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Old 08-01-2008, 09:18 AM   #1 (permalink)
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How far is too far? What is art to you?

I hope all of you have noticed that the creativity forums are now open to discussions on the arts. If not, here is a little heads up! Just remember, you are still encouraged to post your original art work, as before.
But now we can talk about a wider range of arts topics - this means that even if you're not a creative soul, you may be a creative fan, and can now have a greater say in this area of the TFP!


In the spirit of this development, I propose a discussion on the most widely discussed topic in art:

Is the art we see today going too far?

And subsequently:

What is art to you?

I'd like to start by leading you to this interesting article in ARTNews magazine:

Quote:
Originally Posted by ARTNews Magazine - Summer 2008
How Far is Too Far?   click to show 


Link to Article
I know, there's a lot there to digest. But I thought this article will help a lot of people, especially those who are not so aware of how artists are pushing the boundaries today, understand what is being made and provide issues for discussion.

I like the phrase referring to Rilke, though I am not a connoisseur of his work.
«Beauty may be nothing but the “beginning of Terror, we’re still just able to bear.”»

It's a good way to make sense of the wildly broad scope of contemporary art today. It's no use resisting the developments, and attempts to break the mold that occur in contemporary art. I will say though, that although almost anything that causes a reaction can be considered art today, similarly, you as an individual are still able to say no to it. Doesn’t mean it’s not art, but you don’t have to take it if you don’t want to. I’d say it’s fair to at least give it a chance and try to understand it. But if it does not mean anything to you, anything at all, then you don’t have to accept it just because the art world says you must. The art world is truly a fickle place, so trust me when I say I firmly believe that art is what you make of it.

For me, as an artist, but also working on the market side of the art world, I consider that art is a far more encompassing word and cannot be solely used to describe art as we understood it over a century ago. Art is not only a thing of aesthetic beauty, though I still think art should pose questions pertaining to it, and should always have a strong aesthetic component (even if it is an “ugly” aesthetic). I think the best art, to me, is one where I feel there is a balance between the aesthetic and the concept of the piece created.

But, I believe that art is not an object in itself but instead, it is a process and the connections it creates, between people and other people, and people and the outside world in general. It does not exist to be useful to us, though it can be. Art is far more an idea and the reactions it provokes, than it is an object. We do not merely create artworks to decorate the buildings we construct. That is why art is an evolving and changing process – it makes us think about the world, about ourselves, about others, and it is born of our innate need to know more about why we are here, where we are going, and what we are doing with the time and resources available to us.

When we speak of a work of art, we cannot merely refer to the object of it. Some works may have no physical object, to start. To give a simple example, when thinking about a performance, what would the object be? The manuscript originally written for it’s enaction? The first time it was performed? No, when we speak of such an “event”, we speak of the process, the reactions, the implications, the consequences.

“when does shock outweigh artistic value in work that is designed to be provocative? (...)Is such a question even relevant?”

I think so. Art can be about transgression, but it does not have to be only that. The best works may transgress, but they will also bring you something new, a new angle on a particular topic, a new way of creating, a different way of interacting. I balk at certain works myself, even with the training I have had and all I have experienced and read with regards to art. Some of it I can’t like. Usually most proposals I can accept to some degree. I have learned to look beyond the first impact. But that is not to say that first impressions don’t stick, because they do. That’s why it’s important to make that first moment count, even when you’re presenting to a group of collectors, curators, or critics.

I agree that some artists take the shock value aspect too far, and literally are mocking the public for whom the work is intended. I am not appreciative of that and try not to endorse it, much like some of the curator mentioned in this thread. Is it necessary to draw the line? It shouldn’t be I guess. But if we don’t draw any lines, then it will be a free for all. And art will lose all meaning...and consequently value. Yes, market matters are never far out of play. But I am also referring to intrinsic, “magical” value. Without art, how would we dream, or make our dreams materialize? Art is a language, a form of expression (not necessarily communication, there is a distinction), like many other languages. It is a particularly enjoyable and adventurous one.

I like what Arthur Danto has to say on this matter too. He has always struck me as a level-headed critic with a practical approach to understanding art. In fact it was through reading one of his articles that the question “what is art?” finally made sense to me, some years ago. Here again he says it quite plainly: “Something’s being a work of art doesn’t excuse you from moral considerations(...).You can murder someone and call it a work of art, but you are still a murderer. Morality trumps esthetics.”

