To the best of my knowledge, until modern art, all art showed a high mastery of craft.
Do you really think that prior to the 20th century, there was no neglected, unremarkable, in-style but sub-par art, or art that might succeed on its own merits but failed to impress for other reasons, or art that just failed to ever catch on with those who had control over funding/critiquing/displaying it? Do you think that there was no prettying-up of mundane items, creating aesthetically-pleasing but not-terribly-formalized objects and images, no creative commission of form and image to medium for the sheer hell of it, regardless of what high society was upvoting as “the in thing” this year?
What you’re calling “art” is a small subset of the actual collage of human creative endeavor of art generally, and is better termed “fine art” (and in the context of this thread, you seem to be confining yourself to visual arts). Most of art made by humans throughout history and prehistory has been decorative and utilitarian in its impulses rather than created by highly-trained individuals working within a well-defined tradition and its strictures for the sole purpose of aesthetic expression—this is still the case today.
Modern Art itself is largely within the “fine art” category, and it includes all kinds of things you may be familiar with as “good art.” Could your five-year old do a van Gogh? A minimalist or Futurist building? A photorealistic painting? Salvador Dali? Matisse? Picasso? Monet? The buildings of Frank Lloyd Wright? Those things are Modern Art too.
Yes, some things labelled Modern Art look like a box of crayons exploded, or they’re almost absurdly simplistic, or they break from tradition but fail to do anything interesting with it. Especially given it’s a movement strongly influenced by breaks from tradition, one oughtn’t be surprised—and it’s easier than ever for a given work to find space, or be sent around on tour, or to be created essentially because someone wanted a thing there and didn’t have a lot of specifics, felt like leaving it up to the artist they hired. There’s more art, period, than there was in previous eras—more people making it, more people comissioning it, more people interested in displaying it, more people trying to get into it with varying degrees of talent, more people finding something they like and going “here, this is pretty awesome.”
And because you’re living here and now, you have a much higher chance of seeing something made recently that flops, or just doesn’t do it for you personally, from within that timeframe. The flops and failures and embarrassments of centuries past are, by and large, not widely-circulated today—unless they found a niche later on.
How many execrable pieces of old and even ancient art are you not seeing because time has marched on? How many things you find to be the height of aesthetic refinement couldn’t get an audience in their maker’s lifetime? How many have gone on to be considered classics despite their reception at the time?
And how many things that entirely meet the general definition of art are you not even considering because they don’t at least pretend to emanate from one of those establishments?
IAWYC, but I think this thread is quite a bit past due for “art” to be tabooed. Since the discussion is partially about how modern connotations of “art” effect people’s usage its hard to say exactly when the line was crossed, but IMHO
“What you’re calling “art” is a small subset of the actual collage of human creative endeavor of art generally, and is better termed “fine art” (and in the context of this thread, you seem to be confining yourself to visual arts). Most of art made by humans throughout history and prehistory has been decorative and utilitarian in its impulses rather than created by highly-trained individuals working within a well-defined tradition and its strictures for the sole purpose of aesthetic expression—this is still the case today.
Modern Art itself is largely within the “fine art” category, and it includes all kinds of things you may be familiar with as “good art.” Could your five-year old do a van Gogh? A minimalist or Futurist building? A photorealistic painting? Salvador Dali? Matisse? Picasso? Monet? The buildings of Frank Lloyd Wright? Those things are Modern Art too”
Fair enough. I was aiming to answer NancyLebovitz’ question in a way that didn’t amount to just “your definitions are broken” without really explaining why I think that.
Do you really think that prior to the 20th century, there was no neglected, unremarkable, in-style but sub-par art, or art that might succeed on its own merits but failed to impress for other reasons, or art that just failed to ever catch on with those who had control over funding/critiquing/displaying it? Do you think that there was no prettying-up of mundane items, creating aesthetically-pleasing but not-terribly-formalized objects and images, no creative commission of form and image to medium for the sheer hell of it, regardless of what high society was upvoting as “the in thing” this year?
