Field Theory: A post about art (sort of)
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Once again, you are using a partial and largely idealised, abstracted idea of art that arose out of a particular sociocultural context and applying it to the rest of the world throughout time. It's never going to work.
It has worked for the last two hundred years. That is Shiner's point: art is a comparatively recent invention, one of the Enlightenment. I am not applying art to the rest of the world throughout time; that is your endeavour. I am saying that art is an invention of the monolithic West that has become global. In the Polynesian islands, for example, the notion of art as an activity separate from the making of useful things was quite unknown until contact with the West, yet now there are artists of Polynesian countries whose practices are those of the Art World: they work professionally, producing works of primarily aesthetic value, sell through dealers and are members of networks.
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Sorry I missed your pun.
Given how awful all of them are, I thought you'd be more sorry now you've seen it :)
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art is a comparatively recent invention, one of the Enlightenment.
Once again: this is simply not true. The English word art comes from the Latin, that alone ought to tell you that it pre-existed the Quattrocento, let alone the Enlightenment. In the Italian Renaissance, which is itself an invention of nineteenth century historians, it supposedly acquired a different, narrower meaning, and a powerful one to be sure, capable of maintaining some currency even now, and in cultures and places other than the one in which it originated. But it's one meaning, and a meaning that twentieth century artists have been criticising at times ferociously. While it has some use for art dealers, art historians and museum curators, it is most certainly not universal, far from it. And your point that it somehow overwrites every other meaning of the word art, in all its inflections, is ludicrous.
In the Polynesian islands, for example, the notion of art as an activity separate from the making of useful things was quite unknown until contact with the West, yet now there are artists of Polynesian countries whose practices are those of the Art World
What you are describing here is the introduction of market relations in Polynesian cultures. It does not make the art that Polynesian people produced before their contact with the west any less of an art, of any less meaningful to the people who produced it at the time when they produced it. Just as Phidias was held by his contemporaries in the same regard as Michelangelo or Picasso were in their times.
Here's E.H. Gombrich, on page 1 of The Story of Art.
There really is no such thing as Art. There are only artists. Once these were men who took coloured earth and roughed out the forms of a bison on the wall of a cave; today some buy their paints, and design posters for the hoardings; they did and do many other things. There is no harm in calling all these activities art as long as we keep in mind that such a word may mean very different things in different times and places, and as long as we realise that Art with a capital A has no existence. For Art with a capital A has come to be something of a bogey and a fetish. You may crush an artist by telling him that what he has just done may be quite good in its own way, only it is not 'Art'. And you may confound anyone enjoying a picture by declaring that what he liked in it was not the Art but something different.
Elsewhere he elaborated on that a little bit.
One of the rhetorical functions of this opening arises out of the wish to reassure any reader who might feel intimidated by big abstract nouns, what I call "art with a capital A." But this opening also implies the theoretical position that underlies the whole book. Briefly, I propose to go.back to earlier usage, to the time when the word "Art "signified any skill or mastery, as it still does when we speak of the "Art of War," or the "Art of Love," or as Whistler did "The gentle art of making enemies." This good old usage was replaced in the Romantic Period by the one that is still in current use according to which the word "Art" stands for a special faculty of a human mind to be classified with religion and science. It is an interesting shift in meaning but it cannot concern me here. Suffice it to say that when you replace the word 'Art' by the word 'Skill' in the opening sentence, it ceases to look challenging or paradoxical: There can be no skill in the abstract, skill is always for something and the skill with which this book is concerned is mainly that of image making.
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I am saying that art is an invention of the monolithic West that has become global.
Chinese art has a long history of varied styles and emphases. In ancient times philosophers were already arguing about aesthetics. Confucius emphasized the role of the arts and humanities (especially music and poetry) in broadening human nature and aiding “li” (etiquette, the rites) in bringing us back to what is essential about humanity. His opponent Mozi, however, argued that music and fine arts were classist and wasteful, benefiting the rich but not the common people.
By the 4th century A.D., artists were debating in writing over the proper goals of art as well. Gu Kaizhi has 3 surviving books on this theory of painting, for example, and it's not uncommon to find later artist/scholars who both create art and write about the creating of art. Religious and philosophical influence on art was common (and diverse) but never universal; it is easy to find art that largely ignores philosophy and religion in almost every Chinese time period.
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Giovanni, did you read what you posted? Perhaps if you spent a little less time abusing me for my position and a little more time reading before prating, we might get somewhere. And please, do not insult me by quoting Gombrich's Story of Art at me; I am a professional in this business.
Your last slice of copypasta alla Gombrich does more for my view than yours. Your point - which amounts to the claim that "art" is but one meaning of the word "art" - is meaningless, since it is the one meaning we are discussing. There may well be an art of war, but it does not concern us here.
We are talking about art, not the Art of Noise. But you claim this use of the word art is merely of "some use for art dealers, art historians and museum curators, " which is a bit like saying the word "car" is of some use to mechanics, traffic engineers and motoring journalists. The conventional use of the word "art" most certainly is not universal - you are living proof of that - but it is one that is most commonly held by the very people who have the most mana in this matter.
Further, I am not describing the introduction of market relations to Polynesian cultures. I am describing the introduction of "art". All this talk of things being meaningful is no more than noble savagery.
If this is what you mean by interwhatever subjectivity, I am not buying it. It looks to me that you are ascribing a set of modern Western values to people not of the West and not of the modern age, then accusing me of being the cultural imperialist.
