Genuine Art

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
Indubitably.

Another person on this thread said, "Generally, art is whatever the artist says it is. The artist is the sole determinant of what constitutes art. "

I was hoping to hear from those sharing this opinion.

Originally posted by JS357
Another person on this thread said, "Generally, art is whatever the artist says it is. The artist is the sole determinant of what constitutes art. "

I was hoping to hear from those sharing this opinion.

indubitably.

Originally posted by rwingett
If each innovation is half of the previous one, then we must be getting close to nothing by now. Practice might bear that out.

But, just to be contrary, we could ask whether Lascaux was indeed an innovation, or whether it represented the first recorded alienation from 'being.' If all of language and art are stand-ins for the things-in-themselves, then t ...[text shortened]... vior, and, as Guy Debord might have said, the very beginning of 'The Spectacle' itself.

"If all of language and art are stand-ins for the things-in-themselves..."

That would be more of a prescriptive definition than an observation.

Originally posted by JS357
Another person on this thread said, "Generally, art is whatever the artist says it is. The artist is the sole determinant of what constitutes art. "

I was hoping to hear from those sharing this opinion.

Unfortunately, in the case of much art of the past, and especially of the distant past, the artist and his opinions are inaccessible to us. We have no idea whether the creators of cave paintings defined them as art, or even had any such concept. They are judged to be art, nevertheless, by the spectator.

Someone (film critic Gilbert Adair, I think) said that "art is, ultimately, whatever lasts."

Originally posted by JS357
Is Lascaux art?

Was it meant to be beautiful? Very probably. Equally probably there were also other reasons for making those pictures, but the aesthetic element was very likely present, perhaps even predominant. So, yes, it's art.

Richard

Originally posted by JS357
Another person on this thread said, "Generally, art is whatever the artist says it is. The artist is the sole determinant of what constitutes art. "

I was hoping to hear from those sharing this opinion.

Not me (as should be clear by now). If I write down a shopping list, it is not art. If an "artist" finds it where I lost it in the shops, and declares it "outsider art", and "a poignant statement on the vicarious life of the single white male in today's dog-eat-dog world", is it art? Of course not.

Art is that which was created with an aesthetic intent in mind.

Richard

Originally posted by Shallow Blue
Not me (as should be clear by now). If I write down a shopping list, it is not art. If an "artist" finds it where I lost it in the shops, and declares it "outsider art", and "a poignant statement on the vicarious life of the single white male in today's dog-eat-dog world", is it art? Of course not.

Art is that which was created with an aesthetic intent in mind.

Richard

Can a found object be physically incorporated into a work that is created with an aesthetic intent in mind and is therefore art? Supposing you will say yes, because wood can be carved, etc., then your shopping list could be used that way. The question then becomes whether there is, in addition to the intention, any minimum amount of work needed above merely pointing to it as art. Taping it to the refrigerator? 😉

Originally posted by JS357
Can a found object be physically incorporated into a work that is created with an aesthetic intent in mind and is therefore art? Supposing you will say yes, because wood can be carved, etc., then your shopping list could be used that way. The question then becomes whether there is, in addition to the intention, any minimum amount of work needed above merely pointing to it as art. Taping it to the refrigerator? 😉

That is a very good question, and I would have to admit that there is a certain grey area between "art" and "not art".
This is even more important in applied art: is a chair art? If it was made purely for sitting on, with no view for its looks, of course not. If it was made purely for looking at, with no care for whether it's any good as furniture (Mondriaan!), it's art. It may, then, not even be furniture - it may be called "chair" without, in proper fact, being one: a chair unsuitable for sitting on is a sculpture of furniture, much as Magritte's famous painting is not a pipe but a painting of a pipe. (And a Hepplewhite is both good art, because it was made to be beautiful, and good furniture, because it was made to be comfortable to sit in.)

As for my shopping list, no. I think there needs to be both aesthetic intent and actual creative contents from the artist before something is art. Otherwise, my book would be art - my book that I have not written (perhaps not yet). Taping something on a fridge is not creative input. It does not create anything new, nothing distinguishable from if I'd done it myself.
Folding an origami puppet of me from my shopping list would make it art; but in that case, I would say that it's the origami which is art, not the shopping list. The shopping list would be material. It would no more be art than the eggs which went into Rafael's tempera.

But yes, there is a grey area. Suppose I calligraphed my shopping list? Suppose someone arranged it just so on the pavement, and then made a carefully cropped photograph of it?

Richard

Originally posted by Shallow Blue
That is a very good question, and I would have to admit that there is a certain grey area between "art" and "not art".
This is even more important in applied art: is a chair art? If it was made purely for sitting on, with no view for its looks, of course not. If it was made purely for looking at, with no care for whether it's any good as furniture (Mon ...[text shortened]... [/i] on the pavement, and then made a carefully cropped photograph of it?

Richard

Could a urinal be considered art?

Originally posted by rwingett
Could a urinal be considered art?

Not even by a mutt.

Richard

Originally posted by Shallow Blue
Not even by a mutt.

Richard

But... but...

"A white gentlemen's urinal has been named the most influential modern art work of all time.

Marcel Duchamp's Fountain came top of a poll of 500 art experts in the run-up to this year's Turner Prize which takes place on Monday. "

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/4059997.stm

Originally posted by JS357
But... but...

"A white gentlemen's urinal has been named the most influential modern art work of all time.

Marcel Duchamp's Fountain came top of a poll of 500 art experts in the run-up to this year's Turner Prize which takes place on Monday. "

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/4059997.stm

I rest my case. Why is that urinal considered art? Because Duchamp said it was. And now we universally (I should hope) recognize it as such. The artist is the sole agent to determine what art *IS*. No one else is even entitled to have an opinion.

Originally posted by rwingett
I rest my case. Why is that urinal considered art? Because Duchamp said it was. And now we universally (I should hope) recognize it as such. The artist is the sole agent to determine what art *IS*. No one else is even entitled to have an opinion.

So does the opinion of the 500 count for anything?

Originally posted by JS357
So does the opinion of the 500 count for anything?

What 500?

Once the artist has TOLD you what art IS, then you have the freedom to declare whether you think it is good art or bad art. But you are NEVER at liberty to say that is ISN'T art.

Originally posted by rwingett
What 500?

Once the artist has TOLD you what art IS, then you have the freedom to declare whether you think it is good art or bad art. But you are NEVER at liberty to say that is ISN'T art.

OK I can at least say I understand your position. It is not entirely inconsistent with my view that the observer determines whether a work is art and he determines that only for himself. In your case, you determine whether a work is art by seeing whether the artist says it is. You defer to the artist. Of course I think when you determine that a work is art by seeing whether the artist says it is, you determining that it is art is only for yourself.