This reminds me of that artist who let a dog starve to death as a piece of art work. To me that was truly sickening. I can understand the idea: in the street the dog would starve and no-one would give a damn. In an art gallery, it’s an outrage”. I still don’t like it as art. To me, it goes too far. It is a perversion of what art can be. When we see these kinds of actions put forward as art, we can’t help but feel sickened by it. Has the world gone mad? Probably.

I can’t stop the “art world” from calling it art and trying to force it on me. But I can refuse to agree. I have yet to work out what else to do about it! In the end, there will always be one camp who says yes, and another who says no. As long as that happens, it’s debatable. When everyone is indifferent to it, then it virtually ceases to exist, to be an issue. And to be art, in the contemporary sense.

I’d also love to know what your reaction is to some of the works described in the article. There are some amazing ones, with interesting concepts. I have always been a fan of Marina Abramovic – she’s a little loopy but she does some performances that are so cutting I can’t help but have respect for her. I also like the idea of Teresa Margolles’s Vaporization. Simple but so many layers behind, conceptually. Santiago Sierra is a bit borderline but I think he plans everything meticulously, even to the point of predicting reactions to the work and intending them as they are. He brings up lots of questions and I like that. There’s actually so much that can be discussed in each piece it might merit a thread all its own!

As a final note, the works with abortion and cruelly killing animals are, to me, perversions of the true spirit of art. In particular because they are intentionally and calculatingly cruel and physically harmful to other beings.

There are many more topics that I could pick out from this article, but I think I’ll let this settle for a moment. Let you have your say. What is your take on all this?

Feel free to threadjack a little, I think it seems impossible not to with so much material. If it seems like it’s a huge threadjack, jump out and make your own thread on the topic!
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Old 08-01-2008, 02:38 PM   #2 (permalink)
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I'm not an artist, nor do I understand art. Despite this (or maybe because of it), I'll jump in and offer a few thoughts.

Quote:
This reminds me of that artist who let a dog starve to death as a piece of art work. To me that was truly sickening. I can understand the idea: in the street the dog would starve and no-one would give a damn. In an art gallery, it’s an outrage”. I still don’t like it as art. To me, it goes too far. It is a perversion of what art can be. When we see these kinds of actions put forward as art, we can’t help but feel sickened by it. Has the world gone mad? Probably.
To refrain from or prohibit this kind of act precludes us from its benefits. There is the reasonable position of valuing the proper treatment of an animal above the benefits of such 'art,' but there is also the possibility of allowing ethics to forever deny us any value that such art might have. In science, there is a clear distinction between theory and practice; in theory, theory and practice are the same, but in practice they're not. There is knowledge to be gained in testing a theory by putting it into practice. Does this distinction exist in art?

To me, the idea of abusing a dog for the sake of art is abhorrent. But so is the idea of forever passing up an opportunity, however small, to grow, to advance, to enlighten ourselves. Can this opportunity be reached instead through ethical means? Is what I describe an important/necessary function of art, or am I conflating art with science?
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Old 08-01-2008, 03:12 PM   #3 (permalink)
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Quote:
“Something’s being a work of art doesn’t excuse you from moral considerations,” says critic Arthur Danto. “The guy who dumps ink into one of Damien Hirst’s lambs and turns it black—that’s property damage even if it’s a performance. You can murder someone and call it a work of art, but you are still a murderer. Morality trumps esthetics. That’s my view.”
This says it all for me.

I'm not sure if this is judgmental, but I can't help but wonder if some of these over-the-top works are art, or just a way to make a statement. Orators can speak their mind and aren't considered artists, per se. Perhaps some of these supposed artists don't have the words to write a book (an art) or create something to express what they want to get across. So they try to make it fit under performance art.

The antics in the article? Political statements. Or cries for attention, depending on the artiste. That's how I see it.

