What is art?

[davidm]

While I don’t think I agree with Nick about practically anything, I respect him for putting time, thought and effort into his posts. For those of you who want to post 140 characters or less of content-free snark, why not just move on to a more sensible medium for you, like Tw***er. (Can’t bring myself to spell out that word).

[Nick_A]

So for those like davidm, dubious, and Greta, art is synonymous with expression. There is no difference. Whatever a person calls art is art by definition.

Can you imagine a person writing an instruction book on how to play politically correct chess. It has the premise that people don't feel good when they lose so just put your pieces anywhere it doesn't matter. it is all chess. Losing the black bishop before a white bishop is sexist so they must be removed from the board simultaneously. It is sexist to say the king is the most important piece so the game only ends when the queen is lost in the interest of fairness. This is modern chess which will probably claimed as forward thinking by progressives.

It is the same with objective art. It is the transmission of a quality of emotions associated with objective values. If it is absent, then art is subjective and often considered expression with technique. The purpose of art is lost just as the meaning of the game and the beauty of chess will be lost once the rules are sacrificed for political correctness.

[Nick_A]

I could have predicted that Cezanne would leave you cold.

There are no “vibrations” and there is no “objective art.”

You still have given no reason to classify the sphinx, Notre Dame and The Last Supper as “objective art” outside of mere assertion. I am also confident that when you draw your exclusionary circle and claim that the stuff inside the circle is “objective art” and the stuff outside the circle is “subjective art” or not art at all, that the stuff inside the circle is all stuff that you like and the stuff outside of it is all stuff that you dislike. IOW, entirely subjective!

I’m different. I don’t like Renoir’s work. His colors are too sickly sweet for my taste and his bourgeoise subject matter bores me. But I know perfectly well that he is a very fine artist and I know why he is. For me it is possible to dislike art that I know is great. This kind of thinking must be outside your artistic authoritarianism.

What post-Revolutionary Russian art are you talking about? There are two distinct kinds, the Russian avant-garde movement exemplified by such movements as supermatism and constructivism, which was then quashed and replaced by hideous Socialist realism. The avant-garde that was snuffed out produced some brilliant works. Socialist realism was and remains grotesque (it is still practiced in North Korea). Such art is little more than glorified propaganda posters, though of course it is still art.

Of course I understand the story being depicted in your Ninth Wave. The story and the symbolism are just obvious — one of the reasons I don’t care for the work. Such emotional manipulation is facile. Also, because of my education in modernism in the visual arts, I am disinclined to favor visual art that tells any stories at all. Understanding this is one of the keys to appreciating Cézanne and those who came after him, so many of whom he inspired. I think it is fair to say that Cézanne, Van Gogh and Gauguin were the three founding fathers of 20th century art. I also think it’s fair to say that you don’t like 20th century modernist art. Am I right?

The Cézanne painting I linked to is one in a series of increasingly nonrepresentational paintings that Cézanne made of the mountain and the landscape and village at the foot of it. For me, these mountain paintings are like a transitional fossil between different artistic species: the species represented by your Ninth Wave, and the species of the modernist art to come after Cézanne. There is, for example, a direct lineal line from Cézanne’s mountains to Braque and Picasso’s Cubism.

Cézanne’s achievements in the mountain painting(s):

He abandons storytelling. Unlike in your Ninth Wave, there is no story here, facile or otherwise. It is just the art speaking for itself and brilliantly so. The mountain and the village are not actually the subjects of the painting.The subject is the paint itself, arranged in a pattern on a two-dimensional surface. Cézanne abandons illusion — the idea that art consists, or should consist, of fooling people into thinking that they are looking at reality when they are just looking at paint. This insight, btw, goes back to Socrates, who wondered about the usefulness or efficacy of representational art.

He abandons local realism. There is no attempt to slavishly copy reality here; he interprets the reality before him and transfigures it in the service of his free, creative visual genius.

He abandons local color. His colors are a symphonic orchestration of his own free visual imagination; they have contact with the real color “out there” to be sure, but mainly the colors are invented. He thus brings visual art closer to its nearest relative, which is music.

He flattens the picture plane. Foreground, middle ground and background are essentially as one, the mountain barely distinguishable from the sky! When one squints one’s eyes down while looking at the painting we see at a glance the birth of nonrepresentational art, the rise of the Modern. It’s a beautiful thing to behold.

