Art.. what is ART about?

I am placing this here because it is an aesthetics problem…

what is ART? what is its value? what is some ART considered to be
valuable and some ART is not?

look at the ART that we hold to have value? say, for example the Mona Lisa…

what gives the Mona Lisa its value? why is the Mona Lisa considered to
be the pinnacle of ''HIGH ART?" what make it so "valuable? to us?

compare the Mona Lisa to say Andy Warhol… what is the difference?
Warhol is considered to be “low brow” art… so what is the difference?

I point out that “HIGH” ART is art that has context… we can connect to
"HIGH ART’’ in a way that we cannot connect to “Low brow” art…

there is clearly a story behind the Mona Lisa… and you can read part of that
story in the actual painting itself…and in the painting of the woman in
the “Mona Lisa”…and that story give the painting context… and that is the
difference between “HIGH” art and “low brow” art… the context given
by the “HIGH ART” and the lack of context given by the “LOW BROW ART”

What context is given by Warhol’s famous Campbell’s soup “ART?”

It is easy enough to look up online…look it up… what context do you see
in one of Warhol’s prints? the Prints don’t tell a story, they give no context
to the print or the can of soup… that is the failure of Warhol… his art
doesn’t give us a story, some sort of context from the ART/soup can’s to us…
whereas the great ART does give us some context, a story…

take the play, considered to the the greatest play of the twentieth century,
“Death of a Salesman” it is great because it tells a story that resonant with
what we know of 20th century…it matches the story we know and that connection
is creates it context with us… and that is the point of context… context is
simply another form of connection…we connect to the ART… and that connection
is found in the ART context…personally I cannot connect to abstract ART, I don’t
see a story in Abstract art… and that lack of a story prevents me from
seeing context in the abstract ART…and therein lies the failure of modern ART…

it has no context to our lives today…We cannot find a connection
to modern ART… because it doesn’t tell us a story of who we are in
this modern age…ART has failed us in our modern
world because it doesn’t create a story for us to connect to…

Kropotkin

during WW2, in Paris, during one of the Gestapo regular “inspections” of
some Spanish painter… a Gestapo officer asked the painter if he did
a painting on the wall… the Painter replied, “no, you did”…

The painter is of course, Picasso and the painting is “Guernica”…
as the painting is easily enough found online, I just spent the last
hour staring at it…just looking at the painting, I could not find
any context… something that told me a story…of course, “Guernica”
has a very famous backstory, very famous context…and it is through that lens
that we see “Guernica” but looking at the painting itself? no, we don’t see context…

which shows us that context is often found not in the painting, but in
the creation of the painting or the story of who, what, when, where,
how and why of the painting…or some relationship that painting has
with something else…

put the Statue of Liberty in say, Omaha Nebraska, and it loses much of its context…

we can say the same thing about Culture that we say about ART… it needs
context to make sense…and what is Culture?

Culture: the arts and other manifestations of human intellectual
achievement regarded collectively…

and why doesn’t America seem to have something like “Cultural” in it?

I hold that is because we see, give context to everything in terms of money…
how much did that cost? what would it take to buy that? how much did it
get in auction? Why is ART the preserve of the wealthy in America?
because ART is seen in terms of it monetary value, not in terms of
its ARTIST value…a painting has value only because it is worth something
on the open market… as an ART piece, ART has no value in modern day America…
ART isn’t valued for itself but how much money is involved…

as we see other Aesthetics problems like beauty… beauty only has value
if it is engaged with money…beautiful women are valued because of their
monetary value, not for their beauty…a beautiful women on the hands of
a wealthy man is not about the women, but about the man who can afford
a beautiful women… it is about his wealth, not her beauty…

as I look about our condo, I see no paintings on the wall… only a few pictures
of family and the wife and I… and randomly, a wall placard of the San Francisco
Giants winning the 2010 world series…one I did not put up but the wife did…

the walls are bare and white…nothing to adorn them…and personally, I like
it this way…we have three mirrors hanging on the wall, one over the fake fireplace
in the living room, and two in the bedroom…
we are a modern family as we have more mirrors on the walls then we
have paintings on the walls…

there is really nothing in my house to show that we even know what ART is…
and yet, the wife and I go to museums all the time and spent a great deal
of time in Europe in museums…but looking at our condo, you wouldn’t know that…

we have no connection to ART in our lives… we have nothing giving us context
in regards to ART in our lives…

so, what is your connection to ART? what ART pieces do you own?
what is your story, context to ART?

Kropotkin

I have arts on my computer.
Arts i made are music and some games.
Which is quite difficult to produce.

K: and that is excellent…I hope you go on creating…

Kropotkin

Also i believe good art is about a fine taste for ergon.

Form is an expression of function.
and art is to glorify forms.

K: so, what is your connection to ART? what ART pieces do you own?
what is your story, context to ART?

D: I have arts on my computer.
Arts i made are music and some games.
Which is quite difficult to produce.
[/quote]
K: and that is excellent…I hope you go on creating…

D: Also i believe good art is about a fine taste for ergon.

Form is an expression of function.
and art is to glorify forms.
[/quote]
K: I had to look up “Ergon”… translated as function, task, work…
from Aristotle’s Nicomachean ethics… that is most often translated
as function, task, work…

I am about to disagree with you… rare, but true…I hold that ART isn’t made
from work, task, function… ART, true ART comes from an overabundance of
emotions and feelings… ART is created from the strength of someone, not
the weakness… It is easy to spot ART created from weakness… look at the
great ART be it paintings, or literature, sculpture, Architecture… and it flows
from strength, not from weakness…we look at ART to reaffirm… it isn’t
about looking at how the ART is a task or work or a function…ART, true ART
doesn’t say a word about function or task or work… ART speaks to the heart
and if it is great ART, it also speaks to the head…ART defines us as human beings,
ART tells us about what is possible for us, ART gives our lives meaning…
and how does that work with the concept of “Ergon”?

in fact, I would suggest that great ART doesn’t give us a sense of the effort or work or
the task involved in creating it… Great ART is effortless and graceful, flowing,
fluent… unhurried… and full of ease…

Kropotkin

A healthy and more fit man, is more beautiful than a fat and diseased man.

A sword must be sharp, strait, made of fine steel, crafted artistically.

A blacksmith is an artist.

K: and each of your examples are based upon assumptions that aren’t
examined…

for example, why must a sword be "sharp, strait, made of fine steel and crafted
artistically? these are assumptions… for example by your definition,
a sword must be strait…which would leave out swords like the “scimitar” type of sword…
which can be Shamshir swords, or Nimcha swords, or Persian swords like the
“Shamsher” or even “Sabre” swords…

and as far as swords being made of “steel” in fact, swords have been made of
bronze, Iron, as well as steel…

as far as the “blacksmith” being an Artist, that is a very recent idea… the “blacksmith”
was a simple worker in metal who using tools to hammer, bend, shape or cut metal to
create certain shapes…that doesn’t imply being an Artist…

and it is a healthy, fit man more “beautiful” then a “fat and diseased man”…
that is as much social custom as it is anything else…

Kropotkin

Aren’t examined?
Maybe you’ve missed the point?
I am idealizing ergon as one of the meanings within some of the arts.
Not all arts are equal, and not all arts have a function.

Precision is also an aspect of art.
When people paint, and make realistic paintings,
this is precision based art.

Cooking good food is an art.
Some people are better at it than others.
In this instance, art is about creating and combining
something which is pleasant.