Or at least that's how I think I see it. Change my mind if you disagree.
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Old 08-01-2008, 04:26 PM   #4 (permalink)
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Sometimes I feel these "artists" don't have any true talent, so they use their own agendas, call themselves "artists" and get the attention they otherwise would never get.
I don't know of any true artist that would commit a cruel act such as starving a dog to death to make his or her statement; in fact, every artist I know has a kind heart and prefers to express any view without malice or cruelty. We can be made to think without extremism.
Art is subjective. I see colorful graffiti and think "how fantastic!" while others think "those assholes with spraypaint should be horsewhipped".
Art should evoke, invoke and provoke. Emotions, thought, awareness come from experiencing art and I think sometimes these performance artists feel they're doing what they do to bring emotions and thought out. But when the consensus is that what is being done is not thought provoking but just plain wrong or gross, then it can be said it was not art. But, how many leave a gallery in deep discussion about a sunset?
Curators have a moral obligation? To an extent. But it is their job to get people into the galleries and museums and what better way than to have some extreme "artist" as their showpiece.
i can't say that "morality trumps esthetics" because my morals don't match another's. What I can say with certainty that anything that exploits the innocent, demeans any group or person or commits unwitting cruelty upon another living thing, then calls it "art", is merely a scam artist that is only after the gasps and negative attention of a fickle public. Art, it ain't.
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Old 08-02-2008, 03:22 AM   #5 (permalink)
 
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george herbert mead called objects in the world "collapsed acts"

i like that.

art is a form of doing.
there are any number of ways into doing. there are any number of relations to the production of "objects" (which is only one possible outcome), or narrower still, of objects that refer to other objects.

my preferences involve a commitment to craft, but craft is many things. thinking is a craft.

what a viewer or an audience makes of the results of a process is of no consequence for the process. it can't be, really, if you think about it.

in an environment of total design, people sometimes find it disturbing to be put in a position having to make meanings for themselves.

people confuse art and entertainment.
fuck entertainment.
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Old 08-02-2008, 04:18 AM   #6 (permalink)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by roachboy View Post

people confuse art and entertainment.
fuck entertainment.
While I certainly appreciate many forms of art, I find the attitude of, "fuck entertainment" too limiting (and perhaps a little pretentious). There can be many layers to crafted objects and pop culture is not always as vapid as it may appear to be at first blush.

But then, to me, meaning does not reside in the author or the work but in the interpretation of the work by the viewer (and yes, there is intention and "meaning" in a work but I think the final meaning lies in how it is "read" by the audience).

As to the original post, how far is too far... I have to think on that some more.
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Old 08-03-2008, 04:02 PM   #7 (permalink)
 
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i apparently had a bee in my bonnet when i wrote the "fuck entertainment" statement...can't remember what it would have been though.

here's more like my attitude about this---there's lots of folk who make stuff. there's probably as many understandings of what the idea behind that making is as there are people who do it. so there's plenty of work out there in the world to fit with the aesthetic of almost anyone.

i like work that pulls you away from where you are, makes you think about where you are differently---this can happen from any number of avenues, and can involve a range of types of work. so the evaluative criteria i have is not unitary. but it rests on a couple assumptions--one is that art (whatever that is, really) can be confrontational and the other is that it does not have to tell the audience what it is doing, but can demand some attention or work. and because there is so much work out there in the world, it is entirely fine that some of it be confrontational--ugly, discomfiting---because making stuff is reprocessing the world (fragments of the world, arranged) --and the world is not in all ways a lovely place.

that a piece is completed by a viewer or listener has any number of meanings. i happen to prefer open forms because they give an audience maxmimum leeway in creating (rather than receiving) an experience. i like pieces that are radically multiple, that generate as many pieces as there are people to experience them. other folk don't find that kind of openness to be freeing--they find it confusing or disorienting---and i have no problem with people being confused or disoriented.

when you make stuff, in my view, you take on an obligation to be clear---but that means any number of things---what you do is oriented by the clarity you bring to the process, which is what enables the process to have a shape and direction, which is what results in a piece or an object. you do not take on any particular obligation to an audience beyond that. when i do projects (not that this means much, but it's my frame of reference, so i necessarily talk through it) i'm much more interested in the ways in which an audience's experiences diverge from mine than i am in the ways they resemble mine---in the divergences are often commonalities and those commonalities seem to me to reflect back the direct communicative dimension of a performance---but it's the stuff that's other that's interesting.

