I have to admit I have unintentionally created art by spillage and goofs that just worked.
Art is tangible!
Art can be so private. THere are some works so personal they may not be shared, some may be destroyed in fact. That someone else did not see it, does not mean it is not art. I have a few works that are art, but I would never share it.
Great thread!
I want to thank those of you who have offered me your encouragement. I just think this is a good topic for people here to think about. I put this definition up because I've had a chance to discuss it with others before, and I think it is all inclusive.
We like to think of art as having no boundaries, and compared with most other human endeavors it is amazingly expansive and inclusive. However, it is a product of human achievement. This is the reason for the first criteria. Art is only made by those intending to make art. Monkeys and elephants throwing paint aren't making art. Also, every skillful, creative, or wondrous act performed by people is not art unless the intension is there at the start. Art is not an accident or an afterthought, even though accidents can and do play a part in the production.
Something tangible must be produced. Not necessarily something visual or solid. Musicians produce art from concepts that are experienced directly by the audience through hearing. However, concepts that stay in the mind of the artist are ideas, not art. The way that an artist communicates those concepts can vary.
Many of you seem to have a problem with the third criteria. But work that is only experienced by the artist is incomplete. Exposure to an audience may come well after the artist's lifetime, but the presentation is the birth of a work of art.
Once again let me reiterate, these criteria refer only to defining something as a work of art. They do not assist in judging the success of a piece. However, if something is made by a person who is intending to make a work of art and they are presenting their creation to an audience, no one can say that what they have created is not art.
Then, you also have to think of other forms as well. Music, writing, poetry, all are considered art forms. Does that make them less of an art than painters? Is computer generated art less of an art form than oil on canvas? I can't decide that, and I have a hard time believing anyone really could.
I can only define art to me. Not to anyone else, and I define my art as a creative form that touches my heart, whether I'm playing the piano, painting, or writing a poem. As long as it is a dear love to me and close to my heart, it is art. :)
Carrie Ann / Searlait
This definition does not try to rank the different artforms. Painting is not superior or inferior to music, dance, sculpture, computer art etc.
A fourth criteria perhaps - The work must be credible.
Deciding whether a work of art is successful or unsuccessful is secondary to deciding whether or not one is judging a work of art.
This is why I think a definition is important. It is easy to say that art is in the eye of the beholder, or that everything is art in its own way. However, the problem with the first statement is that it gives the viewer the responsibility to declare what is or isn't a work of art. Only the artist can do this. The problem with the second statement is that art becomes indistinguishable from anything else.
Once the viewer is able to distinguish what is or is not a work of art then they can move on to the judgement of quality.
China created to set a table, may now be ART.
Mankind creates things, sometimes in some time it is a household tool, in another time it is an artifact, in another time ART.
American Indians created beaded tunics, not art then, then it was clothing, now art.
In short summary all of the work or works of mankind can and might qualify as art.
I think Worhol saw this when he started to paint Soup cans.
It is more the audiences perception of the object than the Artists that make it art. If I have china on my table it isnt art (perhaps), if I have a collection on the wall it is art.
Again, all the work and works of man are candidates for "ART". We essentially vote it in and out by our acceptance of it as art.
I walk into a restuarant on the docks, there are canoes and skiffs hanging from the ceiling, fishnets, bouys, harpoons etc. These items become art thru usage, not artists intent or a definition of the object. It is usage and the audience that defines art.
Obviously some objects are created with intent to be art, but that isnt the universal scope of what is used and perceived to be art.
The sense that the creator has control of the usage and definition of what he creates denies the audience their free will.
If an object is values enough that someone wishes to display it for the appreciation of some audience it becomes art.
Essentially then the object becomes apprecated for some intrisic value exceeding its utilitarian usage. In fact it is appreciated for its exisitence, not its other values. This recognition of existance and value for no other purpose than sensual appreciation begins to define art.
"I'm not sure what you mean by credible, but you are suggesting an evaluation of quality performed by the viewer."
Not exactly, I realized that my meaning of credible fits pretty closely with all three of your definitions however but contains another notion.
Example: 1. A friend comes over to my studio, an acupuncturist by profession - no hobbies. He takes a scrap of paper and one of my pencils and draws something silly. Is he intending to create art - perhaps, perhaps not.
2. Is my friends drawing tangible? I'd say no (subjective) but what do you mean by tangible? (credible?)
My friend is not an artist nor does he claim to be and if you asked him if his drawing were art he'd no doubt say no. It is not his lifestyle. In that sense his drawing has no crediblity.
3. I was the aubdience.
Did he fulfill all three criteria. I'd have to say no but you might say yes.
When he left I threw the drawing in the garbage.
Again, your confusing the act of creation, that is done by the artist, with the act of critiqueing, that is done by the viewer. When you judge your friend's work as having no artist value or aesthetic worth you are passing judgement on a work of art.
The confusion comes because many of us, when we see something that is being presented as a work of art that we find unsuitable, substandard or offensive, declare, "that is not art". The correct response should be, "that is very poor art", or better yet, "that is unsuccessful art".
I. None, just being silly
2. not credible (his judgement and mine)
3. implausible (his judgement and mine)
So credibility fits under intentionality.
If you ask kindergarteners how many of them can paint and draw - they will all probably raise their hands - by high school, probably only a few, and later on even fewer still. Their ideas about who creates art and who doesn't is squeezed into a narrower and narrower funnel.
Cave paintings from thousands of years ago are referred to as 'art' - cave art - but similar designs spray painted on a building is probably seen by many as a crime.
It's a puzzler, that's for sure.
I was thinking of Audebon (?) who was illustrating birds - but now he's considered a great artist and his prints are super expensive?
A number of artists sold their doodles or traded them for food, etc. Or people saved them and now they are very valuable, but they weren't intended as art - ?
As I said earlier, the concept of an object being created solely as a work of art is a fairly recent idea. In the past objects were always created to perform a function. Not all objects that we see in an art museum are works of art. Our museums are in the habit of displaying objects that have significant historical value alongside objects that were created in a way that they transcend their utilitarian purpose.
King Tut's mask is more beautiful and perfect than it had to be in order to fulfill its religious function. Audebon's prints and watercolors, besides displaying a superior craftsmanship, also go beyond his intention to study birds.
We did not need to know the intention of the indiviual creators of works from earlier periods because we understood the needs and beliefs of the culture that they lived in. In modern times, however, one artist's intention is often quite different from another.
Art defiition:
"Any human creation which contains an idea other than its utilitarian purpose."
Michelangelo created it, along with hundreds of other drawings, as a study for the Sistine Chapel ceiling.
It is a beautiful drawing, but the artist did not intend for it to be shown as a work of art. It certainly has tremendous historic value and merit, and is intrinsicly related to art and art history. But is it a work of art?
Like Audebon's drawings it certainly surpasses its utilitarian function. I would be hard-pressed to say that it is definitely not art, but taken out of its historical context, and forced to stand on its own merit as a work of art, it would certainly be an unsuccessful Renaissance composition.
That's why I like my concept of current usage as defining art, which puts much more of the definition on the audience.
Spinnoza: "Any human creation which contains an idea other than its utilitarian purpose."
In this case you illustrate the non-utilitarian purpose didnt come from the artist but the audience.
Language being what it is tho, is decoration a utilitarian purpose?
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