What
Is A Work of Art?
a
potpourri of ideas, comments, thoughts on same
First, a couple of definitions:
Aesthetic: sensitive to perception of beauty
sensitive to art and beauty
showing good taste
Empathy: feeling—the projection of one’s own personality into the personality of another in order to understand his better; intellectual identification of oneself with another; the projections of one’s own personality into an object with the attribution to the object of one’s own emotional responses.
OK; now let’s have the ideas, comments and thoughts:
A. Broadly speaking, all art is an imitation of nature.
Painting, music, sculpture, architecture, literature, and drama are expressions
of human ideas, which in turn are the product of recalled images. These images are recalled because the
creator uses the images of past experience, the recollected forms of life, and
through them creates an object that is the result of his own imagination but
that fundamentally is nothing but life itself.
B. Art is man’s interpretation of life expressed in a
way that an be universally recognized and understood. The stimulus given by the work of art has not told the individual
what to think but it has brought to action or consciousness the individual’s
own experiences, images or ideas about life. It may stir the individual to a
deeper realization of life and man’s relationship to it or it may stir the
fundamental forces of God or the universe or nature. More usually, it gives him insight into man’s pitiful
helplessness, insignificance and ineffectuality when confronted with or
compared to the greater force that prompts his thoughts and actions.
C. The purpose of all art is to arouse the
emotions. A great painting (Sistine
Madonna), a building (Taj Mahal), Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, dramas like Oedipus
Rex or Hamlet, arouse the emotion and excite intense feeling in an
audience. They leave a lasting
impression.
D. The fine arts, despite their differences, are all
alike in that they offer us not life itself but a representation of life, in
terms of artistic conventions, a reading or interpretation or criticism of
life. Painting, for example, aims to
give aesthetic pleasure by representing or expressing life through the
convention of line, mass and color on a flat surface. There is no movement, no actual depth. Both are suggested.
Sculpture leaves out color and movement but retains depth. Photography
can leave out color, depth and movement but is so accurate that the
photographer finds it necessary to use some screening or defocusing process to
eliminate unessential detail or offset it by the use of odd light. If artistic representation becomes too
natural, it ceases to be artistic. In
the imitation of reality there must be some element of unreality.
Art, it should be noted, retains some of the elements of life but will
reject others as unessential. This
technique is based on the simple principal of selection. If this were not true, the playwright would
only have to reproduce nature or a part of life literally, photographically or
minutely. But this is not art. Literal representation on the stage never
succeeds in evoking emotional reactions of a profound sort. This is true of the actor as well.
Some arts reject concrete elements of life (as in literature/drama) and
translate the thought or feeling into language of abstractions, of pure
form. Music gains its effect through
its power to stir up emotions.
The artist must rearrange the parts of actual life into a whole that
may perhaps seems to be a life reproduction but in reality is not. In nature, there is not emphasis. In man’s expression of nature, there must be
emphasis. The parts that are omitted
can therefore no longer detract from the unity and coherence of the whole.
E. Between nature and ourselves there is a veil, a veil that is dense and opaque for the common hand, but thin, nearly transparent, for the artist and poet. Because life implies an acceptance only of the utilitarian side of things, all other impressions are dimmed or reach us as vague and blurred. Nature occasionally provides us with someone more detached from life whose sense or consciousness is revealed by his art. The veil is lifted. If we could have a complete detachment, we would see an artist like no other in the world. He would excel in every art at the same time and he would be able to perceive all things in their native purity. The forms, colors, sounds and the subtlest movement of the inner life would be perceived by him and he could put them all into one and—bang!
Usually, however, the veil is only partially lifted. Hence the artist may apply himself to color
and form. He sees the inner life of
things through color and form. Or
perhaps the veil is lifted to show the rhythmical arrangement of words which
become organized and animated and have a life all their own. The writer tells us or suggests things that
speech was not calculated to express.
So art, whether it be painting or sculpture, poetry or music, has no
other object than to brush aside the utilitarian symbols, the conventional and
socially accepted generalities, in short, everything that veils reality in
order, to bring us face to face with reality itself.