of course, you have to catch folk so they'll come along for the ride with you. people say the soundstuff i am part of is pretty---i am ambivalent about pretty--i think pretty's what you get when you want something more than that but don't get there. i used to be more militant about this---now i'm fine with it because being militant--which was functional for a while---became a limit over time. everything changes. making stuff is about changing. it's not about staying in one place, to my mind: it's not about repetition, it's not about either doing or not doing what is expected--such criteria are irrelevant, because in the end, no matter what folk say, they do what they do for themselves because it makes them happy to do it and so there it is.

the idea that art is entertainment seems to me to place extreme limits on what you can do. that is *can be* entertainment is not problematic--that an experience *Can* entertain is obviously not an issue--but that it *is* entertainment is another type of claim. to be entertained is not to be put out. to be entertained is not to work---it comes with an expectation that one should not have to work, that the experience should be handed to you. it seems to me to be a reverse side of passivity, when the claim becomes that art *is* entertainment.

much of little tippler's op can be recoded around this question---it's another aspect or way of looking at the question how far is too far---which boundaries can one not violate without undercutting the status of a piece as "art".
this because underneath it is the question of what would prompt someone to go the route of total confrontation?

you could say that television viewers become numb to violence because the medium enables them to distance themselves from it. it's one thing to say as much. it is another to make a piece that confronts people with this---whether every piece that tries to do this succeeds or not is another matter--but the space for trying seems to me wiped away if you assume that art is entertainment.

maybe that was the bee.
maybe it was a different bee, and the above is the bee that's in by bonnet now.
maybe i should have fewer bonnets.
maybe i should no go near bees.
so many questions.
so many.
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Old 08-05-2008, 10:08 AM   #8 (permalink)
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It's a fascinating question, and the rich and various replies here show me that there is no real answer to this. I usually find that conversations on this subject inevitably lead nowhere, as the ground rules are not set first. The biggest one, of course, is the definition of art itself, which has shifted and changed with the times and is interpreted in different ways by just about everyone. Much of what was produced in the past and is we call art now, was not produced with 'artistic intentions' what ever they are, and particularly in early times were necessary elements of spiritual existence. When I lived in Canada, for instance, I was amazed by the sophisticated new masks and stuff being produced by First Nations people, not for their original purpose, but purely for profit achieved by selling them to the people who could be regarded as those who screwed their culture in the first place.

So, to be brave, my feeling is that art is a combination of observation, interpretation, manipulation and presentation. I feel that it is important to shock, or at least make people think. Art has always been a powerful voice for social change, and a barometer on society. There is nothing wrong with what I call 'wall accessories', but they don't excite me, and usually those that I have owned very soon blend into the furniture. However, for me the original post made me think about the only boundary that I can think of.

If you purposely allow a dog to starve to death and then present this as art, I don't think it is. It is abuse, plain and simple, and it is more about the artist than what he or she is producing. Compare this with what Hitler was doing in his time. He wanted to produce the perfect race and get rid of those that he regarded as imperfect. His work of art, if he had achieved it. But to me, if the production of 'art' involved taking sentient life, then it is criminal abuse, and nothing to do with art. Ironically, the reporting of such an act, could be art, as were Any Warhol's Electric Chairs.

I do admire the traditional oriental way of interfacing with art, as I understand it. It is not to make judgments and rant and rail about what offends or challenges, but to observe and see what, if any, impact it has on you. After all, our reactions often say more about ourselves than they do about the subject in question, and that can be very useful information.
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Old 08-24-2008, 11:01 AM   #9 (permalink)
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The direction of some postmodern art today scares me. I dunno how many of you reside around new york, but if you were able to see this years Whitney Biennial, you'll know what I mean. I think there are two main sectors of postmodern art today- that which is effective and is successful through its use of unconventional materials.. and that which was better off as raw material.

-skims the article on here-
I saw the WACK! show...one room was filled with 1980s porn magazines and layouts...

anyway back to my earlier thought. Artists today are continually exploring, and with exploration you can both the good and bad...the successes and the failures. In the work that is getting produced nowadays, you don't see a whole lot of "traditional" media, i.e. oil paintings, watercolors, etc. Well I take that back...it may be being produced, but it's not what's "in demand" in the world of art galleries and curators. New media is where it's at.

