Art vs. Work Of Art

Use this forum to have philosophical discussions about aesthetics and art. What is art? What is beauty? What makes art good? You can also use this forum to discuss philosophy in the arts, namely to discuss the philosophical points in any particular movie, TV show, book or story.
gad-fly
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Art vs. Work Of Art

Post by gad-fly »

Art is the exhibition of what is artistic in anything physical. Work of Art (in dictionary) is materials or tasks on which to expend time and effort. In this respect, art is usually found in Work of Art which carries the intention, though not necessarily found, and Art may be found accidentally in anything you happen to come across. Such is life.

Blame it on the ambiguity of language if you like, but Art and Work of Art has often been confused as one and the same. Take Art Auction, for example. Strictly speaking, art cannot be auctioned, bought, or sold. Like beauty, it cannot be collected or controlled, since it a feeling arising from the bottom of your heart.

As a feeling or inspiration, art is ageless. I may not think much of abstract art when I was young, but this has nothing to do with my aging. Indeed, the opposite may have been the case. Art is beyond gender, race, education, knowledge, wealth, and experience. That you pay a million dollars to buy a painting, for example, does not mean that you are more worthy of that painting or having a higher return from that painting than me.

The appreciation of art varies from one source to another. In this respect, it is futile to argue what exhibits art and what not in a work of art. Art begs for complete freedom of expression. Perhaps this is what makes it so cherished.
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Count Lucanor
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Re: Art vs. Work Of Art

Post by Count Lucanor »

gad-fly wrote: June 11th, 2022, 4:35 pm Art is the exhibition of what is artistic in anything physical.
gad-fly wrote: June 11th, 2022, 4:35 pm..art [...] cannot be collected or controlled, since it a feeling arising from the bottom of your heart.

As a feeling or inspiration, art is ageless.
These two statements contradict each other. First, something physical displays some configuration that exhibits artistry and this is called art, but then you say art is a "feeling form your heart", which takes away art or artistry from the object and puts it alone within the author or the observer.

In any case, how can a particular feeling or inspiration, experienced by a particular person, be ageless?
The wise are instructed by reason, average minds by experience, the stupid by necessity and the brute by instinct.
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Sunday66
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Re: Art vs. Work Of Art

Post by Sunday66 »

gad-fly wrote: June 11th, 2022, 4:35 pm Art is the exhibition of what is artistic in anything physical. Work of Art (in dictionary) is materials or tasks on which to expend time and effort. In this respect, art is usually found in Work of Art which carries the intention, though not necessarily found, and Art may be found accidentally in anything you happen to come across. Such is life.

Blame it on the ambiguity of language if you like, but Art and Work of Art has often been confused as one and the same. Take Art Auction, for example. Strictly speaking, art cannot be auctioned, bought, or sold. Like beauty, it cannot be collected or controlled, since it a feeling arising from the bottom of your heart.

As a feeling or inspiration, art is ageless. I may not think much of abstract art when I was young, but this has nothing to do with my aging. Indeed, the opposite may have been the case. Art is beyond gender, race, education, knowledge, wealth, and experience. That you pay a million dollars to buy a painting, for example, does not mean that you are more worthy of that painting or having a higher return from that painting than me.

The appreciation of art varies from one source to another. In this respect, it is futile to argue what exhibits art and what not in a work of art. Art begs for complete freedom of expression. Perhaps this is what makes it so cherished.
Of course art can be sold.
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Re: Art vs. Work Of Art

Post by Consul »

gad-fly wrote: June 11th, 2022, 4:35 pmBlame it on the ambiguity of language if you like, but Art and Work of Art has often been confused as one and the same. Take Art Auction, for example. Strictly speaking, art cannot be auctioned, bought, or sold. Like beauty, it cannot be collected or controlled, since it a feeling arising from the bottom of your heart.
In phrases such as "art auction" and "art exhibition" the word "art" is a collective noncount noun referring to a collection of works of art.
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Re: Art vs. Work Of Art

Post by Consul »

Sunday66 wrote: June 11th, 2022, 8:50 pmOf course art can be sold.
If "art" refers to the cultural institution so called, then it is as unsellable as philosophy, science, and sport (qua cultural institutions).
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Re: Art vs. Work Of Art

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Consul wrote: June 11th, 2022, 11:01 pmIf "art" refers to the cultural institution so called, then it is as unsellable as philosophy, science, and sport (qua cultural institutions).
For example, you can sell (and buy) footballs, football players, football clubs, football stadiums, football T-shirts, football magazines, and rights to broadcast football games, but you cannot sell (or buy) football as such, i.e. as a kind of cultural institution.
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Re: Art vs. Work Of Art

