oh and no money changes hand.
Take the bower bird, the male has inherited a highly creative streak, including critical faculties of the materials he uses and how they work together. The female has inherited acute critical faculties about the creative skills and execution of the male. Also she has her own particular style and preferences, along with the male. She knows what constitutes good art and poor art.
Quoting Pop
That would also include all of humanity. So every person is an artist?
Quoting Pop
But why is that art? And decorate them? How.
Yes, but some artists are better than others.
Quoting Pop
So how does that help in defining art?
Quoting Punshhh
Yes, but some artists are better than others.[/quote]
Once again that doesn’t help in defining art.
The definition works for animals also, and it will be fascinating to see what AI produces. Not much so far, but in ten twenty years
Quoting Punshhh
That seems to require definition first to me.
Quoting Pop
How do you even know what the sub consciousness of a bird is like? That’s a big call.
Edit: let alone an AI.
Explain where the art is and who created it.
Quoting Pop
Can you be sure that isn’t behind the design and construction of a car?
Quoting Punshhh
Why is the bird an artist?
Because he is using his creative streak to create a refined work for a viewer to critically assess.
So art is instinct?
Quoting Punshhh
So that suggests instinct plays a part in human art.
I think there’s something to this instinct issue, that artists are instinctive animals, maybe primitive in their relationship with their surroundings.
My feeling is that those artists at the top of the triangle are very instinctive creatures and quite primitive in their abilities: perceptions, response, connections with history, techniques, etc. Not always nice people either.
Its hard to know how big a role instinct plays in human art. No doubt it plays a role.
I think the definition is still valid, but ill try to learn a bit more about human instinct in art.
Other nuances that are not explained in the definition:
Artifact - chance products like unintentional paint splatter
X factor: what you set out to achieve minus what you actually achieve
Quoting Pop
Commonly known as “accidents”. But maybe not so accidental as the opening of the mind to the unexpected, a primitive action by any measure and something that makes all the difference. It means letting go of control, to a degree.
:up:
That is beautiful mate.
The symmetry of the right and left horse, and the sea-like desert texture, caught my eye.
Brett yes, but we know that we are imperfect and much of what we produce is not intended and we never produce exactly what we want to - this is the human condition. Yet we continue to produce knowing this will be the result - this is a conscious decision.
Surely he's using someone else's art(in reference to the bird and nest picture).
Yes most of them I keep, for example the white wash over the ripples in the sand in the foreground should be at the other side of the ripples, be done in reverse, a big mistake, but I know from experience it doesn't matter, because the viewer would never know and it works anyway.
Right. It's like the difference between accidentally pressing the button on your camera (complicated machine!) and choosing to do so. The camera may be doing much of the "work" (i.e., showing a "mind" of its own), but you're the primary mover.
We have to make that distinction or else you have no way to distinguish art from bird's nests and sunflowers and sunsets.
Art, is not just a sign, but meant to imply something, I.e. Of an artist.
Problem is we subliminally think art is like a word in a way, not like a sign.
It doesn't send a message, it's ineffable, but it definitely sends something; there is that which can be defined by it, but it's art factor is zero.
I was talking about the bird itself is using the wood, whose is the nest?
It's like - 'I am making a base' - the bird says.
It's wrong too - consciousness is not a logical construct. That makes no sense at all.[quote]@Bartricks
I had a narrow consciousness before reading Piaget, subsequently my consciousness broadened.
It took many years to fully digest. My instinct about this construct was strengthened by the double slit experiment, and further buoyed by recent developments in theoretical physics where they talk about consciousness creating matter.
try to substitute ' understanding of self and world that i live in ' for 'consciousness' in the definition of art.
Then it would become art is an expression of understanding of self and the world, and art work is information about understanding of self and the world, including subconscious elements
Art is an expression of human consciousness, and art work is information about the artists consciousness, and subconsciousness
See if that works for you?
No. First, why do you think you know more than me about this? Why do you assume that I'm the confused one, you the enlightened one?
The Piaget stuff is nonsense.
Consciousness is a state - a state of mind. That is, it is a state minds can be in. Just as 'solid' is a state water can be in, 'conscious' is a state minds can be in.
It's relevance to art, I take it, is that art is something that minds alone can produce. If we find that something that otherwise appeared to us to be a work of art was, in fact, the production of something entirely mindless, we would cease to consider it a work of art.
That doesn't give us a definition of art, it just puts a limit on what qualifies.
Yes I think you're right, the construction isn't the nest, it is a kind of base, or pitch from where he operates. The females visit numerous bowers to inspect them and decide which matches her taste. This includes a dance by the male.
I feel I should point out that you are not correct about consciousness, there are extensive discussions about what consciousness is in other parts of the forum and there are not many people who claim that consciousness is seated in the mind, except perhaps those who subscribe to idealism. Are you an idealist?
Consciousness is a state, or emergent property, of the body, the brain is involved in it, but the mind as a self consciousness is a construct overlaying, or superimposed on, the consciousness. This gives the person in combination with the consciousness of the body, the self of self conscious awareness which we experience as sentience, or being and our thinking mind is a part of this construct.
What there is debate over is what kind of a thing a mind has to be in order to be able to be in that kind of a state.
And there are some who deny the actual existence of mental states - but they would eo ipso deny the existence of consciousness.
But congratulations on being so confidently confused.
It's not left field, are you familiar with the threads on consciousness?
This is interesting regarding consciousness as there is a lot of debate. But we are on the verge of artificial intelligence which, even in today's primitive state has emerged a consciousness .Purely out of an algorithm.
Not really - I don't engage with threads that have 'consciousness' in the title because right at the outset they invariably conflate consciousness with that which is conscious - that is, they conflate states with the things they are states of.
Quoting Punshhh
No, I don't think there's any good reason to suppose that a bacteria or a tree has a mind.
Regarding artificial intelligence, I think you are referring to intelligence. Consciousness is not required for intelligence and visa versa.
But they are closely related to us, their cells are virtually identical to ours, why would they not be conscious, is it because they don't apparently have a mind? They do create art by the way.
How do you know this conflation happens if you don't involve yourself in such threads? It does become a subject in those threads, but doesn't make them impotent.
No, it is because they don't have a brain and minds seem to be associated with brains, not mere cells. For example there seems to be precisely one mind - my mind - associated with this body - my body. Yet my body is composed of many, many cells. It has one brain, but lots and lots of cells. And doing things to my brain clearly affects what goes on in my mind. Thus the evidence is fairly overwhelming that minds are associated with brains. Trees and bacteria do not possess these things, and thus it is unreasonable to attribute minds to them.
And they don't produce art, do they?
I don’t think you can say any of these things are conscious of anything. Nor does it help in defining art. If being conscious was all that was required then everyone would be an artist, and some people may be bad artists but many aren’t any sort of artist. But if you’re suggesting every person is an artist then that’s a whole new thing.
Quoting Bartricks
As I see this what you’re suggesting is that this approach cancels out a bias in what art is and is not, that the archeologist then approaches an artefact without cultural baggage as to what constitutes art. But wouldn’t it also mean the archeologist would have to jettison concepts about repetition, positive and negative space, rhythm, pattern, form, etc. Unless you feel those things are learned, and on that point I’m open at the moment.
This is part of the problem with those who say birds create art when all they’re seeing is the appearance of repetition, pattern, etc.
It would lessen it, but it is not guaranteed to cancel it altogether. The claim is not, then, that if an object passes this test it is necessarily a piece of art, or that if it fails it is it necessarily not. It is just a pretty good test given that whatever it is about the artefact that makes the archaeologist think it is a work of art is going to be some quality that transcends culture, for clearly the archaeologist will assume that the artefact is not an object from their own culture - and thus will resist the temptation simply to speculate on what their own culture would say about it - and they will also not know from what culture it originated. Thus they will see it for what it is, and not for what this or that culture says it is - or at least, they are more likely to. The voice of Reason will be more clearly heard about such matters, now that the cultural noise has been turned off. That doesn't mean it will be perfectly clear what Reason says about the matter, only that it'll be clearer and thus more likely to be correct.
Clearly much 'modern art' would not pass this test. I mean, even an archaeologist who loved modern art would not, if they dug some of it up and assumed they were digging up an object from an ages old unknown culture, classify it as art.
Well, doesn't that tell us something interesting about those pieces? It tells us that they are considered art not on the basis of some detectable timeless quality, but simply because the culture in which the archaeologist happens to live insists that these pieces qualify. And doesn't that then imply that they are not art after all, but objects that - due to cultural indocrination - some are duped into treating 'as if' they are art? I'd say that's the reasonable default, even if it is not guaranteed to be true.
So next time you go to an art exhibition imagine that instead what you are visiting is a museum on objects from an unknown culture in the distant past, and then imagine whether you'd think you're seeing art from a different age, or just a collection of junk from another age. If you'd judge it to be junk from another age, then probably what you're looking at is junk from this age, albeit with the banner 'art exhibition' strung above it.
I go along with that as a way of approaching art, to a degree, and that it avoids the trap of cultural norms. But if it works and the archeologist resists speculation about what it is, based on cultural norms, what are they using to define it as art? If it’s reason then what is it about reason that’s being applied? How, for example, would the archeologist, forgoing cultural norms, decide if this was art or not?
https://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=3&ved=2ahUKEwiK2eHkj5bnAhWryTgGHVRsDmUQFjACegQIEBAG&url=https%3A%2F%2Fsimple.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FVenus_of_Willendorf&usg=AOvVaw2RlAsFQjayQsoTmgksz64T
Expression of human consciousness? That would be pretty much any human action that is not performed as a result of a mere instinct. Any utterance, even the most trivial like “I want a banana”, is an expression of consciousness and any moderately determined movement like walking from point A to point B expresses that the person is conscious.
My definition of art is “whatever is the result of human creativity”. To create is to make something out of nothing, that is to make an independent and original idea in someone’s mind into a physical expression that can be conveyed to another mind. It cannot be a copy of anything that existed previously, and it cannot be a physical object that is just a combination of other physical objects without an idea behind it.
A house is a work of art when it harks back to an architect’s original idea, otherwise not. An utterance may be a part of a work of art (literature) when it expresses an idea not previously known to have been thought, at least not in that way. “To be or not to be” is art, “I want a banana” is not. If it is an action, the main purpose of it must be an expression of an idea (it must be aesthetical). Walking from A to B is not art, but dancing is.
Quoting Congau
Interesting point. Original and consequently unrecognisable as art. What then happens?
If you want a definition for art, here's one: art is cheese and cheese is art. There.
That's obviously a false definition, for we recognise that some things are art yet not cheese, and some things are cheese and not art.
We don't have a rival definition in our heads, do we? After all, how would that rival definition show there to be anything wrong with my one?
We already have the concept of art. When we try and 'define' art we are not 'creating' the concept, rather we are trying to capture it.
Big difference.
That's why my definition above should be rejected. Art and cheese are not synonymous. My definition made them so - but so much the worse for my definition.
So, let's be clear about what way around things are. We have the concept of art - a concept given to us by our reason.
We then wonder what it is that qualifies something as art. We have already started recognising some things as art and some things not - so we don't need a definition in order to do this - but we are just wondering if there is something systematic to it.
Hence we speculate about what may qualify one thing as art and another thing not.
But again: we don't need the definition in order to be able to recognise that there is art in the world.
You don't need a definition of a mountain in order to be able to recognise mountains, or a definition of 'you' in order to recognise that you exist. We can try and formulate definitions, but it is a mistake of the first order to think that our definitions are what's in charge.
The archaeologists in my example are less likely to make this mistake.
Other examples of this mistake: thinking that whales are mammals; thinking that peanuts are not nuts; thinking that tomatoes are fruit.
Duchamp taught us that art can be anything the artist wishes it to be. He illustrated this by presenting a urinal as art.
Nothing else is required of an art object except that an artist deems it to be art.
This has been the state of art for the last hundred years . It is why Pollock could drip paint, and Warhol could stencil prints,and Hurst could cut up cows, and Abramovic could perform, etc, etc it is why I can call a thread in a forum art.
This argument of what is art and what is not is over - its ancient history.
There is no distinction between an arbitrary object and a work of art.
The object becomes distinct when an artist deems it art - that is all, nothing else.
So call yourself an artist and deem that something is art - like magic it is!
Then you get on with what matters - what is good art. and why ?
To put it in the terms discussed - what if the archaeologist dug up Duchamp's urinal ?
Well, I expect they'd think it was a urinal and not a work of art. Thus we should take seriously that it is not a work of art.
Artists create art, but that doesn't necessarily make them experts on what it is that makes something art rather than something else (or mean that everything they create is art).
For an analogy: let's say a strange substance starts seeping out of me whenever I think of a strawberry.
I know how to create the strange substance - I can just start thinking of a strawberry and out it seeps. But that doesn't make me an expert on what this curious substance is.
Quoting Bartricks
Quoting Bartricks
So then, man does not produce art, something else does. That’s an interesting perspective.
Quoting Pop
Define an artist.
What I am saying is that 'what it takes' is a matter we investigate - a matter we use our reason to try and discern - rather than a matter that is in our gift.
So you are confusing that which answers to the concept with the concept itself.
That which answers to the concept is 'art' (and we create it). But we did not create the concept.
Quoting Bartricks
Isn’t that what we’re doing now, aren’t we your archeologist? If we’ve dug up The Venus of Willendorf how are we going to apply our reason, in what way?
And what is the concept?
Do you mean by the concept the idea that we know art exists?
Some kind of a fertility symbol, yes? Not a work of art.
Perhaps it is a work of art - perhaps there's a degree of ambiguity over what to classify it as - but then that just shows us that it is sometimes unclear whether something is a work or art or not, even once we've cancelled cultural noise.
Don't make the mistake of thinking that the existence of unclear cases means all cases are unclear.
If someone dug up Duchamp's urinal, it would not be classified as art, but as a urinal.
And if someone dug up the Mona Lisa, it would be classified as art.
A small, dumpy, weirdy thing with no feet and no face? Well, probably not art - probably a fertility symbol or some kind of cultural junk. Not entirely clear.
We have the concept - that is, it is in our intellectual warehouse, as it were - and then we notice that there are things in the world that answer to it.
The concept of a chair is an idea - an idea of a chair. An actual chair is 'that which answers to the concept of a chair'.
Likewise, the concept of art is an idea - the idea of art. Actual art is that which answers to the concept.
Quoting Bartricks
But art doesn’t always answer to the concept of art. That’s the problem. And it’s why we have suspicions about some art we regard as fraud, created by a fraud. How do we prove it’s a fraud?
Yes it does. It's true by definition. Art is that which answers to the concept of art. It is exactly what that concept is the concept of that is the matter over which disagreement is had. But there cannot coherently be any disagreement over whether art is that which answers to the concept of art, anymore than there can be coherent disagreement over whether a chair is something that answers to the concept of a chair.
Quoting Pop
So everyone and everything is an artist. And everything we produce is art. Is that it?
Quoting Bartricks
You might be getting at something I’m not picking up. But aren’t you just saying art is art?
Art is that which answers to the idea of art.
But although that sounds trivial, what is not trivial is the mistake of confusing the concept of a thing with the thing it is the concept of. So, although we have the concept of art, and art is that which answers to it, art is not a concept.
Quoting Bartricks
And what’s the idea of art, something we know by reason or instinct?
Secondly how do we know the artwork answers to it honestly, with integrity?
,
And this is part of the problem, art and reason. If we do it by reason what are the markers we use in our reasoning?
If I return to my analogy of the pool of water and the stone; the pool is the concept of art into which we throw the stone. The ripples are the art.
Edit: artists may very well be operating on instinct and then we’re going to interpret art by reason. Big headache.
Interesting point though; realistic art is so much more approachable to people because they can interpret it through reason: technical skill, proportion, perspective, etc.
Not Quite.. You have to produce something that you say has value ( that will reveal your consciousness to the world ) to love or laugh at. Anybody can do it, any object will do.
One who produces art.
I'm still fascinated by the concept of accidental art vs art. If I sketch an image that is pleasing to the eye, but I had no intention of creating art, that image is not art. However, if I sketch the same image, thinking, "this will be art", then it is. Heady stuff, indeed! :roll:
Quoting Pop
Quoting Pop
This presents a problem for me. Anyone can do it, any object will do, but it must have value and that value is determined by the artist. The problem then is that anything is art if I say so, if I produced it. That doesn’t get us any closer to what art is. And what about literature? Is a book art, no matter how incomprehensible it is, because the writer said it was art? And what commitment does it require, what stage of development? Is the art produced at the beginning of an artist’s life the same as midway?
Quoting jgill
Is that a statement or question?
There is no concept of accidental art. Accidental art is a moment that happens unexpectedly and the artist is able to use all their skills to take advantage of it.