I am sure that there was all of that, but having seen some works that I know were simply “churned out” to meet the trends of the time, were done by artists considered mediocre in their time (these pictures may not circulate around high class galleries, but people still own them,) or did not achieve popularity in their own time, I have to say that I haven’t found any less appealing than I find nearly all Modern Art.
I know that there are people who appreciate it much more than I do, and I’m sure that many of them can argue coherently for their appreciation, but to me, and I believe for a number of other people here as well, Modern Art appears to be a genre that does not demand redeeming qualities in exchange for success.
Do you really think that prior to the 20th century, there was no neglected, unremarkable, in-style but sub-par art, or art that might succeed on its own merits but failed to impress for other reasons, or art that just failed to ever catch on with those who had control over funding/critiquing/displaying it? Do you think that there was no prettying-up of mundane items, creating aesthetically-pleasing but not-terribly-formalized objects and images, no creative commission of form and image to medium for the sheer hell of it, regardless of what high society was upvoting as “the in thing” this year?
What you’re calling “art” is a small subset of the actual collage of human creative endeavor of art generally, and is better termed “fine art” (and in the context of this thread, you seem to be confining yourself to visual arts). Most of art made by humans throughout history and prehistory has been decorative and utilitarian in its impulses rather than created by highly-trained individuals working within a well-defined tradition and its strictures for the sole purpose of aesthetic expression—this is still the case today.
Modern Art itself is largely within the “fine art” category, and it includes all kinds of things you may be familiar with as “good art.” Could your five-year old do a van Gogh? A minimalist or Futurist building? A photorealistic painting? Salvador Dali? Matisse? Picasso? Monet? The buildings of Frank Lloyd Wright? Those things are Modern Art too.
Yes, some things labelled Modern Art look like a box of crayons exploded, or they’re almost absurdly simplistic, or they break from tradition but fail to do anything interesting with it. Especially given it’s a movement strongly influenced by breaks from tradition, one oughtn’t be surprised—and it’s easier than ever for a given work to find space, or be sent around on tour, or to be created essentially because someone wanted a thing there and didn’t have a lot of specifics, felt like leaving it up to the artist they hired. There’s more art, period, than there was in previous eras—more people making it, more people comissioning it, more people interested in displaying it, more people trying to get into it with varying degrees of talent, more people finding something they like and going “here, this is pretty awesome.”
And because you’re living here and now, you have a much higher chance of seeing something made recently that flops, or just doesn’t do it for you personally, from within that timeframe. The flops and failures and embarrassments of centuries past are, by and large, not widely-circulated today—unless they found a niche later on.
How many execrable pieces of old and even ancient art are you not seeing because time has marched on? How many things you find to be the height of aesthetic refinement couldn’t get an audience in their maker’s lifetime? How many have gone on to be considered classics despite their reception at the time?
And how many things that entirely meet the general definition of art are you not even considering because they don’t at least pretend to emanate from one of those establishments?
IAWYC, but I think this thread is quite a bit past due for “art” to be tabooed. Since the discussion is partially about how modern connotations of “art” effect people’s usage its hard to say exactly when the line was crossed, but IMHO
is pretty clearly getting into arguing over definitions.
Fair enough. I was aiming to answer NancyLebovitz’ question in a way that didn’t amount to just “your definitions are broken” without really explaining why I think that.
I am sure that there was all of that, but having seen some works that I know were simply “churned out” to meet the trends of the time, were done by artists considered mediocre in their time (these pictures may not circulate around high class galleries, but people still own them,) or did not achieve popularity in their own time, I have to say that I haven’t found any less appealing than I find nearly all Modern Art.
I know that there are people who appreciate it much more than I do, and I’m sure that many of them can argue coherently for their appreciation, but to me, and I believe for a number of other people here as well, Modern Art appears to be a genre that does not demand redeeming qualities in exchange for success.