Back to the Whitney Biennial, a reoccurring theme within the show was artists using raw building materials and stuff you would normally see used within a construction site. Those kinda things are not typically seen in the context of "high art". A lot of artists used trash in their work as well. Some did it effectively, others...it just still looked like trash.

As technology develops and new processes become available to artists, there is a lot of experimentation in the work we see today. Artists are pushing away from what was typically seen as acceptable or traditional. As a result, there's a lot of "weird" stuff out there that we're not used to. Some of it is art. Some of it is just poor decisions. Who gets to decide?
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Old 08-24-2008, 11:59 AM   #10 (permalink)
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I think this thread can be referenced here, too:

http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/general...ow-barker.html

This is a topic that has always interested me. How far is too far?

Personally, I'm not comfortable making this kind of distinction based simply on what is repugnant to look at.

On a personal level, I would draw the line at animal cruelty - even though I understand the implications (what the artist is trying to say about our moral blinders when it comes to the industrialization of animal slaughter), it is the ego involved in believing that you are going to raise awareness by exposing their suffering in an unexpected and demoralizing way that gives me pause. On a practical level, I feel no better about it than I do one of our modern day human slaughterfests, such as Saw or Hostel, even though on an intellectual level, I understand that its purpose is not the same - it is not meant to entertain. Not to mention, most of the people going out to art museums these days already have a pretty good handle on the cruelty and suffering that goes on in our world...it's one of the reasons we seek them out.

As for the concepts of beauty and ugliness, I make no distinction on an artistic level. Surely there are objects and ideas that are aesthetically more pleasing to gaze upon than others, but I think to acquire an appreciation of that which is 'ugly' can be equally moving and satisfying. I think art can certainly challenge us in this way - to challenge us not to turn away. I think Western society in particular could benefit greatly from this kind of exposure.
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Old 08-28-2008, 06:53 AM   #11 (permalink)
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Art needs to entertain me. Otherwise, I see it as self-indulgent on the artist's behalf. In that vein, I'd say most art is self-indulgent. I need to appreciate the humility and tedium put into a piece. I also need to feel something when I experience it. Obviously, I'm not a universal conductor of all things artistic, so I concede that I may not be appreciating a lot of things that could be considered 'art' by others. Art is subjective.
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Old 08-28-2008, 07:05 AM   #12 (permalink)
 
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i dont think art is subjective: art is what a producer says is art.
the word is basically a condensed set of instructions--what it defines is the parameters of the situation.
whether you choose to enter into the game implied by these instructions is your choice---but you don't get to decide what is and is not "art" unless you are the one making the situation.

the question of whether you like something is separate---and for you as a consumer (presumably) "i don't like it" and "that's not art" can mean the same thing---but that only obtains for yourself, and says nothing about the situation beyond stipulating something of your relation to it and to other such situations.

btw: situation not objects. an object is a situation, in other words. a painting is not "art" simply because it exists. it is a situation.
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Old 08-28-2008, 07:24 AM   #13 (permalink)
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Originally Posted by roachboy View Post
i dont think art is subjective: art is what a producer says is art.
doesn't that alone make it subjective?
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Old 08-28-2008, 07:27 AM   #14 (permalink)
 
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no.

unless "subjective" is getting used here in some sense that means almost nothing.
so call something "art" is a social action, a public thing.
even if that public is made up of people who are related to you, it's still a public act.
so it's a type of situation---not something that you just make up (if that's what you mean by "subjective")...

for example---say you're sitting in--o i dunno---central park and you hear a sequence of sounds that you find to be beautiful. is that art?
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Old 08-28-2008, 07:50 AM   #15 (permalink)
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If I were to define random sounds I hear as art, I'd be grouping myself with the eccentric brain-fried hippies who frolic through the world, loving everything for its beauty. I'd be Juliette Lewis. But I'm not. I'm not enraptured by "art" - rather, I recognize art as the effort an artist puts forth to convey a message or situation. From there, its up to me to say if its a valid application of the term. Its subjective.
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Old 08-28-2008, 08:29 AM   #16 (permalink)
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I don't consider Supermatism (Black Square, Black Circle, White on White) art.