All the rest is immaterial.
We know what art is: art is an expression of human consciousness, and art work is information about the artists consciousness and subconsciousness
Quoting Pop
Fighting in the streets between gangs is the same thing but it’s not art. Or is it?
Quoting Pop
So it’s art if I say so. That’s no definition.
The above is the definition - this covers everything you can possibly say.
And what you end up saying is art will reveal a lot about you.
“ That wasn’t murder judge, that was art.”
If you look at comments on a previous page I indeed posed this question to a member who seems to have some expertise in art. She said that if I produced a pleasing product with no intention of it being art, than, no matter how skillfully done or appealing, it is not art. However, if I were to produce the same product with an intention of creating art, it would be art.
Amazing, huh? :smirk:
I don't know what you mean here. Is it in response to the accident in art?
Quoting Pop
If an artist who has carved out a successful space in the world makes a painting but doesn’t show it does that mean it’s not art?
Quoting jgill
The only person I could find who posted that was yourself.
However I think you misunderstand what I mean by the “accident” in art. It is not “accidental art,” which comes up first on google, it’s “the accident” I refer to in the sense that Francis Bacon uses it.
Bacon often credited the power of his paintings to accidents. “I want a very ordered image, but I want it to have come about by chance,” he told Sylvester in the same 1966 interview. He believed that through embracing spontaneity—and accepting “accidents” as integral aspects of the composition—he’d achieve true emotional candor. Spontaneous marks and images, for the artist, resembled the unexpected welling up of passionate, unbridled feelings.(https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-francis-bacon-artist)
This is why I agreed with Brett initially, that art is a mirroring of culture.
Bar tricks is tying him/herself in knots.
Pop, jgill and Qwex do seem to be open minded as to what art is, can be and to what might or might not be an artist. Things which constantly change with the evolution of culture.
Quoting Punshhh
Is that your position, that what defines an artist changes over time? That someone like Michelangelo is no artist because we no longer regard him as an artist?
I agree, art is what is produced by things with 'spirits', 'consciousness', things which are alive and this includes the entire biosphere.
Quoting Pop
There are many things that exist that you will never see.
Quoting Punshhh
I understand this connection of spirit and consciousness to art, but it does nothing to help understand art and reduces it to mysticism. If your position is that it can’t be understood, then that’s fine, but it means you have nothing to offer.
I didn't attribute minds to trees and bacteria. I said they may be conscious and that they produce art.
The reason I asked you these questions about animals and plants was to determine what you mean by the word mind. You seem to be saying that mind is some kind of self awareness and includes all the nervous activity in the brain associated with the functioning of the body and intellect. That is a very broad use of the word and explains the confusion.
You are attributing mind to certain states and functions in the body which are not normally associated with the human mind. States of what I would describe as consciousness. The problem with this definition is that it sets an arbritary definition of what organisms are conscious by conflating consciousness with mind and claiming that organisms which don't have a brain, or something equating to a brain cannot be conscious, I would suggest this is rather naive. Surely a tree is conscious of its environment in some way, because it reacts is subtle and sophisticated ways to its environment as a responsive living organism, indeed in ways which are very artistic. I have a slice across the trunk of a tree highly polished hanging on my wall, in my opinion, it is equally as artistic as the Picasso on the wall next to it.
Quoting Punshhh
Sorry, I didn’t mean you personally. I was a bit casual about wording my post.
Edit: what I meant was that if someone’s perception of art is from a mystical point of view then there’s nowhere to go after that, because it can’t be proved or disproved.
Quoting Punshhh
However, this is just too much to go along with. If everything is art then there is no art.
Edit: and the discussion has to be about more than opinion, don’t you think?
Regarding “The Venus of Willendorf”.
Quoting Bartricks
Does this mean that there is no “art” to be retrieved from that era and that the appearance of “art” only appeared at a particular time in human history and hasn’t always been there.
From memory I read that the idea of an “artist” is a relatively new idea. And how do we separate art from pieces like “The Venus”?
“In fact, talking of artists in pre-Renaissance times is an anachronism,” says Rieber. The figure of the artist as we understand it today—that of the creative genius—emerged during the Renaissance, which gave rise to so many masterpieces of painting and sculpture. Yet this was limited to a handful of famous names. In 1571, a few artists from Florence became independent of the guilds and started working in academies, which had hitherto been reserved for the liberal arts.
The Renaissance thus heralded the emergence of classical artists, who were “liberal professionals, carrying out their work within an academic context. It was not until the nineteenth century that the figure of the romantic artist, driven by vocation and deep inspiration, began to appear,” explains Nathalie Heinich, a sociologist specialised in artistic professions and cultural practices at the CRAL.5 (https://news.cnrs.fr/articles/who-was-the-first-artist).
Who knows what art is? Some, I think most, say the most despicable thing a person can do is murder and yet, if current trends are any indication of our "artistic" tastes, the Joker 2019 was a box office hit which goes to show that art is something that seems to transcend morality, and if that then loving art must be the act of appreciating beauty and beauty alone, isolated and unhindered by anything at all.
Reminds me of the autonomist view on art which holds that art must be freed of moral restraints which I find is a scary proposal but yet, people, contrary to my expectations, do seem to disregard everything when face to face with beauty - they seem to literally beg for union with that which is beautiful and all matters from pragmatic considerations to goodness divine become hindrances to be disregarded with utmost urgency and determination.
Bottomline, art is about beauty. What is beauty? I haven't the faintest idea. People see the invention of writing as a giant leap for mankind and then there's calligraphy. There's another great landmark in human history, the spoken word and then there are songs. There's the defining feature of man, logic, and then there's rhetoric. It seems for every x we can say of humans there's an (x + beauty) that's art. As you can see, from the examples, beauty seems almost superfluous and even an obstacle to efficiency as art takes a fully functional human artifact (language, logic, etc.) and beautifies it - the additional aesthetic elements reducing overall efficiency. Why do we engage in what seems to be a self-defeating enterprise? Perhaps there's something in beauty that makes it a worthwhile goal.
It might help to notice that beauty evokes a pleasurable sensation and though our biology is attuned to seeking and appreciating pleasure, nature herself seems rather reluctant to give us pleasurable experiences. Yes, we do see beauty in nature but nature also has a dark side which she's quick to reveal to the unfortunate and the foolish which in my reckoning includes the majority. In other words, unforgiving nature forces us to create our own pleasurable experiences and that's why we have this proclivity for art; it's us trying to please ourselves by imbuing our creations with beauty, in a way, outdoing mother nature herself.
No worries, my response came out more as a rebuttal than was intended.
You will only find me raising mystical viewpoints when I am specifically discussing metaphysics. It does'nt apply here.
You are free to find this to much to go along with, I am further along the spectrum than this, the end where far more can be considered for artistic merit. My opinion on this is that organisms by their nature can perform actions equating to the actions of intelligent artists, like the Bower bird, or a spider spinning a web.
I don't think it can be answered in a definitive way other than by reference to the idea that it is a phenomena of humans activity emergent from human culture. But this is a vague definition and doesn't answer many questions about art.
When I was a student I went to great lengths to find out and understand the meaning of art. I came away with little more than that it came down to personal opinion and preference. I then followed the path of exploring my own journey in art, which included becoming one myself.
I would point out, as I did in my first post on this thread that the art movements of modernism, post modernism and post post modernism, exploded the theory of art and what art is
I think the term "aesthetically engaging" is more useful for defining art. There is art that is meant to engage many, even contradictory aesthetic impulses. Like that one with a Jesus statue on a cross in a jar of urine. Or Nabokov's novel Lolita.
Quoting Punshhh
I'm open to other intelligent beings creating art and kinds of proto-art. But we should be clear that being "artistic" as in, having art-like qualities, is different from, though overlapping category with "art."
Movements like Brit Art were pushing the boundaries of art, but in an art world in which in theory, anything was art provided an artist said it was Art. I put artist in italics because in that world 'artist' meant a person who had gone to certain colleges and been adopted by certain patrons.
So anything could be art, but only certain people could be artists.
Well, that's what I was unknowingly getting at - beauty as transcendent to everything else. Yet I can't help wondering, moral goodness is utlimately about the highest pleasure and hence moral goodness is perfect beauty itself. To then say moral goodness is like shackles, holding artists back from revealing beauty in its most magnificent form, is to make a grave mistake - like a person who seeks warmth but turns away from the sun, into the shadows.
You’re still taking about beauty rather than aesthetics. I believe Artemis tried to point out that aesthetics can transcend beauty, or rather, our conventional sense of it.
Quoting Artemis
This was part of the conversation about intention being necessary when creating art.
So, from this perspective, how are we to know if the famous bust of Nefertiti is really a work of art? We can't simply gaze at it in admiration, thinking, "What a lovely work of art." What were the intentions of the unknown sculpturer?
I don't agree with this idea.
Well, my only slight alteration would be that the artist can't just point and call something art. S/he has to engage in some act of creation.
Quoting TheMadFool
Yes, I agree with that. Lolita is a great example of how beauty and morality don't go hand in hand all the time. Some people have unfairly criticized the novel for valorizing immorality, but because they don't understand the difference for art. Nabokov even said that the whole point was to capture aesthetic engagement and moral revulsion at the same time.
Quoting jgill
I think something like the Nefertiti statue is more obvious than others. Sure, we can only infer intentions, but it seems like a case we can be fairly confident about intentionality. Although one could come up with other theories about its creation, none I can think of are as probable.
It's entirely possible that we may at times misapply the term art, or that we may not always know if something is art. I don't think that's a good counterargument to the definition itself. Like there is nothing apparently wrong with the definition of a cat just because some people might think foxes are kinds of cats.
It helps when we do away with the need to "know with 100% certainty" and accept the fallibalistic realist position that "fairly confident" is the maximum anyone can be about most things in this world.
This is a tangent, but I see the demands for certainty over and over on this forum and elsewhere... I think it probably comes from a really naive understanding and application of science, where we think the answer has to be known with certainty to be true. But most of the time, even,in science (!) we're working with a theory which is just "to the best of our knowledge/understanding," and which is better or more plausible than any other theory.
All this is just to say, I think once you try to demand absolute certainty, you're asking the wrong questions.
Yes. Aesthetics includes other things, even repulsion or disgust.
Another example: Jazz artists use tension and release in the form of dissonance (not pretty) and harmony (pretty) in their music all the time to create amazing aesthetic dynamics.
I don't see how that follows from what I said. It just implies that that particular artefact is probably not a work of art (and something produced today that resembles it, is therefore probably not a work of art either as were it to be dug up in a few thousand years it too would be classified as some kind of totem rather than a work of art).
Just pointing can make an otherwise ordinary object art. That sounds pretty creative to me. Anything can be viewed aesthetically.
Anything can be viewed aesthetically, true. But not all that is aesthetic is art. The object or performance or whatever in question must in some way be changed by the artist in order to move it from the category of "aesthetic object" to "art object." It's not "creative" in the basic sense of the world to merely notice.
I think, again, the bar doesn't need to be raised very high. Photography is not much more than pointing and capturing the vision of a scene. The creative choices come in with how the artist chooses to frame the scene, what lighting, angle, perspective, etc. Of course, then the scene is still not the art object--the picture of the scene is.
An artist is an expert.
Conscious states are 'states' of a thing. That thing is, by definition, 'a mind' ('a mind' being just 'that which bears conscious states'). So if you think a tree has conscious states, then you think that the tree either is, or possesses, a mind. To deny this is akin to denying that never-married Tim is a bachelor (I didn't say he was a bachelor, I just said he was a never married man!).
Quoting Punshhh
I hope it is now clear. I am using the term in its conventional sense to denote an object that bears conscious states - that is, something that can be in a state of consciousness.
If you think there can exist conscious states that are not the states of any object, then I would like to sell you the shape of my house (not my house - just its shape).
if you accept that conscious states are the states of a thing, then you now know how to use the word 'mind' correctly. It refers to that object.
An artist, or anyone, can frame anything as art and essentially invite others to view it aesthetically, and thereby change it from an ordinary object to an "aesthetic object," if they are successful. I believe there is great value in viewing the world aesthetically.
So the definition of a mind, is that which hosts a conscious state. This confirms what I was suggesting, that you appear to be calling mind consciousness and consciousness mind. Are you saying a mind has consciousness by definition. And consciousness only occurs in minds by definition?
Just a few more questions to clarify, is a bacteria conscious? Does a mind require neurons? What do you call the self aware consciousness found in a human?
Surely the act of saying something is art is the alteration.
I am not disagreeing with you, I am largely in agreement, there is only a nuance of difference, I think.
That's a misleading way to put it. It doesn't 'host' conscious states (for that implies they could exist elsewhere - they just happen to be attending a mind). No, it 'bears' conscious states.
An analogy: water can be gas, liquid, or solid. Those are 'states' of water. We would not say that water 'hosts' its solidity. No, 'solid' is a state that water can be in - sometimes water is solid.
Consciousness is a state - a state of mind. So, 'a mind' is the object - the thing - that is sometimes in the state of consciousness.
Am I saying that minds are always conscious? No. That may be the case (Descartes thought it was). But it does not follow from anything I said.
If something is conscious - which means the same as 'in a state of consciousness' - then it is a mind. But something can be a mind and not be conscious.
Consciousness is therefore sufficient to make something a mind, but not necessary (though again, some - Descartes - disagree and think that minds are essentially conscious and thus can no more be lacking in consciousness than a material object can be lacking in extension).
Quoting Punshhh
You have already asked me that - no, I don't see any good evidence that bacteria are conscious.
Minds - the objects that bear consciousness - are associated with brains. Bacteria do not have brains. So it would not be reasonable to believe they have minds. They 'could' have minds, but we have no reason to suppose they do and so believing that they do would be akin to me believing you've murdered 10 people (you 'could' have done so - there's nothing metaphysically impossible about it - but brute possibilities are not good evidence).
Quoting Punshhh
No.
Quoting Punshhh
Self-consciousness.
Note, it is not a 'thing'. It is a 'state of a thing'.
Consciousness is a state, not an object.
Your mind only receives consciousness, but it's trasmission is the heartbeat.
Our consciousness experience is largely down to biology.
Temporal nervous arteries, on each side of the head, provide calm necessary for some thoughts; perhaps thought consistency would be less if our temperament were restricted.
Quoting Punshhh
I think you are confusing ”the elements of art” (line, rhythm, repetition, etc.) with art itself. and organisms performing “actions equating to the actions of intelligent artists” is your subjective view. It still doesn’t rest on any definition of art except what you say art is. And it was my impression that we were trying to move beyond that. So how does this idea of organism producing art contribute to a definition? If you’re going to suggest that the universe produces art, all organisms, all life, then you might as well say the universe produces art, which is no answer that’s any good to us, except to say we’re moved by a greater force than ourselves. So we are not artists then, because it’s not the act of a free will.
Quoting jgill
I don’t think the Nefertiti bust is a work of art in the sense we see it. But I do think there’s a lineage that connects it. I think we went from these anima, created by craftsmen, to work created by what we call “artists’ today. I don’t believe artwork contains anima like it did, just that the craftsmen/artist position changed with culture and has a connection.
This is why I don’t completely agree with Bartrick saying art transcends time and culture. I think it has to be looked at in terms of its time and culture otherwise we can never make sense of it.
I think art should always be defined with respect to the artist. So you won't be surprised to see many definitions of art circulating around. I think one of the feature l have found amongst all art is the bare naked presence of the artist. Great art often comes from people with great emotional sensitivity and depth.When they want to reveal whatever they hide inside of themselves to the world, they need to use art. But great artists are also intelligent people and they can judge the quality of their work quite well and they know how to keep a good balance between the universality and intimate quality of their work.That's why great art can also be seen as separating the artist and the feeling/ideas inside an artist. This causes great distress on the soul and the constant urge for creativity requires constant struggle. I wonder if that's the cause for a lot of great artists suffering from some form of mental illness as it usually depicted in a romantic sense.
I don't think the creator's intention was to create art. The bust was probably created primarily to please the monarchy with a flattering image. This is assuming it is not a fake.
I perceive it as art. :cool:
Quoting Bartricks
I trying to determine why the artefact is not a work if art.
From what you say you believe that these artefacts from the past, these totems, have no relationship to art, and, possibly, that there was no art then. But you do believe that if someone dug up the Mona Lisa they would recognise it as art. If someone dug up the Mona Lisa 20, 000 years from now would they say it was art or just dismiss it as a totem?
Quoting jgill
But why?
I know what you mean, but I'm not sure it suffices. I don't have an answer as to how much an artist has to actually manipulate things in the world in order to transform them into art... At least, no more than I could tell you how many grains of sand it takes to make a pile. But it seems to me just like we know that 1 sandgrain does not count but a thousand do, that a sunflower pointed at is not art, but Van Gogh's Sunflowers is.
