What is not art?
Is there actually a boundary to what can be categorised as art or music? An ordinary object may be transformed into an artistic one simply by an intention to do so.
Photographs of mandarins or cows, percussive sounds created from bowls, paper, food, all of these items in their original context would not be considered art, but placed into the hands of an artist suddenly take on a new life.
So, is art merely a matter of perception? Context?
“if you listen, you can hear music in a school bell” – Michael Franti
What parameters do we work within when we define music? Is music as a whole definable? Of course each genre of music has its own set of boundaries and characteristics, so on this more detailed level music may be more easily categorised (though of course with some degree of flexibility). I’ve heard music defined as ‘organised sound’, but this somehow falls short of encapsulating the essence of musical art.
Maybe art and music are actually ways of perceiving things, rather than the things themselves?
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5 comments:
"Maybe art and music are actually ways of perceiving things, rather than the things themselves?"
I definitely agree with this, and for this reason disagree that the subjects in a photo (eg the mandarins) are not art. To me and many others art is more of a verb than a noun - you can 'art-ivate' anything you like with it, it's just a state of observation.
Sure there are traditional genres and disciplines, like hip hop and painting, but perhaps these could be called capital A 'Art' like capital L 'Liberal'.
By extension I think that a song by 50 Cent is just as much art as a Bruckner symphony, just as a painted wall is just as much art as Picasso's Guernica. I think that's a very postmodern view (?) from my limited understanding of the term (perhaps it's post-postmodern? or has that tag been taken long ago?)
Thanks for your thoughts!
hmm, I guess I wasn't altogether clear in articulating my thoughts. I didn't mean to imply that objects are not art, as such. I was 'thinking out loud', beginning with a perception that objects are simply objects, which take on a new role as artistic elements as soon as someone sees them as such. Does that make sense?
It's almost a situation like the old "if a tree falls in a forest" dilemma. If a mandarin sits on a bench, is it just a mandarin until someone sees it as something more? Of course, not everyone will see its artistic potential, and that's where artists come in - by perhaps providing a fresh view, a new angle, a hidden perspective.
I think we're ready for a new era of thinking, post-postmodern...any thoughts on a less cumbersome term?
An additional thought from artist Tracy Emin.
Why, I ask, is my unmade bed just an unmade bed and hers is art? "Because you didn't say that yours was art and you didn't feel that it was. I saw it as art and felt that it was. I said that it was and showed that it was. I have transferred what I feel on to someone else looking at it. That's the alchemy. That's the magic. I was the person who had to have the conviction in the first place. If you think about it, is it really worth all those fights and arguments and trauma to defend something that isn't real? No, it's not."
http://living.scotsman.com/features/39I-really-know-what-I39m.4280866.jp
Hi there. A small contribution to the big question in a somehow brainstormy fashion:
When I go to a concert, (or an art gallery, or to a movie, or I read a book, or or...) I expect to have an aesthetic experience. This happens when the perception of something triggers a new connexion in my mind that hadn't been there before. This is what art means to me. Aesthetic experiences don't always happen in an "art" environment, meaning that sometimes they happen in other contexts (going for a walk, playing chess,...) and some environments intended as art don't provide aesthetic experiences. They are more related to learning, discovering, etc than to sitting back and relaxing. I don't want music to be overheard, I want music to be listened to! And I'm not concerned about it being called music or art or whatever else.
It reads a bit like a school assignment, doesn't it?
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