The Great Art Debate

[TANGODANCER]

I already stated (more than once) that I find Rembrandt a great artist; not because anyone tells me to, but because I think so. Not a criteria that either looks for support from others, or makes me an art appreciater of renown.( If just agreeing with others is the criteria, then I never will be)

I think this sounds like a bit of a low blow. Nobody has accused you of liking art because anyone tells you too - so it reads like an insinuation that WtW is like that - when the evidence is quite to the contrary - he has dissed what is very popular and highly acclaimed art - the Pre-Raphaelites (the stuff we are henerally "told" to like) - and he took great care to say how and why Rembrandt moves him - I see no reason for such an insinuation.

Vetriano's painting (which I could probably make a quite passable copy of if I had to),

but wasn't the idea that "anyone" could make a pile of bricks part of your objection to the pile of bricks being great art? Now you say you could quite easily knock up a Ventriano - maybe you could - but then there must be another reason for your dislike of the bricks other than its easy knockupability...

You are entirely entitled to dislike the bricks - nobody will insist that you do - I'd just like to hear why - that's all.

Bish. Please stop the patronising stuff, I'm seventy, not seven. And I'm also sure that WTW can take my comments without offence or insinuations of "low-blows" Look, I don't dislike bricks. I've got a house made of them. Long live the great British brick. I just reserve the right not to see piles of them on the floor and someone claiming them as any form of art. If you wish to do so, then fine. You might also note that I said it was Vetriano's idea for his painting I liked and not his great skill as a painter when based against really great painters. There are thousands of great painters, sculptors etc etc. Every one of them says something to somebody somewhere, some to you, some to me. Defining why is back to human nature and personal opinion, something I'm tired of repeating. If it suits you, then I'll admit you are obviously more of an art expert then me (something I never claimed anyway). Will that do?

[thebish]

Bottom line of all debate is one side trying to win, to convince the other side they are wrong. Is that not just sheer opinionism where art is concerned? There are no logical arguments where human felings are concerned.

Trying to get people to throw up coconuts so the they can knocked down by a supposedly superior view isn't debate, that's opinionism. If one person's premise is that something he sees as great art (because he claims it attacks his emotions and moves him, says something to him) then why is anothers less viable or valuable because he prefers different artists? Art is but somebody's creation of their own ideas after all. Gee Bish, I can't remember knocking your views anywhere, but they're yours, not mine.

show me where I have knocked your views. to me this is not about winning - i am not in the least bit interested in being "right" - I WAS interested in other people's opinions about why they see things as great art - that is genuinely interesting to me, I thought that was what this thread was about.

I don't know why you are being so defensive - really I don't.

[thebish]

I already stated (more than once) that I find Rembrandt a great artist; not because anyone tells me to, but because I think so. Not a criteria that either looks for support from others, or makes me an art appreciater of renown.( If just agreeing with others is the criteria, then I never will be)

I think this sounds like a bit of a low blow. Nobody has accused you of liking art because anyone tells you too - so it reads like an insinuation that WtW is like that - when the evidence is quite to the contrary - he has dissed what is very popular and highly acclaimed art - the Pre-Raphaelites (the stuff we are henerally "told" to like) - and he took great care to say how and why Rembrandt moves him - I see no reason for such an insinuation.

Vetriano's painting (which I could probably make a quite passable copy of if I had to),

but wasn't the idea that "anyone" could make a pile of bricks part of your objection to the pile of bricks being great art? Now you say you could quite easily knock up a Ventriano - maybe you could - but then there must be another reason for your dislike of the bricks other than its easy knockupability...

You are entirely entitled to dislike the bricks - nobody will insist that you do - I'd just like to hear why - that's all.

Bish. Please stop the patronising stuff, I'm seventy, not seven. And I'm also sure that WTW can take my comments without offence or insinuations of "low-blows" Look, I don't dislike bricks. I've got a house made of them. Long live the great British brick. I just reserve the right not to see piles of them on the floor and someone claiming them as any form of art. If you wish to do so, then fine. You might also note that I said it was Vetriano's idea for his painting I liked and not his great skill as a painter when based against really great painters. There are thousands of great painters, sculptors etc etc. Every one of them says something to somebody somewhere, some to you, some to me. Defining why is back to human nature and personal opinion, something I'm tired of repeating. If it suits you, then I'll admit you are obviously more of an art expert then me (something I never claimed anyway). Will that do?

once again you entirely miss the point - in idle moments I wonder if you do it on purpose. you take disagreement always to be an attack. I have not claimed to be an art critic - I have merely tried to put into words why I like different categories of art and tried to come up with some ways of explaining why I would make distinctions.

you have made no such similar effort other than to say you like it because you like it - and take offence if I seek to press you further and try to put into words why... I really don't know why that's such an issue for you. why so defensive??

you have simply said - "I like this - but not that" - don't you even think it is remotely valid to try to explore WHY you like one and not the other? I thought that was what this thread was for...