Duchamp's position was that an object need only be recontextualized, by for example, putting it in a gallery. Roger Scruton suggested even most photography may not count because there is not enough creating happening in the production of a photograph. The knee-jerk reaction to Scruton may be that of dismissal, but I recall his arguments being pretty darn convincing....
I think the artist can also present something as it is when everyone else around is busy with changing it into something else. Realism in art comes to my mind. Great art is a manifestation of courage and it takes the greatest courage to present reality as it is.
Because it moves me in a way difficult to describe. I see it and I think,"This is art."
But I see some of the imagery I create with my math and computer programs the same way, even though I have little if any intention of creating art. Merely curiosity, which apparently is the wrong intention, according to Artemis.
I think one of the things an artist does is renews our vision or perception of things. There are many painters but not all of them are artists, as there are many dancers but not all of them are artists. Great artists also create work that is instantly recognisable as being from that artist, the work and their name become synonymous with each other. This is why crafts are not generally regarded as art because they tend to have a repetitive nature, probably bound by their construction. However some craft people do break out of that restriction and use the materials in an unexpected way.
So on that basis there are very few “artists” and far too many people calling themselves artists. @Wittgenstein talked about the trauma of artists. I think that comes from the demands of operating in the field of total originality, an area you can never be sure of; is it real, is it great, or is it just rubbish? And then exposing that work to the public who react to originality in fairly predictable ways; shock and dismissal being just two responses.
Quoting jgill
Do you see how that just takes us back to the beginning.” I don’t know what art is, but I know what I like.”
Sure. It's a product of the artist's conscious and subconscious mind which resonates with both my conscious and possibly subconscious mind.
I think martial art will give us an interesting insight into art. It can be kept hidden from being used yet it is still there in the person. The greatest fighters are the ones who can avoid fights.
Well, first we should not assume that there is some set of features that all artworks have to have in common in order to be art.
What I am proposing is not a definition, but a procedure for testing whether something is a work of art (though a procedure that is not 100% reliable). It is a good procedure, I think, because we are first and foremost aware of art via our reason and this test is a way of accessing its least corrupted deliverances on this matter.
Quoting Brett
I have said nothing so strong as that. My thought experiment is regularly put into practice. That little totem is an example. It was dug up. And it seemed and seems to most of us to be a totem, not a work of art. Looked at objectively, then, it doesn't seem to qualify as art. Which is good grounds for thinking that it is not art - for what better grounds could we ever have for thinking that something is or is not art than the disinterested judgements of rational beings?
It does not follow from this that there can be no relationship between totems and art or anything else and art. Nothing in my proposed test prevents an object from being classified as both a totem 'and' a work of art. My point is just that in this particular case, it seems just to be a totem - that, when looked at objectively, it does not seem to be art, just totem.
Nor does it follow from this that I think there was no art in the past. I am unclear why you think my test commits me to that view? If the mona lisa was dug up it would be considered a work of art, regardless of the age from which it was thought it came.
Quoting Bartricks
This is the test, I guess. Why would it be regarded as art 20,000 years from now?
I still need to know what aspect of reason is helping us.
If archaeologists dug it up now, and because of where they dug it up from conclude that it is 20,000 years old, would they consider it a work of art?
Yes. Obviously.
So why do you think archaeologists 20,000 years from now won't also consider it a work of art?
Note, the whole point of the test - why it is a good test - is that it helps us overcome the prejudices of our current age and look beyond the norms of our own culture.
That's why it is a good test now, and will be a good test 20,000 years from now. And anything that passes the test now, will almost certainly pass it at any time.
Quoting Bartricks
I understand that and I appreciate your test. But can you be sure that your own contemporary views about art are not prejudicing your opinion against “The Venus”, can you be sure that you’re not bound, unconsciously, by the norms of contemporary culture?
No, not completely - one of the reasons why it is not a perfect test. But taking that possibility too seriously amounts to just being a radical sceptic.
If four or five independent witnesses report seeing James stab Sarah, then that's pretty darned good evidence that James stabbed Sarah. Now, yes, how can we be sure that the witnesses aren't corrupt? Well, we can't be entirely sure. But that doesn't mean we aren't very well justified in now believing that James stabbed Sarah.
Similarly, if four of five archaeologists dig up that venus thingy and each one independently judges it to be a totem not a work of art, then that's pretty good evidence that it is not a work of art - for the rational faculties of five independent people delivered that verdict.
Now, that's not conclusive proof because our reason is not infallible and is liable to corruption by the influences of the age in which we live. But this test can reasonably be expected to overcome many such corrupting forces precisely because the judges in question - the archaeologists - are passing judgement about something they believe to belong to another culture.
Quoting Bartricks
And by declaring what an artefact is and is not they are equally deciding what is and is not art. So what we have is a body determining what art is. Which is art by committee.
My children have grown up with a screen in their face, so surely social media is the dominant influence on culture today. This leads me to believe that if art wants to continue to be relevant to culture it must move to the digital platform, and in many ways it has
I originally deemed this thread a work of art in jest, but have since been seriously thinking about its viability as a serious art form.
If art is an expression of human consciousness, then what better demonstration of that then this thread in a philosophy forum.
It has all the elements we deeply value in a work of art :
It explores the idea of what is art
It provides a definition
It demonstrates the difficulty of acceptance of the definition
It is a great resource for a casual inquirer wishing to acquaint themselves with what art is.
It also has human drama.
through posts a sense of the other person emerges.
Their consciousness is slowly revealed.
Like characters in a play they interact , clash, dominate, submit, but over time they learn to respect and care for each other
It shows humanity as a thinking feeling creature. Consciousness at its best.
I would challenge anybody to suggest an art work that would stand up to all that this thread contains.
They are not 'deciding' it, but discerning it.
If we can just 'decide' these things then just decide that art is a piece of cheese and be done.
It's like saying the witnesses just 'decided' that James stabbed Sarah.
Yes, I agree that courage to say something interesting and important would be a quality of great art.
But not all art is great. Some of it (most?) ranges from good to passable to ugh. :rofl:
Quoting Brett
Again, I agree with your burgeoning definition of "great art and artists" here. But bad art is still art.
The definition of "art" is a pretty low bar and pretty lenient. But as to what art is "great".... well, let's just say I have pretty strict and high standards for that.
I guess my suspicion is that people expand or restrict the definition of art too much because they think along with that word comes some kind of quality judgement. But I think "art" is just a fairly neutral category.
Well, it's no Hamlet, but you're right that philosophical dialogue has a lot of the merits of art, specifically plays.
On a side note, dialogue as a form for philosophical books is on the up-and-coming once more. A step in the right direction, if you ask me.
Quoting Pop
Let’s call it a Harold Pinter play.
Quoting Bartricks
But ultimately determining it.
That would take a special sort of person, no?
Quoting Artemis
What do you mean by that?
But they are not 'constitutively determining' it. That is, its status as art is not of a piece with its being judged to be art by objective judges. If it is art then we would expect objective judges to discern this about it, but their judgements and its status as art remain distinct.
It seems to me that your idea is that art is a concept and certain artworks are evidence of this concept and that through reason we can discern this art and separate it from work which is not art. We know that art exists and we know through reason what it looks like.
Correct me or add to where you think necessary.
Edit: and culture doesn’t determine art.
No, I've said explicitly that art is 'that which answers to the concept of art'. The concept of a chair is not a chair. Chairs are chairs. Concepts are concepts.
Art is not a concept. Art is art. We have a concept of art - an idea - and it is by applying this idea to the world that we are able to recognise that it contains some art.
Note, the word 'concept' is actually one of these bullshit words that turns up all over the place and fairly reliably indicates confusion.
Replace it with its synonym - idea - and things become clearer (or do for me).
We have an 'idea' of art. But art is not an idea. It is the object of the idea of art.
Quoting Brett
'Determine' is ambiguous, but yes, culture does not 'constitutively' determine what is or is not art. We can all recognise this insofar as we recognise that many artists go unrecognized as such in their own culture.
Most of the artist that we have in the mainstream are all about buisness and not about art.Bad art is worse than nothing. When you have nothing infront of you. You probably feel normal but when you see some terrible stuff, you feel disgusted and abhor it. That's why l have a tendency to not even regard terrible art as art and one of the biggest BS told is that art depends on taste of the perceiver but l think every art has some standard and time will always preserve great art if people develop the right perspective to see it in line of the artistic tradition. This view also answers the question of artist being neglected during their lifetime and only achieving the status of a great artist after passing away. I hold the view that most of the great art will always rise to the top as long as the artist tries to present it to the society.
Quoting Bartricks
Yes, I realise that now. My laziness.
Edit: so the art produced must respond to, or fit, the idea of art.
I'll second that
Quoting Wittgenstein
A corrupted society, what then? Is it possible art is already dead? Not in making a painting but in achieving its ideal.
:up:
It is dead depending on where you look for it.
Probably. But art can’t achieve anything in the shadows. It needs the light.
But l think there are artists who don't want their art to be public knowledge and they keep it to themselves. Art will never die in a way but become less accessible.
A few years back it was quite clunky and awkward, but so many people have learnt and brushed up - and it occurred to me of course they would, like art students they would learn what is required to improve their work . A lot of the work was very impressive, and I was mentally comparing it to contemporary art and thinking how better it was. How it had character and a sense of the culture it came from.
I imagine much of this work originated without meaning to be art, or to be displayed as such, much less sold.
I have a feeling outsider art has the potential to challenge the art market in a similar way that aboriginal art has in Australia.
Quoting Wittgenstein
I don’t know if I can believe that, even if they say so. I understand the pleasure in the process, but art needs an audience.
Of course I’ve just realised, according to my theory of art reflecting culture, that art can never be dead, but it can be pretty unappealing, dull, pointless, shallow and pretentious.
The same applies to what you hold as your definition of art if any:)
And doing so, make it difficult to ascertain if they exist. But, assuming they do exist, one cannot determine whether their virtual art is really art: did they have the intention to produce art, which may or may not exist? :chin:
Quoting Bartricks
Quoting Bartricks
If what @Bartricks says is true does that mean we cannot understand art through any other means than our reason. Or is the inability to define art because it eludes our reason.
It seems just possible that all art can be addressed through our reason, that even the artist producing the most perplexing art still produces art and addresses it with reason.
That's analogous to the classic philosophy question.
If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound ?
I recall a particular discussion on the consequences/impact of art and how artists are quick to take credit for the good that results from their work but also are reluctant to own up to the bad that follow from their art. If that's the case then there's an underlying hypocrisy that artists are guilty of - claiming that art is somehow free of moral constraints and yet they seem to judge their own work in moral terms. I wonder what Nabokov would've thought of his work - Lolita - if it had a hand in a surge of pedophilia in its audience?
Quoting TheMadFool
The problem is how do you write about immorality without describing it?
I don’t see how a book could create a surge in pedophilia, as if it might convert someone.
What would aesthetics transcending beauty look like? Are you saying there can be disgustingly ugly art too? In my opinion, the most repugnant of acts are immoral ones and if aesthetics can transcend beauty it must be able to make an art of immorality. It's probably true that there are some artworks out there which attempt to do just that but has the audience, us, accepted such works with complete approval? I doubt people will be willing to grant such liberty to artists to make a display of abject immorality; in other words, art must maintain some moral dimension and that would mean, by my account of how the highest beauty is morality, that art has to be about beauty.
His paintings were popularly perceived as ugly
Form follows function is a popular concept in art
[quote="Pop;374617"]Why did Van Gogh paint as he did?
Because he couldn’t paint and had no idea what he was doing.
How could they be popularly perceived as ugly when no one knew about them?
Quoting TheMadFool
Do you actually reject all art that is not about beauty? And do you also reject the idea that beauty is cultural?
Van Gogh, could paint, but he was trying to develop his own unique style and he was so successful that his works hold some of the highest values in the art market.
As scientists admit that they don't know what consciousness is, or how, or where it is produced, we can't therefore assume that organisms like bacteria aren't conscious.
So what is required for a thing to have a mind?
You keep bringing up the conflation thing and you also did in another context with Brett, I don't see the relevance and am not confused about it, I am well aware of the difference between states and objects, or things.
He was a post impressionist. His work is far from equal to other post impressionists like Cezanne and Gauguin. He wasn’t successful at all. The value of his paintings today is irrelevant. Cezanne and Gauguin sold their work at the time, Van Gogh sold none. Why?
Think of punk music
apply it to the times
change the class to merchant middle
and you have van Gogh
Quoting Pop
He serves the suffering, alienated, passionate artist myth. Have a good look at his work and read a biography about him.
He is one of the true Geniuses of painting
Beauty is that which is kind a person's or group's sense.
Different people can consider an artwork beautiful, however, that's because it's kind to their senses, not because it is universally beautiful.
Good art is art that art which generates high quality of interest.
In this scenario, you only attracted the interest of the king with your art.
Who's interest matters?
Does the king's interest outweigh the prospect of millions?
What if I find your art is beautiful? Does that mean it IS beautiful? No. If we all find it beautiful, does that mean it IS? No.
There is some collection of interested parties saying the artwork is kind to their senses.
The artist had generated interest - of X quality. The man with the best eyes is interested, therefore his artwork is Y quality of good.
To conclude, it is about interest but not quantity. Quality of interest that is generated by artwork confirms what is good art. Art stands as X good.
try putting one piece of paper over another, and focus on the edge. you cant focus on both pieces at the same time. The result is a blur.
van Gogh was dialing knobs in peoples heads in 1860
There are all manner of reasons why he didn't sell in his own lifetime (he did exchange paintings with others, and he did sell one - albeit to the sister of a friend). But one reason is that neither he nor his brother made any great effort to sell them. He loved his own paintings. He also valued them highly and priced them far above their market value. For instance, he thought his sunflowers paintings should be sold for 500 francs each (somewhere in the 7,000 pound region in today's money) - the same price as a vase of flowers by the (at the time) very well known and collectible Monticelli. And the first and only painting that he sold in his own lifetime - The Red Vineyard - went for 400 francs. That's a huge sum for a work by a complete unknown (much more than Gauguin was selling his works for). He also didn't paint for very long - his entire artistic career was only 10 years, and of those he only really hit his stride in the last 2 - almost all of his best works come from those final two years. And he spent one of those years in a mental asylum. So the main focus during the last two years of his life - the years when he was producing his best work - was not on selling, but on staying sane.
The early reviews of his work also leave one in no doubt that some, at least, did recognise that his work was in a league of its own (Octave Mirabeau's 1891 review holds nothing back). Monet thought he was great too, and I seem to remember reading somewhere that in the first exhibition of his work after his suicide Monet walked into the room full of Van Goghs and said "My God! He's beaten us all!"
Anyway, Van Gogh can do no wrong in my book and the idea that Cezanne and Gauguin are better is just, well, absurd! The man's a god.
Quoting Brett
Have you? Have you read his letters? Read his letters. They're like nothing else. Read Jo Bonger Gogh's touching biography (the wife of Theo Van Gogh and one of the great unsung heroes of art - she dedicated her life to promoting his work). Then look at his works. If you still can't see that they're masterpieces there's no hope for you! Gauguin indeed - pah.
If art is thought about for it's meaning, it's not thought about for the artist's skill, which is a different category of judgement. There is such thing as stroke.
We can talk about the competitive nature of artists, not about quality of interest but skill of artist.
However skill of artist can generate good interest, surely this is the highest reward for an artist.
The best artist likely has the most advanced stroke.
Imagine the dreamers art.
Someone had created us with the stroke, perhaps it is lesser than being created without the stroke.
I’m not saying that it’s not about beauty, I’m saying it’s about experiencing beauty beyond our conventional sense of it. An artist is skilled in inducing an aesthetic experience, simply put, if only their own. The subject matter may not be what we typically regard as beautiful.
Can you explain why you prefer Picasso over Van Gogh?
Here is one of my favourites, I haven't seen another painting of a sunset with so much depth.
So, if I recall correctly, he suggested that anyone who actually found the first half of his novel titillating was just exposing a corruption already existent in their own psyche's. His book was meant to make the horror of pedophilia more apparent by the juxtaposition of beauty and immorality--which is supported by the fact that the protagonist is a sniveling, whining, unsympathetic dude even without the molestation part. I think the fascinating thing to see culturally is that the book is known for the pedophilia parts, at which we are horrified, but the whole "he's also a murderer" aspect is just kinda forgotten.
Quoting TheMadFool
Yes.
Do I like it? Not really. But some people like punk rock too, and I'm not sure why anyone would subject themselves to that screaming either.
