I consider myself an artist of sorts. I would say more to begin, but I forgot the brilliance of all I would say. So I'll just jump in.
Art is nuanced. An artist does not need to exploit nuances in order to appear artistic. Frank Gheary's architecture is ugly and convoluted, as far as I'm concerned. His twisted metal creations may be innovations in architectural design, but that's science. He pushes the boundaries of math and physics in order to create something unique, as if it is an expression of his view on the world.
An artist seizes the opportunity to create nuance - not through conscious effort, rather through the amount of hard science he abandons for his human feel. The less he uses math and the more he uses his hands and eyes, the more his flaws will show through. His work will be nuanced in an unmistakable and inimitable way.
A human being cannot make flesh from stone. A sculptor's hand is only so precise that it can mimic one or two textile qualities at a time, but not the complex microstructures of our skin. Man does not make art consciously. Art is a by-product of man's inherent imperfections and desire to create or recreate life.
(Weird...I kept wanting to use the words "true artist" up until now. But I decided to change my thinking to "an artist", as the former not only sounds juvenile, it seems rather redundant. By saying "true artist", I would have implied the existence of a "fake artist". That one seems especially odd, considering that it is not common for something to be described as what it is not, i.e. an artist who is not an artist. "True artist" would then be defined as an artist who is an artist, which, as I said before, seems rather redundant.)
2 comments:
I'm curious about your thoughts on art vs science.
I have always considered art to be something created to illicit a response in the viewer. From that viewpoint, there is both "good" art and "bad" art based on the viewer's tastes and perceptions. For me, if I can feel the artist's heart/emotion in the art, it's good, no matter in which medium it is created or whether I agree with it.
In the third paragraph, you seem to suggest that good art comes from using less math/science (I realize that's a very brief summary, sorry). Sometimes science must be used to create such art, such as a large statue or other such structure. Do you feel that those types of artists cannot truly create because they're limited by the math/science side of the finished project? Or are the pieces of art less so because of their limitations? And in the same vein, are paintings therefore limited by the size of the canvas?
I really like your thoughts on art. They offer me a different way to view things, and I'm always up for some of that. Good blog.
Thank you, Lars. You do bring up a good point regarding the necessity of math and science in art. I don't believe that it specifically detracts from art itself, rather in the cases you mentioned allows for the art to exist.
I do believe that restrictions and confines can help foster art and nuance. If I had an infinite canvas, I don't know where the art would end and the toil would begin. It would certainly allow for a single life work, kind of the way I am with my blogs. Confines force us to rethink our ideas and create art that is presentable, so I do see the value of mathematics in relation to it.
What I was really trying to comminicate in that part of the third paragraph is that a person using a computer to generate geometric shapes based on mathematics and the inherent computer science is not truly an "artist" in the sense that he created something unique and individual and personal. It's akin to using a Spirograph toy to make neat designs and calling it art, which I do not believe that it is.
I hope you see this reply, although it's been a couple of years. (I don't get my e-mail notifications for this blog, for some reason.)
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