[William the White]

To say, first of all, i'm not remotely offended by any of Tango's comments, nor do i feel them as a low blow.

And it's true I'd like to convince Tango that some 'modern art' at least is worthy of serious consideration - because if there's anybody on this thread ferocious in his antagonism about certain kinds of art it's not me about Vettriano (dismissal of the total kind, but mildly expressed) but Tango about Emin and other YBAs of the 1980s/early 90s.

Here there's a simple refusal to engage with even the possibility that something might be said in their favour. I'm not sure why he feels so hostile to a form of art he boasts he wouldn't bother ever seeing and feels it appropriate to dismiss them as 'con artists' without ever having tried to engage with their work.

Much earlier in this thread I've offered some preliminary and in-a-tiny-minority defence of Emin (who it is simply ludicrous to call a con artist, she's capable of infuriating, but not of conning) - and i think it's true to say that Tango has not been prepared to enter the debate. Why do you hate Emin so much, why do you think Vettriano is worth a place on your wall? Obviously mutual incomprehension here - perhaps we could discuss it?

I'll also say that Tango and I have a genuine shared appreciation of many great artists.

[Puskas]

The great mass of people is neither finite nor are it's opinions constant - so it's difficult to tell really.

The great mass of people certainly are flippin finite - it'd be a bit hard to move, otherwise...

[Worthy4England]

The great mass of people is neither finite nor are it's opinions constant - so it's difficult to tell really.

The great mass of people certainly are flippin finite - it'd be a bit hard to move, otherwise...

It may well be at a point in time in the future. How can something that keeps increasing (the population) be finite, unless you artificially bound it - by the time you've counted two of the population, the total is already greater than when you started counting?

[mummywhycantieatcrayons]

Bish says it for me, mummy...

Interesting.

Firstly, I think Bish is answering a subtly different question: "What is great art?" I asked you specifically about this 'sense of art' business because I thought it was an interesting phrase. I'm not going to try and argue that market forces offer us much help, but it is clear that Vettriano has a sense of what a lot of people like looking at - indeed it's a least arguable that it takes somebody with a very well developed sense of art to produce something that people want to put on postcards (seeing as you mentioned them), calendars, posters etc. Anyway, it's not at all obvious to me that that Vettriano has less of this artistic X-Factor than Emin's eyelashes.

I mention market forces. You seemed to endorse Bish's comments in their entirety, including, presumably, this:

Except that for me "Great Art" should have the power to touch or move a significant number of people - not just a select few - and in doing so - would limit it to quite a small category.

Doesn't this start to get towards 'popularity'?

You see, to me, and I may be wrong, it seems that it is only a fairly narrow elite who appreciate and are moved by Emin's work. Tango does a great turn as the representative of the average bloke and, without necessarily offering a judgement of my own, I'd say that there are more people on his 'side' of the discussion than yours.

Puskas offers this:

I also (siding with da bish and WTW) think there's an emotional component to it - and one that is, if not universal, at least speaks to many people

That almost suggests there's a quota, a threshold that says that if a certain percentage of people are moved, somewhere between 0 and 100 (i.e. 'universal'), THEN it's great art.

My own view is this numbers game doesn't actually take us very far. But if we were to rely on numbers, I think Jack would fare a lot better than Tracey.

I'm just wondering whether if something that had an intense effect on a very small minority might have a better claim to greatness to something that gently moves a much wider audience. Similarly, I wonder if somebody who had a flair for pleasing a wide audience might have a claim to a great 'sense of art' without ever producing 'great art'.


Anyway, I notice our very own Mofgimmers has written on a similar subject today:

http://www.tvthrong.co.uk/school-saatch ... rt-rubbish

[Hoboh]

I actually like the work of pavement artist's with the space fantasy's etc and others such as sand sculptors.

Art either does something for you or it doesn't.

[Puskas]

The great mass of people is neither finite nor are it's opinions constant - so it's difficult to tell really.

The great mass of people certainly are flippin finite - it'd be a bit hard to move, otherwise...

It may well be at a point in time in the future. How can something that keeps increasing (the population) be finite, unless you artificially bound it - by the time you've counted two of the population, the total is already greater than when you started counting?

Sorry, but no - it'll never be infinte. You can't reach a non-finite amount by adding two finite amounts together. There's always a bigger number you can have - (if you have any finite x, x+1 is always bigger)
We can define omega (the first transfinite ordinal) as the limit of addition, if you like - something addition will tend towards if applied infintely often. But it'll never reach it, despite tending towards it.