Quoting TheMadFool
It's currently under debate whether Gauguin should be celebrated/displayed anywhere, because (contrary to the Lolita example) he was actually erotically displaying underage girls that he apparently molested/raped in real life....
In contemporary art it has a strict meaning.
It goes something like this: In all fields of human endeavor, there are leaders at the cutting edge of their field. They are the only ones with the opportunity to be creative. They do this by grasping beyond the edge of human achievement and clasping onto something, and then bringing the rest of the field with them.
Its two important steps
1: Finding something beyond current understanding - beyond current endeavor / achievement
2: Bringing the rest of the field with them
The second step is the Hard Problem of Creativity - it is necessary to convince others that you are right to bring the discovery into reality, to bring it into the collective consciousness.
Although they have made a discovery, the world is blind to it until they understand it.
What is the difference between an art work that is hidden, and and art work in plain sight that nobody understands? Nothing
People who are successful in this are the only creatives - they are the true leaders of the world.
They are the ones who expand our consciousness.
Relate this to Van Gogh, or Galileo , or Copernicus or whoever discovered the world was round.
Most artists achieve this to a very minimal degree by creating an art work that varies in form or content from previous art. you would be familiar with artists doing weird shit.
So few achieve a sizable shift in the understanding of art.- Duchamp is unparalleled in this.
You have a new idea in this thread, but only a few can see it, and most just ignore it. And this is very much a part of what is art.
You have a new idea in this thread, but only a few can see it, and most just ignore it. And this is very much a part of 'what is art'
I was looking for a frame the other day and noticed a framed Van Gogh print. I think it was a placeholder to show off the frame. Anyway, it occurred to me to try looking at the picture as though I didn’t know who painted it. It did look much more pedestrian when viewing it this way, I must say. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve always loved his work and think it’s brilliant. It’s just that we should probably acknowledge that the value we place on art is often fictional, like money or rare gems (that aren’t actually so rare).
Exactly its all about understanding, or one consciousness looking at another consciousness
Quoting Punshhh
I’d love to get into this but I’m not sure if it’s the right place and maybe futile anyway, in that it won’t contribute much.
Quoting Punshhh
What exactly does this mean?
Quoting praxis
That’s because it is pedestrian. Mid year high school kids paint like that, which is Van Gogh’s level, everything so literal, so clumsy and flat footed.
Edit: just an interesting note. Are we allowed to say Van Gogh’s no good?
Quoting Artemis
But not by serious readers. So if that’s the cultural perception then culture has become shallow and ignorant of art. Which is no surprise. So what is culture today?
Quoting Artemis
What does that mean: “erotically”?
That was not quite what I meant. Originality does not at all require that a new genre of art is invented every time an artist goes to work. It’s perfectly possible to be creative within a genre that has been explored thousands of times. It’s a modern misconception that new forms of art have to be perpetually invented. That puts the emphasis on invention rather than performance; on whims rather than quality.
Think about all the masterpieces that were produced in classical painting. There was not an enormous development in style between the Renaissance and the 19th century compared to what has happened since then, but each one of the old masters showed an incredible creative power in their works while still staying well within the frames of what was acceptable art.
The “Madonna and child” was painted again and again, but although the motive was the same, the best performers could prove an impressive creative energy. The sublime ideas they expressed were not found in the motive as such, but in the unique message of each painting.
Sure, creativity is the opposite of copying, but as long as the essential idea of a work of art is unique and not copied, it is real art.
Your private parts start to feel funny.
Quoting Congau
Of course not, and that was not quite what I meant. What I meant was having found a new way of looking at a subject artists then explore that approach, or style for the sake of simplicity, and apply it to the subject of their interest. All art movements are challenged by an original, or new, approach, otherwise every painting would look like the “Madonna and Child”.
It’s probably worth considering why there was “no enormous development in style between the Renaissance and the 19th century”, and what purpose art served, what it was that constrained the breaking of any rules.
Quoting praxis
And if they don’t?
Quoting Congau
What do you mean by genre? Do you mean it in terms of subject, or technique, or style?
For me, these two categories are almost entirely exclusive...one prefers Shakespeare, and the other would rather watch Transformers. Aren't they both "right"?
I am sure there is someone out there who doesn't particularly like anything by Van Gogh...are they wrong?
Yes, I agree, Van Gogh is popular at the moment, that will change. In my reply to Brett, I qualified my comments about Van Gogh, by saying that in the end it comes down to personal likes and dislikes. It took me a long time to get Van Gogh's work, like many other artists. But my approach is that I am on a journey and at no point do I dismiss any work and always go back and reassess artists and their work. I adopt a position of humility and give the artist the benefit of the doubt. I have always struggled with Matisse, I continually fail to see any merit in his work, but perhaps one day I will see the light.
Of course you're allowed to not like his work, but if you claim he's no good and say why on a Philosophy of art forum, you are going to get shot down. Principally because you are implying that either the world of art appreciation (which I described a couple of posts back) is wrong, or that their position is in line with your personal opinion.
You say his work is "pedestrian, everything is literal, so clumsy and flat footed". These aspects of his work are irrelevant for those who appreciate his work. Have you not taken on board the hard won freedoms in artistic expression won by the modernists and post modernists? The art world moved on from such naive interpretation a long time ago.
Quoting Punshhh
Which is?
Quoting Punshhh
What's naive about it?
It probably says more about the level of sensure in the country in which the gallery considering this is to be found. In the UK, I think the repulsion of sensure would not allow someone like Gauguin to be sensured. Whereas artists clearly breaking the law in this way at home in the recent past are vilified, for example Garry Glitter, Michael Jackson, Jimmy Saville.
The developments in art during the 20th Century broke the critical perspectives in art in which art could not be appreciated unless the artist was displaying traditionally accepted artist prowess. This allowed naive artists to be appreciated and artists exploring other and novel approaches.
Presumably you would be educated in such developments before criticising Van Gogh on a platform like this. I don't wish to sensure you, but you should expect commentators who have many years of understanding and contemplation on all these issues to be found here and it will be pointed out.
I did write this in reply to you yesterday.
"There is within the world of the critic and the connoisseur of art a narrative about this, which does include the international art market. Which does rate artists to a degree and in terms of 19th and 20th Century art Van Gogh is possibly in the lead currently, or perhaps head to head with Picasso"
But now I'm realizing we don't even need a philosophy of art. Or at least I don't. As an artist, the more I read this thread, the less I'm interested in contributing.
Are you put off by the level of debate, or is it the lack of discussion of music?
You didn’t really explain that.
Your own painting that you put up on this OP works successfully using the elements of art and principles of design. That and your technical ability is all it has, and all it needs, and though your technical ability is rudimentary and pleases people the painting could not be called flat-footed or clumsy. You know that yourself otherwise you would not have displayed it. So why can’t you apply the same to Van Gogh?
Quoting Punshhh
I don’t mind people pointing out things. But you seem to be suggesting that I’m not in a position to point things out to you.
Quoting Punshhh
This is the basis for your judgement of art?
Quoting Punshhh
What will be pointed out?
I'm put off by the minutia. Actually, I'm put off by the idea that "art" can be dissected in the same way as a frog. As an artist, I feel like a frog. I feel like there's a scalpel slowly but surely incisionining a precise incision along my spine.
Quoting Noble Dust
Well, unfortunately, it can be. Stop feeling so special.
Sure, present me with an argument.
About what?
About what "it" referred to in your post that I quoted.
Quoting Noble Dust
Art? Actually you seemed to be referring to yourself and art at the same time.
Are you asking me the question "Art?"
Yes, is that what you want me to present an argument on, or the artist?
Oh, I see now you edited your post from "art?" to "Art? Actually you seemed to be referring to yourself and art at the same time."
And now I'm confused...
Shall we start again?
Quoting Brett
Edit: I drunkenly thought I had a good angle, but since I can't delete anything, this is a great piece of music that I love.
Quoting Brett
Quoting praxis
I think I already said this before but there's a need to divide art into two categories viz. the subjects of art and the process of art. By subjects of art I mean the main idea of an art piece. By the process of art I mean the methods by which the artist expresses the subjects of art. Veritably ugliness can be a subject of art but it appears to me that the artist must express ugliness in an aesthetic manner i.e. the process of art must contain some element of beauty. For instance there may be an ugly idea, say racism, that can be a subject of art but it must be expressed aesthetically if it is ever to be a work of art. We can't have an ugly subject of art expressed non-aesthetically (in an ugly way) because such a combination is clearly not art. Imagine a racist doing the monkey chant where clearly both the subject, racism, and the method of expression, the monkey chant, are ugly; nobody will every say that the racist was in the act of creating art. However, imagine a writer who's writing about racism and creates interesting, colorful and moving characters in his book; this is art because although the subject is ugly, the writer expressed it beautifully.
Ergo, art can be ugly but not wholly ugly - somewhere, either in its subject or in the method of the artist's expression of the subject or both, there has to be beauty.
Neither clumsy nor flat footed. I’m overwhelmed by the fact that someone can write this.
What?
The music you put up.
Oh, that? That's only the best piece of solo piano music ever composed.
Sure, I understand.
That word “beautifully” is so open to misinterpretation.
P.s. thanks for bringing me to some great pieces of music.
Eh.... what??....
Sorry, grumpy old man syndrome. :ok:
I was referring to the piece above and the Einojuhani Rautavaara piece.
Thanks again.
Quoting Punshhh
A bit of confusion between Noble Dust and me. All I’m asking from you is more clarification because posts on this forum can be very vague or imprecise which leads to misunderstanding.
My pleasure, I didn't realize you meant that. The fact alone that you enjoyed the Rautavaara piece is enough to make my day. :up:
Nah, don't include me. State your case clearly, with as few words as possible. I just did it myself.
let's start again and then come back to the issues.
This is a work I did last year, many people have said how they like it. What do you think lifts it above an average rendition of a hare by an amateur?
(A clue, it wasn't how well I depicted the hare.)
Also in movements in art, there are groups who work together in some way and push forward as a group effort, such as surrealism and cubism.
I'm not sure of the artistic merit of this thread so far, but touch wood it might shine through at some point.
P.s. You can edit, when you click on the tree dots at the bottom of your post, you will see a pencil, click on that and you can then edit your post.
Quoting Punshhh
I don’t think I can answer that.
So the merit of a work is not necessarily determined by how well it is depicted, but often subtle qualities of the composition, novel techniques, even approaches which seem counterintuitive. Van Gogh has achieved this in a number of ways, which give his work merit. His skill as a painter is irrelevant to this, also as an impressionist, he was not trying to give an accomplished rendition, but rather an impression experienced personally by himself.
I couldn’t answer the question because there’s nothing that lifts it above the work of an amateur. It’s actually the background that lets it down. You should be able to see that.
I feel that I don't quite fit into the crowd so my working definitions may be idiosyncratic at best or inane at worst. I would like to hear what you think art and beauty is.
I've seen and heard of art but always in a second-hand, hearsay kind of way; so you might want to change my views on it.
Somehow I feel your criticism doesn't take into consideration the artists intent and the culture in which the artist is immersed. Likewise with Van Gogh.
Now it's your turn, can you provide a work and identify what in the work gives it merit?
Aesthetics encompasses more than just beauty. It also covers ugly even repulsive things. It describes the entire spectrum of these kinds of.... I guess another descriptive term could be "perceptual emotions."
I have to agree with this. The aspect of painting technique typically referred to as ‘edge’ (skill in controlling the sharpness/softness of a compositions edges) is remarkably clumsy is the bunny painting.
On a positive note, in the foreground the photorealism is impressive. :up:
True. On the other hand, if this scenario were framed as art in some way it could be aesthetically perceived. You might ask what value could this possibly have and the answer would be transcendence.
You see I am working within a genre local to me in which there is a lot of plein air painting done of landscapes and a tradition of painting hares for example. This work is done quickly with the overall decorative effect being primary.
Other than the ‘California Impressionists’ I don’t know how plein-air painting could be considered a local genre, at least not since the time of the California Impressionists. I imagine painting bunnies could be, although a bunny would be an odd choice of subject matter for plein-air painting.
In regard to plein-air painting, of which I done a good amount, I would say that an impressionistic effect is primary rather than a decorative one.
Yes, when it's bunny's it's usually a decorative composition. When I say decorative, that does include decorative impressionist themes and techniques.
Why so defeatist Punshhh.
I believe anybody can make great art. It is not necessary to have knowledge of, or be active in the art world. One can look inwards - explore the darkest depths of one's consciousness. Who would dare sink to ones soft middle and confront all the nitty gritty that might lurk there? Who has the courage for such exploration?
Francis Bacon, Lucian Freud come to mind, They did exhibit, but i doubt they were much concerned with anything external to them.
Art allows one to make their own rules, an artist has only one constraint - that is the knowledge that whatever they might produce will always be information about their consciousness and subconsciousness.
So who dares to reveal that to the world?
Thanks for the info re edit.
Quoting TheMadFool
I think, buried among this OP, there are a few statements worth holding onto.
In a way philosophy is the only was to approach art otherwise it spins off into personal subjective points of view. Bartrick made a statement (if I’ve interpreted it correctly) that we have a concept of art. I think that’s true and a beginning. It doesn’t matter why we have it, we do.
The history of art has a big part to play in this. At some point in some cultures circumstances: time, materials, social mores, changed such that anyone who chose to paint, as one example, could to do so.
That gave a point of view to an entirely different group of people from the past: the church, the academies and the upper classes. until finally we had The Sex Pistols or naive art. Then everyone had an opinion and every opinion was valid. But somehow there is still a difference between Ravel’s “ Gaspard de la nuit” and The Sex Pistol’s “God Save the Queen”. Some people will argue against that but philosophy, given the time, will explain the difference.
When someone talks about aesthetics people generally mean how things look. When you look it up under philosophy you get; “a branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of beauty and taste”, not just how things look but how they’re perceived through ideas of beauty. So then it becomes; what is beauty? What is beautiful? So now it’s about language.
I don’t think that helps or works.
Artemis posted something about the perception by some about the erotic nature of Gauguin’s work. So now it’s about language again. So there has to be some other way of addressing art that steps outside of culture.
We know that all cultures produce art. And we know that that art differs enormously. So too the language used by each culture. So in some way I feel that we have to look at art as anthropology.
anthropology explores human life. Human life's only constraint is consciousness, and art explores human consciousness and subconsciousness.
All art work is information. Information about what? - all number of things - beauty aesthetics, creativity, life, death, etc, etc, Allof these are subsets of consciousness. The only way to encapsulate what art is , and allow it the freedom to be what it chooses to be is to encapsulate it within consciousness.
In the end you look to art as information about human consciousness.
Quoting Punshhh
You placed Van Gogh among the naive artists ( I think you meant that). That’s an interesting field. It’s an aspect of art respected for its freedom from rules and cant. As I said in my post changes in materials, social mores and time enabled people like Van Gogh to use art to express themselves. A lot of interesting things came out of it, not necessarily about art but what happened when people were able to freely express themselves. Another example would be Henri Rousseau. This is more about psychology than art. Art is just the consequences of their condition, which does give us insight into the subject of the artist. Van Gogh is good among the naive artists, but outside of that genre he does not match the abilities and perceptions of Gauguin and Cezanne. So in some ways intentions is no measure of art because anyone who picks up a paintbrush has intentions.
Quoting Pop
As if it’s something outside of consciousness or subconsciousness. Is that what you mean, that art looks into man’s mind?
I'm not being critical of artists, or looking to restrict their freedom in any way. In my comment which you referenced I was commenting on criticism of art and that if one were to criticise it, one ought to know how the recent movements of modernism and post modernism broke apart the critique of art purely on artistic prowess.
There is an issue with critical interpretation of art in which art is reduced or compartmentalised by commentators, perhaps lecturers through an academic intellectualisation, which I pointed out in my first post in the thread.
I am surprised that you appear to have removed Gauguin from the naive art bracket, his work is clearly naive. Indeed the only way in which Cezanne makes it out of that bracket is by more clearly falling into the impressionist bracket. Once in that bracket the world is your oyster.
I agree that naive art is interesting, indeed is in the ascendant, hence Van Gogh is regarded by many as the greatest painter for quite a while.
Quoting Pop
Yes, I would think that’s quite a solid point, if you want art to be about psychology? It does expose something about being human. But I still don’t know what that is and art varies so much within a culture and between cultures and between epochs that it explains nothing. If it’s a visual language then what is it saying, that we’re insane? And why all the different art forms, doesn’t language express things well enough?
Quoting Punshhh
Cezanne is not an Impressionist he’s a Post Impressionist, as is Gauguin.
So humanity is constrained by consciousness. How odd then that that is what art has always looked at - for all of cultures, and for all of time?
Quoting Pop
So that would rule out the subconsciousness. Is the subconsciousness in or out in our search for art?
