Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Club for Open-Minded Discussion & Debate

[popeye1945]

I have seen several topics that ask if a certain genre of music, type of TV show, type of film, etc. is art. For instance, it wouldn't be unusual to hear someone say, Britney Spears is not an artist; she's just an untalented singer.

But that raises question, what is art? What makes one song artistic and another not so artistic? What makes one movie a work of art and another one just a recording? At what point does a sculpture become a piece of art rather than just a piece of rock? At what point does a painting become art as opposed to paint meaninglessly spilled on paper?

Basically, I would define art as expression through attractive symbolism. To use an example from above, the sculpture becomes art as opposed to just a piece of rock at the point when it expresses meaning from its creator.

What do you think? Can you provide a definition of art that is clearer, more elaborate or more accurate?

Art, I think is a celebration of being in general, but it is also experience, the creation of art by the artist is the artist attempting to give you a particular experience, and as it goes, if you have to ask what it is, the artist has failed, at least with you. I think the subject of art does not have to be the beautiful, there are a myriad of experiences to be had in the physical world. Think of Picaso's Garnica, the terrible devastation of war and its horrors. Experiences that you otherwise may never have had, it is a bit like a gift if the artist is successful, showing you an aspect of the world perhaps otherwise you would have missed.

[Catarina Silva_]

I searched for this specific topic because I have a fresh take I was discussing with my loved one recently. We always fall into the same ''you don't have enough sensitivity'' (read, me saying that to him). He mentions the banana in the wall with tape, an infamous piece of art sold for millions and with big repercussions online. The debate the banana sparked for me is proof that it is, indeed, art. It is a very conservative point of view to judge such a remarkable art installation. Saying that time, effort, and studies, are synonyms of art are elitist. In summary, art is what makes us feel, discuss and think.

[Count Lucanor]

None of the definitions that I have seen here so far really get near an answer to the question: what is art? They show some attributes that people find in artistic works, but nothing specific of art. Does art celebrate being? Yes, maybe, but so can a philosophical lecture or public speech. Does it make you feel, discuss and think? Surely, but so does a horse race.

[Sy Borg]

I agree with those saying art is a celebration.

If you are always struggling to survive, you don't do art. You do art in the free time you have because you are not always struggling to survive. That's worth celebrating. It sure beats the alternative.

[popeye1945]

Human art is becoming the creator with the properties of what reality is made of, and how they are arranged to create beings. Art is creation and participation in the celebration of being. As Tesla once said, to understand reality, you must think of energy, frequencies, and vibrations. These are the variables of all creation, so necessarily those of art. The orders of these in creating a whole can be extended to all forms of creation, the writing of a song, the creation of a short story, the building of a house, or the creation of a painting. It is life, it is being inanimate and animate. That which is beautiful speaks to the order of your being; disorder speaks of decay, decline, monstrosities, and death or non-existence. The radiance of a color speaks of energies, frequencies, and vibrations, creating vitality to adore. The rhythms of nature are to flow from the brush and find expression on a canvas. A teardrop on a rose speaks of sorrow, pain, and lost love, a withering rose, a drying tear captured in a fall scene. Melancholy is captured in an array of muted colors. Energies and their forms tweak your intellect, emotions, or both, affecting your moods and chemistry, for art should remind you of your complexity within complexity, a journey and a home at the same time. Art is a reflection as varied as reality itself.

[thrasymachus]

Catarina Silva wrote

I searched for this specific topic because I have a fresh take I was discussing with my loved one recently. We always fall into the same ''you don't have enough sensitivity'' (read, me saying that to him). He mentions the banana in the wall with tape, an infamous piece of art sold for millions and with big repercussions online. The debate the banana sparked for me is proof that it is, indeed, art. It is a very conservative point of view to judge such a remarkable art installation. Saying that time, effort, and studies, are synonyms of art are elitist. In summary, art is what makes us feel, discuss and think.

An interesting take on art. But you can see where this goes insane: All one has to do is inspire conversation and one is making art. Then what do "artists" do? I guess I am dismayed by the flattening, if you will, of art, which is what happens when this deflationary concept takes over. If the banana is art then everything is art. Is this true? Maybe. There is the theory, I think it was the philosopher named Dickie, who claimed that art comes into existence when the perspective brought to bear on an object becomes one of art intent, that is, you look at a piece of driftwood as driftwood and it is, well, driftrwood. But take the driftwood AS art, so to speak, then it is no longer a piece of rotting dead tree, for all eyes are on the form, colors, setting, perhaps some nostalgia rises up and you say, how beautiful it is. What makes a cloud into a camel or a poodle? It's us seeing the cloud AS a poodle. And this "seeing as" is actually the foundation for all things to the understanding, taking that over there AS a mountain, or this on my porch AS a bicycle, and so on.