But this is getting off topic. My point was that expressed by you, earlier - you don't need the full population. You can take a small section of it, and have no agreement on art. In that case, how does the word have any meaning? If it means different things to different people, that makes any converstations you have about it meaningless, as they're not talking about the same thing - unless they refer to some empirical aspect of it. A set of shared behaviour and so on that's associated with art, and not the "stuff" itself (since there's no agreement on what the "stuff" is).

[thebish]

I mention market forces. You seemed to endorse Bish's comments in their entirety, including, presumably, this:

Except that for me "Great Art" should have the power to touch or move a significant number of people - not just a select few - and in doing so - would limit it to quite a small category.

Doesn't this start to get towards 'popularity'?

I can't answer for WtW - but I can clarify the comment you have taken out of my post. My "numbers" aside is there to try to exclude from my category 4 art that moves someone because there is a personal identification with the artist or a personal identification with the subject of the art. I wrote a "significant number" in order to take it beyond a vedry limited number of relatives or close circle of people who identify personally with painter or subjecty in that way - not to indicate mass appeal or "popularity"

on reflection - it was badly/confusingly put. It would have been clearer if i had said something like "great art has the power to "move" me beyond any accidental identification with the artist or the subject of the art."

the numbers question is interesting though...

I think I would still suggest that it is an important indicator that lots of people are moved by a work of art - NOT that lots of people BUY it, or LIKE it, or think it is NICE - but are moved by it. In fact - "decorative art" is very likely to have mass appeal - but LIKING something or finding something NICE does not mean that it moves you. Me and Tango agree in liking the pre-raphaelites (or at least - some of them!) - I like them - they are decorative - and mass-market - but they don't "move" me. I don't know if they move Tango or not in any way - but, like me, he likes them.

I think the vettriano is quite nice - the light is pleasant and it is pretty - and it has mass market appeal - but does it MOVE people? I suspect not - and I haven't heard the person who posted it say that it moves him - rather that he likes it and he can describe what the scene is and likes the idea of the scene painted - all of which is fine - and a marvellous reason for hanging it in your home or having it on a postcard or on a greetings card - but (in my opinion) it does not make it "great" art.

[thebish]

I actually like the work of pavement artist's with the space fantasy's etc and others such as sand sculptors.

Art either does something for you or it doesn't.

indeed. what do sand sculptors and pavement space fantasy art do for you? Can you try to put it into words?

[Worthy4England]

The great mass of people is neither finite nor are it's opinions constant - so it's difficult to tell really.

The great mass of people certainly are flippin finite - it'd be a bit hard to move, otherwise...

It may well be at a point in time in the future. How can something that keeps increasing (the population) be finite, unless you artificially bound it - by the time you've counted two of the population, the total is already greater than when you started counting?

Sorry, but no - it'll never be infinte. You can't reach a non-finite amount by adding two finite amounts together. There's always a bigger number you can have - (if you have any finite x, x+1 is always bigger)
We can define omega (the first transfinite ordinal) as the limit of addition, if you like - something addition will tend towards if applied infintely often. But it'll never reach it, despite tending towards it.

But this is getting off topic. My point was that expressed by you, earlier - you don't need the full population. You can take a small section of it, and have no agreement on art. In that case, how does the word have any meaning? If it means different things to different people, that makes any converstations you have about it meaningless, as they're not talking about the same thing - unless they refer to some empirical aspect of it. A set of shared behaviour and so on that's associated with art, and not the "stuff" itself (since there's no agreement on what the "stuff" is).

You don't need to apologise before telling me it's not infinite - I've never said anywhere that is was. I asked how it could be finite unless you artificially bound it. If you define it as omega, it's transfinite, which is just a mathematical device to say that it's larger than finite, but cannot be infinite as there will always be plus one.

But I agree - to the point in hand. I originally said that to me art is beyond definition - which in the wider sense (all art is clearly definable to all people), I still maintian. There is no definition I've found that universally describes art as something that has the same general meaning to all participants. There are subsets (without particularly trying to take a mathematical connotation) - collections of things within the broad definition that some people will agree on and debate. Other items that will be art to one person but not another. In the former case, then there's a genuine dialogue about a particular piece, which might result in different opinions, but is nonetheless about the piece of art. The latter case is probably more interesting, there can certainly be meaningful debate about whether the item under discussion is art, which I agree isn't about the art itself, but about whether the item should be in the category of art, but there is also a position around accepting that something's art (because by X's definition it is) then explaining at length as to why it's "bad art" or "not really art".

With apologies to the people that wanted to discuss "art" for this diversion.

[Puskas]

You don't need to apologise before telling me it's not infinite - I've never said anywhere that is was. I asked how it could be finite unless you artificially bound it. If you define it as omega, it's transfinite, which is just a mathematical device to say that it's larger than finite, but cannot be infinite as there will always be plus one.

