Gilda

First, I want to make a distiction between little a art and big A art. Little a art may be any sample taken from a particular artistic medium, while big A Art is in some way a special form of that medium.

In comics for example, every comic book is filled with art. Watchmen is Art. Beetle Baily is art. Krazy Kat is Art.

1. So let's look first at little a art. What is it that distinquishes art from non-art? Does the faux wood grain paper on top of the steel and fiberboard table that I use for a computer desk qualify as art? Is the plain white cover on a J. D. Salinger book art? Is the skin used for this forum art? Is the label on the diet Pepsi bottle on my desk art? Is a picture of Jesus immersed in a bottle of urine art? Why or why not?

Personally, I'd say all of those are art. I'd define art as anything humans do that isn't purely functional. If the table in front of me had a bare top, it wouldn't be art. But the decision was made at some point to put a wood grain paper cover on top of the fiber board. They could have used a plain black, or uncolored paper (which would have been roughly manila colored), but someone must have thought the table would be a little more attractive with the woodgrain than without. It's not great art, not Capital A Art, but it is art.

2. Now let's look at Art. When we say of something, "That's a work of Art," we're taling big A art. What is it that distiquishes Art from art? Is just an example of highly skilled craftsmanship, or is there something else that's required?

Ask any comic nerd who the greates writer of all time is and you'll get a variety of answers, perhaps Stan Lee, Alan Moore, Charles Shultz, or a handful of others. Ask the same group of nerds who the greatest artist is, and the general concensus will be Jack Kirby. Kirby's artwork isn't as pretty as, say, Neal Adams, Alex Ross, or John Byrne, but he's almost always placed above them. So what's the distinction? In this case, it's the fact that he just about single handedly invented or perfected most of the conventions of modern sequential storytelling, and did so better than almost anyone has since.

So does being first make one more of an artist than those who copy, even if those who copy do so with more skill? If it isn't craftsmanship, what is it?

I've heard Ron Howard described as being a consummate professional at the craft of movie making, but lacking the artistic vision that distiguishes the great directors such as Scorsese.

So what exactly is it that distinquishes highly skilled art from Art? Is there a difference at all? How can you tell what it is?

__________________
I'm against ending blackness. I believe that everyone has a right to be black, it's a choice, and I support that.

~Steven Colbert

Demeter

I'd say most anything that could please or stimulate the senses could be art. This would include the art of cooking, lovemaking, visual, autitory...

So what exactly is it that distinquishes highly skilled art from Art? Is there a difference at all? How can you tell what it is?

The beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

__________________

I am not bound to please thee with my answers.
William Shakespeare

akito

art is self expression. It's different for everyone.

Playing the piano is my art. Photoshop is an art I'm learning. Tattoo's are art, as well as piercings. It's what tells me something is beautiful.

portereight

I think art has more to do with the motivation than process. Try to imagine the difference between a stone sculpture and carved stone masonry detail. One is art and one is craft. Craft at it's highest level can transcend and become art, but what it is the gap it transcends? In earlier times if you wanted a piece of furniture you had it made by a craftsman. Now if you had the same piece build odds are fair that he or she might consider themselves an artisan furniture maker. If you sit for a painted portrait is that art? What if you sit in the same pose for a photo at the sears portrait studio? Is craft or medium the difference? If we accept a painting by a master as art, what about a poster with the same picture?
In the end I suggest that much like the famous obscenity quote: I don't know what it it is, but I know it when I see it.

maleficent

art/Art is pretty much anything that I don't understand... Especially when I scratch my head and say -- WHY would someone want to do that...it's probably art...

I can go into a museum, look at pretty pictures and all i can see is whether or not I would like it hanging over my sofa... i don't see the artisitic vision and the brush strokes and all the other stuff that I overhear the overdressed pretentious people oooh and aaah at while looking at the picture for 20 minutes... I don't understand it... some of the great works of art were not as good as the stuff I had hanging on the fridge that my young niece had created for me.

I like comics, but because they make me laugh, or entertain me, I don't see the art in them. Stephen Pastis makes me smirk on a regular basis... it's entertainment, not art. If comics are art, then my original definition of anything I don't understand hold true.