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However, they are not part of the Art World, the global network of institutions which defines what is art. Works of these genres would not be found in art museums, because they are not part of the Art World.
Your definition of "The Artworld" (defined by the curators of art museums!?) definitely clashes with Dickie's lowercase artworld(s). Dickie wrote somewhere "“every person who sees himself as a member of the artworld is thereby a member".
Davies explicitly addresses some cross-cultural issues in Non-western Art and Art's Definition
There's a good case to be made that Dickie's definition is too open. But it definitely does not annoint special "High Priests of the Aesthetic" as the sole arbiters of what becomes a "candidate for appreciation".merc
<little voice>hi</littlevoice>
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And please, do not insult me by quoting Gombrich's Story of Art at me; I am a professional in this business.
Not allowed to quote an art historian who reckons that the definition of Art you're wedded to is unhelpful. Gotcha.
But you claim this use of the word art is merely of "some use for art dealers, art historians and museum curators, " which is a bit like saying the word "car" is of some use to mechanics, traffic engineers and motoring journalists.
My point is that it doesn't have universal value even amongst those people (not even art dealers, although for sure your idea of art is the most useful to them). Otherwise it would be hard to fathom why art collections worldwide include works of no aesthetic value whatsoever or whose value is not exclusively aesthetic.
Plus - and this to my mind is very revealing of your approach to this discussion - you appear not to have noticed that I left out "artists" from that list.
It looks to me that you are ascribing a set of modern Western values to people not of the West and not of the modern age, then accusing me of being the cultural imperialist.
Sigh.
Your last slice of copypasta alla Gombrich does more for my view than yours. Your point - which amounts to the claim that "art" is but one meaning of the word "art" - is meaningless, since it is the one meaning we are discussing.
We're not discussing it, actually. You're saying that it's what it is, and have graciously given us the freedom to agree with you.
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There's a good case to be made that Dickie's definition is too open.But it definitely does not annoint special "High Priests of the Aesthetic" as the sole arbiters of what becomes a "candidate for appreciation".
Perhaps I was out of the room at the time, but I missed the part where someone said it was so. In any case, it is not all about Dickie. My definition of the art world is more defined by Danto. Dickie's open group I find a bit vague, since nobody really considers themselves part of the artworld: they just practice artworld activities.
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The superior man understands what is right; the inferior man understands what will sell. (Confucius)
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The refrigerator man understands what will chill.
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Only if some person or persons acting in behalf of a certain social institution has first conferred the attribute 'chillable' upon it. Then sure...
The refrigerator man understands what will chill.
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Paul, your understanding of art really seems nothing more than tired, self-interested, colonial modernism. Just listen to yourself:
I am a professional in this business
not part of the Art World, the global network of institutions which defines what is art
most commonly held by the very people who have the most mana in this matter
All this talk of things being meaningful is no more than noble savagery
I'm sure as a modernist you'll understand when I ask you to come back when you actually have something original to offer - or the intelligence to listen.
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I'm sure as a modernist you'll understand when I ask you to come back when you actually have something original to offer - or the intelligence to listen.
Er, I'll be doing the uninviting where necessary, thank you.
Otherwise, rage on you all, gentlemen.
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Fair enough, dad :)
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Sorry I couldn't get back to you sooner, Sacha, but I was overseeing the coolies building my gesamtkunstwerk. As a Post Modernist I am sure you will understand when I ask you to stick it up your lebenswelt.
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merc,
Hiya Rob, is good seeing you too, anytime. And I am an unabashed Gio fanboy, not sorry bout that.
And I am really enjoying this discussion, I was out for some time, I came back /do not insert long story here/
This is a discussion that does need to be had and I thank RB for making PAS a place for it to take place, I mean where else could we?
Righto, as you were, just wanted to say. -
Oooh that's painfully erudite
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merc: you know how I feel, and it's great to have you back.
Unfortunately this conversation ain't going anywhere - again. Mostly I regret that in a sci-fi discussion we had a little while ago (you did good to be away for that) I missed my opportunity to say "I hold a PhD in English Literature - genre is what I say it is!"
Curses.
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Giovanni, I have been careful to argue my position with cited authorities; I am not just making this up.
Sacha, I am quite alarmed by your animosity towards me. Your counter to my argument seems to be that I am English, and therefore a colonialist. If you have any doubts as to my education and intelligence, please make them clear.
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Nothing personal, Paul, but I find the tenor of your arguments so far totally consistent with a modernist colonial worldview - and I think we've seen enough evidence over time of where that leads us.
It's also innately dismissive of other perspectives and so not that conducive to a productive conversation. That's what pisses me off. But do carry on, I'll just be elsewhere.
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Giovanni, I have been careful to argue my position with cited authorities; I am not just making this up.
You also carefully ignored most of my arguments. So let me ask you a direct question: can you find me in the literature the great shoemaker that the Greeks venerated alongside Phidias? According to your reading of Boardman, the Greeks couldn't tell statuary and shoemaking apart, so I assume they celebrated both of these professions equally. And if not, why not?
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merc,
Perhaps we may regroup? I for one am interested in the original premise (was it to define art in light of the Weta sin (oops, sign)?)...I understand little but am keen to know what others think.
Besides where else in the world would we all know and use the word Weta so understandingly freely? -
Perhaps we may regroup?
Lead on, MacDuff (or is it McDuff?)
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merc,
The Weta rugby statue, is it art? (I don't think McDuff cares anymore, though MacBeth would I reckon).
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I thought we had settled on "it's awful, awful art".
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