If I am bold enough to put up this Web site, then I am also stupid
enough to pontificate on this question.
I am deeply unhappy with the answer, so often heard today "Art is what artists do"
because, of course, no-one explains how to decide whether the speaker is an artist.
Are artists self-proclaimed? Or those who have been through the art-skool system?
Or those who have sold something to someone under the title of art (and who is
the purchasor to decide?)?
Some might say everyone is an artist. Then is everything art? If we take that line
haven't we lost something? There is then no special quality (or feature or characteristic)
of the artistic endeavour that gives it any merit. Merit - oh dear - merit means
we're making judgements - wash my mouth out.
Next he will be asking what is good art and what is bad art.
And how come drawing, painting, music, cinema, performance, sculpture, pottery,
French public conveniences, mathematical formulae - all can be talked of as
having artistic merit. Being beautiful?
A sunset may be beautiful, but is it art?
Personally I subscribe to the seen-it skool rather than the done-it skool.
The seen-it skool says that art is a response in the observer (or experiencer).
There is, to give it a nice name, an aesthetic response. Any of us (including
the artists themselves) are capable of an aesthetic response.
The aesthetic response may be triggered by a fine painting, a concise mathematical
formula, a French you-know-what.
Unfortunately this cannot be the whole story.
Why do we value original art more than imitation? How can some people
get more out of art when they know more about it? Is this aesthetic
response complex - like it has innate and learnt components? Can you learn to
enhance your response and tune your sensitivities? (And I am not talking
artificial devices here)
Presumably yes on most of these questions (why else be rhetorical?).
So, on this story, art is anything that is (or will be, or was) capable
of inducing an aesthetic response in someone. The aesthetic response has an innate
seedcorn (i.e. it must be at least possible for a human being to experience)
plus more or less learnt baggage (like fashion and chattering class pressure
- you know the sort of thing).
(Just when he is about to make a serious point, he goes and spoils it. Bah!)
Of course the aesthetic response has to succumb to the "will be or was capable"
bit since the ancient Romans could have been aesthetic in ways we cannot grasp today
(one is even be reminded of an ancient Indian text, for things to grasp).
And so also for some future peoples. So how can we reliably say anything is
included or excluded from the umbrella of "Is it art?"
Full circle? Fool circle.
