StaticAge wrote:


The fact is that what makes art have artistic value is not because there is some Platonic form of beauty or anything like that. Because people made pictures in caves and carved statuettes for themselves long before there was this forum that was eventually invented called "art" and the possible varieties of meaning a work can imbued with is infinite. An institution like the artworld cannot exist without a culture that permeates and supports the artworld as having a legitimate sort of aesthetic authority in promoting kinds of creative expressions as art.

A work created cannot escape its circumstances. It is a product of its time. If Yves Klein was an unknown and did a blue painting today, it might be dismissed entirely. If nuclear war happened and years later a survivor does not recognize a piece of canvas to be the Mona Lisa and uses it as part of a make shift shelter, it is not an artwork anymore. But in his time period, where representative painting was seriously called into question as to how valuable it was due to the invention and growing popularity of photography, it seemed like an interesting development of what you could do with painting. When people were questioning the social authority artwork rests on, Duchamp's urinal was (and still is imo) an incredibly provocative piece. Its a perfect example of how something that throws the total tradition into question is valuable for that very reason. Its a bit like the logical positivists realizing that denying metaphysics was itself a metaphysical movement.

Anselm Kiefer does not need to be "better" than Tony Bennett. It isnt like one of them is more "art" than the other, what you are talking about there is a matter of taste. We all have our individual tastes and values when it comes to aesthetics, but by and large those tastes reflect aspects of the culture we live in, and art is a larger collective reflection of that same culture. Sometimes it highlights a part of culture we identify or agree with, and sometimes its a reflection of a part of our society that is more foreign or worthless to us.

StaticAge wrote:

Do you feel that other fields are that democratic? Is science, for example, best defined by people who are not themselves scientists? I touched on this when I noted that there are a wide variety of non-innovative areas that cater to what the people expect.

5kroner wrote:
I don't subscribe to the notion that a work is merely some psycho-cultural representation of the artist and his audience, and in such is completely bound to the culture it was created in.

This points to a purely socio-scientific hermeneutic I find insufficient. It is exactly what is seen in the case of "My Kid Could..." and the big Oprah book club fiasco. The question of authenticity itself becomes more important than a true question as to the quality of the work. We find ourselves saying, "yes, yes, it was a horribly crafted tale, but it was based on a true story, so it is somehow better than that good one over there."

As if the fact that a monkey created it makes it any better or worse. While "Candide" is a fine debasement of Leibniz, it is also a very humorous read with or without such knowledge.

Yes, it could be said that a Thomas Mann novel could be used to keep warm, and a painting could provide shelter, but this hypothetical function of the work does nothing to alter how we define or judge the work as we understand it now.

While Duchamp and Klein made important statements with their work, I wouldn't call the works themselves to be good or great, but accordingly this would all be a matter of taste

If I pissed in the fountain would it alter its claim to quality, or would it simply make the work more important, as now it has a rich history? I'd suggest that such temporal dependent works of art are what we should call a fad, as in the progress of history (mentioned earlier), the context will be largely forgotten. If we live in such a hypothetical world, could we not imagine "Daddy Daycare" to be a revolt against high art in general. In making such a profound statement, does "Daddy Daycare" become a much more important, a much better work?

As for a work not needing to be better, that could be said of anything, and comes off as a great cop-out. We once again surrender greatness to tastes and the masses. From this you suggest that the masses support the artworld, therefore the masses affirm the authority of such critics. So these critics, who do not ascribe greatness to a work as such, as the notion itself is not necessary, only serve as arbitrators of a democratically backed taste. So it isn't the case that these critics have any truly developed aesthetic judgment, but a position which is supported by the people. That's a fine assertion to me, so long as it is recognized by the immortal rights of 89 that such taste is for the most part bad taste. However, I doubt how connected the artworld is to the "people," as I see it to be more of a deluded circle of old hacks, who incestuously reaffirm their positions in the name of a taste they can hardly begin to define.

Zimboki wrote:
If there's no inherent definition of art, and anything can be considered art, then the value of art is given by the people viewing it and in order for that value to have any meaning it would have to be a consensus at some point and there has to be some overall definition other than "Art can be anything" because you can't assign value without a basis of comparison. A dollar is a dollar, but its value can only be judged when placed against say the euro. If there was no other currency then the value of it wouldn't need to change.

If 'Art' works like this currency that exists with no other currency, all art is the same and of equal value. and If that is true, then no art holds any value really.