Art for art's sake

[PassionFruit]

This is a topic I've been wanting to post and wanted to hear from the people here. And I also wanted to start a fun topic. It's about art becoming political, I know this isn't something that's new, many artists use their work to express political views because they probably had no other way to do so. An example of this is the Black Arts Movement, where art black artists, for the most part, had to have some kind of political agenda behind their work. They couldn't just create art just purely for expression and enjoyment.

W.E. B. DuBois even wrote an essay on what the criteria for what that should be. In fact, he even believed that art should be used for propaganda. If it's not used for this purpose it has no meaning.
And I'm talking about all sorts of art (or what you consider to be art) such as music, literature, poetry, photography, etc.

Personally, I don't see anything wrong with having a political subtext with art, but sometimes I think when art becomes a tool to express political views, I think it may end up loosing its purpose of just being art.

What do you think? Do you think art should be used as a political tool every now and then?

Is art meaningless when it doesn't have a political subtext behind it?

 

[Mystman]

The big problem is that the term 'art' is incredibly badly defined.

That said, I usually apreciate some deeper message (political or not) in my art. It gives you something to think about instead of just something pretty to look at. Things that are just pretty to look at are also nice, but I wouldn't really call them art.

Can a piece overuse the message, and thus become a bad piece of art? Sure. But in the same that a piece can also overuse the red paint, and become a bad piece of art.

What do you think is the purpose of 'just being art'?

 

[quatona]

Well, the definition of art and the accepted purposes and methods have been changing dramatically throughout history.
Personally, I am not a great fan of propaganda art. Usually it tends to appeal to emotions where reason would be the appropriate tool.

As for art being necessarily political: yes, everything that happens in public is political in one way or the other.

 

[morningstar2651]

"It is to be remembered that all art is magical in origin - music, sculpture, writing, painting - and by magical I mean intended to produce very definite results. Paintings were originally formulae to make what is painted happen. Art is not an end in itself, any more than Einstein's matter-into-energy formulae is an end in itself. Like all formulae, art was originally FUNCTIONAL, intended to make things happen, the way an atom bomb happens from Einstein's formulae." -- William S. Burroughs

 

[Ryal Kane]

Art shoulde usually have some subtext, though it doesn't need to be political.
I'm a writer and much of what I create is fairly mainstream. I consider myself a storyteller rather than someone who's trying to change perceptions and challenge audiences.

That doesn't mean my work is inane slapstick.
Nut I find it more important to entertain first, then educate. I've seen terrible theatre where you feel bludgeoned with The Message and I've seen great theatre where think about it for a long time afterwards, finding your own sense.

 

[jayem]

Nut I find it more important to entertain first

I agree. One of those old movie moguls--Louis B. Mayer, or someone--supposedly said, "If you want to send a message, call Western Union." If art doesn't entertain--if it doesn't have any attraction for you, to command and hold your attention, then it doesn't matter what the message is. You won't get it.

Edited to add: Come to think of it, this thread's title is the rough translation of the MGM motto--Ars Gratia Artis. Was that intentional?

 

[Chesterton]

What do you think? Do you think art should be used as a political tool every now and then?

Using art as a political tool is like using a fine Merlot to wash a car; using something exquisite to influence the mundane. We should use exquisite means to express exquisite things: life itself.

Is art meaningless when it doesn't have a political subtext behind it?

Not at all.

One of those old movie moguls--Louis B. Mayer, or someone--supposedly said, "If you want to send a message, call Western Union."

Edited to add: Come to think of it, this thread's title is the rough translation of the MGM motto--Ars Gratia Artis. Was that intentional?

Yes it was intentional, to excuse poor product.

There is only one thing in life which should be done for it's own sake -"Love", because our Creator is Love, and that's our only reason for existing. Love is the only reason for politics - politicians decide that murder is against policy, breaking contracts is against policy, racism is against policy, etc., because we should treat each other according to the basic principles of love, right?

 

[Autumnleaf]

Political art is overused and tends to be ham fisted.

When art is used to express beauty is when I think it is at its highest form. I think the market would agree with that too.

 

[gwenmead]

Art is weird.

We think it's this big highfalutin' high class magical thing that only hangs in galleries and museums, and that only a few people have any talent for, and that said talent is innate, not learned... well I got a secret to tell y'all: none of those things are really true.

Art encompasses that kind of expression, but is so much more. It's not just in galleries and museums, it's everywhere. Lots of people have a talent for it, and the skills can be taught: I was born loving to draw, but y'know how I got to become a decent graphic designer? I went to school and learned. And I keep learning, on the job. No innate talent required.

