# Like stupid and pompous idiots, who try to define and limit what art is. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 5, 2011, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008 "2011-11-05T23:33:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Lobot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ce7236/32.png) [@Lobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobot)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 7:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/101 "2011-11-06T07:31:29Z")
I have to agree with **Weston** and **njtt**. I’m not an artist myself, but I do have more than a few artists in my family–some contemporary artists, no less–and I’ve been making the argument for years that art that relies on context isn’t real art. I mean, really, if something is only “art” because it’s in a gallery, the art isn’t the object but instead the act of “recontextualisation”, which is just a massive scam and circle-jerk. Watch Stephen Colbert’s “Art Odyssey” series and tell me a pair of overalls and a paint roller can still be called art if they’re outside the confines of a gallery. This is not like the LHC because there’s nothing to “understand”. It’s utter mediocrity parading as sophistication. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 7:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/102 "2011-11-06T07:38:21Z")
> [@sh1bu1](#): > > Which seems to be exactly what art experts are doing. They are taking a somewhat undefinable sense of art that all of us have, and crushing that sense under a level of prescriptivist mumbo jumbo so that only through their mercurial interpretation can we know what is and isn’t art. The quotes from experts I pulled in previous posts are to me an example of people “compelled to crush this beauty, to pin it down, and to reduce it to code”. My Aunt Ida, on the other hand, simply judges art based on the emotional and aesthetic connection it stirs in her. Again, your failure to understand art criticism is almost total. The only difference between the critics you quoted earlier, and your Aunt Ida, is that the critic is able to describe, in detail, the nature of their emotional and aesthetic connection to the work in question. > [@](#): > > Someone using your name apparently, and he is pretty sure because he used “absolutely” and “always”. That’s not what that quote from **Knorf** says. ---
**Author:** ![fumster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9c0ed/32.png) [@fumster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fumster)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 7:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/103 "2011-11-06T07:51:14Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Again, your failure to understand art criticism is almost total. The only difference between the critics you quoted earlier, and your Aunt Ida, is that the critic is able to describe, in detail, the nature of their emotional and aesthetic connection to I absolutely disagree. The art experts are putting the piece into a historical perspective and providing an intellectual basis for appreciating it. My Aunt Ida is going to say whether she thinks it is attractive, makes her feel happy or sad or joyous, and whether it will go with her couch. None of those are important to the art critic or historian. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 7:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/104 "2011-11-06T07:53:55Z")
I’m just surprised that this is an issue. It’s been tested. People intentionally make stuff that is completely random, having a child paint it, have an elephant do it, even have a computer do it, and then claim it as art, and then watch to see people interpreting crap that isn’t there. Is there modern art that’s still art? Sure. But a lot of it is bullshit as indicated by the fact that it wouldn’t be art if you weren’t told it was art. The results are in, and the people who recognized the bullshit were right. There really is no longer any debate–just people who deny the truth. Oh, and 4’33" was a stunt. It’s art, but it’s not music. It’s a performance piece designed to subvert audience expectations. It makes a statement about music, expectations, and the artist. But, here’s the thing: it also means that any further attempts at silence for art’s sake are not art. It’s been done. The point’s been made. Even future performances are usually gimmicks. If an artist drew something on paper just to point out that everyone will call it art when he did no work, that would be art. Drawing and pretending like it says something it doesn’t, and then have other people do the same thing? Sorry, that’s not art. There’s real modern art out there, but this isn’t it. Art is not art just because you call it such and make up an explanation to go with it. It must have meaning inherent. ---
**Author:** ![Grumman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/43a26b/32.png) [@Grumman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grumman)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 7:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/105 "2011-11-06T07:55:34Z")
> [@even\_sven](#): > > Should they shut down the Large Hadron Collider because I don’t really understand what the hell they are looking for or how whatever they are looking for relates to anything? No. The purpose of the LHC isn’t to get a reaction out of _you_, it’s to get a reaction out of the universe. It was built to increase humanity’s understanding of the objective truths of the universe. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 8:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/106 "2011-11-06T08:13:11Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > I’m just surprised that this is an issue. It’s been tested. People intentionally make stuff that is completely random, having a child paint it, have an elephant do it, even have a computer do it, and then claim it as art, and then watch to see people interpreting crap that isn’t there. Yeah, yeah. Another gotcha that simply illustrates that you don’t understand the position you’re trying to undercut. _Artist intent doesn’t matter._ This holds even if the artist is a child, a machine, or an animal. All that matters is the viewers reaction to the work. > [@](#): > > Is there modern art that’s still art? Sure. But a lot of it is bullshit as indicated by the fact that it wouldn’t be art if you weren’t told it was art. The results are in, and the people who recognized the bullshit were right. There really is no longer any debate–just people who deny the truth. Wrong again. This is, in fact, the position that this sort of art is specifically refuting. The idea of putting something like Duchamp’s fountain, or Creed’s piece of paper, in a gallery does not exalt the idea of a gallery, it destroys it. It argues against the gallery as the determiner of artistic worth, and instead puts forward a populist view of art, as something that humans produce constantly and instinctively, that we are so immersed in on a daily basis that we don’t even see it anymore. > [@](#): > > Oh, and 4’33" was a stunt. It’s art, but it’s not music. It’s a performance piece designed to subvert audience expectations. It makes a statement about music, expectations, and the artist. > > But, here’s the thing: it also means that any further attempts at silence for art’s sake are not art. It’s been done. The point’s been made. Even future performances are usually gimmicks. If originality is a necessary prerequisite for something being art, you’ve just argued that vast majority of the world’s art museums out of existence, classical and modern alike. If someone tries to do 4’33" again, they may be _tedious_, but tedious is not the antonym of art. > [@](#): > > If an artist drew something on paper just to point out that everyone will call it art when he did no work, that would be art. Drawing and pretending like it says something it doesn’t, and then have other people do the same thing? Sorry, that’s not art. There’s real modern art out there, but this isn’t it. This presumes that meaning has any external validity beyond social consensus. We’re not talking about math or physics, here. Things only mean what we say they mean. If an artist creates something, and assigns a meaning to it, and at least one other person agrees with that meaning, that meaning exists, at least between those two people. ---
**Author:** ![Lobot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ce7236/32.png) [@Lobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobot)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 8:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/107 "2011-11-06T08:24:39Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Yeah, yeah. Another gotcha that simply illustrates that you don’t understand the position you’re trying to undercut. _Artist intent doesn’t matter._ This holds even if the artist is a child, a machine, or an animal. All that matters is the viewers reaction to the work. I don’t buy that the author is dead, either. The idea that intent is irrelevant is not a law of the universe. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 8:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/108 "2011-11-06T08:39:46Z")
**Miller** , can you define what\* isn’t \*art? ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 8:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/109 "2011-11-06T08:51:26Z")
Now that I think of it, one result of the prevalence of modern art is that I now respect craftsmanship a whole lot more. Craftsmanship is the product of talent, knowledge and effort, human qualities I greatly admire. Craftsmanship is a celebration of the human capacity for greatness. Art? What the fuck is art? Anything can be art, which means that nothing is. Which is why I think we should stop referring to people like Michaelangelo, Rembrandt and Van Gogh with the empty title of “artists”, and instead refer to them as what they were… master craftsmen. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 9:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/110 "2011-11-06T09:00:28Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > **Miller** , can you define what\* isn’t \*art? I don’t know what art isn’t, but I don’t know it when I don’t see it. ---
**Author:** ![Lobot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ce7236/32.png) [@Lobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobot)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 9:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/111 "2011-11-06T09:09:36Z")
**Alessan** , I just want to say that the more I think about your position, the more I agree with it. ---
**Author:** ![Filbert](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/filbert/32/3433_2.png) [@Filbert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Filbert)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 10:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/112 "2011-11-06T10:05:35Z")
Anyone tried [this](http://reverent.org/an_artist_or_an_ape.html) quiz? If art depends entirely on the viewer’s reaction to it- why automatically discount the response of ‘this is trite crap’? It’s a perfectly valid viewpoint, and one you don’t have to be a trained critic to understand. What is counted as ‘art’ depends far too much on who is the named ‘artist’- otherwise, in the linked thread in the OP featuring the cleaning woman and the dried puddle, the actions of the cleaner would have counted as just as much an artistic statement as the original peice. Somehow though, they don’t- why? Because one is an ‘artist’, the other only a cleaner. Getting the critics to take you seriously in the first place is the only condition to things being called art, but once you reach that exhalted level- by winning the art lottery equivalant, and for seemingly no greater skill, everything you do (or cause to be done, as most artists ‘creating’ large installations outsource most, if not all of the actual making to less exhalted but more technically skilled people who don’t qualify for credit on the peice) is automatically ‘meaningful’. ---