The same for the viewer. Are they operating on a subconscious level or not?
It is one consciousness interpreting another consciousness
Quoting Pop
Okay, that’s not much help. I’m including the subconscious for the artist. The viewer I’m not sure of.
“In the strict psychological sense, the adjective is defined as "operating or existing outside of consciousness".[1]
Locke and Kristof write that there is a limit to what can be held in conscious focal awareness, an alternative storehouse of one's knowledge and prior experience is needed, which they label the subconscious”. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subconscious).
why are they doing it?
Consiousness is a personal construct that we make ourselves - we are not certain of it -- it needs validation.
The best form of validation is for another consciousness to agree with it, better still for many, if it proliferates it becomes part of universal consciousness.
Thats how we make reality.
I am very slow at this sorry
The conscious and the subconscious operate differently. The subconscious we’re not really aware of though it can operate on our actions. So an artist painting, dancing, acting, can allow their subconscious mind to influence what’s happening. To me it’s only the subconscious that can contribute originality though spontaneity. It’s due to the skill of the artist that they’re able to make use of that moment in their actions. It’s my belief that not everyone’s open to those spontaneous moments or able to grasp them and transform them.
I believe the subconscious operates on the conscious - it has an effect on the conscious mind. The result is an imperfect conscious state. Not separate but acting together as the one product.
The subconscious mind is primitive. That’s why I tend to think about art in terms of anthropology, in the study of early cultures and the things they produced, like totems, carvings, rock paintings, dances, etc. There’s no reason to think our subconscious mind has altered that much even if our conscious mind has. Though that idea may be open to criticism.
Quoting Pop
Okay. Well either I’m not being very clear or making sense, or you don’t understand. We’ll have to wait for someone else’s input.
I've spent many years pondering art from the perspective of aesthetics, beauty, etc but got nowhere.
I couldn't see the Forrest by examining the trees.
It is only since developing a construct of consciousness that I have understood art to my satisfaction.
Art is a simple concept to me now. I can define it in a sentence.
The trick is : you can understand art only through a concept as broad as all that art can be - and that is only consciousness.
Not sure what you mean, it being about language. But it's a pretty obvious perception.
Quoting Brett
I think anthropology gains much from looking at art, and that artists are helped in their making of art by being good anthropologists. But I don't think art is anthropology.
Quoting Artemis
Obviously perception. But it’s language that’s repositioning the work. And it’s a particular language being used in this case.
Maybe I should have said through anthropology.
I label it as information because recent developments in theoretical physics reduce everything down to information, but this is not universally agreed upon
I think language captures and conveys elements of perception. Sometimes it may influence perception, but it is not the source thereof.
Quoting Pop
Yes, about who we are, but it’s an action that comes and goes quickly, like watching a dancer on stage. A painting, for instance, is only an artefact, like a film of the dancer, the film is not the dance.
Quoting Artemis
I’d agree with that.
But human art will never tell us anything ever about what is out of reach of the mind.
Our mind can be called consciousness.
We cant say with certainty what art will be, because it is free to be whatever it wants to be, and in future it will be things we haven't conceived of yet.
But we can say with certainty that art will be information about the artists state of mind - for all of time across all cultures.
Where else can it originate except somebody's mind?
Whatever it tells us will be through the prism of somebodies mind.
So another Definition has occurred to me:
Art is information, through the prism of somebody's mind.
I mean all of the above. They all have very little to do with artistic creativity. You can have a great technique and still be a lousy artist. Anyone can choose an interesting subject, and a great artist can keep the general style of his predecessors while surpassing them.
There’s nothing good in itself about new art movements. One genre can never be exhausted anyway and if all artists had continued to explore the classical styles and subjects beyond the 19th century, mankind would now have possessed an even greater treasure of classical art. Of course we would have missed many great works from more recently developed genres, but there’s no way to determine what would have been objectively better.
It is my opinion that many modern genres suffer from not having been around long enough to develop a sure foundation of style and content. Many of them never get off an experimental level because artists are afraid of exploring genres they have not invented themselves and hurry on to find new ways of doing art.
Great art is always a breaking of rules, but some rules must be kept so that others can be broken. Within each genre (even within the subject of “Madonna and Child”) there are ample possibilities to break the rules and produce great art.
Just in relation to originality.
Quoting Congau
Though you do say that art is “creativity ... to make something out of nothing ... an independent and original idea”.
But if you’re working in a specific genre then by creating something original you’re breaking away from the tenets that define that genre. If you maintain the tenets of that genre then you’re not creating anything original.
Quoting Congau
It’s possible that new art movements contribute to how we look back on art and review our perceptions of it. It’s possible we may have had a greater treasure of classical art if artists had continued to explore classical styles (though a style is a style and you can’t really explore the style without it becoming something else) but would we know any more than we already did. If those artists explored different subjects that may have been worthwhile, but classical art has its classical subjects which it can’t move away from, otherwise it’s not classical art.
Quoting TheMadFool
I tend to go along with you there. I can’t imagine an artist setting out consciously to create a movement. I’m not even sure they can chose the way they paint, or dance, or act. The vast number of artists out there generally work a pre-existing vein, getting very good at it and maybe finding a subject that makes all the difference.
I feel that a lot of art done today is created by what I’d call art directors more than artists, Damien Hearst being an example. Art Directors in the sense that they’re very good at pulling together contemporary symbols, ideas and attitudes, just like Art Directors in advertising pull together contemporary elements and trendy ideas to produce commercials.
Something I’m interested in knowing is whether Australian Aborigines mimicking animals in their dances, and if you’ve seen that you recognise the animal pretty clearly, the physical actions themselves resemble the animal, like they’ve become the animal, whether they believe they’ve become that animal or they’re conscious of only mimicking the animal.
As is Van Gogh.
So they have been put in boxes, good for the archivists I suppose.
All this analysing of art is a recent development which has sprung out of academia and the interplay of artists striving to find something intangible and critics striving for some kind of explanation of the intangible. It's true it can help someone educate themselves in "the arts" and become cultured and it can be used as a guide on a journey of understanding and appreciation.
But it is not art, art is the result of a physical process, except perhaps conceptual art. This physical process is undergone by a physical body, true the mind and the consciousness is present and plays a role in the controlling the hand, or foot. Some artists are engaged in an endeavour to remove the mind from the process, or even the consciousness, in its various states. And for the artist often these things and issues are more important than what kind of art it is judged to be, if it is art, if it is good art, what box it goes into, or commentary on the mind of the artist by others.
On that note I must bow out.
This is the first time I have participated in an online discussion,and I now realize my etiquette is poor.I type with two fingers so left out the I believe and in my opinion in order to keep pace with posts. If I have offended anyone I sincerely apologize. It was not my intention.
Everybody is entitled to their own opinion. And mine is just one of many.
443 replies - wow
I enjoyed your posts very much and your humility. In my own humility I am also on a journey through art, which is the joy of it. Please don't think that I disagree with anything you have said, or want to change your position, you should cherish it as I do and all artists, with a few exceptions, would.
Just remember that with all the intellectualising which critics and historians do, they are only trying to explain something intangible and difficult to intellectualise. The art itself stands alone and can be seen and known by everyone who has an interest.
I think what distinguishes commercial art is that it’s done for purposes other than self expression, like advertising and branding, or producing art for the primary purpose of making money.
In recent times art has become appropriated by and merged with other forms of media and capitalised on by communications and media giants* seeking to control what the masses are exposed to for commercial gain. More recently with the polarisation of communities and countries by populism, media and politics are co opted and exploited in an identity culture. I fully expect the arts to follow suit. Perhaps this is already happening in the rapid developments in animated entertainment and interactive gaming. Digital images.
Perhaps we should be asking what will art be, where will it go, will it even be called art?
*For example the way in which Saatchi and Saatchi both backed and promoted Brit Art in the 90's. By inflating the status of those artists to the global stage, they re-established Britain as an important player in the art world. They were advertising and communication giants using a small group of art students to give the Saatchi organisation and brand a gold plated message of prestige. I was there at the time and saw the art as soulless. Myself as a viewer in the Sensations galleries as being manipulated. We have art superstars like Anish kapoor producing soulless works on a gigantic scale to impress.
Meanwhile while all this is going on in the mainstream, thousands of artists like me work in more traditional ways, in the shadows, ignored by the mainstream and widely considered by the establishment as not producing Art, but some sort of antequated craft producing twee pictures for twee people to hang on their walls.
What is art becoming?
Quoting praxis
The objective of making money might be the only thing that distinguishes commercial art from “art”. The act of creating commercials and print ads comes from the same process of the mind that self expression comes from. Some commercials are very creative in the little vignettes of life they create. It’s true that they steal techniques and mimic other art forms left right and centre but it seems to me they’re still working from within the same conditions as artists do. Except that there’s a very specific objective writers and art directors are working towards, which in some ways presents a greater challenge. And in fact the commercial must work according to the brief they received and it will be judged successful on the measurable return the client received.
Personally I don’t like advertising. But should it be regarded as the lesser of the two because of its objectives. If it’s money’s that separates it from “art” then should a big price on a painting remove it from the field?
Quoting Punshhh
Quoting Punshhh
What exactly are we expecting from art? Anish Kapoor produces his big pieces, or should I say directs the construction of his big pieces, that are really about spectacle and interaction on a larger than life scale. What should we expect from him?
You seem to feel that he has nothing to do with art, that art is what you and others do, and that groups like communication and media giants should stay away. Because of what? Is their influence any different than the Pope over Michelangelo?
What is it exactly that we expect from art?
I don't know the answers to these questions and perhaps it's not for me to answer, as I feel I am fading into art as it was in the past.
Not that, its rather a sense of sadness that it has come to this. Not that artists like me are fading into souvenir producers, or something like that. You know, like those Red Indian shows that tourists are taken to to give them a taste of what America was like before the white man. But rather what has happened to the art establishment.
Perhaps we should rescue it from the clutches of exploitation, an exploitation which devalues art aesthetically.
I will continue this in the new thread.
In my opinion, it's not necessarily money itself that defines commercial art but the intent or purpose with which it's created. A clever entrepreneur could effectively brand and use advertising to market an artist, like Milli Vanilli for instance. Something like this might be even easier with a painter because there doesn't need to be live performances, and abstract art doesn't necessarily even require good technique. It could be full-on 'emperor with no clothes'. It would still be art, however, in my opinion, just not good art, unless it somehow induced an aesthetic experience and/or expressed a meaningful concept.
Quoting praxis
I think the objective in commercial art is ultimately about money. The art is one of many facets used to sell something, it could be butter, a country, a band or real estate.
But, governments also use commercial art to sell themselves and their ideas, and that’s not necessarily about money but persuasion, which is what commercial art comes down when I think about it. So let’s say commercial art is about persuasion. And commercial art is used to sell art itself, all those carefully designed art galleries, the books, the advertising and promotion.
Is that what sets it apart from what we’re calling art? Art is not trying to persuade us of anything, it’s a take it or leave it offer. Once you start thinking about persuasion you’re thinking about target audiences, budgets, clients and advertising mediums. I think that self consciousness removes it from what we’re trying to define about art.
I’m not saying that. I thought I made it clear in my previous post that I think commercial art is still art, just with the very intuitive distinction that it’s commercial. It may not always be apparent how commercial artworks are, and marketers may deliberately attempt to deceive buyers in this regard.
I agree, this is what I was trying to say when I mentioned the Brit Art phenomena in the 1990's, there was a marketing and media circus whipped up which went international. Millions of people visited the shows, myself included, because they thought there was some amazing thing they needed to witness. Once in the gallery there were exhibits like an unmade bed, a cow cut in half in formaldehyde, a rotting cows head in a glass case with thousands of flies and maggots eating it etc. Even confronted with that garbage the viewers were still pretending it was amazing art and something profound was happening.
There was something quite profound happening, mass hysteria generated by some very clever marketing and advertising gurus.
Quoting praxis
I know that’s not what you were saying. It’s what I was thinking about. I was suggesting commercial art was about persuasion.
Art seems to be more about discovery than invention. It seems to be about searching, in that moment when the artist is working. If he knows where he’s going, what he’s going to do, then there can be no moment of discovery. Repeating yourself, finding a way of doing things, is more about technique, getting it right.
So I don’t see how commercial art can be art in the sense we’re seeking meaning. Commercial art is too much about technique. No budget or client has the time for the act of discovery. All commercial art has a deadline.
That’s the problem I have with Van Gogh, slavishly painting away day after day, the same thing over and over and over, like a moth at a window. What’s his intention, what does he expect? Seemingly nothing. That’s who he is, that’s his whole history.
What’s the point of all that compared to a Picasso who tears art apart, dissects it like a frog, then puts it back together again. He does that over and over and over. Van Gogh never did it once.
A distinction needs to be made between commercial art and what you’re talking about as the Brit Art work. Commercial art and marketing was used to promote Brit Art, but that doesn’t mean Brit Art is commercial art itself, no matter how much promotion went on in support of it.
Yes, I can I imagine that. Not very impressive from what I saw.
Van Gogh had a very distinctive style/aesthetic. We could give him credit for that vision. But anyway, I notice that you use the phrase “over and over and over” for both artists. It seems they were both bound to their respective niches.
Quoting praxis
Picasso didn’t have a niche. Which is why I respect him so much. He challenged himself each day. Most artists find a vein and work it. Very few did what Picasso did. It’s possible it may not be a good thing. Had he done everything he could have with that new style or did he just get impatient and move on. Even if he failed to really explore a particular vein he explored the possible ways of doing things. Again, it’s the action, the moment, that is art, not the relic. Finish the painting then walk away from it.
Edit: art is either one of these two things; it’s the action or it’s the relic.
It occurs to me that the relic is the public experience of art. But it’s a long way from the act itself. Two completely different worlds.
The new and original idea happens in the creative moment of the work of art. You don’t have to be an artist to come up with a new subject matter. If I gave an artist an entirely new motive: “Paint polar bears climbing palm trees.” And he makes such a painting. Which one of us is the artist? Me? No, he is of course. The artistic idea that matters is in the execution of the painting. Likewise, if a painter sets out to paint the “Madonna and Child” for the millionth time, he may still be a great and original artist. (Raphael’s Sistine Madonna was not the first such painting.) He may find a subtle originality and his own unique expression, or he may just be a copyist and thus no artist at all. That can’t be decided in advance based on the chosen genre (subject, technique, style)
Quoting Brett
Say you are giving the Madonna a certain mysterious divine look that has never before been depicted while keeping strictly to the tenets of the genre. Couldn’t that be enough to qualify as something great and original?
Sure, if you call any slight innovation a new genre, anything unique will be a new genre by default, but that’s of course not what is usually meant.
I understand why you don't admire Van Gogh, I am the same about Matisse, so I am not critical of what you say about him or his work. I'm responding to the distinction you make between Picasso and other artists and about the way artists work. To be an artist, well the sort of artist we are talking about, requires a total immersion in the process, a fanaticism, an effort to push at boundaries. For each person this manifests in different ways depending on their temperament and personality, even their mental make up. So in each case the way they work and progress is going to be very different. Picasso did seem to chop and change a lot, but when you look at his body of work there is not actually that broad a range of imagery. He had a fiery, restless, domineering personality, he was a showman. But I don't see the collection of artefacts he left behind as that different to many of his peers, at least in their scope. Even more flamboyant, Salvador Dali would orchestrate vast crowds of people in his demonstration of some kind of megalomania, trying to out do many of his peers. But again the body of work he left behind was not that broad in scope, or vision.
Did any of them break the mould, I can't see it myself, they were all painters, or sculptors who developed their own way to do art in association with other members in the group or school they were involved in. I think the way in which they are judged and admired changes with changes in the societies which follow, some artists may be admired for longer than others. Few reach immortal status and the few that do may do so for anachronistic reasons, for example the fascination with the Mona Lisa is not to do with the artists achievement, but rather some ambiguity about the way he painted her mouth.
Van Gough was a flawed personality which resulted in his working in an intense but narrow confined way with a lot of repetition. This resulted in a body of work narrow in scope and variation.
In the current world naivety and vernacular work is more highly prized than accomplished, polished traditionally valued pieces. I see this too in the world of antique furniture which I have dealt in for a number of years. A country made Windsor chair of a particular naive vernacular form is often worth as much as a highly ornate accomplished chair made by a follower of Chippendale. And is certainly more sought after.
In a similar way art produced by flawed or compromised personalities is highly valued for perhaps shining a light on a distorted facet of human life in a unique way, not out of genius, but peculiarity.
To tell the truth it doesn’t really matter who’s better than who at the level we’re talking about. Nor does it help in defining art. Or maybe the disagreement does help in some way by placing the focus on unexpected things that contribute a little to what we think art might be.
