What is "art"?

[godfry n. glad]

This is a question I've been mulling for several years, on an off. I've worked with artists in training and have yet to get a satisfactory answer. For me, at least.

If some yahoo known as an artist can defecate in an ordinary can and call it "art" (and sell it to some collector for $10,000.00 US), how can we distinguish what is art and what is crap? Yet, on a daily basis I seem to see claims that objects are "art", while others are merely "crafts". Who makes these distinctions and how?

godfry

(who always thought Art was a meter-reader for the gas company)

[livius drusus]

I really don't know what art is, godfry; I don't think there is any one answers to the question. You might find Hugo's Aesthetics (http://eblaforum.org/main/viewtopic.php?t=19) essay interesting as it covers a lot of the philosophical ground.

I suppose at this point I'd have to say that I lean towards the idea of a list of potentially overlapping, non-exclusive criteria defines what is art to me. There are probably a bunch of "crafts" or products of artisanship which would qualify according to my list.

[dave_a]

dunno how to define art, but poop in a can is the antithesis of art, that much I can say.

[freemonkey]

Thanks for pointing to that essay, liv. Hugo, I enjoyed reading that very much.

I don't know what art is, either. On my most cynical days I think its the marketing of art that is the most "real" thing. Poop in a can. Big bucks for paintings done by dogs, elephants, monkeys, little kids... Thomas Kinkaid. :woopdedo:

Which then begs the question: "Does art matter?"

[dave_a]

Which then begs the question: "Does art matter?"

I think art, and therefore it's value, is entirely subjective. Some folks are artsy fartsy types who will ohh and ahh at anything called art, others could care less about it, but will ooh and ahh when they see something that for whatever reason strikes them.

Personally I can go through a gallery and yawn at 99.9% of what I see, but when I see that something special it is really special.

I still dream of the day when I can afford a 200 megapixel digicam with superior optics so I can set about creating my own version of a photo I once saw. Unfortunately the photo is very old and showcases old cars in an old downtown of a small town that wasn't old when the pic was taken so I am going to have my work cut out for me in recreating it. Either that or I have to try and find the gallery again (I think I know which one it was) and hope that the pic I saw 3 years ago is either still there or someone there will know what I am talking about and I can somehow locate another one.

Anyway the point is that particular photo so captivated me that I dream of recreating it (I hate buying someone else's art when I can do it myself).

Other art, like the $15 small statues I have of brass figures engaged in intimate acts (the figures are non detailed and fairly abstract), are less captivating to me, but captivating enough that I bought them and gave them a place in my home.

http://webpages.charter.net/davea/PICT0751_2.jpg <--see?!?!

[livius drusus]

It's a nice piece, dantonac, but I'd much rather have one of your photographs on my wall. :)

[Adora]

The theorist in me says "Art is anything made by human actions". In art history lessons you hear some interesting ones of what people have passed off as art. A woman once prostituted herself and called it "art". I don't recall exactly how she did it, but it had something to do with Irugay's theories of female economy in art or something. The cynic in me says "..." of course, but hey, what can you do?

I don't get the old distinction between "art" and "craft" anymore. I think with the incorporation of the economy into everything there's no point to this distinction, since the practical capital of "craft" is now measured with money, as is the value of "art" in the market. And then there is art that is practical, such as the recently opened Millenium Park in (I think?) Chicago (?).

[Adora]

I figured I may as well put this in a new reply, but you can hit me for it if you like. I've only realised how much more can be said on this topic since starting classes again, and I'm taking one that's called "From Buddha to Bruce Lee: Asian Visual Culture". We addressed this topic thouroughly in the first lecture, and I discovered some things I may as well share since they're related to the thread.

Our modern views on art and related topics are basically leftovers from the Renaissance. The ideas of delineation between "craft" and "art" had faded until then, and were only revitalised as the lines were also drawn between "high art" and "low art". This is a very European view and has it's problems, obviously.