What Cézanne, Van Gogh, Gauguin and others of that era did was to liberate art from the shackles of brute realism, of slavish representationalism. They free it like a bird from a cage, so that art can soar. Your Ninth Wave painter brilliantly depicts water pouring off surfaces — it’s great technique — but it’s also fundamentally enslaving to bother depicting that in the first place. One marvels at and yet is bored by the result — all this artistic talent, to depict water realistically? But he was an artist of his time, and we live in much different times.

You are right to assume that I get nothing from modern art. To me it is just expression. Since people pay for art and wouldn't pay for expression they call expression art.

In all fairness to Aivazovsky he was a luminous painter and painted light in water like no one else could. Though his water was realistic it had an emotional element in it and each of great works has an emotional journey within it. The interaction of the element forces comprising water was a depicition of our emotional states. The Ninth Wave in the painting is also a depiction of the power of negative emotions that prevent conscious human evolution and keeps things turning in circles and cycles

[davidm]

What Cézanne, Van Gogh, Gauguin and others of that era did was to liberate art from the shackles of brute realism, of slavish representationalism. They free it like a bird from a cage, so that art can soar.

It's just paint on canvas and, despite the level of technical skill involved in putting it there, it's value is purely a matter of subjective opinion. "Art can soar", good God!

You know, when you wrote this, I'm curious: Did you actually bother to stop for a moment and consider the totality of my post? Do you even know who Cézanne is? Do you have any familiarity with art and its history? Or were you just eager to cherrypick a metaphor (actually a simile) in order to expound some lazy-minded snark?

My question is purely rhetorical, so you need not answer.

[davidm]

So for those like davidm, dubious, and Greta, art is synonymous with expression. There is no difference. Whatever a person calls art is art by definition.

Can you imagine a person writing an instruction book on how to play politically correct chess. It has the premise that people don't feel good when they lose so just put your pieces anywhere it doesn't matter. it is all chess. Losing the black bishop before a white bishop is sexist so they must be removed from the board simultaneously. It is sexist to say the king is the most important piece so the game only ends when the queen is lost in the interest of fairness. This is modern chess which will probably claimed as forward thinking by progressives.

It is the same with objective art. It is the transmission of a quality of emotions associated with objective values. If it is absent, then art is subjective and often considered expression with technique. The purpose of art is lost just as the meaning of the game and the beauty of chess will be lost once the rules are sacrificed for political correctness.

Gosh, Nick, this is just breathtakingly stupid. Chess is a game with rules built in, in advance. Can you identify the analogous rule book for art?

Of course you can't, Nick. I kind of respected some of your posts. But this is just pathetic. It's becoming increasingly clear to me that you are just some sort of right-wing Republican dumb ass.

[Dubious]

All art is metaphor which each person translates differently....and that's all there is to art. Aside from that it has no value whatsoever.

Well, that' s nice to know. Thanks for an extensive, thoughtful analysis.

I haven't noticed any so I'm just following the trend! Sorry if I can't be as profound about art as you aficionados seem to be except to say there's nothing inherently right or wrong one can say about the subject. Any kind of thoughtful analysis is really all one's own and only true for oneself. I already gave my view on what I generally consider art to be without endorsing any particular view of what it should or must be.

[Nick_A]

So for those like davidm, dubious, and Greta, art is synonymous with expression. There is no difference. Whatever a person calls art is art by definition.

Can you imagine a person writing an instruction book on how to play politically correct chess. It has the premise that people don't feel good when they lose so just put your pieces anywhere it doesn't matter. it is all chess. Losing the black bishop before a white bishop is sexist so they must be removed from the board simultaneously. It is sexist to say the king is the most important piece so the game only ends when the queen is lost in the interest of fairness. This is modern chess which will probably claimed as forward thinking by progressives.

It is the same with objective art. It is the transmission of a quality of emotions associated with objective values. If it is absent, then art is subjective and often considered expression with technique. The purpose of art is lost just as the meaning of the game and the beauty of chess will be lost once the rules are sacrificed for political correctness.

Gosh, Nick, this is just breathtakingly stupid. Chess is a game with rules built in, in advance. Can you identify the analogous rule book for art?

