What everything is about or... literature as it is not.

[Richey79]

All I'm going to say is that the OP might find he fits in a little better here:

http://boards.4chan.org/lit/

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by Ben Thornton

So, I'd agree that we shouldn't seek to mandate a definition, or think that we have the only answer. However, that doesnt mean that attempts to understand what art is, why we make it, how people respond to it etc. are impractical or without value - quite the opposite.

I think those attempts would tell us more about ourselves than they'd tell us about art.

[Ben Thornton]

Originally Posted by Steven Lyle Jordan

I think those attempts would tell us more about ourselves than they'd tell us about art.

It's true that they'd tell us about ourselves - but without ourselves there is no art - it's in us, not out there.

If humanity were to become extinct - would there be any art? No. Not unless there was a creature capable of perceiving it as art - a giant fire hydrant might still be dog-art I suppose.

[Graham Coulson]

Originally Posted by Steven Lyle Jordan

If I say that I don't like Picasso's cubism period, does his work cease to be art?

Yes, I'd say it DOES cease to qualify as art, FOR YOU. Obviously, however, it would be going too far to suggest that Picasso therefore ceases to be an artist...

Art and its definition lies in the eye of the beholder (and also in the eye of its creator). For me (and I recognize it's a very personal thing) if a painting or literature or sculpture or film or play or whatever SPEAKS TO MY INNER BEING, TO MY SOUL, then it is art -- for me.

I do not agree with the notion that, in order to qualify as art, the material must cause one to look at the world a different way somehow. Constable painted very realistic images of how the world IS -- he didn't seek to change people's view of the world in the least.