Well?
Is the separation of art from non-art important?
Actually…
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Coffeehouse/6831/whatsart.html
I would tend to agree, except that Danto missed his date by about fifty years. Actually, I’d argue the separation ended with Marcel Duchamps display of a signed urinal (“Fountain”) in 1917 or therabouts.
Anyway, would you mind explaining why you want to know what consititutes art? It would help focus the discussion.
I may not know it, but I like it when I see it! 
The interpretation of one’s mood, available to someone else’s senses.
Why? General curiosity, I guess. The question occured to me when I was on vacation, and went to a gallery. Then I went to a retail store, and the question became more poignant.
Let be get more specific in my questions:
-The retail store was selling old wooden signs. An example of one of these was a big wooden arrow with the word “BEACH” painted on it. It was selling for $75, I think. Is it art?
-The same store was selling bird houses. Instead of being produced by geniuses of the art world, they were made by mentally challenged children. IMO, they were quite beautiful. Are they art?
-The gallery features an artist whose work is little more than cutting and pasting old photos. Is this art?
-An elephant paints a canvas, more or less at random. Art?
-What makes one work of art more valuable than another? Is it merely opinion?
-What is the difference between pornography and art, or is there one?
I’ll try to think of a few more questions.
You know, paintings and stuff.
(obscure “state” reference, sorry)
Yes. If Duchamp’s “Fountain” is art, then the sign is art. The person who created it as a sign may have thought of it as art too; “art vs. craft” is almost as infinite a debate as “art vs. not-art” or “good art vs. bad art.”
Of course.
Of course; art has nothing to do with the number of calories burned in its creation.
It is if you hang it on the wall. What makes something art is largely the act of a human being deciding it’s art. It’s a purely human invention, this abstract concept.
Yes, and related ideas like fashion and approval seeking and envy, etc.
Pornography is a subset of art.
OK, and thanks for expanding on your topic.
Re: your questions, I’d say:
1 (sign): No; artifact, not art.
2 (birdhouses): no; artifact, not art.
3 (cut/pasted photos): yes; art, even if we happen to feel it’s lazy and unambitious.
4 (painting by elephant): no, unless someone can demonstrate the elephant had a clear aesthetic impulse in creating the work.
5 (value of art) yes, it is mere opinion, informed or otherwise.
6 (porn vs. art): depends on intention; pure sexual arousal or otherwise?
Just MY opinion, of course.
Interestingly, the essay I linked to discusses, soundly I think, and almost in the same order as your questions, various examples of what may or may not constitute art. In particular see what the essay says about the ‘art’ of children, and see whether you think that applies to the birdhouses you asked about. For me, the intention of the person who created the work is very important, although not always obvious at first glance.
My personal opinion is that what makes ‘art’, in the end, is mostly to be decided by the the person viewing the object or installation. The object may be art if it a) was created or modified by another person with intention of being displayed as ‘art’; b) manages to set off an emotional or philosophical response in the viewer that would not have occurred if the object had not been created or modified. One criterion that I find particularly useless is the assignment of monetary value to a specific piece, with the assumption that higher monetary value=‘better’ art.
[Aside] While traveling through Zimbabwe a few years ago, we came upon a 12-year-old boy selling ingenious working toy models of farm tractors carved from wood, beautifully painted and complete with rubber tires and steerable front wheels. By the above criteria, certainly not art from the standpoint that the boy was making practical objects (toys) from found materials with which to earn a bit of money. OTOH, art from the standpoint that he was trying to accurately represent something which he viewed in everyday life, and that these objects set off in us many thoughts about the way technolgy is slowly making its way into the rural 3rd world, displacing more traditional crafts, etc. [/Aside]
So, the question is not easy to answer without qualifications.
Hah, just want to say that I’m right and lissener is wrong. Or vice-versa.
The simplest answer is that art is an object that has ben alterted in order to provokean emotional response in the viewer. It can range from something as glurgy as a poster of a kitten to taking a crap on an American flag and framing it.
I like Frank Zappa’s rather open-ended thoughts on the subject.
from The Real Frank Zappa Book, Poseidon Press, 1989
(Emphasis is quoted as originally printed; Frank had a rather idiosyncratic writing style in that regard.)
There was a rather good discussion of this question in capybara’s thread on art, kitsch, and garbage.
Standard disclaimer: All that follows is strictly IMHO, and I make no claims of expertise in art or philosophy.
To summarize the point of view I put forth in the other thread: Art is a function of aesthetic intent. If the creator of a thing intended the thing to elicit an emotional response, then the thing is art–this includes works for which the artist is the only audience. A thing may be aesthetic (capable of evoking an emotional response) without being art, and I do not regard such things as being inferior to art.
Applying this to the scenarios above:
-The retail store was selling old wooden signs. An example of one of these was a big wooden arrow with the word “BEACH” painted on it. It was selling for $75, I think. Is it art?
No. The signs were made to be functional, I assume. The fact that they are aesthetically pleasing enough to some people to convince those people to buy them doesn’t make them art. It makes them neat old signs that some people like.
-The same store was selling bird houses. Instead of being produced by geniuses of the art world, they were made by mentally challenged children. IMO, they were quite beautiful. Are they art?
Possibly. If a child assembled and painted a birdhouse in bright and cheery colors so that it would make him happy when he looked at it, or with the idea that it might cheer others up, then I call it art.
-The gallery features an artist whose work is little more than cutting and pasting old photos. Is this art?
Very likely. The artist presumably has an aesthetic effect in mind that is achieved by combining specific images from the photos. If the artist is a hack that just threw some pictures together at random to sell to gullible fools, then it wouldn’t be art.
-An elephant paints a canvas, more or less at random. Art?
