Juan Valdenebro
Truth is beauty
Web recipe for denying art:
1. You say on an internet forum art means craft.
2. You say on an internet forum the word art is no longer necessary.
Please, don't take it personally, anyone... I just feel surprised about what the word art produces sometimes... It just doesn't thrill me: it's enough for me to consider art some photographs only.
Fine Art Photography thrills me!
Cheers,
Juan
1. You say on an internet forum art means craft.
2. You say on an internet forum the word art is no longer necessary.
Please, don't take it personally, anyone... I just feel surprised about what the word art produces sometimes... It just doesn't thrill me: it's enough for me to consider art some photographs only.
Fine Art Photography thrills me!
Cheers,
Juan
Juan Valdenebro
Truth is beauty
Exactly!!!
If art exists, photography can be art sometimes, as with other crafts...
Cheers,
Juan
lukitas
second hand noob
Art, craft. The Ming Chinese had the same obsession. The mark of art was that it was made by amateurs, professionals, or people who get payed for their work, were just craftsmen, no better than post-card sellers. In other words, rich do-nothings who desultorily dash of a little painting during a moment of boredom, were artists. The guys who worked at it were just proles.
European 'artists' were just craftsmen, until we invented the myth of the renaissance beginning the process of unshackling the artist from church patronage, culminating in the "art for arts' sake" of the romantic period. The myth of artistic freedom.
In fact, the economic dependence of the 'artist' on the patron never changed. The patron changed. And 500 years ago, the patron found that it was a good thing to shape the artist into a hero. "I have a Caravaggio!" "Way cool! But I have a Michelangelo!".
The artist then had to reinvent himself as a hero, which get us 'art' as being the strongest expression of his deepest emotion. The artist becomes a sort of priest, the guy who can channel our emotions, make them visible to us poor sinners and philistines.
The Iconoclasts of the twentieth century were quite right in making a frontal attack on the whole sorry myth built around the artist, but they failed to demolish the pedestal on which he is still standing. The artist became a commentator of society, a purveyor of truth.
But the fact that the artist has the same relationship to his patron as the cobblers' relationship to the guy who buys a pair of shoes hasn't changed at all. The artist is at best a good artisan, who sells the nice things he makes. If he sells sports photo's to a newspaper, that's just what it is : an honest job. But when the artist acquires heroic status, we enter fantasyland.
Chuang Tzu, an ancient Chinese philosopher, has this wonderful story about this butcher who was called in to perform a sacrifice of a buffalo for the king. His work was beautiful, a dance as fast as the whirlwind, the buffalo seemed to fall into pieces all of itself. When asked about his knife, the butcher said he hadn't sharpened it in four years. He said that, at first, he saw just the buffalo, but over the years, he'd learnt to see the spaces between the pieces of meat, and now he just needed to insert his knife into the right spot, and everything falls apart naturally. The King walked away declaring that he had learnt a lesson for life.
If art is anything, it must be this : the most perfect, most elegant, most beautiful job well done. Fine craftsmanship forged in years of repeatedly trying to do better, until it becomes seemingly effortless.
The fact that the name of the artist has become important is quite recent, and mostly superfluous silliness. Tenth century Icons from Byzantium have at best their owners' name attached to them. We don't even know what Altamira and Lascaux were about, let alone who were the artists - except that they were probably girls, from the size of the hand prints.
And the internet sinks us all into a great anonymous mass of named non-entities.
Art Fart.
European 'artists' were just craftsmen, until we invented the myth of the renaissance beginning the process of unshackling the artist from church patronage, culminating in the "art for arts' sake" of the romantic period. The myth of artistic freedom.
In fact, the economic dependence of the 'artist' on the patron never changed. The patron changed. And 500 years ago, the patron found that it was a good thing to shape the artist into a hero. "I have a Caravaggio!" "Way cool! But I have a Michelangelo!".
The artist then had to reinvent himself as a hero, which get us 'art' as being the strongest expression of his deepest emotion. The artist becomes a sort of priest, the guy who can channel our emotions, make them visible to us poor sinners and philistines.
The Iconoclasts of the twentieth century were quite right in making a frontal attack on the whole sorry myth built around the artist, but they failed to demolish the pedestal on which he is still standing. The artist became a commentator of society, a purveyor of truth.
But the fact that the artist has the same relationship to his patron as the cobblers' relationship to the guy who buys a pair of shoes hasn't changed at all. The artist is at best a good artisan, who sells the nice things he makes. If he sells sports photo's to a newspaper, that's just what it is : an honest job. But when the artist acquires heroic status, we enter fantasyland.