I don't think people realize that.

I also don't think people realize that art is common, everywhere. Where do you think logos come from? Or car designs? Or movies? Or the patterns on your clothing? Or book covers? Or computer interface design? They come from teams of artists, of one kind or another.

I don't think art can help but be political. Think of how many early 20th-century art movements stirred things up, when people stopped painting pretty pictures of European mountain scenes and instead came up with movements like Fauvism and Cubism and made art look "all wrong" for the time. It isn't just the propaganda poster that's a form of political art, no way.

Some random initial opinions from a graphic artist, for whatever they're worth.

 

[morningstar2651]

"It is the function of art to renew our perception. What we are familiar with we cease to see. The writer shakes up the familiar scene, and, as if by magic, we see a new meaning in it." -- Anaïs Nin

 

[Bombila]

Art is weird.

We think it's this big highfalutin' high class magical thing that only hangs in galleries and museums, and that only a few people have any talent for, and that said talent is innate, not learned... well I got a secret to tell y'all: none of those things are really true.

Art encompasses that kind of expression, but is so much more. It's not just in galleries and museums, it's everywhere. Lots of people have a talent for it, and the skills can be taught: I was born loving to draw, but y'know how I got to become a decent graphic designer? I went to school and learned. And I keep learning, on the job. No innate talent required.

I don't think people realize that.

I also don't think people realize that art is common, everywhere. Where do you think logos come from? Or car designs? Or movies? Or the patterns on your clothing? Or book covers? Or computer interface design? They come from teams of artists, of one kind or another.

I don't think art can help but be political. Think of how many early 20th-century art movements stirred things up, when people stopped painting pretty pictures of European mountain scenes and instead came up with movements like Fauvism and Cubism and made art look "all wrong" for the time. It isn't just the propaganda poster that's a form of political art, no way.

Some random initial opinions from a graphic artist, for whatever they're worth.

I agree with much of this comment.

I get particularly frustrated with the idea of 'talent' referring to ability to draw/paint/sculpt/make music etc. These are skills, which once learned can be used to make art or make ads or make statements. To be a writer, you must learn to write - to spell out words, to know their meanings, to know many words, and something of their histories. And so on.

Anyone with a modicum of fine muscle control in hands (or sometimes feet, or lips - there are handless artists) who can also train themselves to observe can learn to draw and paint representationally.

What you do with your skills once you have them is largely personal. Political issues can be full of passion, and an artist may be passionate about them, and make art expressing that passion:

Visual art is a mode of expression and a vehicle for communication, as is verbal or written language, or music, or dance. Graphic arts communicate the ideas that corporations or governments or others want presented to the public. An art like dance can tell a story just as a book might, using the mode of expression that is dancing, and the vehicle that is a choreographed dance. Almost everyone knows about Swan Lake, a story told in dance. A more powerful, and very political dance would be The Green Table:

http://www.ballet.co.uk/images/abt/...lberg_jennifer_alexander_floor_devour_500.jpg

The problem is in most people thinking that art is only one thing, or two or three things, when it is as many things as people using it want it to be. It is a mode of expression, a vehicle for communication, used by those proficient in its exercise for whatever purpose they may have.

 

[morningstar2651]

Our lives affect our art.

Black Paintings - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Picasso's Rose Period - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"Without magic, there is no art. Without art, there is no idealism. Without idealism, there is no integrity. Without integrity, there is nothing but production. "
— Raymond Chandler

 

[white dove]

An example of this is the Black Arts Movement, where art black artists, for the most part, had to have some kind of political agenda behind their work. They couldn't just create art just purely for expression and enjoyment.

And I would imagine it would have been quite difficult to at that time. As artists, we create what we know, what we feel or what we dream of. If it's layered in meaning, all the better. I'm not sure if DuBois was suggesting that all art should be used for propaganda simply because he was trying to persuade and call to action as many people as he could or if he simply believed exactly what he was saying.

I, personally, enjoy art of all kinds. If art mimics what we see, hear or experience everyday, it's beautiful.. and sometimes, even in its truthful parts can we still see the political underpinnings. If it distorts reality, we still may see some political statements being made... and it can still be beautiful.


Using art solely to showcase one's talent is very rarely seen, isn't it? There is almost-always some other statement being made. And if not, art always reveals something about the artist -- which is a statement, itself. Art can be a tool, no matter the specific goal. It can be used to challenge, question, contemplate, mirror, shadow...


I see nothing wrong with it, either way.