__________________

warrrreagl

He's a guy who lives out in the woods with Sus and Mimi.

__________________
Living is easy with eyes closed.

d*d

art and Art, does there need to be a difference, it's all to do with the mysticysm that surrounds the art as to wether (using your definitions) it is Art - it is a cultural and fashion led abstract. Great works of art from the past would not be considered so
if created today, the Mona Lisa is a great work of art more through it's reputation than through it's depiction of the lady in question.
The art world and those who puport to be critics should not be the yardsticks through which you judge what art/Art is, art is a purely subjective experience - enjoy it and make your own decisions, let history decide which will be the graet works from this century

fresnelly

I find this sort of question frustrating because it's a bit like asking how many angels can fit on the head of a pin, or what is beauty. For art, a definition becomes a boundary, and art is nothing without the ability to break free of boundries. Art lies in creation, not in appreciation.

I like this quote from sculpter Alberto Giacometti:

"The object of art is not to reproduce reality, but to create a reality of the same intensity."

__________________
Building an artificial intelligence that appreciates Mozart is easy. Building an A.I. that appreciates a theme restaurant is the real challenge - Kit Roebuck - Nine Planets Without Intelligent Life

kramus

We define our world and then we grow art in the intersections.

__________________
And now to disengage the clutch of the forebrain ...
I'm going with this - if you like artwork visit http://markfineart.ca

zen_tom

I like that one kramus!

For me, big A Art is achieved when someone is able to imbue an object with emotion - as if they enchanted it. I've seen pictures and sculptures in galleries that have made a huge emotional impression, even from across the room. In some pictures, you can see and feel the things that the artist was feeling in every single stroke or cut - their physical process bringing life, or history, or something to an otherwise dead arrangement.

streak_56

interaction, interpretation and definition.

These three things define art for me. The way it interacts with either:

A) My mind
B) The medium used or
C) The environment it is staged in.

Interpretation is all internal. How we interpret something as art may be crap to others. Basically it is our opinion of something.

Definition: Do we define this as art? or is it just a drawing/painting/sketch/mold or some other medium that does not warrent artistic merit.

I think all three of these work together to become what we think is art and what is Art.

chickentribs

art makes me look, Art makes me feel.

__________________
Oft expectation fails...
and most oft there Where most it promises
- Shakespeare, W.

little_tippler

I once read a pretty great text on what is art, seen from an anthropological viewpoint...I'll try and find it and link it here. But basically it explained that Art, is when you create something with that sole purpose, to BE art, to be an object of "spiritual" value. Ok many argue that to be art it has to be recognized as such by others, otherwise it's just some self-indulgent whimsy. I disagree with that.

__________________
Whether we write or speak or do but look
We are ever unapparent. What we are
Cannot be transfused into word or book.
Our soul from us is infinitely far.
However much we give our thoughts the will
To be our soul and gesture it abroad,
Our hearts are incommunicable still.
In what we show ourselves we are ignored.
The abyss from soul to soul cannot be bridged
By any skill of thought or trick of seeming.
Unto our very selves we are abridged
When we would utter to our thought our being.
We are our dreams of ourselves, souls by gleams,
And each to each other dreams of others' dreams.

Fernando Pessoa, 1918

Nisses

Personally, I think that Art is something that creates, innovates, not just follows something that is already existant. And at the same time it summons emotions in the people that look upon it. "Art" influences people, calls up emotions either good or bad, where-as "art" makes you stop, say: that's pretty, look at how they did this and that... and then you just move on.

I like it too! I wish I had that way with words.

__________________
Moderation should be moderately moderated.

cowudders14

An interesting debate!
I've been struggling with the art thing for a while too.

I work in Birmingham City Centre. A couple of weeks ago we had some guy come and attach a large "birds nest" to the side of the Rotunda, and live in it for a week. One day he was standing on top of it (wearing no safety restraint, but that's just a gripe from being an engineer!), another he was just poking his arms out of it and waving them up and down, another he was attached to some pole and was fully out of the nest, horizonatally, as if taking off. The news turned up and said he was barmy, the arts bods turned up and said it was superb and breathtaking, and most people just walked past shaking their heads. Art? art? "Performing art", apparently. To him I guess it was art. To me, it was someone making a statement in his way, to others he was an idiot.
Have a read of a news story - you'll see the picture of him and his "nest".