We were at the MET last year and the modern art section featured a number of canvas with little more than a bunch of squiggly lines and 2nd grade level shapes. I was almost offended by it. I don't consider that art either.
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Old 08-28-2008, 08:29 AM   #17 (permalink)
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It's probably no surprise to hear that I agree with roachboy on this subject. The designation of the definition 'art' is the purview solely of the 'artist.' Whether it gives anything to the spectator is irrelevant.

You are a writer, Hal, and I'm pretty sure you have an ego. Who gets to define what you do as 'writing'?

I will agree that the concept of art is subjective only to the extent that most anything we label with words is subjective.

And put me down as an eccentric, brain-fried hippie, because I believe the randomness of nature and happenstance can be art.
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Old 08-28-2008, 08:33 AM   #18 (permalink)
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MM, as a writer, I am nothing without an audience. How people react to my writing determines what I've done. Now, I might have my own reservations ("Hah, I can't believe they're taking that so seriously!") about what I write, but once the public has a hold of it, its no longer for me to decide. Did you know that "Tilted Forum Project" was only a temporary, whimsical title? I changed the name once a week for the hell of it. The site just happened to get popular when it was titled as such. It means nothing, everyone just made up what they thought it meant.
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Old 08-28-2008, 08:47 AM   #19 (permalink)
 
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consumers are passive machines that make selections between options that are posited for them. as a consumer, you don't define anything. you have consumer preferences. you like jiff, you like skippy--but the fact that you like jiff doesn't mean that skippy isn't peanut butter.
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Old 08-28-2008, 08:48 AM   #20 (permalink)
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It's probably no surprise to hear that I agree with roachboy on this subject. The designation of the definition 'art' is the purview solely of the 'artist.' Whether it gives anything to the spectator is irrelevant.

You are a writer, Hal, and I'm pretty sure you have an ego. Who gets to define what you do as 'writing'?

I will agree that the concept of art is subjective only to the extent that most anything we label with words is subjective.

And put me down as an eccentric, brain-fried hippie, because I believe the randomness of nature and happenstance can be art.
:writes it down: ok
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Old 08-28-2008, 08:55 AM   #21 (permalink)
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MM, as a writer, I am nothing without an audience. How people react to my writing determines what I've done. Now, I might have my own reservations ("Hah, I can't believe they're taking that so seriously!") about what I write, but once the public has a hold of it, its no longer for me to decide. Did you know that "Tilted Forum Project" was only a temporary, whimsical title? I changed the name once a week for the hell of it. The site just happened to get popular when it was titled as such. It means nothing, everyone just made up what they thought it meant.

If the designation of what you do as ‘writing’ rests with your audience, then what are you when some say that it is and some say that it isn’t?
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Old 08-28-2008, 09:43 AM   #22 (permalink)
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Art, according to dictionary.com is:

the quality, production, expression, or realm, according to aesthetic principles, of what is beautiful, appealing, or of more than ordinary significance.

As such, it is entirely subjective from the audience point of view. Like I said, I don't consider some works to be art despite what the "artist" thinks it is.
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Old 08-28-2008, 10:03 AM   #23 (permalink)
 
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so by that definition, anyone who produces stuff that you don't like isn't doing anything at all.
you should look up narcissism in the dictionary.
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Old 08-28-2008, 10:06 AM   #24 (permalink)
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Oh, no. They're doing something. It's just not art. Take your recordings of nature and bug sounds for example. You think of that as music/art, no? I don't. It's a recording of nature/stuff, but it's not art the way I see it.
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Old 08-28-2008, 10:14 AM   #25 (permalink)
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If the designation of what you do as ‘writing’ rests with your audience, then what are you when some say that it is and some say that it isn’t?
Imprecise. Of course, my audience is not necessarily defined as everyone who reads it. Instead, I aim for a particular batch of people and hope for their best interpretation.
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Old 08-28-2008, 10:17 AM   #26 (permalink)
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Art is art only in how it's contextualized. One cannot deny the status of an art object or an artistic act if one simply doesn't like it. They will merely overlook or otherwise disagree with how it's understood or interpreted. None of this makes it any more or less an artwork.

