Abstract Art - Art or the scribblings of a toddler?

I think all I really need to say to this is, thank you. Thank you very much.

 

It' s not abstract art, it' s impressionism, meaning he drew classic paintings of real subjects using a different technique than his peers : instead of using his brush to paint lines he used it to paint points or tiny strokes. It' s a kind of ancestor of the pixel art. ^^ (I didn' t know the blurry result was due to his bad eyesight though).

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Abstract art means what it means, it depicts abstract subjects (that don' t exist in the real world). The thing is, there' s abstract, and then there' s abstract.

- You can paint something abstract that is a stylized representation of real world scenes/events/subjects, like Picasso' s Guernica (Guernica is a Spanish village that was bombed during WW2) :

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- Or you can paint something abstract that is a representation of, well ... nothing in particular (to my knowledge) like this paint from Jackson Pollock :

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The kind of abstract I was rambling about before is the kind that represents nothing in particular : I fail to see what is so great in this Jackson Pollock' s paint or what the hell he could have tried to convey. Surely some people think it' s pretty, but in my eyes it' s almost a child random doodle, although I wouldn' t mind having it on my wall (I can' t say it' s pretty, but I can' t say it' s ugly either).

 

Well, an artist may not of intended some of their work to have a statement and yet people think there is one. So I mostly disagree with your statement that art needs one to be considered true art. Some artists won't have any intentions at all and yet what they make is still art.


That does stink...I thin that's just ridiculous.​

 

Then does that mean I can present whatever I like as art? Is a pile of others' waste art? Is this half-eaten spag-bol art?

I think it could be, if a message were intended by it. Otherwise, I don't think so.

 

It can be art. Not really good art, but it still can be art. All music is considered art and some of it is trash, yet people still like it and it is still music. ​

 

Most music has a message of some kind, or is supposed to evoke certain emotions. Even if the message is just "Money, sex and drugs are nice", it's still a message. Music is composed to be pleasing to the ears in some shape or form. Could I record the sound of cars driving past, and call that 'music'?

 

You could record the sound of a water cascade, with the occasional chipping birds and wind blow, and call it "zen music". Some also record singing whales. It IS pleasant to the ears of many people. Is it art?

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The thing is, it could drive someone to think about the consumer society and pollution. It' s totally unfair to grant the prize to the one artist that nearly didn' t work, and yet I think it was somehow a good idea. Is it art ?

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AAARGH ! It' s really tough to draw a clear line at what' s art and what isn' t !!!

 

Questions like this gnaw at the fragile walls keeping the universe as we know it together. The truth is that nothing has a sure definition, because you can eventually ask enough questions that the answerer's mind goes blank. "What is art" is one of the easiest questions in that arena; the best recourse, as far as I'm concerned, is to accept that your definition is simultaneously as wrong and as right as everyone else's and that you may as well use whatever you find is comfortable. If piss on a cross isn't art to you, that's fine, but don't flip your lid when you find someone has actually done that and it's called art.

As for me: Everything is art, in a way. If it's a skill that takes experience or cultivation, there isn't a moment in our lives where we're not creating art or performing art or perfecting art--especially by experience. Much of it barely registers even on a subconscious level, but just think about it: Would you be able to see if your brain and your eyes weren't constantly feeding you information? Would you be able to express emotion properly if you didn't have some form of pattern recognition concerning facial expressions, language and tone, etc., much less the proper chemical reactions? Would you be the person you are if you hadn't experienced anything at all?

People notice the arts, and the absence thereof. They react to it. In that light, the whole and complete autonomous potential of the human race is art. Abstract art is just a blip on the radar at that point--hardly worth debating.