It will be finite because it starts finite and grows finitely (in the sense that each growth incrementation is also only a finite increase) - unless it grows for an infinite period of time (which we don't have...) it will always be finite, no matter how big it grows.

I'd also take issue with your categorisation of transfinite number theory as "just a mathematical device". But it's probably the wrong place to do it. So I'll shut up.

And repeat your apologies to those who wanted to talk about art....

[Hoboh]

I actually like the work of pavement artist's with the space fantasy's etc and others such as sand sculptors.

Art either does something for you or it doesn't.

indeed. what do sand sculptors and pavement space fantasy art do for you? Can you try to put it into words?

Float the boat, Marvel at the imagination that lets them build or paint what they do, how they craft and construct them, imagine ones self in such places with the tingle factor, that enough

[mummywhycantieatcrayons]

I actually like the work of pavement artist's with the space fantasy's etc and others such as sand sculptors.

Art either does something for you or it doesn't.

indeed. what do sand sculptors and pavement space fantasy art do for you? Can you try to put it into words?

Float the boat, Marvel at the imagination that lets them build or paint what they do, how they craft and construct them, imagine ones self in such places with the tingle factor, that enough

It's amazing to think that geometric optical linear perspective (making stuff look like it's 3-dimensional) actually had to be 'invented'... I've have been reading a little bit recently about the rise of the Medici family and their role in the Renaissance, and it seems that Brunelleschi, heavily patronised by the Medici, has a reasonable claim to have been the first to do this, at the start of the 15th C.

[thebish]

I actually like the work of pavement artist's with the space fantasy's etc and others such as sand sculptors.

Art either does something for you or it doesn't.

indeed. what do sand sculptors and pavement space fantasy art do for you? Can you try to put it into words?

Float the boat, Marvel at the imagination that lets them build or paint what they do, how they craft and construct them, imagine ones self in such places with the tingle factor, that enough

yeah - of course it is!

I like that stuff too - and for me the appeal is in the technique and artistic skill in doing it - it is truly amazing... my reaction to them is one of interest and admiration - pretty much the same kind of reaction I'd have to a seeing a squirrel juggling - wow! how cool is that - how is that done - etc...

my reaction is to the technique and the skill in executing rather than so much the actual art produced - though there is clearly at least some link - because if it didn't look good - then I wouldn't admire the technique...

so - in my personal categorisation of 4 reasons that people like art - (and these are just my own wild stab at trying to describe the varied ways people react to art - so probably not exhaustive) then they would be like the spiral pen-drawing of jesus' face... something that interests and intrigues me - entertains me - but doesn't "move" me.

[William the White]

Remember this - Verbal posted a while ago...

This is art of tremendous skill, dramatic storytelling, emotionally powerful - look at the audience, see the tears... In a medium of its nature entirely transmutable, rendered visible to a large audience by technology, which also gives it a permanence...

It's brilliant, it's sand, it's art... it moves the viewer, makes you think, makes you care, makes you wonder...

Fab, Verbal - I emailed it to loads of mates...

Ukraine's got Talent, sand artist. unbelievable

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=518XP8prwZo

[William the White]

I actually like the work of pavement artist's with the space fantasy's etc and others such as sand sculptors.

Art either does something for you or it doesn't.

indeed. what do sand sculptors and pavement space fantasy art do for you? Can you try to put it into words?

Float the boat, Marvel at the imagination that lets them build or paint what they do, how they craft and construct them, imagine ones self in such places with the tingle factor, that enough

Outstanding summary of what art can do.

[thebish]

Remember this - Verbal posted a while ago...

This is art of tremendous skill, dramatic storytelling, emotionally powerful - look at the audience, see the tears... In a medium of its nature entirely transmutable, rendered visible to a large audience by technology, which also gives it a permanence...

It's brilliant, it's sand, it's art... it moves the viewer, makes you think, makes you care, makes you wonder...

Fab, Verbal - I emailed it to loads of mates...

Ukraine's got Talent, sand artist. unbelievable

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=518XP8prwZo

stunning - I think I had something else in mind when "sand art" was mentioned! (the ornate castles you see on the beach) I have never seen this before - and - yes - it isn't JUST the skill and the technique - it is very moving..

interesting questions...

the LIVE aspect adds something - if a "still" of one of the stages of the sand-art was displayed - or a sequence of stills - would it have the same power? I suspect not (this doesn't diminish it - it is just a question) - this could be categorised as "performance art"

the MUSIC - is that added by the Youtube boffin - or was that part of the original performance - because my guess is that forms a whole with the visual and is at least a part of what adds the emotion...

you hint that PERMANENCE is important... but - is it? can art be "great" that is temporary?

great stuff - keep it coming!

[mummywhycantieatcrayons]

Remember this - Verbal posted a while ago...


Ukraine's got Talent, sand artist. unbelievable

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=518XP8prwZo

I missed this first time round. Wow.