But still, then we face the question, what does it mean to take something AS art? It's not like taking it as a poodle of a mountain. What are the meaning criteria for such a perspective? My daughter is in grad school working on an MFA, and she agrees with you, but I can't agree. There has to be something that makes art what it is apart from the way this banana has made its way into the art world.

[Pattern-chaser]

Catarina Silva wrote

I searched for this specific topic because I have a fresh take I was discussing with my loved one recently. We always fall into the same ''you don't have enough sensitivity'' (read, me saying that to him). He mentions the banana in the wall with tape, an infamous piece of art sold for millions and with big repercussions online. The debate the banana sparked for me is proof that it is, indeed, art. It is a very conservative point of view to judge such a remarkable art installation. Saying that time, effort, and studies, are synonyms of art are elitist. In summary, art is what makes us feel, discuss and think.

An interesting take on art. But you can see where this goes insane: All one has to do is inspire conversation and one is making art. Then what do "artists" do? I guess I am dismayed by the flattening, if you will, of art, which is what happens when this deflationary concept takes over. If the banana is art then everything is art. Is this true? Maybe. There is the theory, I think it was the philosopher named Dickie, who claimed that art comes into existence when the perspective brought to bear on an object becomes one of art intent, that is, you look at a piece of driftwood as driftwood and it is, well, driftrwood. But take the driftwood AS art, so to speak, then it is no longer a piece of rotting dead tree, for all eyes are on the form, colors, setting, perhaps some nostalgia rises up and you say, how beautiful it is. What makes a cloud into a camel or a poodle? It's us seeing the cloud AS a poodle. And this "seeing as" is actually the foundation for all things to the understanding, taking that over there AS a mountain, or this on my porch AS a bicycle, and so on.

But still, then we face the question, what does it mean to take something AS art? It's not like taking it as a poodle of a mountain. What are the meaning criteria for such a perspective? My daughter is in grad school working on an MFA, and she agrees with you, but I can't agree. There has to be something that makes art what it is apart from the way this banana has made its way into the art world.

I think art is anything that the artist claims as art. I think *GOOD* art lies purely in the eye of the beholder, though.

Personally, I think the point and value of art and artists, is that the artist sees something in a way that I would have missed, and finds a way to communicate it to me, even if only in the form of a banana or a pile of used bed linen. It is the artist's *perspective* that I admire. YMMV

[Count Lucanor]

I totally agree with this, I mean, if we go along with the proposed definition of “creation”, every man-made thing, including a rocket, would classify as being art. It seems more appropriate to say that some creations classify as art, but which ones? Also, art “as celebration”. What exactly is meant by that? Does a birthday party or a graduation ceremony, if somehow being creatively set up, classify as art? I doubt it. And then why would we need art galleries, art museums, art schools, etc? The definition must point to something more specific. The problem with Dickie is that he finally settled for a tautology: art is what is called art pr has an artistic intention. Although true, that does not clarify anything about what makes something artistic.

OTOH, while we need to point to something more specific, we should also look up for a definition that is broad enough as to describe what is common to Rodin’s sculptures and to Altamira’s cave paintings. I suggest that essential elements of art are:
1) It is man-made
2) It involves the free use of imagination, even if trying to reproduce or imitate something else
3) It is always concerned with form and composition, looking for the unity of a single work.
4) It is always concerned with technique, which involves selection and articulation of materials in the medium and tools used.
5) It is made to be contemplated, to provide an experience to observers, being that experience one of pleasure or enjoyment, either sensorial or both sensorial and intellectual.

All of these have been combined some way or another during the course of human history, most of the time tied to the production of everyday, practical objects, which also carried symbolical meaning in cultural practices. At some point in the modern age, production of objects for the sake of contemplation became a specialized discipline, divorced of the production of utilitarian objects (which became the discipline of design), and very much concerned with the innovative power of individual genius.

[Count Lucanor]

Catarina Silva wrote

I searched for this specific topic because I have a fresh take I was discussing with my loved one recently. We always fall into the same ''you don't have enough sensitivity'' (read, me saying that to him). He mentions the banana in the wall with tape, an infamous piece of art sold for millions and with big repercussions online. The debate the banana sparked for me is proof that it is, indeed, art. It is a very conservative point of view to judge such a remarkable art installation. Saying that time, effort, and studies, are synonyms of art are elitist. In summary, art is what makes us feel, discuss and think.