F. Francis Bacon said, “Art is man added to nature,”
and the moment we have the same element of selection and emphasis rather than
sheer representation, we have an approach to art, for no two persons see the
same thing.
G. Do not confuse the two terms “reality” and
“realism.” Reality is life, “for
real”—a misleading term. Realism is an
illusion of life as portrayed by the artist: life as make believe. No art is ever natural; it only seems
natural. The most interesting
conversation in life would be unreal or unsatisfactory in literature for it
would lack coherence, unity, climax, continuity. All art implies selection on the part of the artist. A photograph is artistic only when the
element of choice is evident through the subject chosen, through the
arrangement, the lighting, the emphasis, even through the delicate touches
obtained in the development and retouching of the negative.
H. Imagine that an individual has had an experience in
life which has given him personal pleasure by affecting him either emotionally
or intellectually. It may be a
discovery of a great truth, the realization of a philosophy, a humorous or
serious aspect of daily life. In any event, the participant has a desire to
reproduce that experience. (Aristotle
said that the one basic instinct of man is to imitate.) He wants to share his experience with
others. So he must choose an art form
through which he can speak this truth or knowledge or beauty.
I.
Every artist selects
and emphasizes just what he desires us to see,
We see life through his eyes.
But he works with a single goal: to share his emotional truth with us,
the truth he has observed or discovered or experienced. The purpose of art is to give aesthetic
pleasure and to clarify life through the communications of the artist’s
thoughts, ideas, or emotions to his audience.
It is the primary function of any work of art to stimulate the
imagination through the senses. The
physical experience of beauty lifts us out of ourselves and enables us to see
more deeply into the great realities.
This has been called “aesthetic pleasure” and is defined as an
appreciation of the beautiful.
J. Just what beauty is has never been defined. It may be different things to different
people. There are those who feel that
beauty is inherent in the subject matter itself and the artist merely records
that beauty. There are those who
believe that beauty lies in the artist’s skill, style or technique in
duplicating nature. Some would call it
a “unity in variety” or the complete idea or theme. Many moderns contend that beauty rests in the mind of the viewer
or hearer, that the artist strikes some note which brings to the observer’s mind
a pleasurable experience or emotion that gives the aesthetic pleasure through
recognition of a past experience.
Another theory would place the sense of beauty in the artist’s personal
interpretation of what he sees. This
has given us both the impressionists and the expressionists as well as many of
the “-isms” of modern art.
Some unite their ethical or religious thinking with their aesthetic
sense. Followers of John Keats and his
belief that “Beauty is truth, truth beauty” are closely allied to this
idea. But standing by themselves are
those who insist that only the presence of God or an emphasis on their own
moral code combined with their art can give them aesthetic pleasure. They are the moralists for they insist upon
the presence of a great moral theme or lesson.
There are also intellectuals who insist that before any object can give
them aesthetic pleasure it must challenge them to think or give them a greater
understanding of the world’s problems.
K. Closely allied to the importance of aesthetic
pleasure is the clarity of the artist’s communication. Leo Tolstoy said, “Art is a human activity
which is passed on to others, causing them to feel and experience what that
artist has felt and expressed. It is a
means of communication between people, uniting them in the same feelings. As soon as the spectators and the hearers
are affected by the same feeling which the artist felt, that is art.”
L. Aristotle said, “The aim of art is to represent not
the outward appearance of things but their inward significance, for this, and
not the external mannerism and detail, is true reality.” He felt that art should clarify and not
further complicate life.
M. Clayton Hamilton:
“Art and nature compete eternally with each other in the great task of
making humanity aware of what is true and beautiful and good. They are the two great teachers in our
schoolroom of the world. It would be
difficult to judge decisively whether art or nature is the greater teacher.
Nature has more to tell us but art is better skilled for utterance. Nature has so much to say that she has not
the patience for articulation. She
thrills us with a vague awareness of multitudinous indecipherable messages, but
she speaks to us in thunders and in whispers—elusive, indeterminate,
discomforting. Art, with less to say,
has more patience for the formulation of her messages; she speaks to us in a
voice that has been deliberately trained and her voice is lucid and precise. She does not, like nature, attempt to tell us
everything at once. She selects, instead,
single, definite and little truths to tell us at a time, and exerts herself to speak
it clearly. We can never estimate precisely
what it is that we have learned from nature, but whichever art has spoken to
us, we know exactly what we have been told.”