**Author:** ![jordanr2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/838e76/32.png) [@jordanr2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jordanr2)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 11:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/113 "2011-11-06T11:17:22Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Oh, and 4’33" was a stunt. It’s art, but it’s not music. It’s a performance piece designed to subvert audience expectations. It makes a statement about music, expectations, and the artist. No, it’s still music, whether you like it or not. One purpose of the piece was to reframe the boundaries of “music” as being aleatory and beyond the artist’s deliberate control, and on that note it succeeds as music. > [@](#): > > But, here’s the thing: it also means that any further attempts at silence for art’s sake are not art. It’s been done. The point’s been made. Well no, it doesn’t mean any such thing - “further attempts at silence for art’s sake” may be (are not necessarily) conceptually tired or redundant, but they’re still art. Furthermore, plenty of contemporary musicians are doing very interesting work with silence: Steve Roden, for instance, or many of the performers on Erstwhile Records - [this recording](http://www.erstwhilerecords.com/catalog/014.html) is as close to silence as music can possibly get, and it’s wonderful to hear. So in that sense, not only was _4’33"_ a musical work, but it was also one that opened the floodgates for some very exciting work since. > [@](#): > > Even future performances are usually gimmicks. Intriguing that you say this - makes me wonder how many performances of _4’33"_ you’ve seen. ---
**Author:** ![Grumman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/43a26b/32.png) [@Grumman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grumman)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 11:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/114 "2011-11-06T11:26:06Z")
> [@Filbert](#): > > Anyone tried [this](http://reverent.org/an_artist_or_an_ape.html) quiz? I got 6/6. ---
**Author:** ![jz78817](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jz78817/32/1028_2.png) [@jz78817](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jz78817)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 11:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/115 "2011-11-06T11:35:53Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Who’s making snide remarks, exactly? Other than you, I mean? Again, you have this bizarre fixation on the idea that people like modern art because it lets them exclude other people, but this idea has absolutely no basis in reality. you must be skipping over **Knorf** ’s posts, since I’d wager they contain the vast majority of snide remarks and personal attacks in this thread. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 11:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/116 "2011-11-06T11:43:59Z")
> [@Filbert](#): > > Anyone tried [this](http://reverent.org/an_artist_or_an_ape.html) quiz? You may believe it or not, but I got 100. Some of the pieces had a person behind them, others did not.\* I picked out the ones with a person by them, and said they were by an artist. The rest I said were by an ape. And I was right. \*This goes against my view, btw, that apes have a degree of personhood. But what I said above could be reformulated in terms of “degrees of personhood.” ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 11:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/117 "2011-11-06T11:46:10Z")
While I don’t particularly care one way or the other how or whether we define art, I’m puzzled by the combination of the following two statements: > [@Miller](#): > > _Artist intent doesn’t matter._ This holds even if the artist is a child, a machine, or an animal. All that matters is the viewers reaction to the work. > > […] > > This presumes that meaning has any external validity beyond social consensus. We’re not talking about math or physics, here. Things only mean what we say they mean. If an artist creates something, and assigns a meaning to it, and at least one other person agrees with that meaning, that meaning exists, at least between those two people. The first seems to be saying that what (or whether) an artist “means” in the creation of an artwork is irrelevant to its artistic interpretation, while the second seems to be saying that on the contrary, the artist’s meaning **is** relevant. ---
**Author:** ![Lobot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ce7236/32.png) [@Lobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobot)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 11:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/118 "2011-11-06T11:47:36Z")
_4’33"_ is not “music” and it “reframes” absolutely nothing (quite literally). There is zero effort involved in creating (or performing) this piece. Art without any degree of craftsmanship is a complete sham. I think **Alessan** is really onto something. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 11:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/119 "2011-11-06T11:48:23Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > While I don’t particularly care one way or the other how or whether we define art, I’m puzzled by the combination of the following two statements: > > The first seems to be saying that what (or whether) an artist “means” in the creation of an artwork is irrelevant to its artistic interpretation, while the second seems to be saying that on the contrary, the artist’s meaning **is** relevant. On a view like **Miller** ’s, the intent of the artist has no significance that comes specifically from his being the artist. He has the same role in contributing meaning as does any other human being. ---
**Author:** ![jordanr2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/838e76/32.png) [@jordanr2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jordanr2)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 11:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008/120 "2011-11-06T11:55:58Z")
> [@Lobot](#): > > _4’33"_ is not “music” and it “reframes” absolutely nothing (quite literally). There is zero effort involved in creating (or performing) this piece. > > Art without any degree of craftsmanship is a complete sham. I think **Alessan** is really onto something. Well, having read _that_ resounding refutation of a half-century’s musical progress, I just don’t know what to think. ☹ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/like-stupid-and-pompous-idiots-who-try-to-define-and-limit-what-art-is/602008.md?page=7)