I don’t know enough about the inner workings of an elephant’s mind to say, really. Perhaps the elephant is expressing profound emotional concepts and is reminded of them every time she looks at the canvas, and doesn’t understand why we don’t get it. It seems a bit unlikely, though. That doesn’t mean the result can’t be aesthetically pleasing to humans.
-What makes one work of art more valuable than another? Is it merely opinion?
It depends on how you’re judging value. The monetary value of a work is often based heavily on the reputation of the artist; that reputation is theoretically attained by consistently producing good art (i.e. artwork that evokes the intended emotional response in its audience), but other influences (like political notoriety, for instance) affect it as well. However, an extraordinary work by an ordinary artist may if enough people find it evocative and appealing.
The element that I think of as the “artistic value” of a work depends mainly on the audience. How well does it evoke the intended emotion in the audience? A get-well card lovingly drawn by a child to cheer his sick mother is likely to evoke a greater response in the intended audience (the mother) than viewing a Picasso. For her, at that time, the card has the greater emotional value regardless of the skill involved in its execution.
-What is the difference between pornography and art, or is there one?
I don’t consider the content or medium important to judging whether or not something is art. Porn can be art, but most of it isn’t. It’s still a question of intent–if the creators are just punching the clock (so to speak), trying to make money, then it probably isn’t art. If they actually care about the emotional (yes, I consider horniness emotional as well as physiological) impact on viewers, then it qualifies.
The distinctions made by Balance and El_Kabong should be more properly stated as distinguishing different kinds of art; without question every example on your list is art.
I don’t think Warhol made it impossible to distinguish something that is art from something that is not, he simply pointed out that art was everywhere.
His work was a reaction to action artists like Pollock and his adoring critics, who decided that art was something esoteric and not meant for the general public. Normal people don’t get Pollock, because his ‘work’ is basically a calculated mess on a canvas. Warhol didn’t bring about the end of the differentiation of art alone. Abstract art had a hand in it.
What is art? Whatever you say it is. Whatever they say it is. There was a man on the egg arts show who made incredible ‘whirligigs,’ intricate metal contraptions made from scrap metal and others’ junk which spun or twirled in the wind. The creator did not consider himself an artist or his work to be art, but there is no doubt that he is an incredibly talented artist and that his work is astounding. According to whom? The show’s creators? The viewers? Me?
If you call it art, it’s art. If they say it’s not art, you tell them to piss off. Art is in the eye of the beholder.
As an artist myself, I’ll say that art is the interpretation of internal or external existence but can also involve the innovation of methodic expression.
Art is limited only by the imagination (too frequently, that of the viewer but such is life). I’ll repeat what I’ve said in other forums. You can frame a used condom and it instantly becomes art. What sort of art and of what quality are another matter altogether.
If you wish to see an innovative example of my own art and that of others, I refer you to The Ultimate Straight Dope Art Thread.
PS: Sadly, some of the pieces were damaged in the recent software upgrade. Fortunately, many are intact.
Anything a person does with the intent of creating a symbolic message. Some artists are creative, some artists are talented, good ones are both.
I dig Zappa’s take. Essentially, anything you can frame–either literally or metaphorically–is art.
Thanks for all the thoughtful responses (and the few not-so-thoughtful ones!). I will now add a few opinions and clarifications:
My opinion is that it may not originally have been art, but once wall hooks have been added, it becomes so. Since it is being sold for the sole purpose of hanging on a wall for aesthetic reasons, it has made that magic transformation.
I’d also like to add that some of the signs were not as utilitarian. Such as a sign that said “SNACKS” and had some crude paintings of various snack foods on it. That took an artist’s skill, so I would call that art. So what is the difference between “SNACKS” and “BEACH”? Is one art and the other not because of the presence or lack of a painted-on bag of cheesy poofs? Or does “BEACH” become art simply because it hangs on a wall next to “SNACKS” and is similarly priced?
Just to set the record straight, these were not simple utilitarian birdhouses from a kit that were painted with smiley faces. These were handmade structures ornately embellished with pinecones, acorns, clothespins, etc. They were truly impressive on a level that birds will never appreciate. Think “baroque.”
This is a tough one. It’s not a hypothetical question, there really is such an elephant. Her owner seems to believe that the elephant is truly making artistic choices. To me it resembles “facilitated communication” for autistic children – that is, wishful thinking on the part of the trainer. Does that make it less valid as art? I don’t think so. I just think that the trainer herself is the artist, and the elephant is a medium.
As disgusting and prurient as some people think it, the photographer must still consider lighting, composition, layout, etc. I’d say that’s an artistic call.
There you have it – my random brain droppings.
My own definition of art: that which evokes an emotional response.
“Oh, how cute!” is not really an emotional reponse, so I would say the Beach sign is a craft item. There is an emotional response to the birdhouses, not only because of their aesthetic value but also because you have knowledge of the people who made them and their purpose. I think that has to come into consideration too, although I’m not sure how big a role that plays.
Just because something is functional does not necessarily negate the fact that it is art - take architecture, for example. And just because you can hang something on a wall doesn’t mean it’s art, either - take Thomas Kinkaide (please) for example.
I rarely get bogged down in the art vs. craft argument, but I occasionally find myself hip-deep in the crafter vs. craftsman debate. I crochet, needlepoint and do other crafts, thus I consider myself a crafter of those things. I’m also a polymer clay…artist, artisan, whatever… and I consider my work there to be craftsmanship. I don’t object to being called an artist, even though I’m really not, but I grit my teeth everytime someone says I’m a polymer clay “crafter.”
JMHO, YMMV, etc.
I think that art has to be something more than the ordinary. Art has to be a meaningful display of technical expertise in a craft. Anyone can paint, but art is more than merely slapping dye onto a house. Anyone can sculpt, but art is more than merely slapping mud blobs together.