And
here are some other random quotes about art by artists…
Pointed criticism, if accurate,
often gives the artist an inner sense of relief. The criticism that damages is
that which disparages, dismisses, ridicules, or condemns.
--William Ernest Henley
They'll talk about me showing cleavage and my
belly, but they don't say anything about the artists who accept an award and
can't even talk because they're so drugged out. After the awards show, I go
home, drink my tea and go to bed.
--Britney Spears on the media
A musician must make music, an artist must paint,
a poet must write if he is to be ultimately at peace with himself. What one can
be, one must be.
--Abraham Moslow
Art is a jealous mistress.
--Ralph Waldo Emerson
Art produces ugly things which frequently become
beautiful with time. Fashion, on the other hand, produces beautiful things
which always become ugly with time.
--Jean Cocteau French poet, novelist, director
I tell you, the more I think, the more I feel
that there is nothing more truly artistic than to love people.
--Vincent van Gogh
My mother said to me, 'If you become a soldier,
you'll be a general; if you become a monk, you'll end up as the pope.' Instead,
I became a painter and wound up as Picasso.
--Pablo Picasso
The more perfect the artist, the more completely
separate in him will be the man who suffers and the mind which creates.
--T. S. Eliot
As artists, we must learn to be self-nourishing.
We must become alert enough to consciously replenish our creative resources as
we draw on them.
--Julia Cameron
Art is born in attention. Its midwife is detail.
--Julia Cameron
The artist is nothing without the gift, but the
gift is nothing without work.
--Emile Zola
I am enough of an artist to draw freely upon my
imagination. Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is
limited. Imagination encircles the world.
--Albert Einstein
Artistic creativity is a whirlpool of imagination
that swirls in the depths of the mind.
--Robert Toth
Art is not living. It is a use of living. The
artist has the ability to take that living and use it in a certain way, and
produce art.
--Audre Lorde
Great artists are people who find the way to be
themselves in their art. Any sort of pretension induces mediocrity in art and
life alike.
--Margot Fonteyn ( English dancer)
No artist is ahead of his time. He is his time.
It is just that the others are behind the time.
--Martha Graham
Perfect love is rare indeed - for to be a lover
will require that you continually have the subtlety of the very wise, the
flexibility of the child, the sensitivity of the artist, the understanding of
the philosopher the acceptance of the saint, the tolerance of the scholar and
the fortitude of the certain.
--Leo Buscaglia
Art, like morality, consists of drawing the line
somewhere.
--G.K. Chesterton
Good art maketh glad the heart of man.
Jeff Krewson
Human life itself may be almost pure chaos, but
the work of the artist is take these handfuls of confusion and disparate
things, things that seem to irreconcilable, and put them together in a frame to
give them some kind of shape and meaning.
--Katherine Anne Porter (1894-1980) US novelist, short-story writer
Every child is an artist, the problem is how to remain
an artist once he grows up.
--Pablo Picasso
I think most artists create out of despair. The
very nature of creation is not a performing glory on the outside, it's a
painful, difficult search within.
--Louise Nevelson US sculptor, painter
Ars Longa, Vita Brevis - Art (is) Long, Life (is)
Short
--Hippocrates
White. A blank page or canvas. So many
possibilities.
--Sunday in the Park with George, by Stephen Sondhiem and James Lapine
Art is just a pigment of your imagination.
--Tony Follari Comedian
Rubbish in, rubbish out does not apply to a junk
Artist.
--Tony Follari Comedian
Let your natural inclination be road sign that
will take you to your destiny.
--Robert Richard Toth, Artist
for other
artists on art:
http://www.scribbleskidsart.com/generic.html?pid=128
http://www.aenj.org/links/quotes.html
http://www.critiquestudio.com/mytoolbox/quotes.html