 

[Received]

I don't have anything against the concept of art for art's sake. What bothers me is that the advocates behind this position tend to support what I wouldn't call art in many cases.

So it goes back to a definition of art. I'm simple-minded. Intrinsic to art is the appreciation of beauty; and beauty doesn't necessarily need to be supplemented with a feeling of positive emotion in order for it to be beauty. Beauty involves the appreciation of something for its own sake, fully in the phenomenological moment. As the philosophers would say, something of beauty has its telos (or end, or goal) in itself. Nothing political, religious, existential, or whatever else is intrinsic to beauty, although these things might overlap something of beauty.

The difficulty of a stance like this is that there are times when artistic streaks mix with potentially morbid and unartistic ones. Take David Lynch. Eraserhead is, in a sense, a work of art. The cinematography is striking, even beautiful. But at the same time, the film is an unambiguous psychedelic horrorshow -- which constitutes part of the reason why I love it, but which does nothing to add to its artistic flavor.

I think many times people mistakenly conflate art with flashiness or general well-doneness. There's more to art than this. Art is, to me, essentially a medium for beauty.

 

[morningstar2651]

I don't have anything against the concept of art for art's sake. What bothers me is that the advocates behind this position tend to support what I wouldn't call art in many cases.

So it goes back to a definition of art. I'm simple-minded. Intrinsic to art is the appreciation of beauty; and beauty doesn't necessarily need to be supplemented with a feeling of positive emotion in order for it to be beauty. Beauty involves the appreciation of something for its own sake, fully in the phenomenological moment. As the philosophers would say, something of beauty has its telos (or end, or goal) in itself. Nothing political, religious, existential, or whatever else is intrinsic to beauty, although these things might overlap something of beauty. The difficulty of a stance like this is that there are times when artistic streaks mix with potentially morbid and unartistic ones. Take David Lynch. Eraserhead is, in a sense, a work of art. The cinematography is striking, even beautiful, and inherent to beauty is a sense of valuing something for its own sake (that which has its telos in itself, as the philosophers would say). But at the same time, the film is an unambiguous psychedelic horrorshow -- which constitutes part of the reason why I love it, but which does nothing to add to its artistic flavor.

I think many times people mistakenly conflate art with flashiness or general well-doneness. There's more to art than this. Art is, to me, essentially a medium for beauty.

I consider art a medium for the sublime - both the beautiful and grotesque.

Burke, Edmund. 1909–14. On the Sublime and Beautiful. Vol. 24, Part 2. The Harvard Classics

 

[PassionFruit]

And I would imagine it would have been quite difficult to at that time. As artists, we create what we know, what we feel or what we dream of. If it's layered in meaning, all the better. I'm not sure if DuBois was suggesting that all art should be used for propaganda simply because he was trying to persuade and call to action as many people as he could or if he simply believed exactly what he was saying.

Have you ever read his essay entitled Criteria of Negro Art? Really interesting to read, you may be correct that he wasn't suggesting that all should be used for propaganda. Perhaps that's how I interpreted it. Been awhile since I've read anything from DuBois.

Using art as a political tool is like using a fine Merlot to wash a car; using something exquisite to influence the mundane. We should use exquisite means to express exquisite things: life itself.

That's an interesting way to put it, but does art have to be exquisite?

Edited to add: Come to think of it, this thread's title is the rough translation of the MGM motto--Ars Gratia Artis. Was that intentional?

No, it wasn't. I was kind of thinking of the french term l'art pour l'art.


Thanks for the responses.

 

[Bombila]

I don't have anything against the concept of art for art's sake. What bothers me is that the advocates behind this position tend to support what I wouldn't call art in many cases.

So it goes back to a definition of art. I'm simple-minded. Intrinsic to art is the appreciation of beauty; and beauty doesn't necessarily need to be supplemented with a feeling of positive emotion in order for it to be beauty. Beauty involves the appreciation of something for its own sake, fully in the phenomenological moment. As the philosophers would say, something of beauty has its telos (or end, or goal) in itself. Nothing political, religious, existential, or whatever else is intrinsic to beauty, although these things might overlap something of beauty.

The difficulty of a stance like this is that there are times when artistic streaks mix with potentially morbid and unartistic ones. Take David Lynch. Eraserhead is, in a sense, a work of art. The cinematography is striking, even beautiful. But at the same time, the film is an unambiguous psychedelic horrorshow -- which constitutes part of the reason why I love it, but which does nothing to add to its artistic flavor.

I think many times people mistakenly conflate art with flashiness or general well-doneness. There's more to art than this. Art is, to me, essentially a medium for beauty.