An interesting take on art. But you can see where this goes insane: All one has to do is inspire conversation and one is making art. Then what do "artists" do? I guess I am dismayed by the flattening, if you will, of art, which is what happens when this deflationary concept takes over. If the banana is art then everything is art. Is this true? Maybe. There is the theory, I think it was the philosopher named Dickie, who claimed that art comes into existence when the perspective brought to bear on an object becomes one of art intent, that is, you look at a piece of driftwood as driftwood and it is, well, driftrwood. But take the driftwood AS art, so to speak, then it is no longer a piece of rotting dead tree, for all eyes are on the form, colors, setting, perhaps some nostalgia rises up and you say, how beautiful it is. What makes a cloud into a camel or a poodle? It's us seeing the cloud AS a poodle. And this "seeing as" is actually the foundation for all things to the understanding, taking that over there AS a mountain, or this on my porch AS a bicycle, and so on.

But still, then we face the question, what does it mean to take something AS art? It's not like taking it as a poodle of a mountain. What are the meaning criteria for such a perspective? My daughter is in grad school working on an MFA, and she agrees with you, but I can't agree. There has to be something that makes art what it is apart from the way this banana has made its way into the art world.

I totally agree with this, I mean, if we go along with the proposed definition of “creation”, every man-made thing, including a rocket, would classify as being art. It seems more appropriate to say that some creations classify as art, but which ones? Also, art “as celebration”. What exactly is meant by that? Does a birthday party or a graduation ceremony, if somehow being creatively set up, classify as art? I doubt it. And then why would we need art galleries, art museums, art schools, etc? The definition must point to something more specific. The problem with Dickie is that he finally settled for a tautology: art is what is called art pr has an artistic intention. Although true, that does not clarify anything about what makes something artistic.

OTOH, while we need to point to something more specific, we should also look up for a definition that is broad enough as to describe what is common to Rodin’s sculptures and to Altamira’s cave paintings. I suggest that essential elements of art are:
1) It is man-made
2) It involves the free use of imagination, even if trying to reproduce or imitate something else
3) It is always concerned with form and composition, looking for the unity of a single work.
4) It is always concerned with technique, which involves selection and articulation of materials in the medium and tools used.
5) It is made to be contemplated, to provide an experience to observers, being that experience one of pleasure or enjoyment, either sensorial or both sensorial and intellectual.

All of these have been combined some way or another during the course of human history, most of the time tied to the production of everyday, practical objects, which also carried symbolical meaning in cultural practices. At some point in the modern age, production of objects for the sake of contemplation became a specialized discipline, divorced of the production of utilitarian objects (which became the discipline of design), and very much concerned with the innovative power of individual genius.

[Gertie]

Catarina Silva wrote

I searched for this specific topic because I have a fresh take I was discussing with my loved one recently. We always fall into the same ''you don't have enough sensitivity'' (read, me saying that to him). He mentions the banana in the wall with tape, an infamous piece of art sold for millions and with big repercussions online. The debate the banana sparked for me is proof that it is, indeed, art. It is a very conservative point of view to judge such a remarkable art installation. Saying that time, effort, and studies, are synonyms of art are elitist. In summary, art is what makes us feel, discuss and think.

An interesting take on art. But you can see where this goes insane: All one has to do is inspire conversation and one is making art. Then what do "artists" do? I guess I am dismayed by the flattening, if you will, of art, which is what happens when this deflationary concept takes over. If the banana is art then everything is art. Is this true? Maybe. There is the theory, I think it was the philosopher named Dickie, who claimed that art comes into existence when the perspective brought to bear on an object becomes one of art intent, that is, you look at a piece of driftwood as driftwood and it is, well, driftrwood. But take the driftwood AS art, so to speak, then it is no longer a piece of rotting dead tree, for all eyes are on the form, colors, setting, perhaps some nostalgia rises up and you say, how beautiful it is. What makes a cloud into a camel or a poodle? It's us seeing the cloud AS a poodle. And this "seeing as" is actually the foundation for all things to the understanding, taking that over there AS a mountain, or this on my porch AS a bicycle, and so on.

But still, then we face the question, what does it mean to take something AS art? It's not like taking it as a poodle of a mountain. What are the meaning criteria for such a perspective? My daughter is in grad school working on an MFA, and she agrees with you, but I can't agree. There has to be something that makes art what it is apart from the way this banana has made its way into the art world.

I think art is anything that the artist claims as art. I think *GOOD* art lies purely in the eye of the beholder, though.

Personally, I think the point and value of art and artists, is that the artist sees something in a way that I would have missed, and finds a way to communicate it to me, even if only in the form of a banana or a pile of used bed linen. It is the artist's *perspective* that I admire. YMMV

That's my inclination too. If someone tells me they created something as art, I'll assume they're communicating something to the viewer about the subject, or their feelings. Something which isn't easily communicated in a prosaic way. And for me, 'good art' does that well, it resonates in ways which are difficult to spell out.