Chuang Tzu, an ancient Chinese philosopher, has this wonderful story about this butcher who was called in to perform a sacrifice of a buffalo for the king. His work was beautiful, a dance as fast as the whirlwind, the buffalo seemed to fall into pieces all of itself. When asked about his knife, the butcher said he hadn't sharpened it in four years. He said that, at first, he saw just the buffalo, but over the years, he'd learnt to see the spaces between the pieces of meat, and now he just needed to insert his knife into the right spot, and everything falls apart naturally. The King walked away declaring that he had learnt a lesson for life.
If art is anything, it must be this : the most perfect, most elegant, most beautiful job well done. Fine craftsmanship forged in years of repeatedly trying to do better, until it becomes seemingly effortless.
The fact that the name of the artist has become important is quite recent, and mostly superfluous silliness. Tenth century Icons from Byzantium have at best their owners' name attached to them. We don't even know what Altamira and Lascaux were about, let alone who were the artists - except that they were probably girls, from the size of the hand prints.
And the internet sinks us all into a great anonymous mass of named non-entities.
Art Fart.
Juan Valdenebro
Truth is beauty
Totally sounds like craft, and not like art...
If we think of the most influential visual artist at a world level in the last 100 years, that would possibly be Picasso, and he was never after any traditional perfection, elegance or beauty...
Cheers,
Juan
NickTrop
Veteran
Well, I certainly have no time for a hack like Shakespeare. I share the opinion of Voltaire, Tolstoy, and George Bernard Shaw when it come to the Bard of Avon. Joseph Conrad? Now "maybe" I'll make an exception to prove the rule.
__--
Well-known
Just finished watching a new HBO documentary on Robert De Niro Sr., in which his son, the actor, reads excerpts from his father's journals and also speaks very honestly and movingly about their relationship. A Google search will lead to a wikipedia article on Sr's life, which has much that is of interest.
The HBO documentary brings out strongly how it can feel to be an artist and can also give you an idea of what art is. Depressing, now, to come back and read some of the blather that litters so much of this thread. But, then, it's hard to find any photography forum that has intelligent, or even interesting, discussion of art. I've got to remember to stop trying to participate in these threads.
MITCH ALLAND/Potomac, MD
Download links for book project pdf files
Chiang Tung Days
Tristes Tropiques
Bangkok Hysteria
Paris au rythme de Basquiat and Other Poems
The HBO documentary brings out strongly how it can feel to be an artist and can also give you an idea of what art is. Depressing, now, to come back and read some of the blather that litters so much of this thread. But, then, it's hard to find any photography forum that has intelligent, or even interesting, discussion of art. I've got to remember to stop trying to participate in these threads.
MITCH ALLAND/Potomac, MD
Download links for book project pdf files
Chiang Tung Days
Tristes Tropiques
Bangkok Hysteria
Paris au rythme de Basquiat and Other Poems
Chris101
summicronia
C'mon Mitch, you know how good it is to educate us plebs. You're one of the good guys anyway.
lukitas
second hand noob
Well, Picasso did have a long, and even moderately successful career before he invented cubism. If I remember well, he even was a bit of a child prodigy.
And frankly, that is entirely my point : Picasso's work is craft, his genius is that he moulded African art (well, yes : craft) into the European canon, and then he became a hero and nobody really knows what for.
ART is about names, heroes, geniuses found by curators who relentlessly sniff out new talent, it is about high volume sales and great brand value.
Being an artist is just craftsmanship. Wether it be Picasso, HCB, or Rembrandt. The Holy Halo of Heroism that shines around the head of the Artist is only a construct of the public.
Ranchu
Veteran
The problem is that art has no words unless it's writing, but some people like to **** around with words. So they insist, and insist, and insist, that HERE is what IT IS in words. It's not much to know, really.
Juan Valdenebro
Truth is beauty
Picasso's work was not craft, but art.
Using materials doesn't mean there's no concept or concepts beyond traditional craft.
About what I marked, to some of us real artists are common sweet people we talk to.
Cheers,
Juan
Juan Valdenebro
Truth is beauty
Ranchu
Veteran
Pablo Picasso was never called an ***hole. NSFW http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sl8sWnUZVL4
Juan Valdenebro
Truth is beauty
Ranchu
Veteran
I agree, glad you liked it!
mfunnell
Shaken, so blurred
Nick, always and once again the provocateur. Some day you'll have to let us know if you regard this sort of trolling as an art or "merely" a craft.
...Mike
btgc
Veteran
What about if craft can be valued and priced according to how well the piece is made, what materials are used, how strong and usable it is, but art, on contrary, can be valued, priced and sold independent from this, relying only on opinion made up by curators, art houses and other art promoters? And, sure, basing on what people are ready to pay for, just like in case of crafts.
Juan Valdenebro
Truth is beauty
Not fair, Nick, Shakespeare can't share others' opinion on you!
Cheers,
Juan
(Just kidding...)
Jobin
Established
Seems to me like people are over analyzing things for some kind of validation. Just use a camera and have fun.