Of course you can't, Nick. I kind of respected some of your posts. But this is just pathetic. It's becoming increasingly clear to me that you are just some sort of right-wing Republican dumb ass.

You still don't get it. A work of art is capable of serving as the means for the communication of objective art. Objective art is like a phone call. It occurs. The process of objective art begins with the artist who must have experienced a quality of emotion associated with an objective value. The artist must be aware of the techniques by which the transmission of this emotion becomes possible through the means of his chosen work of art. A sensitive viewer will experience the same emotion the artist put into their work of art. When this happens the communication called objective art occurs. People less sensitive will not experience this direct communication. Subjective art will take the place of objective art since it doesn't require the knowledge or emotional experience necessary for objective art. The expression of egoisitic imagination gradually becomes known as art. The knowledge and skill necessary to produce works of art is gradully sacrificed for the egoistic benefits of random expression.

If a person doesn't know chess they see no reason to retain it for what it is. They may know the rules but consider it archaic. So why not change them and produce chess which everyone wins so everyone is happy? If one hasn't experienced the value of chess, it is a logical thing to do. For those not having experienced objective art it is easy to deny it in favor of random expression where its value is only determined by current social norms. It may be politically correct but lacking any objective value

[Dubious]

So for those like davidm, dubious, and Greta, art is synonymous with expression. There is no difference. Whatever a person calls art is art by definition.

Speaking for myself, that's not quite true. I define art differently from the rest of you as containing no value at all. Everything exists within the realm of rank. All things, as in nature, exist as greater or lessor entities. Calling someone an "artist" because he creates an artificial something does not in any way confer merit even though it may be called art amounting to nothing more than vulgar graffiti. We've called the output of chimps and elephants with a paint brush also art as well as the canned poop of an artist! So the word "ART" means zilch unless there exist a spectrum of values based on how a civilization defines it beginning with garbage to being utterly unique, never to be repeated. Art refers to that which is created by man...or animals without further connotations of value or skill except whatever merits we individually apply, those being only our opinions or subjectivities to what the consensus of that civilization deems worthy in any age.

[Belinda]

Art means not only pictures but also music, theatre, weddings, perfumery, poetry, cookery, costume, novels, architecture, Christmas trees , speech making, sculpture, shop window dressing, dancing, face painting, flirting, funerals, and cosmetics.

The idioms which I listed can be combined to unusual effect face painting and perfumery at funerals, or speech making combined with shop window dressing, or flirting combined with poetry.

[Harbal]

The process of objective art begins with the artist who must have experienced a quality of emotion associated with an objective value. The artist must be aware of the techniques by which the transmission of this emotion becomes possible through the means of his chosen work of art. A sensitive viewer will experience the same emotion the artist put into their work of art. When this happens the communication called objective art occurs.

A process whereby both artist and spectator become transducers of emotion. The artist fashions his feelings into little dashes of paint recorded on canvas, in much the same way a microphone converts sound into electrical impulses and sends them off to be stored on magnetic tape. The viewer, providing he has the correct wiring, transforms the little paint marks back into emotion, somewhat analogous to the way a loud speaker transforms electrical impulses into sound waves. To those who don't mind their head being stuffed full of someone else's emotions this is a wonderous thing.

[Dubious]

Art means not only pictures but also music, theatre, weddings, perfumery, poetry, cookery, costume, novels, architecture, Christmas trees , speech making, sculpture, shop window dressing, dancing, face painting, flirting, funerals, and cosmetics.

The idioms which I listed can be combined to unusual effect face painting and perfumery at funerals, or speech making combined with shop window dressing, or flirting combined with poetry.

Very true! Most of what you mention was already practiced in ancient times as art; all of these artifacts identify much of what defines any civilization. In that sense art can be objectified as that which individuates one civilization from another. The domain of art is far greater than anyone's personal reaction to any one of its inventions.

[davidm]

So for those like davidm, dubious, and Greta, art is synonymous with expression. There is no difference. Whatever a person calls art is art by definition.

Can you imagine a person writing an instruction book on how to play politically correct chess. It has the premise that people don't feel good when they lose so just put your pieces anywhere it doesn't matter. it is all chess. Losing the black bishop before a white bishop is sexist so they must be removed from the board simultaneously. It is sexist to say the king is the most important piece so the game only ends when the queen is lost in the interest of fairness. This is modern chess which will probably claimed as forward thinking by progressives.

