Art and the World

I hate it when I have to bite my tongue at comments like that. Someone who says that clearly doesn't see how much of the world is made up of art.

I suppose the world COULD function without art, but I don't think it'd function very well. The element of beauty would completely vanish, and what is the world without a dash of beauty?

There are so many forms of art that are coming into my mind right now. Not just drawing/painting/other mediums for canvas or paper, but it extends greatly. Modeling, music, photography, fashion- it goes on and on. Honestly, how great would this world be without it?

4)Most oil painters get work triple coating decks and garage floors.[/quote]

I prefer latex base myself. Oil takes too long to dry and absolutely no one reads the "wet paint" signs even if you stick them at eye level. Some illustrators use oil, pen and ink, watercolor etc.

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=172094

"I shall create, if not a note a hole..."
We need things to survive beyond the obvious... human contact for one. I still posit that the need for art is an inseparable part of our beings.

TsukiRyoko said:

I suppose the world COULD function without art, but I don't think it'd function very well. The element of beauty would completely vanish, and what is the world without a dash of beauty?

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Beauty! Ah-ha! See? The world needs beauty. Man needs beauty. But this idea of "art," well, that's an artificial construct and man doesn't need that. Not the elitist's idea of what is art.

But beauty, beauty can be anything in the eye of the beholder. Someone who hikes is surrounded by natures beauty. Someone who goes to the beach is surrounded by beauty. Someone's backyard to them can be beauty. Sitting in a recliner watching a quarterback throw a perfect game-winning touchdown pass is beauty.

Art as defined on college campuses or art museums isn't necessary. I know dozens, maybe even hundreds of people who've never been to an art museum and they survive just fine. I know hundreds of people who never watch PBS. I know people who never read. People who's idea of a movie is some chop socky flick.

Yet they all have their own idea of what beauty is, be it fishing, or hunting, or going to a monster truck rally.

That's what I mean. You can call anything you like "art" but it doesn't make it so. The $5 doorknob I bought at Home Depot isn't art, it's functional. The chair I'm sitting in isn't art, it was bought because it feels good. Esthetics were the last consideration as long as it didn't make my butt fall asleep.

RE: Art and the common man

Um, I think I fall into that category, and one of the best poets in this area is an exterminator by day. A lot of artists are common men, and a lot of common men (as opposed to who?) relish different mediums. The need for it goes back to the time of cave paintings.

Common man as opposed to elitists. Common man who prefers meatloaf to caviar, beer to champagne, wrestling to ballet, Willie Nelson to the Three Tenors, a deer's head to a Monet.

and to be honest, I consider an exterminator who does poetry kind of uncommon.

whistlelock said:

So art can only exist for it's own sake? It must be put on a pedistal to be viewed?


What about the doorknob on your door? The very one you use to open the door.

Why isn't that art?

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Dearest whistle, are you talking to me? If so, I didn't say it must be put on a pedistal to be viewed, I said it's meant to be experienced. I suppose one can experience a doorknob and if the guy creating said doorknob, in all honesty, MEANT for it to be art, then I say it's art. If the guy designing it chose to make it the way he did as one chooses paint colors or strictly to fulfill a practical need and to match Acme's door style, I'd say it isn't.

I will, however, ammend my art is not practical statement to say art is usually not practical.

whistlelock said:

Your screenplays and novels aren't art?

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Bite your tongue. I didn't say that, either. You better ****ing believe my screenplays are art.

If you weren't talking to me, please disregard. It's all just my opinion, anyway.

Either way, have a wonderful day.

Bird of Prey said:

I'm chewing on the rest of your post, like a lion. . . . on a weak herd member. Hmmm. That sounds sadistic. I'll leave it.

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*bleat*

(and thank you)

I don't consider my novels "art." Just as I said at the beginning of this thread, that I don't consider myself at artist.

i am art.

everyone is.

that's my contribution to this thread.

good luck every1!

Yes, you are, Bravo. Yes, you are.


Shadow, I'm not telling you you must consider yourself an artist or your novels art. The definition I posted actually totally puts that decision in your hands. As long as you don't tell me I can't call my screenplays art, we're good.

Nope. I would never presume to tell you what to call your creations.

I'm just in a sassy mood today.

Shadow_Ferret said:

1Common man as opposed to elitists. Common man who prefers meatloaf to caviar, beer to champagne, wrestling to ballet, Willie Nelson to the Three Tenors, a deer's head to a Monet.

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Shadow_Ferret said:

and to be honest, I consider an exterminator who does poetry kind of 2uncommon.

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1. Yep, then that's me, except the part about Monet though I do have a nice 10 pointer in my attic that my husband shot. I prefer beef and chicken myself and don't hunt.
2. That's why I love Jersey, it's full of surprises

Shadow_Ferret said:

Common man as opposed to elitists. Common man who prefers meatloaf to caviar, beer to champagne, wrestling to ballet, Willie Nelson to the Three Tenors, a deer's head to a Monet.

and to be honest, I consider an exterminator who does poetry kind of uncommon.

