Following that definition the persons we call "Renaissance Artists" would have been no artists at all.
The fact, that many see an "obvious difference" shows that the impact of 19th Century aesthetics is still going strong.

There's nothing wrong getting your creative energy from seeing yourself as a genius artist driven by inspiration and nothing else.
But for historic truth it does not hurt to know that in this case you are using a concept, that was developed with 19th century romanticism. Earlier artists/craftsmen had a quite different conception of themselves and their work. Still most regard them as great artists today.

 

Gee. Music is art. Now I know why it is always a part of every University's Fine "Arts" program. Just a little levity with all the mud. As an art instructor once told me, it is only becomes art if someone is looking at it.

 

Do you go back as far as the Sumerians ? It's not really true is it that before romanticism artists/craftsmen had a quite different conception of themselves because you do not know of those times before ?

 

If I was wrong please tell me how it really was in 17th century for example.
Just name a few artists that did not accept jobs but preferred to create their art freely and sell it on the free market afterwards.

 

All the creative pursuits such as music, paintings, sculpture and even speaking were not in origin 'arts'. To acquire a good understanding of what art is you really need to grapple with its origins including knowing where there the word comes from. If you think that a few decades ago is history, think again. History takes us back to the first human creative expressions; the beginnings of speech, language and artful expressions. Art 30,000 years ago had a serious purpose, serious meaning life or death. Everything once had a serious purpose - people just wouldn't waste their time doing it if it didn't. Long ago, song and story-telling around the camp fire would have been created for the purposes of enforcing the inportance of going on the hunt together or telling stories about how the moon-mother created everything. Paintings in dark caves would (probably) have had light shone on them as an aid to dramatic story-telling. Sculptures of goddesses would have been created in order to give visual representation of the goddess of their religions. Later, knowledge filtered down via extra-terrestrial visitors taught how sound - and the understanding of the frequencies - could be used to move large objects such as pyramid bricks, sound made via a type of music and speech. Music was also used in conjunction with understandings of the Earth's energy fields; the sounds of the Aboriginal Didgeridoo have some connection with Earth's frequencies. I am pretty sure that the flutes of the primitives actually had serious uses beyond music, again, the ancients only engaged in activities that had something to do with their survival. Wouldn't the flute have been used to mimic the sounds of birds in hunting etc? The origins of alphabets and writing are rooted in hermetic knowledge; there were deep underdstandings about the energetic power of letters, numbers and words arranged in certain ways. Reading was only done at first by the only people educated in the FULL understanding of reading, the scientist-priests. Simply put, they had full knowedge that a religious congregation could be entrained or put into trance by the readings of religious passages, because they were written with that intention. Still to this day people are reciting religious passages in their places of worship unaware of the entrancing effects it is having on them. Art then, since the first creative expressions was a tool much like language. I hope this helps to put art into perpective. In the modern sense of art, I have been artful because I have made you think about something. This modern definition of art answers the OP's original question. If art is supposed to make people think then art is necessarily, logically completely open to judgement and criticism.

 

First allow me to say that this is the most interesting thread I have read in a very long time. Thank you neo lover.
And please - forgive me if I appear to ramble.


Expression? Execution? Both?

I believe that art is evocative creative expression [by my definition].

My favorite art form is music because I can use it to make people laugh and/or cry. I once made a friend vomit forcefully by using the sound of my guitar as a weapon [great story - maybe I'll tell it sometime]. Perhaps someday I may become that proficient in other art forms but not yet.

Because my music is art to me, for the most part I keep it to myself. I usually don't care enough to allow other people to listen. When I create songs to help me mourn those that die I do NOT let others hear them. Sometimes I feel that sharing a segment of my music is somehow important. At those times I don't analyze why, I just share it. Some might feel the need to lable it 'spiritual' because at times it has so much power. It certainly moves me. Most times I would rather listen to me than anyone else. So to my way of thinking, what else could it be but art?

But we need, as humans, to determine one thing by comparing it to another.

The music I play for others is usually less personal. I am willing to give others a glimpse of what it could have been. That makes it, in my opinion, craft not art. That's all right with me. I have found that craft pays better than art. Like that old Traffic song said - 'Sing a song, play guitar, make it snappy'.

The difference between craft and art is sometimes hazy [for me]. Just how much of me am I willing to allow out into the world for others to experience? Where is the delineator between art and craft? Maybe something as simple as ...

Does it act upon me in a profoundly evocative manner? That would be it's capacity for expression. Also, does it express in an accessible fashion? I need to access it to appreciate it. Otherwise how could I discern it as art?

So I suppose expression is essential but maybe execution is part of the expression.

Or maybe I just need sleep. It is 3:42am.

 

Last edited: Jan 6, 2016

I believe these are excellent examples of evocative music.

 

Your problem is that you are telling it how it was - When you do not know how it was - You do not no what artist's thought in all history's - Artistic expression is a universal thing - I retains space symmetry - It was not invented recently by intellectuals ---


http://i64.tinypic.com/28211ub.jpg[/IMG]']http://i67.tinypic.com/28m37ya.jpg[/IMG]']

Archaeologists may have discovered Earth's oldest known cave art - Dating back to around 40,000 years ago - Paintings in Indonesian caves of human hands and pig-deer may be the oldest ever found on Earth ---

 

Last edited: Jan 6, 2016

Before I write my thoughts, I must congratulate everybody who participated in this thread for making it very intresting and specially @neo lover for starting it.

Nice to see that everyone is respecting each other's views and putting forword own points.

