Art is what is taken away from the work that tugs away at your soul and makes you feel something.
Why make art such a cold thing? If I want form and structure I'd take a Calculus Course.
Jeremyday- If you want to be able to study art you have to quantify it in some way. I agree with you and I disagree. Art is certainly something that pulls at the heart, but it has a sort of objective ability to do that. Certain poets can better than others, if read by someone educated in literature. It's an artist's ability to evoke emotions, realizations, and appreciation from his/her reader that defines him/her as an artist.
Most of us come to art and literature not with a clipboard and hard hat, not in a cold, calculated manner, but as something that has inspired passion and feeling. I know this is why I came to it and continue to do so, but this doesn't mean that all art or opinion has to be respected as equal. Even individual opinion on a piece can change over a short space of time. I'm not denying people opinion, no one is, or the feeling that a piece evokes, but just because a person may have enjoyed it doesn't automatically make that piece any good.
You still have to be able to stand back from the work and give a fair, unbiased assessment of the work. This is something that is learnt and developed over time. No one is forgetting about the human element at all. Instinct and feeling are all important, in fact is highly important, but so is the ability to be able to stand back from the work a little as was mentioned previously elsewhere. My enjoyment of Oscar Wilde does nothing to cloud my judgement that his early poetry is anything much more than third-rate.
I agree with both Jeremyday and Neely. We are not dismissing the human or the emotional aspect of art... but entries of a teenage girl in her diary ("Does Jimmy like me? Suzy told me that Bobby told her that Sally thinks that Jimmy likes me. If he doesn't like me I'll just have to kill myself...") or even the baby crying convey human emotions... they just don't do it in a very artistic way... a way that stimulates us... even challenges us intellectually as well as emotionally. I'm certain that almost every teenager has written poetry or done drawings which they imagined at the time conveyed such profundity... and at which they will later cringe with embarrassment... much as we might cringe at Troll 2 or Jim Morrison's poetry. I would rather not talk about my teenage artistic efforts which were all, thankfully, long ago consigned to a land-fill somewhere.
Relying solely upon emotional responses is as problematic in judging art and even creating art as it is in other aspects of life. This does not mean that we shut off the emotions or that we deny their worth... but we also recognize a need to step back and assess things logically as well. There are moments of spontaneity and inspiration in art... but these are far more likely to occur in individuals who have put forth the labor in preparation. Do a little exploration as to the studies or preparation undertaken by poets such as Keats or Shelley or Rimbaud... the reading they did... their efforts in translating the poems of Greeks and Latin poets... the early, less-than-great poetic efforts.
There is a great story concerning the American painter, Willem DeKooning.
As one of the great Abstract Expressionists it was presumed that his paintings were all conceived in a sort of orgiastic frenzy. A young film-maker, wishing to compete with Hans Namuth's famous film on Jackson Pollack, talked DeKooning into allowing him to film his painting process. He showed up with the cameras and lights at the agreed upon time and spent an afternoon filming the artist as he rushed back and forth, slathering paint and scraping it off in wild abandon. After 4 hours or so, he thanked the artist and left.
A few months later, DeKooning ran into the young man in Central Park. He asked him how the film was coming, and the film-maker responded with enthusiasm, "It is to be released in a few weeks." The youth then queried the painter, "By the way, how did that painting turn out?" "That? Oh I threw that away the moment you left," he replied. Shocked, the young man asked, "but why!?" "You don't really think I paint like that?" replied Dekooning. "Do you remember that large cushy cushy chair in the rear of my studio? I spend most of my time sitting in that chair... staring at and studying the work in progress. Every now and then I get up and make a few marks and then I go back to the chair. That's how I really paint." Incredulous, the film-maker asked, "But then why did you put on that show with all the wild gestures, and slapping on paint?" The artist smiled, "Do you really believe anyone wants to watch a film of me sitting in a chair?"
As a painter myself, I can tell you that such is the truth. If I take it upon myself to make a painting expressing sadness or anger, I cannot maintain the emotions of sadness or anger the entire time I am painting. Much of the process involves stepping back... looking at the work objectively... recognizing the weaknesses and the strengths... thinking about all that I know of the formal aspects of visual art... how color or line or shape work... responding to how they relate. Of course there are moments of inspiration... sometimes even extended periods of great lucidity... perhaps not unlike the "runner's high"... moments when everything just "clicks"... when one has the Duende... to use Garcia-Lorca's term. But these moments are more likely to occur when one has properly prepared and when one puts in the endless labor... as unromantic as that may sound. "Inspiration exists, but it has got to find you working." Or so said Picasso, who one might argue knew more than a little about inspiration.
Self expression alone is not enough. It is easy to convey anger or sadness or whatever... I know that certain colors will almost certainly have a desired emotional impact... just as a composer knows that by using a minor key the music takes on an inherent sad or tragic nature... but the ability to simply convey emotions does not mean the art is good. Cliche, sappy, sentimental writing, paintings, music, and films may all succeed in conveying human emotions... but they don't do it well... they don't do it in a manner that will continue to engage an audience that has a degree of experience. We all know what awaits in the basement when that one individual gos off on his own in the latest horror flick. For art to have any continued worth it must stimulate our intellect as well as our emotions.
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Originally Posted by Alexander III
