From the safety of my armchair, I willingly enter into a discussion on "what is art?". Of course it is a philosophical question, brought up after a few beers, meant to stir conversation into the evening. I jokingly poke my friend MFG with "hey you took some Art philosophy classes, so what the hell defines Art anyway?". He quietly concedes he does not really know and that it seems to be open to debate. Considering myself a bit of a pragmatist, I was thoroughly unimpressed with his answer, so I wanted to take this further. I really wish I would of had Wikipedia's article on Art available to me at the time (if only I could have an encyclopedia in my brain) as it would of provided some additional insight. I believe the conversation ended with myself claiming that at its root Art had to have a purposeful message intended by the artist. Today MFG dropped a comment on me, challenging me to elaborate (and rightfully so).
"...I agree, but the problem is that that is only a necessary condition, but not entirely sufficient. In other words how can you distinguish art which communicates from other forms of media, e.g. the news, entertainment, a street sign, which communicate."
Undoubtedly I am getting myself into deeper water, on an armchair that doesn't float, but I will attempt to clarify. To me it would seem that all forms of communication may have an element of art about them, but it is not a required aspect of communication. It would seem that Art is a purposeful tool used by an artist to convey a message in a non-conventional way. I am willing to go out on a limb and claim, that the difference between art and standard communication, is that art requires the audience to have an emotional response. So art must have three things, a message, an audience and an emotional response.
(Continued)
That wiki entry on art is really well done. I too wish I had an encyclopedic mind. It seems there are a few approaches one can take with regard to art, with the realist, objectivist, and relativist positions being the starting points.
ReplyDeleteI guess I would lean toward a relativist position (which is strange given some of my views on other subjects), because, otherwise, I don't see how Duchamp's Fountain could be considered art.
I too like the appeal to emotion in a definition of art, but have problems when the purpose of such an appeal leads to a less than aesthetic virtuous purpose. I am thinking of advertising and propaganda. In one sense I can see how people will want to maintain that those forms are indeed art, however, if they are then I would like some way of distinguishing them from, say, something more pure like VanGogh's Sunflowers or even that silver thing at the bottom of the University Bridge in Saskatoon (lol).
Anyway, thanks for pointing out that wiki entry, it was a very interesting read, and gives me something to ponder here for the rest of the day.