About topic:

Yes... Music is art... Definitely. If we go by definition of ART:

"Art is a diverse range of human activities in creating visual, auditory or performing artifacts – artworks, expressing the author's imaginative or technical skill, intended to be appreciated for their beauty or emotional power." (Source: wikipedia, original source: Oxford and Merriam Webster Dictionaries)

I think, "criticism" is by product of "appreciation". Sometimes it is useful... Sometime it is garbage if it becomes topic of gossip.

For music... Let's consider today's scenario when technology has empowered all "serious" listeners to try out producing music with "never before" tools.

Have we ever thought that what would have the result of all great musicians with PIANO ROLL...? We have great tools, modern sounds, ready made libraries of orchestras, almost unlimited resources.

But how will everyone get the "gifted talent" to use them...? It's not possible, practically.

So... I call such musicians as "made" while others as "born".

As we all know... Both such kind of artist/musician needs audience for satisfaction of being "the artist/musicians".

The "born" artist/musician needs nothing for feedback or criticism (unless the motive is being commercial and earning bread out of it.). The one can produce ART on his or her own and world will follow if luck is with the one. No EXECUTION. Only ART.

But...If the one is a "made" musician/artist... when he or she lacks "inspiration" (like other "born" artist), the one may look for help in any form.

Such help may be in form of criticism, suggestions, etc.

This way it serves two purpose: the artist/musician gets an audience and also gets inspiration.

Modern tools helps re-developing the artistic/musical thought based on feedback/criticism, too.

The more the flexibility given, the more complex the performance becomes as mixture of originality and feedbacks/critique - leading to "execution" instead of "art".

Definition of ART says about technical skill too..

Here comes...couple of other important factors are... "Patience" and "Experience".

Inspiration is sometimes very hard earned after severe efforts and experience gained from those efforts, failures and success.

Technology driven "made" artists/musicians sometimes (I repeat, sometimes) may lack both of them: the patience to reap fruits of hard work (if it is put. Anyway, no fruits without any hard work)...eventually the person will always remain "inexperienced". This vicious cycle never ends.

Hunger of quick success tries for shortcuts.

So.... the main element of ART-expression- fades out in some amount.

 

I've been thinking about this conversation as I wander about New Orleans this week taking in a great diversity of music. Eventually every avenue of contemplation brought me back to one of two conclusions:

The first, is that I can readily and enthusiastically agree with the statement that music is art without hesitation, but my following thought is always, but what is art?

Without having previously defined (with consensus) what art is, the question of whether music is art is meaningless.

While I'm well aware that there are reasonable and eloquent definitions of what art is all over the net, in many books and lectures, etc., it is my personal belief that there can be no one definition of what art is because it is inherently different for different people. I have my own personal opinion of what art is, but I don't believe other people's opinions should match my own, nor do I feel at all compelled to convince anyone of the superiority of my definition. In fact I'm happy that other people have different definitions of what art is - it keeps art interesting. I applaud all artists struggling to understand what art is to them. I deeply mistrust any artist who wants to impose their definition of art onto other artists . . . Suck it Stuckists.

The day we have a perfectly encapsulated and non-evolving description and definition of what art is we might as well pack up the whole show and start selling insurance, because it won't be art anymore.

The other concluding thought I often arrive at when considering this idea is a variation of my first conclusion, but slightly more eloquent . . .

Exploring and defining what I think art is is extremely important to me, but it's still just slightly less important to me than not giving a shit what another artist's definition of art is . . . or believing that it's any of my business to do so.

 

@ returnal exactly the conclusion I arrived at; that deep thought on the topic brings you to the question of what art is. The answers to most problems can be discovered by going to its start, its origin, how it came to be in existence. For instance ask anybody, 'Why do you eat?' and they will most likely answer that they eat because are hungry. Wrong answer. We eat to feed the body the nutrients, vitamins, minerals and fluids it needs to stay alive. What is art? first answers that pop into the head, 'It's an emotional expression of some kind.' Apologies to OP but the idea that art belongs in some way to its creator is abhorant to me. Art isn't art until you have a viewer, listener. Art has to be all about its audience. That audience makes all decisions about it - it's good, it's bad, and yes 'make it like that next time.' It seems to me that the artist has elevated himself to 'be' the art in a more profound way than the art that he is creating, I think Gilbert & George arrived at this conclusion .. just to keep this fascinating discussion roilling ..

 

It is nice that this thread seems a reflection of ourselves as we gaze at our selfs reflecting on our ideas of art's niche within the sphere of important ideas.

 

Art like all other things can not be explained - Think of a single thing that you can explain ! It will always be reducible to some lesser thing - Until you reach the underlaying reality - We humans have to contend with living in a mental realm because the real nature of reality does not permit creatures like ourselves to persist inside it - Of course it's difficult in this case to define what art is because it can not be defined - It can only be pondered - We as humans have to make a secondary reality out of the more unattainable fundamental reality that exists beneath it - It is in this secondary reality that we can call art: a frozen mental vision of ones own volition captured temporarily in a type of platonic realm that is reducible to the underlaying reality -
Eventually all things will evaporate away into the underlaying reality - Man is like a flame - A product of the energy - Visible in a type of phase transition and soon he and his art will be no more ---

 

Last edited: Jan 7, 2016

An artful song with many layers of meaning, maybe the end of this thread, maybe babyknot.

 

"and spell it out so he can understand"

wow

I don't often learn other people's songs but I will learn this one.

Thanks, superliquidsunshine [ and here I modulate (evocatively ) ]

 

Last edited: Jan 7, 2016

That seems a great compliment to Mr. Gullahorn

 

a song never starts or ends.. the same with all arts..