I was teaching an art appreciation class to many students who were not art majors, and had never taken an art class before. I felt that I needed a definition to help the class to begin thinking about the subject.
In discussions about art many people define art according to their own personal tastes. We've all overheard the disgruntled viewer in a museum who sees something that they don't like or understand and proclaim, "that is not art". So, I like for my students to start off by understanding the difference between defining what art is and judging it's quality or success.
I think this definition works well because it shows that the creator is responsible for deciding what art is or is going to be.
I was really suprised when I posted this originally because there were so many challenges to the third criteria. It seems that there are many artists who think that the making of art is something that is done for their own experience and that sharing it with others is not always neccessary.
After hearing all of the debate however, I maintain that the third criteria is just as important and neccessary as the other two. It is easy to focus on the idea and the process of creation, but for art to exist it must be presented to the rest of the world.
Art is a form of human communication. Once a work of art is presented to people other than the one who made it, the work begins to communicate, grow, evolve, illuminate and inspire. I don't think that work that is kept hidden by the artist or destroyed after creation is in the same catagory.
Seems to me that on the average it's a battle between the artist and the art vier as to what is appreciated as art.
But when talking about the great artist's works of the past and present we are getting into an area where there has been great impact on people at a particular time in history when they and their art was most appreciated. Sort of like fashion; here today gone tomorrow.
The great landscapes of Thomas Moran for example lost their appeal in the early 1900's and today are mostly antique art even though they have rarely if ever been matched in quality by modern artists.
Personally I think film and performances are the most contempory thing in art because it can shape an arrange an artist's idea of the most pressing issues in the world like war, nature and man, science and religion, etc. Some really un-appealing stuff is toted as great in this area but most leaves me cold. Shock art made by some who call themselves artists but are just performance artists who will be little remembered in the future. The new art form is looking a lot like a screaming spoiled child........which a short film of would make a statement of interest perhaps.
I'm personally interested in expressing the lesser seen aspecrts of nature and even rocks and minerals. Like those artists who do it all for personal psychotherapy or pleasure as itf it were knitting or something I think art is a play activity too but I want to share it with people.
On this it's good luck standing in line with a million other artists trying to share it with people I think
However I still don't think anyone has succeeded in defining art here.
In my opinion, to destinguish between a work of art and a... work of smth else, one has to wait a little and let the art history to decide what is what.
I don't believe that one can adequately judge his/her contemporaries: there were so many cases that the art highly appreciated at its time, was later completely forgotten...
However, there's one more consideration. Regarding a concrete work of art - I'd add two points here: I think that a work of art should be able to evoke certain positive emotions in other people + it has to influence other artists.
Art is the expression of any and/or all of the infintinte possibilities of the human mind From the concept of beauty to the vulgar and the ugly From freedom to captivity From Intellect to stupidity From the obvious to thoughts understood only by a rare few From entertainment to boredom From mathematical precision toaccidental chaos From the divine to the damned From theism to atheism From belief to measured certainty From the ego to an unbiased dedication to objectivity and an inherent will to live life for the good of the whole and all others
Every culture and time period has different tastes and points of view in terms of what is considered important.
But art is a form of communication between a creator and an audience.
The Egyptians had no intention to create funerary objects that would be displayed in future museums. However, they did find a way to communicate ideas about what they perceived to be beyond normal physical existence.
Were they intending to create art? That's an irrelevant question.
If I accidentally spill a cup of coffee and the stain looks beautiful, it may have aesthetic value but I don't know if I would consider it art since there was no intent behind the creation of this thing of beauty.
Show me one thing in this universe undeserving of our awe for its beauty and elegance simply for the fact it exists. If it doesn't boil down to intent, does that make everything art?
The world of art is changing just as fast as everything else around us. With websites like 'artwanted', 'deviantart' and 'fartsyorartsy', the ability for artists to gain exposure is unprecedented and allows for both rapidly expanded ideas of what art is, and at the same time increased specialization.
I think most if not all primitive "art" was a decorative craft in service of religious as well as other practical functions like war, hunting and politics.
The idea or "art" being is service of decoration seems to be the dominant function of it in today's time. Other than this it is more of a luxurious hobby or therapeutic function like reading and writing. Making money from selling it is an economic function. Museums are an educational function.
Every semester I ask students to describe their earliest recollection of an art experience. I always have one or two students that describe things like sunsets, or their mother's face. These are beautiful things, but not works of art.
Art is man-made. It is a form of human communication. If the maker is not intending art in the creation it is not art - no matter how well made, inspiring, beautiful, or important it is.
The God thing is a can of worms that I am reluctant to address. However, the belief in God is another example of what I am talking about. That belief has inspired incredible works of art.
Believing that God is some sort of Meta-artist, I think, is ridiculous. Art is made by humans for humans. God is not a prerequisite.
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