[discussion] What is art?

[Louigi Verona]

In thinking about electronic music and its principles, I have stumbled upon several things.

When we see a person play a fiddle or piano or a flute - we know the amount of work required to do this. We know the skill required to play the instrument because we observe the movement of fingers and out of our everyday experience we know that this is very difficult. And this knowledge adds to the impression.

It seems that a lot of what we call art depends on how difficult it is to achieve and on the amount of skill displayed.

At the same time in electronic music a listener does not know how much skill was required to create it. In fact, he does not know if any skill was required at all.

This lack of transparency is characteristic to basically any computer activity and it influences greatly the way the audience perceives any computer creations.

So in light of this I decided to ask myself - what is art then? How much of it is skill, how much of it is communication of a feeling (which not always requires any skill that would impress).

I understand that the question is one that people try to answer all their lives, but any constructive discussion would be helpful and interesting to me. Let's just keep to the subject and learn as many opinions as possible.

[psishock]

Do i smell deja vu?
We have been through this before, here on central. One does not need a lifetime to realize, art is a totally personal phenomena, just like taste for instance.

And the "art" word istelf is an artificial one, only "creations" exist, by the creators. People who have the same taste and think, that the given creation is quality/abstract/worthwhile/etc enough beyond their chosen border, tend to call it art. What is art for you, doesn't necessary mean its art for me, and vice versa.

That border can even easily change over time, anything can affect it. Example if the tools get easier and easier to use, more and more people will try to create something with them. Take photoshop, average people can make a drawing with a few clicks with it nowdays, a few decades before the same kind of drawings would be called high quality arts, nowdays they are just "meh, another shopped picture" (while they still looks awesome).

[AlisterFlint]

"art" comes from the audience, not the creator..

[psishock]

usually, but i've seen dozen of times nowdays when the expression came right from the creator. =)

[AlisterFlint]

yes, the material comes from the creator, but people turn it into art.. or not..

[psishock]

i've meant that the creator declared his creation as an "art" right away.
"behold, this is my great art work"

[uncloned]

art is what gets you groupies.

[psishock]

art is what gets you groupies.

yay! lets gather Sam and the rest of the people and make lots of art, everyone would just love to be surrounded with groupies. ^_^

[AlisterFlint]

i've meant that the creator declared his creation as an "art" right away.
"behold, this is my great art work"

oh yes, yes, true indeed  

[AlisterFlint]

art is what gets you groupies.

you wish!  

[uncloned]

you'd be surprised how microtonal music makes women swoon :-)

[LPChip]

Isn't art something that touches someone else in a unique way?

[psishock]

nah, don't hafta complicate simple things. Art can touch even the creator in "a unique way", so its certainly just a personal phenomena. Everyone reacts differently.

[AlisterFlint]

you'd be surprised how microtonal music makes women swoon :-)

they might swoon, at first; but when you start to play, they shwoosh away, no?  

[uncloned]

no.... we get the smelling salts.

Web definitions for swoon
   faint: pass out from weakness, physical or emotional distress due to a loss of blood supply to the brain