Quoting Punshhh
This is a fair observation. And it contributes a little bit here to what art is. You don’t want to have a relationship with an artist, you’ll be second in line to the work. They only care about their work, which means they only care about themselves. All they think about is their work, you might even call it an obsession.
So I think that obsession is an important element. And if you look at any artist of merit that’s bound to be part of their personality.
Quoting Congau
I don’t know if that helps much in terms of originality. If the execution is done in a realist manner, as most portraits are done, then the artist is falling back on traditional techniques. What exactly could be called original in that? Even if you give the subject a mysterious divine look it would still have to be done by traditional techniques. What would be original was a painting that showed the mysterious divine look, that person, because that’s who it’s about, in a way it had never been perceived before.
Who is the artist here, and who owns the results?
Interested in this discussion.
Quoting sime
If it helps towards defining what art is I’d be interested.
Quoting Susu
Do you have any way of proving that?
Suppose you are creating art, what purpose are creating for? Perhaps in your mind, you are aiming this art for a particular audience, to instill a particular feeling. As well as to convey a message.
[quote="Susu;376858"]Has there been art that is not meant for emotional communication?[/
Marcel Duchamp.
Finnegins Wake
Quoting Susu
The obvious one would be the Cubism developed between Picasso and Braque.
We as consciousness create what we want to be conscious of.
What I am saying is bad, is the way art may be compromised by the need to convey a political message. It can become a divisive slogan.
I think you could analyse the history of art and examine what kind if things have been considered art and how widely an example diverges from the prominent model.
For example if you have an apple pie and someone makes something with beef and calls it an apple pie you can say this is not sufficiently like 99.9% of of apple pies to qualify as an apple pie.
I think if you call everything art then you make the term meaningless or useless.
Then add in the dimension of money making.
For example I can't make a dog a cat by claiming that the dog is a cat.
In this sense you can say nothing is art if there is no consensus. But based on what humans have identified as art for their long history then I think statistically something does not qualify for the label art if it is far removed from examples related to the majority usage of the word art.
Bad art is art that Reason disapproves of.
Not to keep agreeing with you (which is boring around here), but what I think makes the majority of political art "bad" is that it has a concrete, direct, and specific message it's trying to communicate, and not only that, but it has a telos: to convert, to change the audiences mind. It functions the exact same way as Christian Contemporary Music, for instance: there's an orthodoxy of belief that needs to be maintained in the work, and there's a goal for outsiders to be converted through the work.
What makes this "bad" is that most political/religiously apologetic art ends up just preaching to the choir, rather than changing political or religious views or belief. I experienced this first hand working at a very artsy-fartsy, politically focused music venue in a major city; political works were presented all the time, and naturally the audience all agreed with the message. I guess at best maybe the work inspired the audience to be more politically active? But it's tough to make the claim that any of these works actually enacted real change. And as the works themselves were concerned, they were so far removed from what @csalisbury called a direct aesthetic experience, that I found it sad. The only exception from that experience was Pussy Riot; their show kicked ass because it was loud, fearless, profane and brimming with passion. Basically the opposite of the other works I saw. But to this day, I remember the aesthetic experience of that show better; the political message I can remember well enough, but it wasn't what stuck.
lol
If art is bad, then - other things being equal - we have some reason to adopt certain attitudes towards it. Someone who, for instance, looked at it approvingly, would be adopting an attitude towards it that they have reason not to adopt towards it (which is just another way of saying that they would be adopting an attitude towards it that Reason does not approve of them adopting).
So bad art is art that Reason disapproves of, for that is the best explanation of why - strange circumstances aside - she would disapprove of us approving of it or creating it, or whatever.
Circular argument my friend.
Does "she" refer to reason?
All of which can be demonstrated by means rational. Though you, no doubt, would consider that circular.
Badly phrased. Concepts can't adopt attitudinal stances. You might say bad art is not in accord with reason. But that would be to misunderstand how art functions, which is to be just that creative product which is not a priori bound by any expressible criteria. Bad art lacks quality. And quality is contextual and the root of reason rather than its product.
Oh, I see. You're taking the proverbial. Have fun with that.
Reason is not a concept. A concept is an idea. Reason is not an idea, it is something we have ideas 'of'.
Bugger off with the BS.
Just clarifying. That being the case, if I were to rephrase the statement in a clearer way, as in "the best explanation of why reason would disapprove of us approving of or creating bad art is that reason disaproves of bad art", would you not call that circular?
You conflated an idea with the thing it is an idea of. A classic mistake.
I said Reason is a person and persons 'can' adopt attitudes towards things (for instance, you're a person and 'contempt' is the attitude you're adopting towards me).
Perhaps you think philosophers know already what Reason is. Well, that's a mistake as a cursory knowledge of the literature would tell you.
That isn't what I said - I said that bad art is art that we have reason (lower case r) not to adopt certain attitudes towards. The kind of reason in question is an 'aesthetic' reason (a kind of normative reason).
The best explanation of 'that' is that Reason herself disapproves of the art in question, for typically if we disapprove of something we disapprove of others approving of it.
Don't feed the troll.
:up:
Sorry, can't resist. It is what you said; I quite literally re ordered your sentence in a clearer way; this is not disputable.
:up:
And those that don't fall into "most" are just people that have studied art, established the criteria for "why they like/don't like this" and then attempted to create some authority so their opinion applies to the rest of us.
Quoting Invisibilis
That certainly fits my opinion. But there have been some long "Art" threads with a wide variety of opinions, so it may not work for everyone (and it looks like you just got merged into one of them).
And welcome to the forum :smile:
I think that's an oversimplification. Why does someone like or dislike something? This goes back to the concept of a direct aesthetic experience. Not to mention social/psychological factors; a common phenomena is taste being determined not by the individual, but by their environment. Yes, this means following the critics, but it also just means fitting into the social situation; if it's not cool to like Coldplay, I won't admit that I do, unless I have enough self confidence to do so. So taste is complex, and to suggest that that complexity can be boiled down and answer the broader question of what makes art "good" or "bad" feels like an oversimplification.
In other words the simple facts of taste (real or fake) and power structure within the art world don't actually have anything to say about the concept of a concrete aesthetic standard.
Bad art is a product that is created without skill and originality, but still with enough originality to qualify as art (not a mere copy).
If I draw a stickman on a scrap of paper, it is likely to be bad art since I am lousy at drawing in the first place and since a stickman would be quite a conventional idea. Still, it would be art since I drew it freely with my own hand and didn’t try to copy any specific stickman that I have previously seen. But if you tried to copy my stickman, it wouldn’t be art at all since nothing of what you made would be your idea.
Any original human creation anywhere must qualify as art (if it’s not copied). Art is everywhere, not just in art galleries and that’s why pretty much anything can in principle be admitted to a gallery. When something at an art exhibition appears to be junk, the question shouldn’t be “Is this art?”, but “Is it good art?”
The tragedy of modern art is not that the definition of art has been extended in comparison to past centuries but that the standards for good art has been blurred because of the great variety.
I feel like I agree, but may be missing your exact point. The line you quoted from was me making fun of (or attempting to) the idea that someone else can tell me I am "right" or "wrong" when I say I like something.
Is taste so complex that it cannot be simplified to "I like it" or "I don't"? All of the factors you mentioned go into that "like" or "dislike".
I would also think that saying you don't like Coldplay when you actually do (they royal you, not you Noble Dust), is more a type of virtue signalling than it is a type of taste (your taste says you like it, period).
One can argue about whether art is good because one likes it and vice versa.
But it’s possible you could determine whether a piece of art was “good” or “ bad” on the same basis that you decide whether a person is good or bad. We might determine whether a person is good or bad by their behaviour, how they present themselves. A bad person would be dishonest, deceitful, misleading, a liar, misrepresents himself, mean spirited or insincere.
How do we make our decisions on whether a person is good or bad, where do we get the experience to understand this? Some of it, in its most rudimentary form, we learn as children. But as we mature we meet more and more people and it becomes difficult to know if you can trust someone. They can become very good at concealing their true nature. Sometimes we get fooled, then later we find the truth and learn. The fact is that bad people have particular characteristics we learn to recognise and use to get by among people.
Alright, back to arguing art with you again :grin: Let me know if I get too annoying.
There are only a few people in history where there is near universal agreement on them being good or bad, so that seems to suggest how difficult it would be to come up with universal measures for art.
Quoting Brett
For me, someone could absolutely be all of these temporarily and still be good. I would go as far as saying each of those traits, or all of them in combination, could be used to accomplish good things.
Now, I am also happy to say that those are typically negative traits that should generally be frowned upon. Similarly, I could say that MOST stick-figure art is bad. But to create true objective parameters, they would have to be universal; and because "good art" is often created by atypical geniuses, this seems impossible. Notice if I paint a clock it is terrible, but if Dali paints a clock it is good.
I wouldn't mind some general guidelines or parameters that OFTEN define "bad art" but I don't think you could sell me on anything universal.
Remember I still think Transformers is better than MacBeth.
And just to provide an example, despite me not liking him, Shakespeare is a perfect example of an atypical genius. There is a whole movement of anti-stratfordians who argue that Shakespeare could not have written these stories because he is just a townie. Only some wealthy noble would have the depth and breadth of knowledge to write that. But that is elitist BS nonsense. The vast majority of rich and educated could not write those books either. It is hard to define genius before we experience it, and that is what art rules would feel like to me.
I am just writing what comes to mind here -
Cannot an artwork which copies something still be good art. Most landscapes and portraits are copies. Or an artist recreating the same scene, dance movements, or language are making copies. What if the second version is 99.9% copy and it turns out that perhaps the 0.01% difference somehow becomes decidedly good art.
Cannot an artwork be good art without conventional art skills, such as painting, drawing, grammar, movement. What if skill is not all about rules and self-controlled. What if intuition displays more skill than can ever be learnt and/or practiced?
Yes, what if intuition of what is good and bad is the key. If so, what is it about intuition that makes good/bad art?
Quoting ZhouBoTong
Relativist games. How does it work for you on the street, in a bar?
Quoting Invisibilis
Ditto for you.
The difficulty in defining art is so great that dictionaries return us to undefined terms such as "beauty" or list the branches of art. I think this definition is either not possible or so vague that almost everything could be art: noises, things or stains without any deliberate form.
Total abstraction has taken over the art scene. A new definition of art would be "Art is anything that enters art museums, is sold at art auctions or exhibited at art exhibitions.
I think the situation is catastrophic for art because of some causes that I would like to discuss here:
-There are no objectifiable aesthetic values but totally subjective tastes.
-Absolute elitism. Art does not have to respond to a more or less numerous public, but is accepted or rejected by a minority of critics who choose according to their tastes or particular interests and are not accountable to anyone.
-Commercialization. The only objective value is the market price. Art has become a commodity.
The result is that what you see or hear in an art space is just money in disguise.
There is an urgent need for a new definition of art that can distinguish between art and banknotes.
Agree all you like, I discussed philosophy with people I agreed with for years before I came to forums. Forums require some disagreement to work, which I found awkward to begin with.
Yes, it presents you with what might be a good work of art and claims that a political position is good because it is associated with the good work of art. Also it can become sloganistic and be used as a tool for populism. This process can devalue the art, or a genre of art and the artist, or artists in the genre. A good example is Nazi Art Deco art, it also extends to a lot of Art Deco art as well, which is a shame because there was some good art which has largely been erased from history.
Yes, for the choir it becomes a mantra and for others it is a slogan being forced on them.
That is ok until the process and the message become divisive, or deceitful. As in the Brexit debate for example. "just get it done"
Yes, I was very impressed with their performance, I was surprised the authorities tolerated it.
The problem is that you come along with an unusual philosophy and then argue with people as though they are wrong you you are right. This also extends to accusing them of being mistaken when they are defending a well established view.
It would be fine if you exhibited some politeness and humility until you had presented your position at least. It would then be ok to argue the case, because your interlocutor would know what you are talking about.
We need to know when to draw the line between a work of art and a work that is not art. Lets say for example an architect made a particular construction like a building. His purpose was to build a shelter, nothing else. His work is not considered art. Now, if the architect hired an interior and exterior designer, his work would be considered art because the patterns and decorations he adds to the architect would have to be something that can resonate with us emotionally. A beautiful pattern would be something for example that would attract us because we are evolutionarily pattern seeking animals, and we are atteacted to colors and shapes. This is the point when we can call something art.
Quoting Susu
A thought maybe, but an emotion is not the intention of those artists, nor do they expect an audience to instil an emotion when that is not their intention. That’s you putting a subjective spin on it. If you want to ignore the artists’s intention then your wasting everyone’s time.
Quoting Susu
Not exceptions to what? They are exceptions to the idea that art is about emotion, because the particular work I’m referring to is not about emotion, it’s cerebral, intellectual, certainly not primitive, which I use as the opposite to cerebral.
Quoting Susu
No it’s not. Read up on Cubism, Duchamp. Unless of course Picasso and Braque we’re deluded in their intentions.
Quoting Susu
Quoting Susu
Which one? You can’t have both.
to be agile enough to put paintbrush to canvas.
to be agile enough to paint arc'd eyes.
An agile artist draws more precise eyes.
I struggle to define art, I think we need a new 'para' word.
Perhaps art is about the seed and the peer, and we're choosing side.
A seed may be the most agile artist, but the peers might prefer the jester's silly works. Does a good artist require a good peer?
Art is created by an artist. Does this statement even stand? Am I false when I say 'Art is'?
You name the comoddity, what is it? It can broadly describe all artwork or mean the inner movement of the artist or peer.
The idea I was trying to convey is as follows: since defining art is an elusive task, the more valuable question should be 'what is good art?' Any number of things can be pulled under the great umbrella term 'art', but this does not necessarily make them of any value to the artistic world or vision.
Defining art is a subjective task and is thus impossible to reach a clear consensus on; defining valuable art is a far clearer aim.
By copy I mean a copy of another work of art. If I take a photo of a van Gogh painting, that photo is obviously not a work of art and I’m not an artist. If I try copy the van Gogh with a brush and paint and somehow manage to do it perfectly, that’s no more a work of art than the photo (although I’d be an excellent craftsman if I could do it.)
Painting a landscape is not the same as copying it. It will always be an interpretation from the artist’s perspective and so a unique and original creation (even when it appears to be highly realistic).
Quoting Invisibilis
Sure, unconventional skills are also skills and can produce good art. The only problem is that it is not easily recognized. How would I know that it is skillfully made if I have nothing to compare it to and don’t understand it. Whenever an artist uses unconventional skill, he in fact introduces a new genre of art. Until we have learned to understand this new genre, there’s no way to decide if the work is good or bad. I think some artists take advantage of that and make trash hoping to be recognized by an ignorant audience.
You can't think of any examples where lying is beneficial? Feels like absolutist games to me.
Quoting ZhouBoTong
Of course I can. But you’re just playing philosophy games. In this world you need to know when you’re being lied to, deceived and misinformed. Sure people lie, but I’m talking about a person who is a liar all the time, who deceives you then takes your watch.Trying living without that understanding and reality. Maybe you spend your days in your bedroom, I don’t know, but try living the way you imply with your dancing around words and sentences and see where it gets you. So let’s try and stick to the world outside your front door.
Sure. which is why in my initial post I said we could come up with comparable "suggestions" for good/bad art. As long we don't think they are anywhere near absolute objective rules.
My post wasn’t about universal agreement on good or bad. It was about the characteristics of a person you couldn’t trust. I’m not sure but I think someone who cannot be trusted might be considered bad by many people. You’d be wise anyway to steer clear of them.
My point about a bad person was that unless you lived some sort of life you’d be ignorant of what this person had in store for you, the coat off your back, for a start, later maybe your wife. Whatever, you’re going to come off second best, again and again and again, until you learn. Education by the school of hard knocks. So you need to learn to recognise these things in people. It takes time, many mistakes, many losses, but by and by you’ll learn to recognise these characters. You might be able to see where I’m going here.
If you want to understand art, tell good from bad, then you need to educate yourself.
What if the artwork, regardless of skill or content, is pleasing to the eye.
Yes, I agree with your last sentence (above). I've seen such work, and the artist always points out they are successful artists, as if that was the qualifier of good art.
However, a good artist cannot help create images which contain eye pleasure. There is a natural flow of harmony that the eye picks up, and 'knows' that it came from not-trying, as if created unconditionally.
The classic paradox: supposed freedom leads to control.
"the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting or sculpture, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power." - Dictionary.com
Provide any piece of work from Marcel Duchamp, Picasso, or Fennings Wake that doesn't fall under this definition, I assure you, there is none. Every form of art boils down to emotional communication that requires an audience.