Post by LuckyR »

Consul wrote: June 11th, 2022, 11:10 pm
Consul wrote: June 11th, 2022, 11:01 pmIf "art" refers to the cultural institution so called, then it is as unsellable as philosophy, science, and sport (qua cultural institutions).
For example, you can sell (and buy) footballs, football players, football clubs, football stadiums, football T-shirts, football magazines, and rights to broadcast football games, but you cannot sell (or buy) football as such, i.e. as a kind of cultural institution.
Art and work of art, to me are the difference between the nonphysical and the physical. The performance of music is nonphysical, a painting is physical. While I can purchase a recording of a performance of music, that recording is not what that performance was, any more than a courtroom sketch of a lawyer's closing argument IS that closing argument.
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Consul
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Re: Art vs. Work Of Art

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LuckyR wrote: June 12th, 2022, 3:14 amArt and work of art, to me are the difference between the nonphysical and the physical. The performance of music is nonphysical, a painting is physical. While I can purchase a recording of a performance of music, that recording is not what that performance was, any more than a courtroom sketch of a lawyer's closing argument IS that closing argument.
A performance of music is a physical event: Physical musicians with physical instruments are creating physical sounds. Depending on the acoustic technology used, the sound of a recording may not be qualitatively identical to the original sound of the performance in a concert hall or studio; but it is more or less similar.
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Re: Art vs. Work Of Art

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Consul wrote: June 12th, 2022, 4:13 am
LuckyR wrote: June 12th, 2022, 3:14 amArt and work of art, to me are the difference between the nonphysical and the physical. The performance of music is nonphysical, a painting is physical. While I can purchase a recording of a performance of music, that recording is not what that performance was, any more than a courtroom sketch of a lawyer's closing argument IS that closing argument.
A performance of music is a physical event: Physical musicians with physical instruments are creating physical sounds. Depending on the acoustic technology used, the sound of a recording may not be qualitatively identical to the original sound of the performance in a concert hall or studio; but it is more or less similar.
I'll give you similar. Sort of like a movie (a physical item) is similar to theatre. Though one could argue that if you videotape a theatre performance you didn't capture the theatre performance, you made a movie (a different form of art).
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Re: Art vs. Work Of Art

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Consul wrote: June 12th, 2022, 4:13 am
LuckyR wrote: June 12th, 2022, 3:14 amArt and work of art, to me are the difference between the nonphysical and the physical. The performance of music is nonphysical, a painting is physical. While I can purchase a recording of a performance of music, that recording is not what that performance was, any more than a courtroom sketch of a lawyer's closing argument IS that closing argument.
A performance of music is a physical event: Physical musicians with physical instruments are creating physical sounds. Depending on the acoustic technology used, the sound of a recording may not be qualitatively identical to the original sound of the performance in a concert hall or studio; but it is more or less similar.
I'll give you similar. But are you really saying going to a concert is all that similar of an experience to listening to a live album? Sort of like a movie (a physical item) is semi-similar to theatre. Though one could argue that if you videotape a theatre performance you didn't capture the theatre performance, you made a movie (a different form of art).
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Re: Art vs. Work Of Art

Post by gad-fly »

LuckyR wrote: June 12th, 2022, 3:14 am
Art and work of art, to me are the difference between the nonphysical and the physical. The performance of music is nonphysical, a painting is physical. While I can purchase a recording of a performance of music, that recording is not what that performance was, any more than a courtroom sketch of a lawyer's closing argument IS that closing argument.
Art versus Work of Art. The former is mental; the latter physical. It is a misnomer to refer the latter as the former, but such examples abound in language. Take beauty contest as another example. The contest is between participants often referred to as beauties on their beautiful-ness. Some may not even be beautiful, you may say. Back to work of art. Your painting in an art class is, veritably, a work of art. Does it exhibit art? I hope so, but your art teacher may disappoint you.

performance of music, movie, and so on, serve to entertain, like talk and magic shows. That art may be exhibited or inspired upon you is accidental, or incidental. The difference between is in the intention, not the expectation and consequence. Go to a classical music concert. Your expectation not the same as going to a talk show? Fine. Does music exhibits art, but talk not? I don't think so. Let me qualify the statement: it is a matter of degree. In the final analysis, forget about all that baggage on art history and art schools. It is how you feel that matters most of all. It is how you cherish life for all its ramifications.
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Re: Art vs. Work Of Art

Post by gad-fly »

Count Lucanor wrote: June 11th, 2022, 6:54 pm
These two statements contradict each other. First, something physical displays some configuration that exhibits artistry and this is called art, but then you say art is a "feeling form your heart", which takes away art or artistry from the object and puts it alone within the author or the observer.