Other cultures never even had a word for "art" until European contact. A specific example I can recall is the Japanese. Once, they simply had "Kyogei" or The Industries. This eventually became split into "kogei" (craft) and "kogyo" (industry) after a good deal of influence from the Chinese. 'Art' (bijutsu) did not exist until encounters with the Germans, and the Japanese word "bijutsu" is actually derived from some long German word that means "art" (I can't recall it properly, so I'm not going to try). During the early and middle 19th century, the self-imposed Japanese isolation was lessened slightly to allow trade, and there was more cultural exchange, especially in the arts. Not only did ukiyo-e prints become hot items in Europe but the prints themselves started to adapt things like perspective in them as an influence from the European styles, which had previously been absent. And until the country opened up again completely at the end of the Meiji Restoration, there was no concept at all of "High Art" and "Low Art". Any Art (bijutsu) was unclassed in this European manner.

Personally, I believe the creation of asthetic pleasure, thoughts, or some sort of reaction in a viewer/audience is as much a utility of art as everyday useage is of "craft" (ick, I hate that word). I don't see the lines many draw by saying "This is art because it was made with no other purpose except to sit on a wall and look pretty" and "This is craft because it is a lovely silver spoon with engravings but you can still use it for eating". Because there are "artistic" things that illicit stronger responses in people than decorative "crafts" that are never even put to use (untouched Ming Vases, for example).

Though I have my own tastes and pleasures, 3 years of university conditioning has made it hard for me to draw lines between high and low art as well. I've been brainwashed by the Evil Cultural Studies Conspiracy (as mentioned in another thread) to believe a rare Russian arthouse flick is as worthy of cultural attention as an episode of The O.C. People find pleasure where they find it, and for those with more money than others (as it has been traditionally) to say it is "low" because it is not found in the same places as they think it should be is disturbing.

For example, I am not a photographic person. I think the photographic "arts" is more full o shite than many other genres and mediums, because of the ease of the technology in any half-brained monkeys' hands. Given, I tend to fuck up all photos I take, but that's besides the point *cough*. The point is that I will always take issue with a lot of photography, no matter how good it is, and debate long and hard whether it is a real art form, no matter how open-minded I may pretend to be. But I'm not going to call it low-art or culture. Photography is an important part of human history, and good photography is a treasure to be cherished and loved, not to mention it's importance to film culture which I'm so deeply involved in. If I was to call Photography "Low Art", I'd be as fucking stupid as GW calling the entire country of Iraq "Evil".

Okay, that's my little rant of the day. Now I'm going to sit outside and talk to the magpies *warble warble*...

[JoeP]

I thought about this a bit when this topic first came up, and Adora's (rejected) defns of art as prett-on-the-wall and craft as could-be-useful made me think about it again.

I see 'art' and 'craft' as ways of doing things. 'Art' is done for creation, creativity or expression (and we can spend another 100 posts disentangling those terms), and 'craft' is something done with skill. A 'craftsman' is experienced and recognised, perhaps, for quality of work, but that quality needn't be artistic, it could be utilitarian. A cabinet-maker could make pieces for a living he doesn't like. There's a further sense in which 'craft' denotes 'industry' (getting things done and made) without machines and automation and is kind of distinct from the way 'industry' is most often used. But that's not what I'm talking about.

'Art' often involves craft. A 3-year-old can be very creative and expressive, but have no craft. A lot of "fan fiction" is creative but lacks the novelist's 'craft' - stuff you have to learn or practice, and can do better or worse, but isn't itself creativity.

Art is the difference between good grammar, plot construction, characterisation, etc, and a successful novel. It's the difference between being able to play an instrument and being able to play it with feeling. It's the difference between bars and staves and notes and key signatures and actually being able to write melodies.

Art's the new, innovative, different stuff; craft is being able to do it again and again and get the results you actually intend.

Historically I think this difference was not so clear. A good artist was a good craftsman and vice versa. Rules and form mattered - for classical poets, medieval architects, renaissance painters. Now we have the situation in some modern art where any 'craft' at all is regarded as detrimental.