Upon further review of my comments, I concede that perhaps I should be a bit more clear.
For where I wrote “viewer,” put in its stead “audience.” A piece of art should communicate something to its audience. If I’m the audience, and it doesn’t communicate something to me, than I deem it a failure for having failed to do so.
A novel written in Islandic? I’m not the artist’s audience, as obviously, the artist intends the novel to be appreciated by someone who speaks the language. Likewise, Yankovic’s song’s audience, that is, who is meant to appreciate the art, is that segment of the population that understands the concept.
I don’t prejudice authors’ hard work in languages I don’t understand. I’m not the intended audience. Rather, the kind of people thar irk me, are those “artists” who make art for me as the intended audience and then complain that I don’t “get” it. No, I don’t have any examples right off the top of my head, but I’d guess that you could surmise what type of folk I’m talking about.
As far as I can tell, Soup, the only thing you really object to is artists who whine that their audience doesn’t get them. How does that come into this discussion? Anecdotal individual obnoxious artists will always be around: The “art world” has just as many dilettantes and poseurs as any other segment of society. Once I hear an artist blame his audience for his lack of success, I pretty much write him off as an artist.
Since we agree on this point, perhaps we can agree that it’s not the point of this thread: the audience member who feels insulted because he doesn’t, for whatever reason, “get” a piece of art is the point. Not the fact that of course there are obnoxious individuals in the art world.
An audience member who whines that the artist has not chosen to aim his art dead center at the individual audience member’s specific and idiosyncratic worldview is just as obnoxious as the whiny artist. Both of them should just move on and find a message that does commmunicate clearly. To impose his worldview, coercively, on the other, is stupid and useless.
How times change, Nanook. Many moviegoers today would probably accuse Fellini of exactly the kind of elitism that’s being discussed in this thread. Just because he expressed a desire to reach a vast audience doesn’t mean that he succeeded in doing so.
Just out of curiosity, you DO realize there was a video associated with the link, correct? You didn’t just glance at the thumbnail, assume you knew everything you ever would about it, and feel justified in posting, as this quote implies?
Review this statement keeping in mind the definition of Art I’ve stated several times in this thread.
In my experience anyone who is not a populist is automatically considered an elitist by anyone who IS a populist. There’s no way to argue for a finer appreciation of difficult art with such a person unless you’re willing to go all the way and try to undermine their whole populist mindset. It’s like trying to teach someone with no tolerance not to be a racist: how does one do so rationally while still allowing them to be intolerant of different sexes, sexual orientations, religions, etc. I do think it would be invaluable to address these issues on a more universal scale as such, but for the purposes of this thread I don’t think there’s any piecemeal reconciliation that can be made between the divergent interests.
Joe Blow has had a minimal education, and has never read anything but Stephen King and John Grisham. One day he picks up a copy of Finnegans Wake, skims a few pages, then uses it to prop up a wobbly table.
Then he meets a girl at a bar–Her name is Nora, lets say–who’s working on her masters degree in modern Irish literature. The subject of her dissertation is Finnegans Wake.
Sparks fly, chemistry bubbles, they fall in love. As they live together, and spend a lot of time together, Joe becomes fascinated by Nora’s descriptions of Finnegans Wake. She reads him passages, and explains the references. He is impressed by the layers of meaning that Joyce accomplished, and intrigued to learn that deciphering Joyce’s words doesn’t require any innate talent, just a certain kind of education.
He begins reading some of Nora’s secondary sources–her vast collection of Joyceana. Over time he becomes more and more obsessed with Finnegans Wake, and after about 7 years of marriage to Nora, and his new obsessive hobby, he decides to go back to school. He gets a degree in literature, then a masters, and finally a Ph.D.
Now Joe and Nora both teach graduate-level lit courses at neighboring east-coast ivy-league universities.
Please, litost, discuss, in terms of your insistance on a “hierarchy” of art. The above scenario seems to me to prove the truly democratic nature of art, and to toally discredit the aristocratic–inflexibly hierarchic–view.
Do you realize that many of us don’t agree with your definition of “Art”? The whole point of this thread is that everyone looks at Art differently, based on their subjective experiences, and so it is perfectly possible for an individual work to appeal only to people with certain backgrounds.
I honestly don’t see where you’re getting this idea of universalism from. Sure, there are some basic sensations that all people share (sadness, happiness, etc.) but they are not all evoked by the same things. I find Radiohead’s “Let Down” to be an incredibly uplifting piece of music, but my brother interprets it as whiny, pretentious, and annoying. Am I wrong, or is he wrong? I would submit that “wrong” as a concept doesn’t apply here, as our gut emotional reactions are shaped by our subjective points of view.
You seem to be implying that unless a piece of artwork evokes similar feelings in every person who comes across it, it is Bad Art (or not Art at all). In that case, every piece ever created has to be quite horrific.
In my prior post, I was trying to separate two different hierarchies. I joined you in rejecting the notion of a aristocratic hierarchy which assumes that some people cannot appreciate art for whatever reasons, including one’s educational background. There could be, however, a hierarchy when it comes to art itself. I thought you agreed with me on this (the wine/sugar analogy). For example, Jow Blow had to work more to appreciate Joyce as compared to Grisham. There is a degree of separation (a hierarchy so to speak) within the creations themselves. But, to repeat, I reject the hierachy that is presumed to exist within the audience, i.e., within the consumers.
“Just because he (Fellini) expressed a desire to reach a vast audience doesn’t mean that he succeeded in doing so.”
Which is not only irrelevant but inaccurate as well. LA STRADA alone is a classic of world cinema, playing in revival houses and on television for the last 50 years and available in video stores the world over.
Oops. I did miss that. I only looked at the thumbnail, not the surrounding webpage. Having watched the video, though, I think I liked it better when I thought it was a poorly digitized picture. Although the flower screaming in pain when it got picked was amusing. Still, from both a technical and emotional stand point, it’s not terribly impressive.
That statement was intended as a rebuttal to your definition of art, which I maintain is neither universal, nor necessarily emotional in nature. To me, the most valuable art is art that makes you think, not art that makes you feel. However, this is purely a personal preference, not a dictum.