In any case, how can a particular feeling or inspiration, experienced by a particular person, be ageless?
A work of art, or not a work of art, exhibits art. This exhibit may or may not be received by you, depending on how you feel. Is it art or not? Depends.

Take wine. Wine may age, but the taste for wine is ageless, though it may mellow. See the difference? Like art, the taste is not a function of time.
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Re: Art vs. Work Of Art

Post by Count Lucanor »

gad-fly wrote: June 12th, 2022, 12:39 pm
Count Lucanor wrote: June 11th, 2022, 6:54 pm
These two statements contradict each other. First, something physical displays some configuration that exhibits artistry and this is called art, but then you say art is a "feeling form your heart", which takes away art or artistry from the object and puts it alone within the author or the observer.

In any case, how can a particular feeling or inspiration, experienced by a particular person, be ageless?
A work of art, or not a work of art, exhibits art. This exhibit may or may not be received by you, depending on how you feel. Is it art or not? Depends.
To exhibit, to recieve, all point to physical perception of an object. Even if filtered by our emotions, those emotions are physical process in our bodies. What makes some objects or events art may differ in different cultural contexts, but nevertheless, it always points to something concrete with a recognizable form.
gad-fly wrote: June 12th, 2022, 12:39 pm Take wine. Wine may age, but the taste for wine is ageless, though it may mellow. See the difference? Like art, the taste is not a function of time.
The taste of wine comes from the composition of chemicals it contains as perceived by our palate. There are different wines and even those made with similar production processes under the same label, can taste differently. The composition of chemicals often changes with time and we can be pretty sure our palate can change with time and from person to person. The taste of something is a particular experience, so it is very unlikely that such experience remains exactly the same for everyone, for ever and ever.

The problem with your view is that you confuse abstractions with real things or treat them as concrete things, a typical error of idealism.
The wise are instructed by reason, average minds by experience, the stupid by necessity and the brute by instinct.
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Consul
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Re: Art vs. Work Of Art

Post by Consul »

LuckyR wrote: June 12th, 2022, 4:56 am
Consul wrote: June 12th, 2022, 4:13 amA performance of music is a physical event: Physical musicians with physical instruments are creating physical sounds. Depending on the acoustic technology used, the sound of a recording may not be qualitatively identical to the original sound of the performance in a concert hall or studio; but it is more or less similar.
I'll give you similar. But are you really saying going to a concert is all that similar of an experience to listening to a live album? Sort of like a movie (a physical item) is semi-similar to theatre. Though one could argue that if you videotape a theatre performance you didn't capture the theatre performance, you made a movie (a different form of art).
What I've been saying is that the sound of a musical performance heard live in a concert hall is more or less similar to the sound of a recording of this musical performance heard at home.
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Re: Art vs. Work Of Art

Post by LuckyR »

Consul wrote: June 12th, 2022, 6:06 pm
LuckyR wrote: June 12th, 2022, 4:56 am
Consul wrote: June 12th, 2022, 4:13 amA performance of music is a physical event: Physical musicians with physical instruments are creating physical sounds. Depending on the acoustic technology used, the sound of a recording may not be qualitatively identical to the original sound of the performance in a concert hall or studio; but it is more or less similar.
I'll give you similar. But are you really saying going to a concert is all that similar of an experience to listening to a live album? Sort of like a movie (a physical item) is semi-similar to theatre. Though one could argue that if you videotape a theatre performance you didn't capture the theatre performance, you made a movie (a different form of art).
What I've been saying is that the sound of a musical performance heard live in a concert hall is more or less similar to the sound of a recording of this musical performance heard at home.
I don't disagree, but is the art of a musical performance limited to the sound of the music? I'd say: no. Just as more goes into a movie than writing the screenplay and acting, more goes into a record/CD than writing the song and playing the instruments. After all, special effects are an art form that exist in movies, but don't in most live theatre. Similarly, record producing, sound mixing and engineering are part of record making, that don't as much in live concerts, whereas visual effects, lighting etc are part of the art of concerts that aren't on an album.
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