And if you lay down rules about what constitutes 'proper' art, you're more likely to miss out, than gain anything.

[Pattern-chaser]

I think art is anything that the artist claims as art. I think *GOOD* art lies purely in the eye of the beholder, though.

Personally, I think the point and value of art and artists, is that the artist sees something in a way that I would have missed, and finds a way to communicate it to me, even if only in the form of a banana or a pile of used bed linen. It is the artist's *perspective* that I admire. YMMV

That's my inclination too. If someone tells me they created something as art, I'll assume they're communicating something to the viewer about the subject, or their feelings. Something which isn't easily communicated in a prosaic way. And for me, 'good art' does that well, it resonates in ways which are difficult to spell out.

And if you lay down rules about what constitutes 'proper' art, you're more likely to miss out, than gain anything.

It's nice to see your words. Not because they agree with mine — although we all have egos — but because they are accepting of how things really are. Or, more accurately, how they seem to us humans.

It's next to impossible to pin down what art is, what it does, or how it does it. I can tell you that I like much of Tracey Emin's work, and Banksy, and quite a bit of Kandinsky too. I can't really describe exactly why I like them, I just do. And that's rather the point of art, I think? Each of us can get something different from a work of art, and that's just part of it.

So why do some of us try so hard to pin these things down? An exact and precise measurement of how good a work of art is, is to misunderstand what art is about, I think? "Hey it has to be good, it has an Art Quotient of 34.792!"

[thrasymachus]

Count Lucanor wrote

OTOH, while we need to point to something more specific, we should also look up for a definition that is broad enough as to describe what is common to Rodin’s sculptures and to Altamira’s cave paintings. I suggest that essential elements of art are:
1) It is man-made
2) It involves the free use of imagination, even if trying to reproduce or imitate something else
3) It is always concerned with form and composition, looking for the unity of a single work.
4) It is always concerned with technique, which involves selection and articulation of materials in the medium and tools used.
5) It is made to be contemplated, to provide an experience to observers, being that experience one of pleasure or enjoyment, either sensorial or both sensorial and intellectual.

I actually want something like this to be right, but you know, contemporary aestheticians are going to have a field day with this, and I am not saying I disagree, but just that art has become so indeterminate, and nobody knows, or wants to know, what it is, because there is no limit one can impose on its nature, and this is because art has its ground not in the institutions of the past, but in experience itself. It's like trying to define economics: It's easy to talk about exchange of goods, the way money works, and so on, but note how everything you can say rests with other things. What is money if not use value of perhaps understood as a labor theory of value, or is there such a thing as intrinsic value, and if there is no value, there is no economics, so economics has its analysis in value, and value is in exchanges in every dealing we can imagine, and so all dealings are essentially economical ones in nature. I mean, to say what economics IS in so connected to all things, one can hardly find a boundary. Art is like this. Say it must involve the use of free imagination, as you do above, and one asks, what is the imagination and how is this the supposed to by in the making of art exclusively? The response is that is clearly not exclusively in the category of art that one finds imagination. But then, If one is using the imagination to conceive of a new lawn mower or dental procedure, how is it that this stands outside of art? Well, it does and it doesn't.

Or what if I have an aesthetic response to something that is not human made? Imagine, someone constructs a work of art that looks exactly like real driftwood, and I see it and believe it is just a bit natural rubbish taken out of a river. Then I am told, no this is a work of hyperrealism in 3D. Now it's art? There is an intractable ambiguity here, and philosophers try to deal with it. Is art in the observer's possible responses, of the artist's? Either way, are these not the same thing, the observer, after all, belongs to a culture and it is here one finds possiblities for judgment (this is what Heidegger argues).

There's a reason art is so ridiculous these days. It's because it is one of the most "open" concepts there is. Appreciation is SO wrapped up in criticism and interpretation, unlike economics which sort of just evolves. Art has criticism in its very nature, like philosophy, and so the banana is just an inevitability.

Isn't this where everything is headed: art doesn't know what it is because nothing like this "knowing" is possible any more. Post modern culture is entirely up in the air in terms of its social concepts, the kinds of things that in the past seemed as if there was a foundation are now int he air. It is freedom that is responsible, and long as freedom dominates a culture's social phenomena, there will always be the question, the piety of thought, Heidegger calls it---which is ironic because Heidegger is a social conservative (Jordan Peterson, the Canadian psychologist who rails against lgbtq and the moral ambiguities it raises is a Heideggerian). As long as a society is free to reconceive itself, its art will be an open concept, as will its ideas about gender identity, music, marriage, family, and so on.