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Hmmm well my husband is an exterminator who is also a very good guitarist/musician. (I won't go into his snobbish food preferences) Writing lyrics is very similar to writing poetry. Music has been put on the back burner because we have a whole mess of kids to take care of and the music business isn't something reliable. But without his guitar or his other instruments he wouldn't be happy. Music is art and it is often made by the working man. I have to think that making a generalization like that is not a good idea. It doesn't perhaps fit a stereotype that you have in your head but that doesn't mean a darn thing. People aren't stereotypes. Most people are a mixture of what you are defining as common man and elitist. By your list you're defining me as an elitist (except that I find the prospect of eating fish eggs repulsive. I don't care how they taste - but meat loaf is gross too.) and I'm as common as they come.

I believe that beauty, though it can live alone, is expressed best through art. Without art, beauty can live, but without beauty, art will die. Still, why should the two be seperated when they do best with the other?

I don't think beauty can be fully appreciated WITHOUT art. Why should it be? As you said, someone who hikes is surrounded by nature's beauty, but someone who appreciates art sees just how beautiful it really is. If we took art (not just reifned pieces of art, it can be as simple as being seen through an artist's eye) out of the equation, beauty would be doing all that hard work for nothing.

That's what I mean. You can call anything you like "art" but it doesn't make it so. The $5 doorknob I bought at Home Depot isn't art, it's functional. The chair I'm sitting in isn't art, it was bought because it feels good. Esthetics were the last consideration as long as it didn't make my butt fall asleep.

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The good thing about art is that you can turn those seemingly "artless" things into a masterpiece, it all depends on how you see it.

I agree with you completely.

Anyone who disagrees is horribly, horribly wrong.

Shadow_Ferret said:

Art as defined on college campuses

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I think you would be greatly shocked as to what the colleges call art.

My wife, who is pursuing her degree in Fine Art, just got back a salt and pepper shaker she made for a show. Two small pieces, the pepper shaker made from copper and the salt shaker from silver, that now sit on our table and perform the function for which they were designed. dispensing spices.

Her pieces garnered the most comments.

She won an award. Think of a "best in show" for a metals piece.

In a art show. For a salt and pepper shaker.

So, because it was designed for a practical everyday use it's not art?

They are pleasing to the eye. they have a practical use.

She designed them because she was sick of the wooden ones we bought at Target 6 years ago. While she was making them at school, her friend told her about the show.

They were shakers first, entered into a show second.

shadow ferret said:

The $5 doorknob I bought at Home Depot isn't art, it's functional.

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but why that doorknob against all the other doorknobs for the same price? Was it the color, was it the shape? Did that shape and color happen by accident?

They weren't sculpted? They weren't meant to be pleasing to the eye?
How is that not art? Why does practicality and function negate artistic value?

Art is far more than what gets put in a muesem; more than what gets hung on a wall. That is the smallest part of art. And it's usually art for artists.

Art is real. Art is practical. Art is functional.

Art is your curtains. Your couch. The stein you drink beer from. The mug you drink from. And if art wasn't all of these things, then all our couches would look the same. We would all use the same doorknobs. Sit in the same chairs.

Elitests, regardless of whatever portion of life they're infecting, suck. They prop themselves up by 'claiming' to know what is real and isn't. When all they really know how to do is put people down.

oneovu said:

I suppose one can experience a doorknob and if the guy creating said doorknob, in all honesty, MEANT for it to be art, then I say it's art. If the guy designing it chose to make it the way he did as one chooses paint colors or strictly to fulfill a practical need and to match Acme's door style, I'd say it isn't.

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And I say it is.

I say that the act of making a doorknob different from any other doorknob is an act of art. by saying, 'you know, I think the door would look better with a brass doorknob that has a swirly bit would make it look better' you are making an artistic choice.

And when I pick the $5 doorknob that is brushed aluminum over the $5 doorknob that is polished brass, I just engaged in an artistic choice.

Everyday that I use it, I will experience a door that I like. That I think looks good. And is functional. And is practical.

We are surrounded by art. We are emersed in it. We engage in it every day. Every time that someone has said, 'you know it'll look better if we do THIS to it.' they have engaged in art.

Being useful does not negate artistic merit.

I tend to agree with Whistle here. While it does stray close to the even more dreaded Art vs. Craft debate, the fact is that some degree of artistic sensiblity informs everything around us. In that context, Art is the appreciation of the visual (or audible or tactile) impact of a human artifact. That's what leads doorknobs to be the variety of forms they are - the pratical aspect can be filled in so many different ways that all that differentiates one from another is the artistic sensiblity of the person who designed it.

I think there are two ways to look at Art - first, through its impact on its creator; and second, through its impact on the audience. Writers like Kafka are artists concerned with the first definition of art above - they create for personal expression and gain satisfaction from the mere act of doing it. Their work is for themselves alone. I often say that everyone should be a painter, but not everyone should get a solo show. I believe that everyone can benefit from Art of the first sort. The act of creation is spiritually uplifting and enlightening, if one can simply be pleased with the act and not seek outside validation.