Marcel Duchamp is an interesting case when it comes to this. Suddenly a functional tool is an art object. What happened there? It's all context. (Or mostly, anyway.)
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Old 08-28-2008, 10:42 AM   #27 (permalink)
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so by that definition, anyone who produces stuff that you don't like isn't doing anything at all.
you should look up narcissism in the dictionary.
I think the fact that this is a discussion illustrates how art is subjective. Subjective meaning that it is up to the interpreter. Where does narcissism come into play? Art is simply a word that has a different meaning, depending on who says it. As someone who creates art, I declare that what I've created is nothing if its audience rejects it. This is not narcissism.

Perhaps the view that "anything I declare as art is thus art" is the more narcissistic of the two. Art being a very high concept and snooty thing at times.
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Old 08-28-2008, 10:46 AM   #28 (permalink)
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There's art that I like and art that I don't like. I try not to confuse the latter with things I don't consider art.
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Old 08-28-2008, 10:59 AM   #29 (permalink)
 
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hal---no, it really doesn't demonstrate that, at least not from the side of the art-consumer.
it does demonstrate that the category is arbitrary in that someone who makes things can enframe what they are doing as "art" as they like.
but everyone who makes stuff makes more than they show.
and it is the idea that it really doesn't matter---to my mind the basis for art production of any kind is an engagement with craft, and that simply takes work and time and patience. so that means that making stuff is entirely different from showing it, and that the process of making stuff has nothing to do with the processes of its reception.

if you give away your ability to continue working on craft to the approval of others, you'll never get any better at what you're doing.
you have to believe that it's legit in itself or you'll just stop.
anyone would.
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Old 08-28-2008, 11:22 AM   #30 (permalink)
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So what you're describing is a hobby. Art, to me, has always been about the audience.
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Old 08-28-2008, 11:33 AM   #31 (permalink)
 
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no, what i'm describing is how anyone who makes stuff that they understand as art keeps doing so once they pass their mid 20s.
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Old 08-28-2008, 11:35 AM   #32 (permalink)
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So what you're describing is a hobby. Art, to me, has always been about the audience.
I first thought art was what you made for an audience; next, I believed Roland Barthes' words "the birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of the Author." But either of these views is too narrow, or, at least, they focus on the wrong thing. Now I believe that an "artwork" is a theory of "Art." The status of an artwork can exist solely in the mind's eye of its creator. It doesn't need an audience to validate its existence, nor does it need to be detached from its creator.
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Old 08-28-2008, 11:39 AM   #33 (permalink)
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Thus bringing me back to my point that art is subjective. So, it doesn't matter how I define it or how you define it. Its a flexible concept. It changes with age. It changes with your experience. It changes with your education. It changes with your relationships to artists. It cannot be defined.

And here we are, arguing over how to define it.

Is this discussion art? The art created by art.
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Old 08-28-2008, 12:03 PM   #34 (permalink)
 
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actually, there is no argument.

the underlying point i am making really is that if you want to keep going you have to give yourself the space to fail, to make useless things, to head down wrong paths--because you learn things from the doing. you cannot give away the legitimacy of what you are up to : you cannot hand the ability to define what you're doing to folk who interact with the outputs--because making stuff is not about the outputs. the outputs are condensed expression of process. that's it, all there is to it.
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Old 08-28-2008, 12:18 PM   #35 (permalink)
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actually, there is no argument.

the underlying point i am making really is that if you want to keep going you have to give yourself the space to fail, to make useless things, to head down wrong paths--because you learn things from the doing. you cannot give away the legitimacy of what you are up to : you cannot hand the ability to define what you're doing to folk who interact with the outputs--because making stuff is not about the outputs. the outputs are condensed expression of process. that's it, all there is to it.

but that's what inventors and programmers do. are they artists? is what they create art?

"I have not failed 1,000 times. I have successfully discovered 1,000 ways to NOT make a light bulb." - Thomas Edison

so is a light bulb art?
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Old 08-28-2008, 12:19 PM   #36 (permalink)
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The problem with defining something is that before you've defined it, people have already formed their ideas about it. So, when you define it, you do it on a scope that is incompatible with the previously formed ideas. It is like saying Baseball is a game where you try to hit the ball as its pitched to you. Then I come along and say, "No, it is a game where you try to score more runs than the other team." Its all baseball, but the way we appreciate it is different.
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Old 08-28-2008, 01:29 PM   #37 (permalink)
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but that's what inventors and programmers do. are they artists? is what they create art?

