Art for Art's Sake

[Janine Flynn ASGFA]

Good Morning All,

It's a bit quiet around here, let's see if anyone is awake :)

Is there any consensus on what is Art?
What does Art attempt to achieve?
How do the attitudes of artists differ from those who enjoy Art as spectators?
Why would any of these question be relevant?


This extract from Walter Pater states [1]

... For while in all other kinds of art it is possible to distinguish the matter from the form, and the understanding can always make this distinction, yet it is the constant effort of art to obliterate it. That the mere matter of a poem, for instance, its subject, namely its given incidents or situation - that the mere matter of a picture, the actual circumstances of an event, the actual topography of a landscape - should be nothing without the form, the spirit, of the the handling, that this form, this mode of handling, should become an end in itself, should penetrate every part of the matter: this is what all art constantly strives after, and achieves in different degrees.


He appears to be saying that the painted subject is almost secondary to the way the painting is handled by the artist, implying Art for Art's Sake.


kind regards,
Janine



[1] The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Literature The School of Giorgione
http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/pater/renaissance/7.html

[Remote Viewing Media]

Hi

Just in case you were worried that it is always quite around here.

My reply is that 'All art is at once surface and symbol' (Oscar Wilde)

Kev

[Janine Flynn ASGFA]

Wilde goes on to say...

'... all art is at once surface and symbol. Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. Those who read the symbol do so at their peril. It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors. Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work is new, complex, and vital. When critics disagree, the artist is in accord with himself. We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely.
All art is quite useless.'


Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/174/174-h/174-h.htm#chap00

[Lisa]

my take - art is obliteration. regeneration. Charlie Parker said "Bop is continual recovery."

[Janine Flynn ASGFA]

Hi Lisa,

Would you like to expand please?


Lisa said:

my take - art is obliteration. regeneration. Charlie Parker said "Bop is continual recovery."

[Lisa]

Hi Janine-

Well, I'm talking about art as a log of being. To create something, you must take something apart, either consciously or subconsciously, and then put it back together. You know what a cat is for instance or a cloud. or a catcloud. You obliterate the original object (not in the sense of destruction, but in the sense of interpretation) and then you re-create and maybe combine it with other ideas - regeneration.

[Janine Flynn ASGFA]

Hi Lisa,

Yes, I understand you. It's in the putting to oneside of all knowledge about a form and seeing what it looks like in the first instance and then translating that onto whatever support is being used.

Unless I've misunderstood Pater, he seems to be saying that for him, it is the handling of the medium that is more important than the subject and I can relate to this in a sense as once I've begun a piece that becomes possibly my most important consideration. But I only begin a piece if I think it has potential to be a good subject in the first place; it's never occurred to me to wonder whether anyone else has ever begun a piece for any other reason before. Pater appears to be speaking as a spectator, in which case he was looking for something about the way it has been made, rather than the subject.

He then goes on to state that in his opinion (to paraphrase - he included music and poetry in his text) that the method of handling by an artist is 'the goal of Art' - my understanding of this opinion is to think of the brushmarks of Titian, Augustus John, Rembrandt as being 'the point' of their paintings as their brushwork is what I gaze at in admiration. But whether that is A, let alone THE 'goal of Art' - I really don't know. Does Art need any goals?

Bearing in mind the typical victorian paintings that can be seen in the Tate... I'd better leave that with they don't appeal to my taste.

kind regards,
Janine




Lisa said:

Hi Janine-

Well, I'm talking about art as a log of being. To create something, you must take something apart, either consciously or subconsciously, and then put it back together. You know what a cat is for instance or a cloud. or a catcloud. You obliterate the original object (not in the sense of destruction, but in the sense of interpretation) and then you re-create and maybe combine it with other ideas - regeneration.

[Lisa]

Hello again Janine,

I'm wary of people that put such a high value on technique. Form over substance. Isn't that antithetical to all conceptual art? And, if you're speaking of musicians instead of visual artists, the song written by the composer could be considered the substance. Where would music be today without the composer/performers - Michael Jackson being a timely example. To me the composition is at least as important than its execution.

[Janine Flynn ASGFA]

Hi Lisa,

We agree about the composition - as I stated earlier, I don't begin a piece unless I feel it has potential as a subject - the composition is a significant part of that decision but once decided it assumes a very minor role in the completion of a piece.

As for technique (or the method of handling that Pater refers to without giving an explicit example), it can be argued that it is nothing more than the methods used to put pigment on the support.

Would Guernica have the same impact if it had been completed using different techniques? Or Dali's surrealism is/can be unsettling because of the realistic techniques he used with his unreal subjects. Turner is another one - but as he is from the same era of Ruskin and Pater that probably excludes him from this discussion. To some degree, in some instances, it is impossible to separate the substance from the form.

kind regards,
Janine



Lisa said:

Hello again Janine,

I'm wary of people that put such a high value on technique. Form over substance. Isn't that antithetical to all conceptual art? And, if you're speaking of musicians instead of visual artists, the song written by the composer could be considered the substance. Where would music be today without the composer/performers - Michael Jackson being a timely example. To me the composition is at least as important than its execution.

[Lisa]

Hi Janine,

You're right about form. Sometimes it can't be separated from substance. All I can say is thank God I was born in the 20th century with all its craziness and freedom. I've just read a story I know you'll enjoy about a 19th century painter that lost his way to artistic integrity - Nikolai Gogol's short story, "The Mysterious Portrait". It's on www.wikisource.org It deals with developing masterly technique and how it is tied into the power of a painting. All the best to you, Janine, Lisa

[John Adams]

Hi Janine, how are you?
There is one thing for sure there is so so much bullshit said and written about art.
Art is a form of expression, it should come from your soul. It is not down to how commercial it is or how beautiful it is either. Art can be purely aesthetic and also art can be conceptual. There are a lot of people out there even on this site who call themselves artists, but just because you make images is that enough to actually call yourself an artist.

There are a lot of people who think they know what art is, but art is not something you can put in a box. Art is so many things but it is not for example, some pretty flowers done by someone with no talent for painting. Art is deep and thoughtful. Art is special, art is clever, art is forever changing. Art is old and new.

If we are doing something purely to sell it then it is not art. If we are doing something as a way of expressing ourselves, or as a way of releasing some inner intellectual thoughts then that may be art.
Art is music, poetry, dance, painting, sculpture, ceramics, filmmaking, and the list goes on and on.
It is how we do it and how good it is which makes it art.
Howz that for some thoughts on the subject.
Lots of love to all of you artists out there.
John

[Kevin J Hatton]

Hi

Lots of pointed questions. Yes I am certainly awake. This might be some useful core material for my Pod Cast next year.

Just a thought.

Kev