Has art jumped the shark after WWI?

[abaris]

It seems fairly pleasing as a piece but I rather think that give me a ruler and some paint and I could come up with something similar in an afternoon.

That's my whole point. The technicality involved is extremely simple, but Mondrian managed to make himself a name with it. It met the audience's approval by being provocative and new.

And personally I rather like it.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Plot and character aren't everything in literature. They are two of the main three creative parts of a literary work, the third being composition. When people are considering what is and isn't a great work of literature, they evaluate it by using those components as criteria. Stephen King's composition just isn't on par with many other authors, and that is why many people consider him pulp.

The energy that comes from Stephen King's writing is due to the well-crafted characters and intriguing plot. His composition(which admittedly is intertwined with how you craft your characters, so he does have some skill there) doesn't really elicit much reaction. It's plain and straight forward, which is not what people are looking for when people are determining what is great literature.

How then do you explain Hemingway's legacy, when his writing is most often even plainer than King's? Who is more talented, the writer who paints a scene using 100 words, or the writer who paints the same scene in fifty? Why?

MacLuhan aside, the medium is not the message. In writing fiction, simple language is just as artful as complex language. Simple language adds more energy. There's a reason why the two most important maxims to an author are "Second draft = rough draft - 10%", and "Kill your babies." Both those maxims work to reduce the verbiage and make each word carry more weight.

The essence of our difference here is that you hold that there is an objective metric for the quality of art. I disagree. Art, like morality, is inherently subjective, and relative. Some people can more clearly elucidate their artistic vision using standard techniques, but confusing the mastery of technique for the expression of artistry, while common, is in my mind fallacious. The finger pointing at the moon is not the moon.

Technique helps us express what is inside us, but chasing technique often results distracting both the artist and the viewer from the vision which lies at the root of all art.

Diane Romanello is, technically speaking, a great painter. Her perspectives are congruent, her colors accurate, her brushwork very acceptable. But -- is it art?







Is that art? Why, or why not?

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Of course, because ultimately art comes from an emotional connection with the medium that allows you fluidly manipulate it into a creative expression.

But that just proves my point that standards can be set for what is and isn't art, because you can evaluate a piece of art by looking at how developed that emotional connection was and its influence upon the final product. You see, evaluating art isn't just about the final product. It's also about evaluating the process involved.

Ah, but when the standard is emotional, the metric is necessarily subjective. And that means sometimes crude art is more artistic that the technically refined art.

[thesummerqueen]

I think this thread just turned into the Atheist Forums version of "Mona Lisa Smile".

Can I play the hot, sexually liberal Maggie Gyllenhaal character?

[Faith No More]

Emotional connection with the medium? Really? Many artists do have an emotional connection with their mediums be that word, the violin, their own voice, oil paint, marble, wood, or their own bodies as in dance. But that rarely, if ever, is the point. It's emotional connection with the subject that's necessary.

True, but my point was that it's the emotional connection with the medium that truly draws out the creative inspiration in the artist. The feeling I personally feel as I'm sketching out a picture doesn't compare to the almost giddy feeling I get from laying down a page worth of character development for a story. It's that emotional connection that allows an artist to tap his/her potential.

I strongly disagree. If the result is not good, the fact that the process was a journey (even a deep emotional one) for the artist won't make it any better art. You are mistaking art therapy for art.

I'm not saying that it doesn't ultimately come down to the final product. I'm saying that it's impossible to completely separate the final product from the process that created it, therefore the process comes into consideration.

[abaris]

I'm not saying that it doesn't ultimately come down to the final product. I'm saying that it's impossible to completely separate the final product from the process that created it, therefore the process comes into consideration.

I'm certainly not downplaying your opinion, but for me the process is entirely secondary when it comes to art. Parker in his post on this very page explained it best. The techniques the above painter used are top notch. The middle picture looks like a photo, but that's just it. For me it bleeds sterility. There's nothing emotional about it.

[Jenny A]

Diane Romanello is, technically speaking, a great painter. Her perspectives are congruent, her colors accurate, her brushwork very acceptable. But -- is it art?







Is that art? Why, or why not?

Yes, because it is a expression of human creativity through the use of skill. But it's also vapid art. We have visited the artist's mind, and discovered that there's not much going on there beyond cliched and dreamy thinking.

[abaris]

We have visited the artist's mind, and discovered that there's not much going on there beyond cliched and dreamy thinking.

Wow, thanks for pointing that out.

[Jenny A]

The essence of our difference here is that you hold that there is an objective metric for the quality of art. I disagree. Art, like morality, is inherently subjective, and relative. Some people can more clearly elucidate their artistic vision using standard techniques, but confusing the mastery of technique for the expression of artistry, while common, is in my mind fallacious. The finger pointing at the moon is not the moon.

Technique helps us express what is inside us, but chasing technique often results distracting both the artist and the viewer from the vision which lies at the root of all art.

[emphasis mine]

^This^

[Alex K]

Sorry his is in german, abaris, what do you think about this stuffy gentleman's argument that classical music has an objectively more developed artistic language than pop?

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http://youtu.be/e81_lAwOBgg

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[abaris]

Sorry his is in german, abaris, what do you think about this stuffy gentleman's argument that classical music has an objectively more developed artistic language than pop?

Does it? I'm a musical illiterate, but I find it telling he's always going on about Britney Spears. He obviously never really appreciated the arrangements of Beatles songs and the musical complexity of Abba, regardless if you like them or not.

But that's not the point, he's making the usual mistake of talking from the usual elitist position. I am the one determining what's good music and to use his own words, stupider music. It's also an objective mistake, since pop musicians have to use the language of music. They also build on the long tradition of musicians coming before them.