"I have not failed 1,000 times. I have successfully discovered 1,000 ways to NOT make a light bulb." - Thomas Edison

so is a light bulb art?
The issue is not whether everything created is art but rather whether the intent of the creator is to make art.

I can't even get a handle on what Hal and Logan are trying to say. They want to say that art isn't art unless someone other than the creator calls it such? I think the flaws in that thinking are apparent. What about the many, many people who spent lifetimes painting and drawing without ever showing their work to anyone? Are they not artists? If the concept of art is totally subjective then there is no such a thing as art. For every piece of art out there you will find admirers and detractors. Even the old masters have their naysayers - there are those who believe that only expressionism is 'true art.'

I don't mean to disrespect, but I think if you admittedly don't really care about art, then you're really not in a position to say what it is and what it isn't. Even moreso, why should you care? Seems more like nose-tweaking than a real opinion.
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Old 08-28-2008, 01:45 PM   #38 (permalink)
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mm, by your logic, you're trying to answer the age old question of "if a tree falls in the woods..." How would we know they're artists unless we see their work?

Something only exists if it has a witness.

And who said anything about not caring?
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Old 08-28-2008, 01:57 PM   #39 (permalink)
 
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a light bulb is a lovely example of industrial design. the only real difference between industrial design and "art" is that there's no original, just lots of objects which enact the lovely design. the ready-mades were already in some way about this arbitrary distinction, and about the outmodedness of the original, the singular as a normative feature of "art"---so "art" is what the person making an object says is art, what turns up presented as art. or art is about itself (the white square is about painting)...or art is about the situation that prompts you to see something and call it art. no object is self-contained--what defines something as itself is the result of you performing particular conventions, subscribing to particular ways of grouping phenomena, none of which are "necessary" but each of which is functional for you; none of which needs be transparent, but each of which generally is transparent. so you see through the rules rather than think about them, as a famous dead guy once pointed out about chess and language and other games. you'd think that this would be obvious by 2008, given that duchamp put up the readymades almost a century ago and histories of 20th century art started turning up that made this otherwise isolated gesture in a paris gallery into some fold in the zeitgeist about 50 years ago and so and so. but nothing is singular, least of all the present, and slightly less the sense of the past that shapes that particular fiction and how it is performed.

and none of what i'm saying is exclusive either: there are still countless folk who make representational paintings and derive great pleasure from that and sometimes get to sell them and sometimes even making a living from it and that is a fine thing it is hard to make a living doing this sort of work at all and so the world is better because they are out there doing what pleases them and if other people like it so much the better.

but not everyone has to work in the same way and it is simply not up to consumers of cultural commodities to dictate what is and is not anything. this because, put bluntly, making stuff is not about you. lots of folk who are now understood as great and important artist types could not make a living doing it--joseph cornell had a rought time of it; kafka had a rough time of it; joyce had a rough time of it---charles ives was an insurance man and made his music when he wasn't working. on and on. the old-school conception of art is a residuum of an aristocratic order and maybe that's what makes it so difficult for many artist-types to get over and what makes it so likely that those who do end up becoming copies of themselves and why so many folk just stop and maybe that's why so many consumers of such commodities or otherwise fundamentally find something irritating about the fact that there are such people who make stuff and who do not fundamentally care what they think. maybe the problem is that most folk imagine these artist-types in a dysfunctional way.

i wouldn't characterize myself as anything special in this regard, but i know alot of people who make things and i continue in my own peculiar way myself and what we all have in common is that making stuff is the part of the world that's in color and everything else is in black and white and this not in a good way. people do this stuff because they love doing it, and in the end they do it for themselves because they love doing it, and not because they love being adored by other people though that is nice when it happens.
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Old 08-28-2008, 02:09 PM   #40 (permalink)
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mm, by your logic, you're trying to answer the age old question of "if a tree falls in the woods..." How would we know they're artists unless we see their work?
I'll jump in for a second on this. I write a lot of music. As a matter of fact, when I'm on TFP after 2:00 on most days, I'm also composing or tweaking or some such thing. I've got gigabytes of music on my external hard drive and stacks of music paper on my Roland. Most of it will never be heard by anyone but me. Does that make it any less art? I appreciate it, after all.
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