Art smart

[Sojourner]

OK, so the other art thread has gotten me thinking about art and beauty. Many moons ago, I took a class on aesthetics (fascinating stuff) and I think it would be fun to delve into it again.

So here's the questions of the hour: What makes something "art"? How would you define "beauty"? How is the meaning of a piece determined?

There are a number of theories on this that have been proposed over the years ... I am relatively certain I still have my textbook from this class and maybe even the thesis paper I had to write for it on exactly this topic. I'll have to do a bit of digging tonight.

Some considerations: In producing a work of art, an artist typically has a message he or she wishes to convey through the piece ... this could be one source of meaning for the work. However, the viewer/listener/consumer may not necessarily pick up on the artist's intended meaning, and may in fact assign a wholly different and separate meaning to an artwork. When there's a conflict, who's meaning is right? Or, can a work of art have inherent, objective meaning?

What about conceptions of beauty from different cultures? Japanese art doesn't look much like Western art, and yet many would say it's beautiful. Are there standards by which we can determine what is beautiful apart from the raw form of a piece of art?

[Jaime]

[img]http://gaming.unlv.edu/gallery/friendinneed.jpg[/img]


Balance, Structure, Form..


What else can I say?

Of course the dogs are naked so that's a problem...

[Sojourner]

[quote name='hot stuff' post='960096' date='Apr 25 2006, 09:51 AM']
Balance, Structure, Form..
What else can I say?

Of course the dogs are naked so that's a problem...
[/quote]
Are you trying to intimate that I hate puppies?

[toledo_jesus]

oops, I just wasted my intellectualism on the other thread.

[philothea]

[quote name='Sojourner' post='960091' date='Apr 25 2006, 08:44 AM']
Some considerations: In producing a work of art, an artist typically has a message he or she wishes to convey through the piece ... this could be one source of meaning for the work. However, the viewer/listener/consumer may not necessarily pick up on the artist's intended meaning, and may in fact assign a wholly different and separate meaning to an artwork. When there's a conflict, who's meaning is right? Or, can a work of art have inherent, objective meaning?
[/quote]
This sounds like a good definition of 'art' to me.

And IMO, as an artist, the consumer is always right. If people can be inspired to actually care about, interpret, and read into something... they've got it. If the meaning the artist intended doesn't come across, he's misunderstands what he's done.

Artists always have a lot of subconscious stuff that gets added to a work, which they may be completey unaware of.

I have heard that Amy Tan said she was excited to see the Cliffs note on [i]The Joy Luck[/i] club, so she could finally learn what all that stuff she wrote really meant!

However, people shouldn't do things like define canonical allegorical meanings, if the artist clearly stated they had no such intention. (Like Tolkien.)

[Sojourner]

[quote name='toledo_jesus' post='960296' date='Apr 25 2006, 12:44 PM']
oops, I just wasted my intellectualism on the other thread.
[/quote]
Here, I'll help you out.

[quote name='toledo_jesus' post='960292' date='Apr 25 2006, 12:42 PM']
If modern art simply aped the classics it would not be art.

Modern art can in fact be meaningful and speak to us. What is dangerous is when modern art is part of a fad, and will not speak to future generations as the classic works do.

The measure of art is that it speaks to timeless humanity, not to a small segment of history. That sort of art can be appreciated for intellectual value but to last beyond its immediate relevance it must strike a chord with people.
My college education has made me perhaps the world's best Art Museum Security Guard.
[/quote]

[quote name='philothea' post='960453' date='Apr 25 2006, 02:16 PM']
This sounds like a good definition of 'art' to me.

And IMO, as an artist, the consumer is always right. If people can be inspired to actually care about, interpret, and read into something... they've got it. If the meaning the artist intended doesn't come across, he's misunderstands what he's done.

Artists always have a lot of subconscious stuff that gets added to a work, which they may be completey unaware of.

I have heard that Amy Tan said she was excited to see the Cliffs note on [i]The Joy Luck[/i] club, so she could finally learn what all that stuff she wrote really meant!

However, people shouldn't do things like define canonical allegorical meanings, if the artist clearly stated they had no such intention. (Like Tolkien.)
[/quote]
I've loved talking to my artist friends about the thought processes they go through as they put together a piece or series of pieces. It's pretty fascinating to see how they visualize their thought processes, and talking to them about their intent does inform my own understanding of their work. But I think you're right that in the end it's the consumer who really determines what something means and divines the "intent" of a given piece.

[Era Might]

I'm not really into abstract artsy type stuff. I'm like George Costanza in that respect. I need stuff explained to me.

Which brings me to my reason for posting...

John Paul II's "Letter to Artists" [url="http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/letters/documents/hf_jp-ii_let_23041999_artists_en.html"](Link)[/url]

AND

Barbara Nicolosi [url="http://churchofthemasses.blogspot.com/"](Link)[/url]

Nicolosi always spits some insightful knowledge about art (Case in point - [url="http://churchofthemasses.blogspot.com/2006/03/pt-i-really-long-wichita-interview.html"]Link[/url]). I wish she would write a book...

Edited April 26, 2006 by Era Might

[Sojourner]

I'm a big fan of Barbara Nicolosi. She should indeed write a book.

[homeschoolmom]

I've been thinking about art a lot this week-- the HSkids are in an art class and I am looking at curriculum for next year... I was pretty interested in the curriculum that this particular art teacher was selling. He's very well-known in the HSworld... and he has one book on art history and Christianity and I was skimming through it. He has a section on whether or not one should use art examples containing nudes. And, well, I don't agree with his POV, so... I'm still looking.

[St.MGoretti]

As an artist you are trying to take a view or a thought or an idea and make it visible to others. But you are also trying to see things in a different light and to open the doors for more and new ideas. You are not only trying to take a view that you have and put it down on a canvas or into a song, but you are trying to get other people to see something in a different way.
I am not a fan of the abstract art myself, yet you do have to give the artist credit for trying to get us to open our imagination and see something in a different way.

[Fides_et_Ratio]

I took Aesthetics as my philosophy elective last semester... it was... uhh.. "interesting". I had to do a "creative project" for the final (that was even more "interesting"... lol.

The text we used for the class was a book called, "Philosophical Issues in Art"... and gave a lot of different perspectives and viewpoints. But as I look back on things now... I'm not sure what I learned. lol.