What is Art For You: a Way to Share Creativity or Popularize Ideas
What is art for you? Surprisingly, the definition of art which I have read in one essay is somewhat vague and not comprehensive, and I agree with this statement. Also I can define art as “application of skill to production of beauty (esp. visible beauty) and works of creative imagination (as the fine arts).” According to the Meriam-Webster dictionary art is “the conscious use of skill and creative imagination especially in the production of aesthetic objects.” Both are very close with difference in details. I am not saying that I disagree with these statements, but they are not painting whole picture, pardon the pun.
There is no doubt in my mind, although at is indeed is primarily act of production of beauty, or esthetic objects though use of specialized skillset and creativity, these definitions omit economic, social, and political aspects of art. I also think that these definitions have their limitations because terms “beauty” and “aesthetic” are very subjective, especially in today’s world. – for example, work of Michael Hussar, see below. Today art is a cultural phenomenon and point of reference because it is taken by people as a basis to give rise to new ideas.
What is Art For You? Where You Can See It Nowadays?
Art demonstrates what society and the artist think about. Art can be done for a higher idea (see Jim Fitzpatrick’s Guerrillero Heroico poster), to satisfy need for creativity and for monetary reasons as well. Art can be both masterful and incredibly primitive, it can be destructive and ugly.
And what is “not art” - it is something that does not carry ideas or repeats patterns worked out in the past, that copies other people's ideas, or which focuses on beauty alone, is created as a standard design, machine-made, for the sake of functionality.
As long art existed, history and art have always gone hand in hand, following our technical, moral and evolutionary development. This is natural, because history is dependent on development of art as much as art is dependent on history. Because society, just like a moving car, leaves tracks as it passes, in form of art that represents history. This can be seen throughout ancient art like Lascaux Cave Paintings all the way to Shepard Fairey’s Hope.
Art also bears a responsibility of a social or public order to serve to public interests on behalf of governments or other groups. One of the prominent examples of such art are works of Russian artist post-October revolution when all “bourgeois” art was rejected and new form was introduced in fine arts, movies and literature – see Kuzma Petrov-Vodkin’s Bathing of Red Horse, 1912. Later this style was replaced with so called Social Realism that was stamped as a propaganda in the West.
Last but not least, art also bears heavy mercantile functions – one does not need to appreciate certain piece of art or art movement, or even does not need to like art at all to extract monetary value from artwork. Very unique situation formed around art market – artwork can be better investment than most of conventional investment tools. Art can be bought and sold sight-unseen, without any loss of value. Some modern artists capitalize on this phenomenon by producing questionable artwork en masse while creating artificial demand – see works of Mr. Brainwash or Steve Kaufman.
Conclusion
In conclusion, art consistently responds to the change of interests of society and its requirements by changing the variety of important issues, enriching its structure, the development of new trends, and enriching the society and each individual person in it. Formed, it obeys the laws governing the development of society, reflects changes in its socio-economic structure, in public relations. The artist consciously or unconsciously expresses the interests of certain social strata, groups, classes, parties, views, moods, thoughts and feelings of a particular cultural and historical era.
