Your personal definition of art

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I like the Chesterton quote 'where you draw the line'.

Where do you draw the line?
500 years ago, the chinese drew the line between amateur and professional : Art was amateur self expression, professional work had no more value than a cupboard or a pair of socks.
There is a similar divide in our modern appreciation of what is art and what isn't : art shouldn't be commercial, but we aren't quite clear about that. Do we categorize Irving Penn's and Avedon's commercial work as 'not art'? The romantic artist who lives off water and love, who lives to produce art only, is also a figure of ridicule.
Where is the line between kitsch and art? Someone made a reproduction of a Wylie Coyote cartoon cut out of metal plates, hung it on his wall calling it art. Is it? A friend's daughter justifies her obsession with make-up as an artistic endeavour, a search for beauty. Is that then also art?
Where is the line between very good artisanal work and art? Can a mass-produced camera be art? Is a hand-woven basket art? And if so, what makes this basket art, and the other just a utensil?
If a restaurant-bought meal can be described as art, what about a beautiful made-with-love family dinner? Is that not much more sublime, exalted, brimming with emotion than a T-bone from Sancho Panza's?

'I know it when I see it' is a perfect answer because it tells you nothing. I see a lot more questions than answers.
 
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It's a few dormant neurons lighting up and maybe a few sprays of dopamine. Nothing to see here, move on citizen. Like when a chimpanzee sees a banana.

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Murchu said:
Yes, but graphic is really the proper label here. I don't think we'll be seeing any actual diagrams of integrated circuits hanging in art museums anytime soon.. :)
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Who are you to determine the "proper" label, when thousands of engineers use and understand the term ?

What is an "art museum" ? You don't think this is pretty ?

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("Detail of Integrated Circuit, Intel Museum, Santa Clara, California, Usa", by Walter Bibikow; you can order a print here, have it matted, wood-framed, etc.: http://www.allposters.com/-sp/Detai...ta-Clara-California-Usa-Posters_i8946821_.htm)

See, the real problem with the term art is when people tell other people what not to call art. Enuff said.
 
ferider said:
See, the real problem with the term art is when people tell other people what not to call art. Enuff said.
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That wasn't really my intent, more to point out that just because something is in common usage, does not make it so. For example, I can refer to a vacuum cleaner as a 'hoover' as much as I want, but it does not mean it is actually one, unless it is actually a vacuum cleaner manufactured by the company Hoover.

Re: circuit diagrams, I am not arguing none have any artistic significance, or cannot be regarded as artwork, but rather that circuit diagrams as a whole are graphics to me, not artwork. Some may transcend that, but exceptions do not prove the rule.

In any case, I have my own personal definition of what I recognise as art, which I laid out in my first post. I am not here to impress that on others, more to discern others views in that I might widen my own. I do however believe that art (by which I mean artwork) is something can be objectively discerned.
 
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My second favourite quote on this topic (by a german painter, I think):
"Design follows function, art never."


Btw: It seems to me, the anglo-american tongue is quite more liberal to call something "art" or someone "artist"; ... compared to other languages.
 
ferider said:
See, the real problem with the term art is when people tell other people what not to call art. Enuff said.
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I don't think thats what this thread is about. I think the OP was just curious about our PERSONAL views which is much different conversation from what universally is or isn't considered art.
 
Wrong again, clearly he was interested in how to cook a good strip steak.
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At last someone finally gets what this thread is all about, I'm not sure I could possibly add anything more really now :D
 
airfrogusmc said:
I don't think thats what this thread is about. I think the OP was just curious about our PERSONAL views which is much different conversation from what universally is or isn't considered art.
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I would just like to confirm this is what I had intended with this thread :)

The steak advice is just an added bonus (sorry Fred, you were only half right..) :D
 
Shirley Creazzo said:
Mine is probably the working man's definition but I will go with a heightened awareness of things seen or heard. Does that leave things out? We have heard about the sound in the forest, but is it art if there is no audience? i.e. is it art when it is created or only when it is received?
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Art can only be created,reception is always distorted.
 
It is hard to find a good strip steak, had an awful one recently at Pastis but always get good ones a the Odeon. Go figure.

I always look at Ansel Adams when I get a chance (MoMA) but they never work for me, but I have not given up yet.
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Yes, but if you want a good steak, you're on the wrong coast. to styart with. Try the Far Western in Guadalupe on the Pacific Coast.

Then again I've never been to Argentina.

Cheers,

R.
 
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