Quoting Susu
I didn’t say this. I said “They are exceptions to the idea that art is about emotion,”
I’m guessing you looked at Finnegans Wake, did you?
One example to satisfy you;
https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-duchamps-urinal-changed-art-forever
I would step back further and say that the work presented isn't even good in itself because of the political ramifications. For the audience (who already agrees with the message), it's not a real question of whether the art itself is good (on a purely aesthetic level), it's just a question of agreeing with the message. And, remember, this is the exact same principle at work in fundamentalist religious art as well.
Quoting Punshhh
I saw the show in the US, so I wasn't necessarily surprised that it was tolerated. But the venue itself I was working at was exactly the type of venue that would claim on paper (like the Pharisees, to continue the religious metaphors) that they fully supported the zealotry; but in reality, the venue management was horrified by the show. I'm talking about a deeply left-leaning (American) politically oriented music venue. It's a distinctly memorable concert experience for me on so many levels; I'll never forget it. It was one of the best shows I've ever seen.
But why does so much political art not accomplish what Pussy Riot has? I don't have the energy to jump into a new tangent (edit: I did), but there's something to be said about political art coming from nations that are actually experiencing dehumanizing and fundamentally crippling oppression; nations that are not strictly first world nations. There's a heroism to Pussy Riot that gets the blood flowing; it gets the righteous indignation pumping; actual fight/flight kicks in, and fight takes over. On the other hand, what boils my blood in the worst way is political art from first world nations like mine that essentially pits (unwittingly) this first world work from privileged artists who are not subject to arrest, mistreatment, and, most importantly censorship against the work of artists like Pussy Riot that actually are experiencing real oppression. When you see it clearly, you see the children, and you see the adults.
I don’t care about your perceptions, I’m saying that the artist’s intention was not about emotion.
Quoting Susu
That’s a big call. Care to back it up.
Edit: by the way, the “urinal thing” has a name.
Edit: “Duchamps point of this urinal thing was that Art can be something non-conventional.” That was not his point.
Being inspired by what you see is not art.
Art(2)= All Artwork
Can it be more accurately defined?
Art(3)= A judged event between art-seeds work and peers of that work.
The artist's event and the audience's judgement.
(Just trying).
No comoddity is art without justice for it being so. An artist paints a painting and becomes a peer of his own work.
Asking what 'work' is would be answered any creation possible in the seed's world.
“Pleasing to the eye” can’t be a criterion for good art. Wallpaper may be pleasing to the eye or a Mercedes Benz for someone who likes expensive cars. Sure, artistic harmony may please the eye because of its connection to a higher idea, and it may be considered beautiful whenever there exists some unity and balance just like a mathematical equation may be considered beautiful for the same reason, but this kind of harmony is hardly pleasing to the eye in a literal sense.
Good art may sometimes be downright ugly. What makes it good is the skillful way it conveys an idea and makes the audience think. There shouldn’t be a goal to make the eye know without trying. On the contrary great art is rarely immediately accessible but requires that the mind is set to work. Whatever is too easily available is shallow and brings no great ideas.
That being said, one shouldn’t force art, not even great art, on an unwelcoming audience. Whenever a piece of art is placed in the public space (as opposed to at an art gallery), it should be pleasing to the eye. Then the passers by can choose for themselves if they want to look at it as art or just decoration.
[hide="Reveal"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sWGmsi_wFw[/hide]
I always think of this piece which is probably the most successful piece of political art ever produced. It lmortalised the subject Che Gavara.
I am a political cartoonist at times and I think this is where art and politics collide in a more meaningful, artist and politically relevant way. This is one of my favourites (not by me). It was made during a brief period when Prince Charles sounded a bit Marxist.
Andrei Tarkovsky.
Why not try to break that down like a poem? Dot points. What are it’s qualities, what does it allude to, do it until you run out of meaning.
Because then what makes it art is gone.
Interesting juxtaposition. Do you find one more arresting over the other? I'm not well versed in political cartoon-ism.
Quoting Noble Dust
Okay. So then this OP just becomes an art gallery?
You're right in the sense that it does require interpretation. But "dot points" got me riled up; dot points are high school teacher non-sense, as are the questions you ask after that turn of phrase. I'm not here to get a good grade.
You apparently know Tarkosvksy. What's your interpretation of the clip?
So you felt like you were being instructed. An old school hangover.
It doesn’t require anything. It’s something to do if you feel like it. It’s a pleasure to really look at a work. Yes, dot points sounds sterile, but it was just a way to ease into it.
No, I don’t know Tarkovsky, but I watched the video, then the short interview after. My interpretation? Who knows? I’ll need to look at it longer and assume the comments on translation are accurate enough to go by.
No, I felt like you were trying to instruct me, apparently about things you don't know about; i.e. Tarkovsky.
Quoting Brett
So in other words, why waste space with this?
Quoting Noble Dust
I don’t understand this.
You responded to me posting a Tarkovsky clip with "Why not try to break that down like a poem? Dot points. What are it’s qualities, what does it allude to, do it until you run out of meaning."
To which I eventually asked if you were familiar with his work, to which you responded
Quoting Brett
To which I responded:
Quoting Noble Dust
Quoting Noble Dust
This is the bit I don’t understand. Are you asking or is it rhetorical?
Edit: how does my last comment equate to your single sentence?
Why talk about Tarkovsky if you're not familiar with his work?
Because he sounded interesting and I didn’t know anything about him. So I thought it would be interesting to talk with you about him and find out a bit more about where he was coming from. But not anymore, thanks.
Word, I guess I missed that genial attitude in your initial posts... must have been my mistake...? regardless, Tarkovsky is a master of presenting reality as dream, and dream as reality. The Mirror, the film I posted that clip from, is admittedly not a good staring point...if you like what you saw, I would recommend Stalker as an entry point. Tarkovsky is a true poet, as his father was (who's work Tarkovsky used in his films). The imagery in his work functions as imagery does in poetry. Image functions as...memory does...? it becomes impossible to talk about when you watch his films.
This is not true.
They were traveling billboards from one graffiti group 'home' to another. The graffiti were hidden messages specifically for their own 'home members', sub-culture, and nobody else. Their locations where the art was found marked out the groups boundaries, and other groups usually respected each others space. The trains were used to send a message to the other group down the track, as if to say: 'Can you do better than this piece of artwork'. They competed against each other. Also it was a way to get their artworks outside of the home territory, and into the outer-worlds so to speak.
You are right about what is "good" art because you know more than me about art? How do we decide who knows more?
Quoting Brett
Hmmm, I am not sure this has any relevance on my opinion of art. When I was young, I liked action movies and I disliked Shakespeare. When I got older, and understood Shakespeare better, I did not suddenly like it. I just understood WHY I didn't like it. I can admit there is some clever writing in there, but the stories suck (solely from my perspective...I can list reasons and am sure some others would agree, but nothing objective or universal).
Learning about art allows me to learn about myself. I begin to understand why I like/dislike certain things...I DON'T SEE HOW MY DEEPER KNOWLEDGE OF ART ALLOWS ME TO TELL OTHER PEOPLE WHAT THEY SHOULD LIKE...isn't that what you are doing if you attempt to objectively label some art "good" and some "bad"?
Painting on a canvas manipulates the space of the canvas.
I might be wrong.
Does that mean life/existence is professional space manipulation?
I don't know, is life objective art?
Honestly to answer this I'll need to think. I will hail you later.
Don't fret too much. I was sort of just playing on words. But it seems to me that "recreational space manipulation" is a fine way to describe art, but it doesn't help one understand it any better (and I would think oral stories are still art but they do not take up any physical space...??).
Quoting ZhouBoTong
Big assumption. We don’t know if you learnt anything or understood anything about Shakespeare.
You can claim the stories suck, but at the time people flocked to see the plays, so we can assume that the stories resonated with the times.
At its most basic level the visual arts use “The elements of art and principles of design.” (This is why people think they see art in nature). Even when artists break the rules they still use those elements and principles.
Writers uses standards we all understand. Those standards enable us to understand what the writer means. All languages operate this way.
These are not subjective, these are universal. They can be learned and understood.
So to satisfy your demands for objective standards we can begin with that.
You remind me of the football fans who sit on the couch drinking beer and watching the game and telling the coach where he’s going wrong.
I’m not concerned with your opinion on art. It’s irrelevant. Only you think it’s important and yet you profess to know little about art.
My point about recognising deceptive behaviour in people was that if you know something about art, if you make the effort to familiarise yourself with the history, the movements, the techniques, the artists themselves, then you might be able to see through the deception in art and separate the charlatans from the genuine artist. Otherwise how can you make any decision except to say “I enjoyed that” or “I didn’t enjoy that”. Which is all your entitled to in your ignorance.
Quoting ZhouBoTong
No ones saying that. Deeper knowledge allows you to work your way through the world of art, not to tell others what they should like. Why would anyone want to do that? We’re not saying you should like something, we’re saying why some pieces have value in the world of art. No ones forcing you to go to an art gallery.
One last thing, care to list your reasons why the Shakespeare stories suck? Should be easy because it’s not even about language. Just pretend it’s a Batman movie.
Quoting Qwex
Except a monkey can do that. So there’s still the issue of intent, which comes first.
Quoting ZhouBoTong
Some people do lead lives that are absolutely unique compared to most others. Their lives might be considered creative.
I understand taking a walk as an expression of human consciousness and where one chooses to walk as information about the walker's consciousness. Walking as an expression of human consciousness is broad enough to capture all walking ever done - cave people walking to the present.
All meaningful acts are an expression of human consciousness.
Just saying.
if I am going to purchase art, then I will decide what art is.
Quoting Arne
I don’t think that really works.
If you go to buy a car you go to a car dealer. You don’t decide what a car is you decide what sort of car you want. It’s the same when you go into an art gallery.
It is your comparison that does not work.
You may rest assured I will never buy a car that fails to meet my definition of a car nor will I ever buy a work of art that fails to meet my definition of art.
How others define either matters not to me.
All meaningful acts are an expression of human consciousness.[quote]Arne
What separates an art object and a non art object is that an art object has extra information - it is deemed to be art.It is an arbitrary extra bit of information, but results in art being put on a pedestal, this differentiates it from other aspects of human consciousness.
Glad to hear from you Arne - first serious challenge.
.
Quoting Arne
Which is what?
Quoting Arne
But everyone can walk, it comes naturally to everyone, unless they gave a disability. Not everyone can create art. Unless you think they can, and then you’d still have to define art to describe what they’re doing.
Quoting Arne
Why is that?
Quoting Arne
You can’t define what a car is. If you defined a car as anything but a car, then it wouldn’t be a car. The definition of a car was defined before you came along. All you do is recognise it.
I don't want to be argumentative in what I say, rather simply try to identify who decides what art is.
Take the artist out of the equation, i.e. pretend all the artists and their work suddenly disappears. What are you going to purchase?
I find the original Che Gavara poster the best piece of political art ever produced. It's status as a work of art left the political cause behind and stands in its own right. The second piece is for me hilarious and a clever example of how political satire works. It hasn't though become an art work in its own right and has disappeared from the artistic world.
I would say that political cartoons are an important and sophisticated genre of art.
Here is a piece I produced about 15 years ago prior to the G8 summit while there was a lot of discussion about climate change. As a skull and cross bones, harkening the death of the planet( death of habitability).
If all art suddenly disappeared, why would I have to purchase anything?
And I would probably purchase a paint brush and some paint.
And as for your point as to who defines art, the answer is nobody and everybody.
It is not as if the world needs an agreed upon definition of art before in order for the "world of art" to function. If that were the case, it would have ceased functioning long ago.
And even if there were consensus definition, are you suggesting that an "artist" (for which we are also lacking and do not need a definition) would be required to stay within the definition? Would people be able to purchase only those works meeting the definition?
Art thrives upon the very controversy resulting from it's indefinability.
It is not the lack of definition nor the need to determine who gets to define art that is the issue. Instead the deeper issue is the notion that it can even be contained within a definition. it cannot.
Has there ever been any useful definition of art?
Have artists or art patrons ever considered themselves bound by a definition of art?
Can there even be any such thing as a useful definition of art?
I have never been in need of a definition art and I would not know what to do with one if I had one.
Why would you presume I am bound by an already existing definition of a car?
I am not.
The better question is why would it matter to me how others define either a car or art?
Just like every other morning of my life, I woke up this morning in no need of a definition of car or art. How about you?
They will not.
If all the artists disappeared you could still buy something and call it art, by your criteria. You couldn't though buy an Andy Warhol, or a Picasso. Also if Andy Warhol didn't disappear, you would only be able to buy an Andy Warhol which he chose to create, not any of the works he conceived of, but decided not to take any further.
In the other art thread I described what Modernism brought us, that anything may be art and anything can be art. So this includes you saying something is art, but you may find you become an artist by default, by saying it.
What are you talking about?
I have not listed a single criterion for determining what I consider to be art.
All I have done is to reserve to myself the absolute right to make such a determination.
And I have no obligation to share any criteria that I find useful in making that determination.
Why do people find this perplexing?
What you indicate is a total lack of interest in art. Fine, but why bother posting here?
I love art.
You just don’t like talking about it.
You never answered this.
I love talking about it.
Is there anyone talking with you about it more than I?
Mine and mine alone. Again, I have no obligation to share the criteria I find useful in determining what I consider to be art.
And what is it that you want in the way of definition anyways?
And I can tell you my thoughts on what art is without providing any sort of definition that would provide a template as to whether any particular purported work of art is art.
I do not really care as to how others define art and I am a bit puzzled as to why they would care as to how I define it. Because mostly I don't.
Art is a reflection of the world of the artist. How could it be anything else?
(To save time)
If you have purchased art, then you have done this, " I will decide what art is".
You may rest assured that whatever it is I may have done is consistent with my assertion that I will determine for myself what I consider to be art, and that includes anything hanging on my living room wall (though my living room wall contains mostly interesting pieces of driftwood I find when I go to the beach).
If you happen to find anything else on my wall that others may consider to be art, it is only there because we happen to agree. I certainly didn't seek anyone else's opinion, let alone rely upon it.
Why are you here?
to discuss art.
what about you?
What is art?
I will start with that.
Quoting Arne
Congratulations. That is a beginning. Of course everyone reflects, I assume, but not everyone takes it further.
But at no time was a rejecting any definition of art.
Instead, I was rejecting to the notion that we need to define art before we can discuss it.
I have had many a meaningful discussion about art with many people and with many of them having a far deeper understanding of art than I.
But not a single discussion ever began or ended with an any agreement or disagreement regarding a definition of art.
Either way, this is a discussion and not an interview.
What is art?
Quoting Arne
Look at the title of the OP. That’s the subject.
These things taken from this OP are ideas I would support.
As Bartrick said, “Humans have a concept of art.”
Only man makes art. Intention.
Not all humans make art.
An artist has a sensibility that maybe others appreciate but do not possess.
All art movements have a set of rules. All rules are broken.
Artists seem to have a desire to make something new.
Duplicating what you see is about technique.
Imagination and interpretation break the rules and move art outside of technique.
“Whatever is not natural.” From unenlightened.
“That we understand art by our reason. We cannot know something by instinct, for unless or until that belief which was formed by instinct is ratified by reason is does not count as 'justified' and knowledge involves having justified true beliefs, whatever else it may involve.” From Bartrick.
Therefore art is an act of reason.
Quoting Brett
not even close. This is the Philosophy Forum. No philosopher worth their salt would consider "what is art" to be the functional equivalent of "how do you define art." And it is your OP so the burden of clarity is on you.
If you want a discussion, take it to the forum. If you want a definition, take it to Google.
It’s not my OP. Like I said, what are you doing here?
Edit: by the way we’re not looking for a definition, you introduced that idea.
to discuss art, not to define it.
how about you?
Quoting Arne
Then begin.
Quoting Pop
From the original post. I added the emphasis.
Yes, you’re correct. But it has not been my intention to find a definition.
Me or Arne?
But essentially we are not discussing art, but our consciousness of it. And I also believe the art world is not discussing art but its consciousness of it.This is really what the definition is about. It seeks to clarify what is going on. We are really discussing consciousness, and so is the art world.
I don’t believe you can get it down to a definition. How long should a definition be, a sentence, a paragraph, as essay?
I prefer the long dialogue that weaves in and out of things and to pick the nuggets out of it, then to isolate them and see if they stand up to scrutiny. I’m not interested in someone’s personally constructed definition, I’m looking for consistencies and commonalities, things that can be agreed on then move onto the next stage. Does anyone really believe they’ve worked it out completely? Have they applied their ideas to all the arts? Do they really think they’ve put in enough work to define art? Can you even do it if you haven’t experienced producing art? Do the academics have more of an idea than the artist? They’re smart and knowledgeable so they might, they might be more articulate than the average artist.
