Does art take away from life?

@djjd62,

Dont get me wrong, I love art and I struggle to oil paint. But it is just like sex and food in that it does far more for someone if they do it rather than watch.

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First of all, doesn't this whole question hang on the assumption that anyone reading it agrees on what art is?

Art is everywhere. Good art is life. The little things that make us human can be uncovered and discussed. I personally have a tendency to see almost everything as some kind of art.

I also love art museums, although a little jukebox in the corner would be more fun. The Detroit insitute of arts is spectacular now after the renovation. If there was ever any reason to visit Detroit, the DIA is on the top of the list.

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@chai2,

Hi! thanks for the welcome. Roger too - hi roger:)

"spin a stone" = selling someone something that you can find anywhere, and would never buy were it not for the salesmanship.
Like "he could sell ice to an Eskimo" I suppose.

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@djjd62,

djjd62 wrote:

Ionus wrote:
Give me a sunset in the bush over spattered paint in an airconditioned room any day.

i still consider that art, it's just natural art

This sums up my exact point.
How is it 'natural art'?
You mean that, you're looking at nature with the 'aesthetic attitude', which is how you would look at art.

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@The Pentacle Queen,

Quote:

You mean that, you're looking at nature with the 'aesthetic attitude', which is how you would look at art.

I think there is a huge difference between man made art and what occurs in nature. We are supposed to be artistically looking at Nature, not a second hand imitation of someone's expression of nature.

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@Ionus,

Ionus wrote:

You mean that, you're looking at nature with the 'aesthetic attitude', which is how you would look at art.

Me, walking through nature, I look and react. First I just register what is in front of me. Second, I may revolt, as in, stop that wind, dammit. Next, I may like what I see, or not, and, after all these years, come up with a take on what I am looking at. I might like my framed cool projection of natural dimensions, or I might like the chaos. Which of those I see may be based on my mood that day.

I think there is a huge difference between man made art and what occurs in nature. We are supposed to be artistically looking at Nature, not a second hand imitation of someone's expression of nature.

As I said earlier, I think art is a continuum with nature, an expression of reactions to it, riffs, if you will. Second hand imitation - second hand, sure, by definition. But a reaction isn't always an imitation. Even if at base it is, it is a kind of connection for the artist.

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@The Pentacle Queen,

Well, if you look at some fine photographs of nature, say, electron micrographs, you will see distributions that can shock you for beauty. Maybe that'll be because you went to school for a bit, or maybe it is built in to humans to just see.

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@mushypancakes,

Quote:

Intellectualizing too much can take away from life. IMO.

Cant repeat that too much.

I love art critics who, due to lack of their own talent, try to ascribe meanings to work that the artist , if he/she listened, would laugh their heads off.

I once did a series of watercolors on industrial subjects . I loved the way that the atmosphere and light played on the various buildings and hunks of machinery. When I had several of these works on a three person show, a Philadelphia art critic was going off on how my inner demons were striking out at the machine and all the evil it brings(something like that, I am in acute ADD). I had no idea what he was smokin at the time but we had some good yucks . I earned the name "Damion" for a few months.
Helped me get laid , so I thank critics when they show up to an opening.

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@farmerman,

Grins to Farmer..

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@farmerman,

Quote:

Helped me get laid

Gomer got laid once ?? Shocked

There is hope for me yet.....

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I view art as an expression. It's a communication of one sort of another that someone has felt led to offer and it elicits a response of one sort or another from the viewer/ listener/ participant.
It is a purposeful event- unlike nature which is absolutely just as spectacular - moreso many times- but ongoing and spontaneous- not a discreet or planned event or contribution.

For me, it depends on the time of year and where I am. I think May is my favorite month in England and that's because the yellow rape is in flower and the fields of it are more spectacular than any painting. It is a color so vivid in hue - I've never seen anything like it before in a painting, let alone in nature and that almost surreal yellow against the blue, or even more spectacularly, grey and threatening sky and the green grass is more spectacular than any painting- so you'd be hard pressed to get me out of the fields and into a museum in May.

But again, it's apples and oranges. The beauty of nature doesn't take away from or diminish the value of artistic expression - for the artist or for the viewer.
I think they are codependents - in that nature inspires and informs art. I wouldn't want to live without either one of them. But I don't ever feel that my response has to be informed or dependent on anyone else's expectations.
If I find it meaningful and beautiful, I take it in - if not - I let it go.

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@aidan,

As Cezanne said"The only duty of an artist is to capture the next moment in time"
Views of nature by impressionist plein air folks are often a precis of the important elements of what makes that field of rape be so eye catching. I especially like the work of the CAlifornia and Bucks County Plein air painters who , by painting the same scene in different light, drew me in to the role that reflcted light and color play in interpreting the scenes. Seeing the same field of bluebonnets competently painted in morning, mid day, and sunset light always impresses me with the way that we see the world through a prism .

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@farmerman,

farmerman wrote:

Quote:
Intellectualizing too much can take away from life. IMO.
Cant repeat that too much.

I love art critics who, due to lack of their own talent, try to ascribe meanings to work that the artist , if he/she listened, would laugh their heads off.

Hell yes.
Not that I think meaning is fixed within the artists conception, or because that critics necessarily do it solely due to lack of talent, but I continually get frustrated with the sheer audacity of some critics to thrust meanings onto a work to serve their own ends.
I just don't understand the point.