Domai has always made me think of the art debate too: Is the naked lady on there art? Is she Art, or an artform unto herself. Is it just porn glorified as art? I'd go for "art". Many others wouldn't

The much acclaimed turner prize: In many peoples books, and, indeed, I must add myself to this camp, usually a load of rubbish, but they are given £40,000 for winning it!
Have a look at this years entries.
Barmy? Or art?

The best summary of art etc that I have ever come up with is that art exists only in our minds - it is not something that can be defined or definitively explained or showcased. It is different for all of us, and our interpretation of other peoples ideas of art is different. Art is a method of expressing ourselves, and/or for allowing others to express themselves.

For me, "art" is the method, "Art" is a particular example of the method that stands out for whatever reason.

__________________
Moo! I'm mooey!

doodlebird

the chicken has spoken.

i agree that Art is about conveying an emotion. it doesn't have to be deep or profiund or universal. but it should make you feel something.

little a is just nice to look at. perhaps more like a craft than an Art? this could be a related topic... craft v. art.

i've never wanted to be called a craftsman, always wanted artist. yet i realized earlier this week that what i do could be called a craft. not an art. self realization = yikes.

__________________
xoxo
doodle

Drider_it

so by art being an outlet for emotions... is it a good or bad thing? when others feel anger at a show peice. or awe at a painting.

I have had the simplest of paintings or sculptures move me to tears. yet the complex and outlandish of some just cause me to scoff at ones work. but then again we are all human and have a sense of free choice. of free will.. this alone moves us when looking at any form of art. next in line is our grounding in reality. how far off can we go or imagine?

as an avid fantasy and scifi book reader and big in to table top role playing games such as the d20 system given out by wizards of the coast. heck i can come up with a world of fantasy or fiction in a day. complete with seasons and such. but with the chaotic nature of my real life, i prefer the calm and easy flow of lines and colors call to me.

and yet you have the individual again.. the ego of man as a whole. for that alone determines what is the norm in the social stream of life. burn this.. but ohhh keep this its pretty. (dog stuffed in a lawn mower- for instance)

and then the evil of man. immoral and decrepid. everyone has a dark side. do not deny it. you have that inner voice that tells you "dont do it" but you refuse to listen to it and so you blunder though another path. the dark of man has had its art form all through history. what.. look at pearl harbor, nam, even 9/11.. time mag is full of art pictures of the horror and evil of man.

but i believe music is your best choice at art. what do you like to listen to? there are more forms of music now then there was 20 years ago and 40 years before that? how about 80?

here is a simple truth. the brain has safety features built in. stand outside tomorrow/today. dont look around find one object straight ahead and stare at it. now open your mind and try to take it all in at once. you cant. every color of each blade of grass, the individual colors of the leaves on a tree. the bricks on the building can you focus on them all in truth? thats just sight. then comes sound. notice people as they go through life. they will perk up with a sudden intrest in a sound. or even a smell.. that is the brains self defense keeping the ego and even the ID from short circuting from the over flow of senses. we are flawed and limited.

so does that mean art is? one person tapped an area to produce this yet does that mean you or I cannot? is that why we find such art distasteful or vulgar?

the evolution of art. nothing new comes to us.. just taking it in a different form .. one could say evolution.. of course im on a tanget now so ill go.. in parting

what is in your minds eye when you look at the world?

__________________
It means only one thing, and everything: Cut. Once committed to fight, Cut. Everything else is secondary. Cut. That is your duty, your purpose, your hunger. There is no rule more important, no commitment that overrides that one. Cut. The lines are a portrayal of the dance. Cut from the void, not from bewilderment. Cut the enemy as quickly and directly as possible. Cut with certainty. Cut decisively, resoultely. Cut into his strength. Flow through the gaps in his guard. Cut him. Cut him down utterly. Don't allow him a breath. Crush him. Cut him without mercy to the depth of his spirit. It is the balance to life: death. It is the dance with death. It is the law a war wizard lives by, or he dies.