I disagree. Art is a vehicle for communication, just as much as writing or composing music. What the artist intends to communicate may or may not have anything to do with beauty. Because an individual perceives something in a work of art that is not beautiful according to their personal responses does not make that work of art 'not art'. It only means the artist has failed to communicate well, or the individual does not understand the language, just as if s/he were trying to understand poetry in a foriegn language.

An artist may fail to communicate well through being inept with their medium, or having nothing very interesting to say. An individual looking at art may fail by not understanding the language, or not being very perceptive. It is a two way communication, and subject to all the same problems encountered in verbal communication.

 

[cantata]

Well-said, Bombila.

Additionally, some art is meant to make you wonder, “Is this art? Is this beautiful? What am I supposed to feel?”

 

[gwenmead]

Art is a vehicle for communication, just as much as writing or composing music.

This, plus the rest of what Bombila said. I pulled this bit out because it sums things up nicely.

There's a reason why my BFA is in Visual Communications, not "Art" or "Design" (though I am trained in both). Art is about sending messages and telling stories, as much as anything else. It isn't always pretty.

The visual appeal or "beauty" of a work of art has to do with its aesthetics, and aesthetics is not art, though it's common for people to confuse the two because it is a quality that matters.

 

[Received]

I disagree. Art is a vehicle for communication, just as much as writing or composing music. What the artist intends to communicate may or may not have anything to do with beauty. Because an individual perceives something in a work of art that is not beautiful according to their personal responses does not make that work of art 'not art'. It only means the artist has failed to communicate well, or the individual does not understand the language, just as if s/he were trying to understand poetry in a foriegn language.

An artist may fail to communicate well through being inept with their medium, or having nothing very interesting to say. An individual looking at art may fail by not understanding the language, or not being very perceptive. It is a two way communication, and subject to all the same problems encountered in verbal communication.

I'm familiar with this interpretation, but maybe you meant to emphasize the quality with which one communicates rather than the brute fact of communication itself? If the latter, where is the line between common communication and "real" art?

Perhaps you've heard of Tolstoy's theory? Art to him is also communication -- but in particular emotive communication, not abstract. He comes to this conclusion mostly because beauty has no agreed definition, to him, therefore the goal posts must be moved. Art is the medium that passes the feeling of the artist to the perceiver; when the perceiver catches the artist's feeling in creating, he "has" his art, and the medium of the artist's expression becomes artistic. This makes sense given that creativity has no teleology; if you will, it's the id exorcising itself. I'm speaking of non-verbal art (i.e., painting, sculpture, etc.). When language comes on the scene, it's a different matter. Words can be used to communicate beautiful (or terrifying) ideas. But insofar as the words work beyond description, art seems to lose itself to philosophy (or theology, or politics). The art in War and Peace is founded in the depiction of the lives of the characters and how this relates to the basic themes of life. But I'll be damned if it's artistic in any way because of Tolstoy's philosophical interpretation of history, which he tried very hard to communicate, at times with superfluously didactic essays scattered throughout the story that actually took away from what I feel to be the artistic heart of the novel. (The use of Tolstoy's War and Peace with his theory of art is completely coincidental).

Of course, who is anyone to disagree with me, or you, or anyone else on matters of art? "Art" is such an abstraction that there's no way outside of personal interpretation to determine what it is, and from this you have the problem of every half-headed adolescent and intoxicated literary critic defining something to be "artistic" solely because it makes an effect on him in whatever way. I can only choose the idea that best fits with my experience of the world. Communication is a part of art, but art is essentially the expression of elements that are perceived (or heard) for their own sakes (which fits the definition of beauty). I can call tragedy, sadness, and the darkest subjects beautiful -- so long as they suspend my sense of time in drawing to an intrinsic value of what I'm viewing. The grotesque doesn't do that for me. During moments of viewing things like this, I return to myself; I'm conscious of my inclination to get away. Intrinsic to my definition of art is self transcendence -- even if this is for the briefest of moments.

Because an individual perceives something in a work of art that is not beautiful according to their personal responses does not make that work of art 'not art'.

That might be part of the problem: absolutising a work of art; saying that something that's been considered art for a long enough amount of time by a large enough number of people is therefore absolutely artistic. The perception of art, to me, works relatively: the more mature an individual is in growing toward an intrinsic appreciation of phenomena rather than an instrumental appreciation, the more his sensitivity to attempted works of art will grow, and the more likely he will be to consider an artistic work as a goal in itself in viewing it (that is, beautiful, therefore a work of art). Art works purely on a subjective basis according to this interpretation.