Is there such a thing as an 'artist'?

Great Debates
1

I was talking to a friend who is studying at art college and I asked him why so much modern art nowadays seems to be so devoid of any artistic talent. The conversation ran something like this:

Me:“Mike, why does so much modern art suck?”

Him:“How do you mean?”

Me:“Well, y’know, all that stuff in the Tate modern which I can’t tell whether or not it’s been vandalised. What’s that all about?”

Him:“Well it’s still art if someone likes it. Just because you don’t like it doesn’t mean that someone else can’t find it beautiful or thought provoking.”

Me:“It’s hard to tell whether anyone could find some of the stuff in there to be beautiful or thought provoking.”

Him:“Well that’s just your interpretation again, even if just one person can find the artistic merit in a piece then it is worthy of its artistic merits”

Me:“Well in that case, considering that we can’t tell who would find a piece beautiful or if anyone would for that matter, doesn’t this mean that pretty much everything is art. I mean (picks up coffee mug) someone could find this coffee mug thought provoking, we can’t prove otherwise, therefore is this coffee mug art?”

Him:“Basically yes, everything can be presented as artistic.”

Me really confused: “Umm…'kay. Want a beer?”
Anyway, I found myself thinking about this again today and if this is the accepted position of the art world then it throws up the question of who exactly the art world comprises of. I mean, if everything everyone makes or does is art then surely everyone is an artist and if everyone is an artist then no-one can be marked out as an artist. To me it’s kinda like looking for colour in a room where everything is the exact same shade of brown, without contrast there is no colour and likewise if we cannot contrast between who is an artist and who isn’t (bearing in mind that everything is art in some form) then is there such a thing as an artist at all?

2

Art is now, and perhaps often is, in the same league as stamp collecting. What is rare is treasured, not because the “double struck penny” is so nice to look at, but there are many hopeful that if they act the fool and buy it for a ridiculous price, a greater fool will want it for even more.

In this, they all are destined to lose when the pyramid collapses.

Much of the “most important” art is never seen, being kept in museum basement “septic tanks”, to be held until needed or sold, like some Monopoly card.

If that is the point of the work, then its “above ground” life is just there, not to stimulate the mind, but to justify the investment.

3

I think art is how you look at things. Yes, bluntly, art can be anything; a crumpled pop can for example. Yet if one can evoke emotion with this pop can then the result is art.

But I agree with Mr. Bake (can I call you that?) that so much of art is made to generate money. If I crumple a pop can, call it art, and sell it to some whacko for $50.00, it isn’t really pure. Merely the illusion of art (but i got paid 50 bucks!)

4

Answer to OP: I am an artist. So, yes. :wink:

Seriously, this is one of the great unanswerable questions. Here, for example, is a recent discussion that started with the question of whether non-rhyming poetry is still poetry, and then branched off into the various other disciplines. No hard and fast answer was ever reached, because no hard and fast answer has ever been reached.

Thomas Kinkade’s work is not art.

DuChamp’s Fountain, however, is.

Go figure.

5

Thomas Kinkaide’s work is art, just not very good art, IMHO. Technically competent but doesn’t say much. Now, stuff a Kinkaide-mass-produced print into the Fountain and I think you’d have a charming twist on an old classic. :wink:

6

IMHO, Thomas Kinkade’s work can best be described as kitsch.

OTOH, as the essence of the modern artist’s intentions, “Fountain” could not be a better example; I’ve heard it said more than once by artists themselves that there has been nothing truly new since Duchamp’s “ready-mades” of 1914-17.

Since the late 19th century, an ever-greater gulf has opened up between what artists do and what the majority of the population considers to be art. Most people who think about visual arts at all (and in the USA, that’s next to no one) seem to demand that art be both representational and decorative. The problem here is that the modern ability to record our surroundings with increasing fidelity (by such means as photography, film and video) and to mass-produce designed objects of high quality, have made the one-off, luxury items created by traditional artists rather pointless.

At some point after the late 19th century, it became generally agreed among artists that the point of the work was not simply to create a decorative object for the admiration of the consumer, but in some way to challenge the preconceptions of the viewer; to find a greater meaning than simply a demonstration of one’s technical virtuosity in a given medium. From that comes the idea that straight representation, and limitation to a certain genre or artistic medium, is to be avoided as excessively limiting. In this case the concept is the most important thing, and any medium may be selected that seems most appropriate for the concept.

The oldest question, and one still often addressed in modern art, is simply, “what constitutes art?” One could argue that the limits of this question were defined by Duchamp several decades ago. Many artists still attempt to do little more than push the perceived boundaries of the acceptable, although it can be argued that such boundaries no longer exist anyway. This may be the source of what drives VofR, and many others, so crazy about current art.

While the image of gallery owners selling crushed beer cans at outrageous prices to moneyed, clueless yuppies may have some basis in fact, it is a gross caricature. Commercial galleries are mainly in the business of selling trademarked goods to an elite group of consumers, and thus tend to be well behind the real leading edge of art.

For the majority of the artists I’ve known, creating their work has been much more important than maximising the income from the sale of it, and in any event, most of these people work in styles, such as large-scale installations, and mixtures of unusual media, that would make it impossible to purchase and display the work in a home setting anyway. Many exist on day jobs, occasional grants and commissions, and depend to some extent on the support of sympathetic friends.

In addition, most of the artists I know would much prefer it if they could somehow reach outside of the very small group that understands and appreciates the various modern movements. This seems a faint hope indeed, however, as the insistence that works not be strictly representational means that often, persons who are not familiar with the history of modernism have no idea what the artist is trying to accomplish.

So after all this windy pontificating, I guess I have to respond to VofR’s statements by saying, yes, just about anything can be considered art, and just about anyone is an artist, IF what we create has some intellectual meaning to us. I would also point out, as someone once said, “80 percent of everything is crap”. In my experience, for any given multi-artist exhibition, I will always find at least something that strikes me in some meaningful way.

7

Sure. I’m a he, although I have been told the name is also used by hot strippers.

Actually, Thomas Kinkade’s work is quite varied. His views of Chinatown street scenes are very perceptive. Yes, he makes his money off figurines advertized in USA-Today Weekend Magazine, where he sells greeting card Santa Villages and lighthouse figurines. But besides being a “Painter of light”, he has tremendous depth as a painter of water and rain and mood. But you only see those images in actual high-priced galleries in big cities.

However, what would put him into a museum is anyone’s guess. I would have thought that he would have compromised his image with too much commercialism, but on the other hand Salvadore Dali was the master of that and he hangs in the best public galleries.