The second sort is where we begin to encounter more challenges to the experience. It becomes defined by forces outside the artist. Success becomes defined by how well the intent of the artist and the perceptions of the audience align. If the audience "gets it," then it's a successful artwork. If not, then someone is at fault.

I've been grappling with this question for 30 years and this kind of non-answer is still the only truthful one I've ever found to the question of "what is art". It's best to make sure you're defining the question in the same arena before you argue over whether something is or isn't art.

Totally forgot to answer the original question -

As far as whether the world can function without art, I don't believe it can, though I can't tell you how it would be different. I think Art is necessary aspect of human evolution akin to laughter. It serves no explicit survival value in the same way that strength or stealth do, but it exists. I think it's a necessary step in learning how to deal with our overly evolved cerebral cortexes.

But there's no way to know what the world would be like without it. It's here and regardless what kind of value judgements we put on it, it will continue.

It must.

pconsidine said:

I tend to agree with Whistle here.

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And yet I remain rep pointless for the whole thread.

KTC said:

When are you people going to realize that when you disagree with me, you are wrong? Boy. I'm getting tired of this.

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KTC said:

Art is necessary. Art is life. Art is the window to self. Art is the reason we don't jump off of mountains and plunge to the rocky shores. Art is the antidote to suicide.

I have spoken. (Do not DARE disagree with me.)

And, Haskins, yes...Art Garfunkel is essential too. I can't help it. It's that voice. (And that hair!)

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Can't agree more. An artist is student of the human experience. "Common Man" poets, by the way: add on Bukowski please, Charles that is. And I like ole Art.

Music.

Fudge, I put up something about music and the "common people" and it disappeared if it even made it up at all. Anyway, my point was that especially with music it's hard to draw a line between functional craft and "pure art". I cited the use of the dhol (drum) and I think the davul (drum), too, in war to prepare troops for battle and frighten the enemy and in music used while harvesting crops. Also had something about shepherds' use of the kaval (wind instrument) and the zurna (wind instrument) being used for "grape gathering, grain grinding, cloth making," along with something about sailors' use of songs for their work. I imagine there was similar music in Africa, East Asia, etc. I just don't have any examples.

Art is the reason we don't jump off of mountains and plunge to the rocky shores.

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Yeah, pretty much.

I just wish Art would concentrate more on the exporting and less on the importing.

whistlelock said:

And yet I remain rep pointless for the whole thread.

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I'm not.

(it was from whistle, 'cuz he's swell)

Def 1.

art is when a person, in earnest, creates somthing - perhaps with some skill, likely to be experienced by others - with the expressed intent for it to be art. This art may be bad, good, fine, revered, spit on, profitable, not profitable, nonprofit, new, time tested and as many more possible descriptives as there are probably opinions over whether or not it's art.

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I’m really trying to define it in a boiled down way. One wouldn’t say I’m going to an art show, get in the car, and drive to Lowe’s to see their new line of doorknobs, you know? Which also isn’t to say if you can’t have a show for it, it isn’t art. You know what I mean. A craft in and of itself – in this more specific definition - is not readily considered art and to say so is neither elitist or snobby. You will not find doorknobs under Art in the yellow pages.

(the doorknob artist from the other post and your wife’s S&P shakers, notwithstanding. There’re always exceptions, eh?)

Def 2. In the broad sense, I totally agree, whistle. Art, and artistry, as a state of mind can find art in anything and any venture. It’s a wonderful place to see things from and it’s as valid as def one. They’re separable, but equal, I believe. We'll call it def 1B or 1A or the other 1.

Def 3. Subjective. I knew it would come to this. It always does, lol. This should actually be definition #1.

Sheesh. Yes, you can have doorknobs that are art. You can spend hundreds of dollars for some sculpted crystal masterpiece. Salt and pepper shakes can be art, as someone earlier mentioned.

But if I go to the hardware store and pick out a mass-produced, machined stamped doorknob, that isn't art.

Neither are the salt and pepper shakers I pick up at Target to replace the other chincy ones I just broke.

I may choose one doorknob over another because I prefer brass to steel, but that isn't an artistic choice. I'm not debating the relative merits of the medium. It's mere asthetic preference. Maybe some of you don't want to accept that. But art does not permeate my everyday life as you seem to think it does.

Granted we could be talking semantics here. But to me "art" is something above and beyond the ordinary. It's special and it speaks to the soul.

My doorknob doesn't speak to my soul. It doesn't spark something deep within me and make me go, "Ah, that's beautiful." maybe it does to whistle, but it certainly doesn't to me.

I guess I do put art on a pedestal. And I certainly don't think that artists are the everyday man. Everyday men can become artists, but dabbling in poetry doesn't make one an artist. And social status doesn't make or break an artist.

I play guitar but that doesn't make me a musician. I write poetry but that doesn't make me a poet.

And if it seems my argument has changed it's because I'm in a different mood today. I cheat like that.

Shadow_Ferret said:

I play guitar but that doesn't make me a musician. I write poetry but that doesn't make me a poet.

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"I got feet but I'm not a feature"

dadgum soul/soldier song... just ONE more time, I tell ya...