It is the same with objective art. It is the transmission of a quality of emotions associated with objective values. If it is absent, then art is subjective and often considered expression with technique. The purpose of art is lost just as the meaning of the game and the beauty of chess will be lost once the rules are sacrificed for political correctness.

Gosh, Nick, this is just breathtakingly stupid. Chess is a game with rules built in, in advance. Can you identify the analogous rule book for art?

Of course you can't, Nick. I kind of respected some of your posts. But this is just pathetic. It's becoming increasingly clear to me that you are just some sort of right-wing Republican dumb ass.

You still don't get it. A work of art is capable of serving as the means for the communication of objective art. Objective art is like a phone call. It occurs. The process of objective art begins with the artist who must have experienced a quality of emotion associated with an objective value. The artist must be aware of the techniques by which the transmission of this emotion becomes possible through the means of his chosen work of art. A sensitive viewer will experience the same emotion the artist put into their work of art. When this happens the communication called objective art occurs. People less sensitive will not experience this direct communication. Subjective art will take the place of objective art since it doesn't require the knowledge or emotional experience necessary for objective art. The expression of egoisitic imagination gradually becomes known as art. The knowledge and skill necessary to produce works of art is gradully sacrificed for the egoistic benefits of random expression.

If a person doesn't know chess they see no reason to retain it for what it is. They may know the rules but consider it archaic. So why not change them and produce chess which everyone wins so everyone is happy? If one hasn't experienced the value of chess, it is a logical thing to do. For those not having experienced objective art it is easy to deny it in favor of random expression where its value is only determined by current social norms. It may be politically correct but lacking any objective value

Nick, this is such utter meaningless twaddle that I can't even bring myself to respond to it. To quote my favorite villain Anton Chigurh from another context, "You don't know what you're talking about, do you?"

Nick, what's the most you ever lost on a coin toss?

[davidm]

“Call it.”

“Well … I don’t know what I’m calling it for.”

“This coin has been traveling for 22 years, Nick. And now it’s here. And you’ve got to call it. I can’t call it for you. It wouldn’t be fair.”

“Well … what do I stand to gain?”

“Everything. You stand to gain everything, Nick.”

“All right then … heads.”

*flips coin*

“Well done, Nick!”

*Nick tries to put coin in pocket.*

“Don’t put it in your pocket sir. Don’t put it in your pocket.”

“Well, where do you want me to put?”

“Don’t put it in your pocket. It’s your lucky coin. If you put it with the other coins, it’ll just become another coin … which it is.”

[Dubious]

The artist must be aware of the techniques by which the transmission of this emotion becomes possible through the means of his chosen work of art. A sensitive viewer will experience the same emotion the artist put into their work of art. When this happens the communication called objective art occurs. People less sensitive will not experience this direct communication. Subjective art will take the place of objective art since it doesn't require the knowledge or emotional experience necessary for objective art.

Well expressed! What you appear to denote as objective art is the gestalt manufacture of that which renders the emotional response for those whose empathy conforms to what is experienced. When encountered the first time it can be quite overwhelming and inject a new complex layer in one's Weltanschauung.

Art, especially great art, is the catalyst which penetrates those layers of the psyche to make the experience possible. In that repect, art has much in common with dreams which always seem to refer to another person inside oneself.

It is art as an object, as a potential prophecy, which causes one to know oneself better meaning subjectively that in the collective amounts to culturally.

[thedoc]

Nick, this is such utter meaningless twaddle that I can't even bring myself to respond to it. To quote my favorite villain Anton Chigurh from another context, "You don't know what you're talking about, do you?"

Nick, what's the most you ever lost on a coin toss?

Political correctness is total Bull Shit, and doesn't deserve the attention it gets. Chess is a game with definite rules and to abandon the set rules of chess is nonsense, chess is not politically correct and never should be, play the game as it is or go find another game where you won't loose. About 45 years ago I encountered idiots who insisted that no child should ever experience failure and wanted to eliminate the failing grade from the school system, how is a student expected to learn about real life if they don't occasionally fail. These "experts" had obviously never been in a class room and stood in front of a class of students who didn't want to be there. Failure was the only way to wake them up but it didn't always work, students often come to school with the attitude of their parents, so they just drifted along till they were out of school.