Is shapeless on this thread? I'm thinking Susan McClary. And a whole load of others I've wasted a lot of time reading.

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@Ionus,

Ionus wrote:

Quote:
You mean that, you're looking at nature with the 'aesthetic attitude', which is how you would look at art.
I think there is a huge difference between man made art and what occurs in nature. We are supposed to be artistically looking at Nature, not a second hand imitation of someone's expression of nature.

Well, I agree, but what do you mean by 'supposed'?

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we are both rational and irrational creatures, for max quality of life we need to feed both sides of our nature. Art feeds the irrational, unless we are trying to use it to make money. Art is a requirement for a full life, though their are nearly an infinite forms that this art can take.

Perhaps as one poster eluded the question in the OP indicates that you are too much in you head/ego/intellect. Perhaps your art no longer speaks to you and you should find some new to you form of art that does. Perhaps too you are dying inside, it happens to a lot of people. There are a lot of mostly dead people walking around.

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@djjd62,

djjd62 wrote:

i've always heard that life "imitates" art, but i think it actually "mocks" it

in a choice of art over life, i'll take art everyday, i spend most of my life in some kind of radio drama that plays out in my head (via podcast or imagination)

Yeah. My point is getting a bit nebulous within my own head, but this is basically what I mean.
You say 'radio drama' through means of association, and that's a fact about the world we live in- you are utilizing what we know as occurring in a radio drama to express your point. I would probably choose the radio drama too, BUT, (this may just be me talking here and if you think it's bollocks then it may well be) on many an occasion in which I have done stuff like this, I've reminded myself that this is merely a form of narration, and since a form 'radio drama' exists, I am merely emulating this within my head, not having a real 'experience'. Ergo, if this concept did not exist, would feel this method of narrating my own life had more validity, perhaps. Same goes for art too. Notice how we may describe a sunset as 'picturesque'- well the sunset was there before the picture was.

I hope that makes sense. I do agree that intellectualizing takes away from life a hell of a lot. I am also aware I do it too much sometimes (I would like to point out that it's primarily what I come on here to do, I do have a normal set of interests outside here).

But anyway, I've recently really gone off contemporary art. Too much emphasis based on ascribing meaning, to little attention to form, IMO.
I went to the turner prize exhibition in Nov, and that's when I really started to hate it because I realised how much more interesting the little booklet with all the explanations in was over the actual exhibit. I also realised I had payed £7.50, discounted, to look at some dust and badly made cut out printed faces. Not that I didn't know that before, but that was the clincher.

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@hawkeye10,

hawkeye10 wrote:

we are both rational and irrational creatures, for max quality of life we need to feed both sides of our nature. Art feeds the irrational, unless we are trying to use it to make money. Art is a requirement for a full life, though their are nearly an infinite forms that this art can take.

Perhaps as one poster eluded the question in the OP indicates that you are too much in you head/ego/intellect. Perhaps your art no longer speaks to you and you should find some new to you form of art that does. Perhaps too you are dying inside, it happens to a lot of people. There are a lot of mostly dead people walking around.

Can you explain what you mean by 'dying inside'? That sounds worrying.
No, I have other outlets that are extremely emotion/'irrational'- e.g. my classical music obsession and playing the piano- they feed my emotions pretty well.

I'd contest the view that art feeds only the irrational, if that is what you are saying, because a lot of it bears reference to concepts which are a mixture of both.
I just think the 'frame of mind' required to appreciate art in both the sensory and cognitive sense is better applied to life than a selection of really **** 'art objects'.
I think, in essence, I am just bored with contemporary art and how much bearing it has on my life right now.

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@The Pentacle Queen,

Dying inside= a decreasing of the inner life, that spiritual interplay between the ego and the soul. a lot of people are nearly nothing but the pursuit of biological survival for yet another day and the fulfillment of "responsibilities". There is little spirit, little meaning, little joy or in fact any emotion of any kind. People sometimes walk about in this undead state for decades, until their body dies too.

Thomas Moore "care of the soul" says that we need depression, boredom, listlessness and that it can be the souls way of working beyond our awareness, it is our way of finding new footing when the old ways fail us. In these cases we come out of the mood/spell when we are ready, better than we were before. Maybe that is what is going on with you.

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@hawkeye10,

Oh no no no, not at all.
I understand why you might suggest that, given my discussion of art from a negative perspective, but no- as it happens, my life is really full, which is perhaps why I am suggesting I don't need art objects that appear 'dead' to me.

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@The Pentacle Queen,

The Pentacle Queen wrote:

Is shapeless on this thread? I'm thinking Susan McClary. And a whole load of others I've wasted a lot of time reading.

Not to worry, I'm listening in. I've been mostly silent because I believe you know my views already: it's hard for me to answer any question about what "art" does; I would rather take things on a case-by-case basis and think about what specific artworks do. I don't think it's possible or desirable to develop general statements about art as if it were a monolithic concept.

But, yeah... Susan McClary. Needless to say, not all scholars in the field take her seriously. That said, I do think what she says about Beethoven's Ninth is no less (or no more) illuminating than, say, what Heinrich Schenker says about Beethoven. And is there really all that much difference between McClary's "pelvic thrusts" and E. M. Forster's "elephants dancing" (his description of Beethoven's Fifth)? McClary's approach at least has the merit of casting some sociological light on the fact that the two principal themes of a sonata were traditionally called the "masculine" and "feminine" themes.

Anyway, not to derail the tread.

1 Reply

Does art take away from life?

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