One fails as a scientist if one cannot not replace a name such as ‘Pluto’ with increasingly accurate properties of what we now call the dwarf planet Pluto. But this has never been the case in the arts. We do not understand a painting by Picasso by discovering an ever-lengthening list of true facts about it. The goal of art is not to create paraphraseable imagery, but to create something to which no paraphrase ever does justice.
I agree that great Art produces something whose imagery is not paraphraseable, "something to which no paraphrase ever does justice" — Cavacava
What do you think the goal of a work is?
[side question: Is a work of art a "something" ?]
If this is your understanding, Cavacava, can you explain why art is not paraphrasable?
To communicate feeling/value/meaning.
As much a something as anything else.
The "goal" depends. The conscious goal of the artist? Sometime's there isn't one. The metaphysical telos of art in general? Big shoes to fill, no? I like what Berdyaev said about art, paraphrasing: "art wants to create actual being, but fails." Art has the divine creative urge, to create being itself. Laughable or controversial, maybe, but real.
Even for myself, my motives for making art depend. I will say, in leu of the Witty quote I just posted to the TPF Quote Cabinet, that the music I've made that I found to be the most personally satisfying and cathartic was the work that was the most personal and honest, as cliche as that is. The personal goal, for me, of making music is to go deeper and deeper, both into myself as I evolve (or devolve), and also into the medium that I have available to me. To explore my own being concurrently with exploring the medium, and to explore how the two interact, and how they interact with the world. All of this is a product of the world around me; the world and the life I find myself in dictate how I respond to the medium, and to what extent I can go into myself to pull a piece of myself out and transform it into something.
It is very important for the artist to gauge his
position aright, to realize that he has a duty to his art and to
himself, that he is not king of the castle but rather a servant
of a nobler purpose. He must search deeply into his own soul,
develop and tend it, so that his art has something to clothe,
and does not remain a glove without a hand.
They may have worked alone, but no one can fully isolate themselves from society, they have to be raised by someone, go to school and learn. Yes they can become eccentric, and perhaps by in being so isolated they can see further and clearer than those who are so fully enmeshed in society that it is impossible for them to have such a point of view.artists who worked alone throughout their lives
What you seem to be worried about in my position is the view that science and philosophy do not provide the same thing. Science is supposed to provide knowledge, of course, replacing vague proper names with lists of properties truly possessed by things. One fails as a scientist if one cannot not replace a name such as ‘Pluto’ with increasingly accurate properties of what we now call the dwarf planet Pluto. But this has never been the case in the arts. We do not understand a painting by Picasso by discovering an ever-lengthening list of true facts about it. The goal of art is not to create paraphraseable imagery, but to create something to which no paraphrase ever does justice. The same goes for history. Here, factual research in the archives is only one part of the work. To understand Napoleon or Suleiman the Magnificent requires going beyond the verifiable facts and understanding an object that lies somewhat beyond knowledge. The same holds for philosophy. Socrates gives us no knowledge about virtue, friendship, or justice. Philosophy is not a proto-science from which the sciences are spin-offs. The reverse is actually the case: the pre-Socratics are certainly scientists, but in my view not quite philosophers. They speculate about the ultimate physical root to which everything can be reduced— this is a scientific aspiration, and not a philosophical one, as shown by Socrates’ jail cell remarks distancing himself from Empedocles’ naturalism.
I am not sure I understand here. Is it because he is imitative in the way Plato suggests in the Republic or do you mean that Picasso always founds new ways of presenting what he had previously presented.Some art may be hard to paraphrase, but its meaning has finite strokes. No, study of a single Picasso does not reveal ever increasing detail because the Picasso itself is a limited study of something else.
Yes, I wanted to bring that up, I don't agree with Harman that there is a finite interpretation, in fact I would strenuously argue against any finite limit, as long as there are humans there will be arguments about what is the correct way to interpret. I think the reason why masterpieces are masterpieces is because they continue to strongly affect their observers.The on-going creation of art does in fact reveal an ever lengthening list of (sometimes) true facts about the subject matter it captures...
What reveals more about the world and is harder to paraphrase, a photograph of a person or Picasso's portrait of them?
I am not sure I understand here. Is it because he is imitative in the way Plato suggests in the Republic or do you mean that Picasso always founds new ways of presenting what he had previously presented. — Cavacava
Yes, I wanted to bring that up, I don't agree with Harman that there is a finite interpretation, in fact I would strenuously argue against any finite limit, as long as there are humans there will be arguments about what is the correct way to interpret. I think the reason why masterpieces are masterpieces is because they continue to strongly affect their observers. — Cavacava
The photo and the portrait are both mimetic, in a photo time is frozen as it presents a reality which as you indicate presents much more detail and more information. Yet it is still a simplified reality, since it presents a 3D object in 2D. The portrait distorts her face providing an overt commentary (to use your word) prior to any interpretation. Simplifying it as you suggest. While the figurative elements in the artwork may be simpler than the photo, the art work presents a much deeper view of the character in the portrait. It goes beyond the surface to the invisible in a way that is very difficult to replicate using a camera.
So then perhaps a goal of art is the communication of a way of understanding/experiencing by means of simplification and stylizing of its object — Cavacava
If this is your understanding, Cavacava, can you explain why art is not paraphrasable?
— praxis
I don't think artworks provide discursive explanations of what they are. The aesthetic effect we experience from certain works of art describe a spectrum of experience which is not amenable to discursive explanation because it expands beyond our typical conceptualization of the subject by opening new ground and expanding our conception of what the subject entails . The experience of art , the aesthetic effect is lost in any attempt at interpretation of what is experienced. If there is no remainder, nothing left out of the explanation then what is explained is not a work of art. — Cavacava
I didn't deny this only that I don't think it is art's goal.The goal of art is not to create paraphraseable imagery, but to create something to which no paraphrase ever does justice
does the whole exist for the benefit of the parts or do the parts exist for the benefit of the whole, — Cavacava
These are all aesthetic considerations of the loaf. Is that what you're getting at? If so, I'd say the parts serve the whole, when it comes to the utilitarian artisan. The parts still have value in themselves, though.
But it's not clear to me when it comes to a painting, or a piece of music. What is the "whole" here? I don't know. The artwork doesn't have a clear utility (nutrition). Nutrition of the spirit, maybe? An attempt to create "actual being" that fails?
But it's not clear to me when it comes to a painting, or a piece of music. What is the "whole" here? I don't know. The artwork doesn't have a clear utility (nutrition). Nutrition of the spirit, maybe? An attempt to create "actual being" that fails?
The word ''art'' is very vague but I think art is a medium of expression. The message may be everything under the sun and the medium too has a similar range.
What you want to say and how you want to say it.
So the butcher, the baker, the cobbler, the culter, the chef...don't have an aesthetic? — Cavacava
Art is simply a social trait that enables one to acquire resources, mates and friends - which is why we do most of the weird social things we do. — Harry Hindu
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