More and more often, I find myself listening to high-brow explanations of art or qualifications of art or the artistic process and reaching a state of confused amazement. It seems there are as many opinions on what constitutes art as there are people that bother to think about the concept, and it is a central tenant to the idea of progress that as we move forward, our thoughts as a culture and species move ever more often towards such frivolities.
Art? Frivolous? Don’t misunderstand me, I’m enamored with the idea of a final societal goal of eudaimonia; a Shangri-La world of perfect personal freedom. Art can exist only when there is enough personal freedom to step away from the daily practicum of life, only affluent societies that are on their way to eudaimonia can create such works; but what bothers me is the way such things are viewed. Far from frivolous, I think art is a necessity; so why then do we perceive something so important to the final goal as having such an untouchable grandeur? The shoes I wear when I mow the lawn are very important too, and they live in the garage alongside who knows what manner of creatures. Why is it the biggest proponents of art as a necessity tend to separate it so much from other necessities?
Here’s my thought on the defining trait of a construct of art- if a thing’s value is primarily aesthetic it is art, if it is primarily utilitarian, it is not art. The line blurs a bit of course, but notice one thing; no mention is made as to the QUALITY of the aesthetics. There is good art in the world and there is bad art, a point few would argue with, but at no point does the aesthetic quality sink below a line that it drops off the art spectrum completely. Good or bad, if a thing is made for a purpose that is non-utilitarian, it is art.
A certain movie critic briefly sent teenage males and life-long geeks everywhere into a frenzy by stating that video games would never be art. Aside from bafflingly sophomoric reasoning from an otherwise well-versed professional observer, the odd thing here is that he’s implying that it isn’t ALREADY art (or if you chose to not use my definition, its a thing that is neither primarily utilitarian nor high enough of the poshness scale to constitute art). While many that disagreed with him point to titles like Shadow of the Colossus and Okami, I’m not even sure why Pong and Space Invaders should be left out of the mix. Is it because they were too new? Too simple perhaps? Or were they too EASY to be considered art?
Several times over the course of the last century, the concept of traditional aesthetics have been challenged by artistic movements. The modern art movement posited that abstract forms can be just as potent a means to deliver a message than more traditional figures. Every couple decades of the century brought fourth a new kind of music that was less aesthetically oriented by arguably more emotionally charged that its predecessor. Many look at modern or post-modern works and feel that they constitute some of the highest forms of the creative process available today, so much so perhaps that the layman isn’t equipped well enough to properly extract the message, much like those who don’t drink wine aren’t trained to taste the differences in year and vineyard.
In literature, almost uniquely among the arts, we value the idea of a good ’story teller’. A proficient story teller can draw the audience into an otherwise completely banal and mundane story. Why is it that we praise our authors and playwrites for their ability to connect to untrained audiences, but look down upon musicians, visual artists, and directors that are accessible as not being artistic enough?
This seems to be the tip of a rather large iceberg here, that maybe someday I’ll get to covering more thoroughly. For the moment though, it seems to me that we’re just too concerned with making art some distant thing that only the super-elite can create or appreciate. It is not. Art is no more an achievement than composing an e-mail or taking out the trash. Its everywhere in the modern world, and the only real bad art that I can seem to find is the art that fails to communicate itself to the observer.