We are discussing art, then we’re moving back into consciousness in an attempt to put pieces together. Just how does it reflects the height of our consciousness, for all of us, for the artists or the viewer? It’s clear that the experience of producing art is not the same as viewing it. So who’s consciousness are we talking about?
If you’re watching a dance company on stage, whose consciousness is being displayed, the dancers or the person who conceived the dance. The dancers are just presenting a rehearsed version of the concept. What about a play; the actors, or the writer, or the director?
Quoting Pop
I think that is basically that we all have a personally constructed definition of what we like. That doesn’t mean much at all.
If you cant do that, then perhaps you should consider the validity of it.
Ultimately everything is about consciousness.
Quoting Pop
So is this your definition?
Is this paraphrasing correct?
Art is humanities expression of itself.
Art gives us insight into the artist,
Okay. Well you deserve credit for getting it down to a statement. I’ll think about it.
I never thought I would say some of these things.
Humans have a concept of art.
Art is humanities expression of itself.
Art gives us insight into the artist. The artist is human, so art is an insight into humanity.
All people express themselves in some form, therefore everyone is an artist.
Nothing is expected of art except the expression of the artist.
Artwork allows people to share in that expression.
Different forms of expression resonate with different people.
You would not believe how many ideas and thoughts I have fit into this.
Let’s see what happens to it.
No go ahead. It’s mostly yours anyway.
Wait, I am saying there cannot possibly be objective standards for art...so certainly I am not demanding objective standards. And what you have described is still not objective. Even most "grammar rules" are just suggestions once you are beyond the basics.
Quoting Brett
EVERYONE is just expressing an opinion. That is my point. When did I say I know little about art? I admit to having "poor" taste in art, but that is tongue in cheek as my whole point is that no one can have "poor" taste in art, just tastes that aren't popular.
Quoting Brett
But Shakespeare is "better" than Transformers? Sounds like you are telling people what to like.
Quoting Brett
Why would I want to go to an art gallery to see art? The "best" art in the modern era is movies and television anyway (just an opinion, but unquestionably true if "best" is in anyway connected to "most popular").
Quoting Brett
Why do you act like I don't want to do this?? I have offered many times, but no one ever takes me up on it, haha. Let's keep this somewhat limited, I will give a couple specifics from MacBeth, and then quickly hit Romeo and Juliet as it is more obviously a mess from a modern perspective.
In MacBeth, much of the prophecy stuff is nonsense. MacBeth can only be killed by a man who is not born of a woman and he can only die in the woods of some forest. These "prophecies" are just word games that do not even influence the story's outcome. MacDuff was "born" by c-section (I guess in Shakespeare's day people "born" by c-section were not actually "born"?!?). Also, although MacBeth never went near that one forest, the invading army made spears out of the trees. That is not the same thing. These are just dumb word games. They do not drive the story or influence the outcome (they do not even seem necessarily true/accurate/fulfilled). Shakespeare is full of stuff like this. He is the Quentin Tarrantino of his time. He writes great dialogue but the stories are garbage, even seemingly nonexistent at times.
Now to Romeo and Juliet. The story that takes place over 4 days and is about a 13 year old and 17 year old who are "deeply" in love, although they have not even met when the story begins (and the 17 year old is actually "deeply" in love with a different girl at the start) :roll: .
If that is not enough to destroy that story, please let me know what you think the moral of the story is for Romeo and Juliet...? What do people learn by reading that story?
Quoting ZhouBoTong
Maybe your right about that.
Your criticism of Sheakspeare's work is divorced from reality and it's focus on plot is naive. You should appreciate the context in which it was written and performed.
Art is an expression of nature, by using space, either directly, or by some other mode.
Cause monkeys also have been recorded doing art, Brett.
Here's food for thought.
Is my smile art? When is it art?
Result 1: I have intent to draw interest with my smile for your judgement. Is it then art?
As per usual on this topic, I'm not confident with my definition.
That something is art is arbitrarily deemed.It becomes art when you choose to say it is.
Of course - you are not going to put forward as art something arbitrary. though you have that freedom. You are going to put forward your best thought, your best painting, etc - the height of your consciousness - for everybody to scrutinize.
Art is information about the artists consciousness.
Quoting Qwex
I think this qualifies as part of the definition: “ Whatever is not natural.” From unenlightened.”
Natural elements may be used but the result is contrived.
Why? That is not the context in which modern audiences experience his work. To study how audiences in Shakespeare's day appreciated the work would be a study in history more than a study in art. How would it change my view?
As I have no idea how one would defend such stories based on the context of his time, please do so, and then we can see if you have a point.
Surely there are hugely popular artists alive today that still have millions of people who hate their work..."The Irishman" comes to mind. No one should be immune from criticism, and no one is universally loved.
I assume you think the more specific examples from Macbeth that I provided are also examples of good clever writing...they just need to be viewed in the context of the times?? I hope you aren't another one of the people that LOVES Shakespeare, but hasn't read it since high school.
Even if I could be convinced that if I lived in Shakespeare's time and place that I would love his stories, that doesn't change the fact that I don't live then, and from today's perspective...they have some decent dialogue at best.
And in case it is lost in all my Shakespeare bashing (and to at least somewhat relate to the OP)...this is all subjective and opinion based. I have not found any objective measures of art that work for me. So when I say "Shakespeare's stories stink" what I am really saying is "most people don't like them".
I also don't like a lot of modern (or more modern) writers. But why am I so much more likely to get push-back when I bash Shakespeare than when I bash Tolkien?
Sorry, a lot of partially connected thoughts there, I am trying to avoid going too long before I know you have some interest in an extended discussion on the merits of Shakespeare.
Is my judgement better than most because I have so much experience? Yes.
I notice more technical details, and don't just base goodness on pleasure.
Do I belong in a separate field?
Ironically, the track I'm about to share is in the dark horse of genres. I believe it's the best song. I know that's up for discussion with others but who can better my judgement?
I'm not claiming to be the only good judge, I'm sure there are others.
Here's that track. I recommend you listen to all of it, and take even the screaming in, and judge it. If you give up on the screaming, then not only do you miss the singing, you miss the chance to see if the song is actually good.
Are there lesser and greater judges of art?
Anyway, I listen to all genres, classical - rap - metal - this is the best I've come across.
I would actually say no. You can just explain your reasons for liking something better. You can break down and really analyze the specific aspects that cause you to like it. However, you have NO more ability to know what other people prefer and no reason for other people to view your opinion as correct. An art critic needs to be educated so they can thoroughly explain their reasons for like/dislike. That is NOT so we can view their opinions as objectively correct in any way. We just get some details to help us decide if the reviewed work is worth our time as something we might enjoy.
In all genres of art, I have not found that my tastes change significantly as I learn more. I occasionally find things accessible that were previously unintelligible, but I do not notice a real change in my tastes.
Quoting Qwex
I would say there are better and lesser art ANALYSTS. But to call them "judges" gives them a power I do not think they deserve. I am not more likely to agree with a well educated art critic, I am just more likely to understand their reasons for liking/disliking.
Quoting Qwex
Me too. Even country...although most country is like fingernails on a chalkboard.
I thought the song in the video was fine. But nothing that particularly hooks me (I actually liked the screaming bits better than the rest). But if you say it is your favorite song, I can only agree. Who am I to tell you what your favorite song should be? Would you give that power to anyone? Could someone out there know so much about music that they could tell you that you are wrong and you would change your mind?
If instruments are, then it's beneficent to focus on even the smallest unit of a beat.
There is a way to make perfect music. Thus, people can make more appealing art.
I don’t really want to stir this up again, but it got me thinking.
I’ve tried many mediums and forms to try and capture (for better use of a word) my experience in the world. But I feel like I’ve failed in every attempt. Whatever I do never quite makes it. Not that anyone would necessarily know that. But I’ve realised I’ll always fail because art is artifice, a synthetic version of my experience. How could it possibly succeed at capturing my experience?
However it's not all bad because often when the artist is dissatisfied, the viewer is not. Or the work inadvertently conveys something successfully but chance, or happenstance. Very occasionally the work does capture what was intended, which is a very rewarding experience for the artist. Or the artist discovers a successful technique.
The journey of the artist is an exploration, along the way the artist becomes a creative person, learning more artistic techniques, developing insight into nature and the ways things are observed and may learn rewarding creative processes, exploring and sharing these insights. Some artists break through a threshold, or ceiling of limitation and find creating successful pieces effortless, like Picasso for example.
Brett, If you do not mind me suggesting, you are describing your consciousnesses. Consciousness is a creator of reality - what we perceive reality to be , becomes our reality, and then we pervade that reality to others.By understanding consciousness, you can change your reality.
Now to explain the above in more conventional thought - I am still trying to get my head around consciousness . - You are searching for a language. All artists must find a way to express their particular sensibility ( consciousness ).The first part is to find a language.You wont find the language until you are settled in you thoughts.You will settle on your thoughts and find a language at the same time. At that point not only will you show your work, but you will insist on shouting it to the world.
I’m not sure if “expression” is the right word in all this. It’s an inadequate word, it might even be a lie, being used to justify something. That part of us behind this idea, call it consciousness if you like, is far more valuable in inventing a car, or the engine. That’s taking our experience of the world and turning it into something understood as artifice, synthetic, no pretence about what it is, something that actually interacts constantly between consciousness and the world. A painting is totally synthetic, it’s inactive and does nothing. People talk about “art that changed the world”. No art ever changed the world. An individuals actions might change the world when their consciousness is transformed into action. A painting is inactive, it’s a very poor result of consciousness.
In a way art is an effort to tie something down, freeze a moment in time, like butterflies behind glass. It’s turning an experience into a corpse at best. If that’s the “expression” then it is a lie.
Perhaps a human attempt at expression is a better way of putting it. The acknowledgement of human frailty accepts the limits of artifice.
I accept your comments on the futility of conveying experience in an profound, or adequate way. But it does not allow for a creativity in the appreciation of art. Or the power in formulaic art, such as in religious iconography, or artefacts.
For me there are works of art which have an experiential effect on me which is equally profound as any beautiful human experience. Some artefacts can become invested with such meaning that simply to think of them can induce an experience of joy, or profound understanding.
So perhaps what I am saying is that beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
I still have a problem with expression. It sounds inadequate to me. Conveying experience is better for me. But that still feels inadequate, but if that means conveying your sense of existence at a particular point in time then fine.
If I’m at the beach, swimming in the surf on a fine clear day, and I want to make that the subject of a piece of art what should I focus on: sight, sound, touch, hearing, smell, and then my state of mind at the time and my perceptions switching about with the priority of my senses, A painting is not going to do that. Obviously that’s a big call to catch all that and the materials I use compromise me even more. But if it’s just going to be a very good painting of a wave on a perfect day then that’s all it can be. And there are thousand of images of waves out there reducing its value even more.
Multimedia might work here, and conceptual work that doesn’t tie things down, that keep your mind tracking over the subject. But you can see where the inadequacy lies, that what’s produced relates very little to the experience, and obviously that experience takes place as consciousness.
So for instance, what was called new journalism that appeared in the sixties is possibly more effective in telling a story than a novel. One, because it doesn’t pretend to be the real thing like a novel does, and two because it includes the subject and the writer; it has facts and the experience of the writer observing the subject.
My other thought, as I mentioned, is the modern consciousness. Is it real? If so then does it need new ways of regarding itself?
Edit: a person could sit on the beach and write down on paper every word that comes to mind over a 60 minute period then hang it in a gallery. Is that any less than a painting?
These are a couple of paintings I have done in contemplation of the sea on one of those days. (Lighting is difficult when photographing these paintings, they look so different with different lighting). The first is inside lighting and the second is outside lighting.
This painting by someone else has a quality I like
I think that as our consciousness has speeded up with the increased use of IT etc, we have become exposed to and accustomed to aesthetic narratives and these have become part of the nature of our consciousness. I think that if one looks to examine these issues philosophically this phenomena should be understood, for what it is and the aesthetic narratives identified. A knowledge of previous aesthetics would also be appropriate.
I feel that people go on their own individual aesthetic journey, either like what I have just described, or not thinking about it, but being spoon fed by the electronic gadgets etc.
I think that for artists, there is a similar spectrum of consciousness, genres act as a good framework through which to develop ways to convey experiences, but this would probably require a social group of viewers, who are familiar with the narrative.
Yes, I think that poetry, or writing could convey the beach experience, as it is something which can be evoked, reminding the viewer, or listener of when they personally had the experience.
Nice work.
Is this a contradiction?
if you watch a UFC fight, it's good par with one of two fighters, before actually recognizing who the second fighter is.
If I watch UFC, I carefully examine both fighters, and come to a rational decision. 'he's got better eyes, but I've seen the other guy fight before, I'll bet on draw' - contrary to - 'I prefer this guy - I'm going to bet on him blindly'.
Am I wrong to conflate UFC and art or is it a fair assocication?
Take two pieces of art for example, can one be pit against the other?
Isn't that what beauty is? Rated art?
What is happening when my brain converts the sound vibrations of a Mozart sonata or Maria Callas aria into electrical signals and experiences them? Why does it generate a nice feeling, pleasure? Also, the sensation of joy does not need anyone else to be present, not even the performer. Other than enjoyment, it does not convey any information. It is unlikely that such a complex characteristic would be an accident or vestigial. So why have we evolved to create and experience certain combinations and sequences of sound in an enjoyable way? How does it support life?
From what we observe about the creation, reception and effects of music, it could serve multiple purposes for life.
Art could have evolved in one of several ways, based on its utility for life. One role it could play is to make the registering, analysis, retention and reuse of event sequences that we experience. For example, it rains heavily, and there are mudflows, the hut collapses. Or the cock crows and it is dawn and time to wake up and get going. Drawings and paintings help humans record events and causes and effects. Musical notes in specific sequences create a melody the mind can focus on and follow. Like it can track the flight of the deer and the chase of the lion. In this role, art is a teaching aid for the brain.
The other function it could have is to increase the capacity of the more advanced parts of the brain by exercising them (e.g. the cortex), although they may have evolved a lot before art came into the picture.
Another possibility is that it could help calm the more reactive parts of the brain (which meditation and mindfulness do too).
Art could also, in a secondary role, strengthen the bonding within social groups. The Arts represent the more complex emotions of humans and sharing the experience of music, dance and art could strengthen the bonds within human groups. To the extent that some other species also exhibit the capacity for music and dance, it applies to them too.
Our perception of Art is intimately tied to our senses. Therefore, its existence, form and value are entirely relative to our species. For any other species on our planet, it may be similar but will not be the same. For an alien species with very different sense organs and evolutionary needs, art may not exist or will be very different if it does.
Sunsets over the ocean look good to us. Is it because it is a sign that everything is fine with the world? The life-giving sun is there, just right for us. There’s water, even if it is salty. Music sounds good to us. Is it because it resembles the sounds of natural things that are wholesome for us, such as flowing water, singing birds, flowing air? Is the ability to create and enjoy art only possible when we have leisure time? And because leisure is a sign of satiation, comfort, shelter and safety, does art enhance it by generating positive feelings and make us strive for such conditions?
Then what about sad songs? How are they good for us? How about paintings of war and death? How are they good for us? One answer could be that they remind us of what we should not be, what we should not do. So, art could also be serving the function of reflection and teaching. And it may do it for many of us together. It could be a way for us to agree on what is right for us and what is not.
In summary, either art makes us more fit for survival directly or pushes us to such behaviour that the enjoyment of art becomes possible in our lives. Either way, it is utilitarian. As an enabler or as a source of pleasurable sensations that accompany healthy activities.
Pretending I didn't read that, I'd have said .. any observable and intentional arrangement of matter not done so for utility.
Quoting Julia
- expressing their consciousness
Welcome to the forum.
I agree that art can be all the things you suggest it should be, but at the same time believe that it need not be any of those things to be art. Indeed it could be the antithesis of all that you suggest, and still be art. So what is art?
To answer the question I have tried to identify elements that are always present in all art work- from the whole of time and across all cultures, even the future and arrived at the conclusion that those elements are 1:art work is information and 2: the information reflects the artists consciousness. These are the only two elements present in every art work ever made. Everything else is variable, but these two elements must be present. Wittgenstein could not find any constituent elements, he only saw variability, so concluded that art cannot be defined.
After forming the definition : art work is information about the artist's consciousness, I then asked myself is this all art can be? can it be more then this? I concluded that as art must always arise out of the artists consciousness it cannot be more then this. I use John Searle's definition of consciousness.
I don’t believe the definition diminishes art’s standing in any way. On the contrary I believe it raises it to new heights – If information is fundamental, then so must consciousness be. –so it is entirely fitting that we artists have been expressing something fundamental all along.