Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Is It True that “the Whole Point of Art Is to Be Provocative”
[The above quoted phrase came from Fred Cole’s post on “The Interview,” which is otherwise excellent.]
Isn’t that the stupid excuse that leftists use in producing bad (or good) art that is strictly political in nature?
The whole point of art is to express — to express one’s heart, an insight, an epiphany (especially) — and to create. The best use of art is to ennoble and to add to mankind’s collection of many and varied interpretations of what life on this earthly plane is.
If in the process of artistic expression the final result happens to provoke, then the modern thinking (sometimes rightly) advises that one proceed even against furious opposition. If there is a societal value around art I think that the ennobling impulse should be given precedence over simple provocation.
Can we drop all the left-wing perversions of our culture and our values. Art shouldn’t be used in a decent society to destroy, to wreck. If it is then it shouldn’t be supported simply because it’s art. This is nihilism.
Published in General
There is no point to art. That’s the point.
Freedom to vs freedom from. Aristotle and Sophocles vs Voltaire and Marilyn Manson. I know which world I prefer.
Every kind of human activity can be used for good or for evil. I don’t know why so many people think art is the sole industry in which practicioners don’t bear any responsibility to use their talents wisely and with charity.
I see what you are saying but disagree a little — at the very least you must admit that the purpose of art is similar to the purpose of our existence. Only God really knows what kind of book He is writing. What point is God making with us?
But, other than that small quibble I like your hands off approach.
Yes, this is exactly what I am trying to say. Thanks, Aaron.
The only time the point of art is to be “provocative” is to cover up inability to get attention otherwise.
It’s like saying “the entire point of speaking is to make people angry”– it’s only true if you’ve got nothing worth saying.
That the critically acclaimed art is measured in terms of how offensive it is to the correct targets rather speaks for itself in terms of what they have to say.
That is a brilliant analogy!
Art and artificial are both descendants of the same word, which roughly translates as “skill.”
We tend to think that art is “creative” and that artificial is “man-made,” but of course those two ideas go together, and have gone together from the start. Man mimics God in creating things, but we highlight and promote those things which exhibit skill. Originally, we reserved the term “art” for things that are made skillfully.
Art has both an individual and social dimension. Art is a product of an individual’s skill, but it becomes social when it includes an audience that draws meaning from the product of skill. It has become the intellectual fashion for the social meaning to be considered more important than the product itself, often to the point of making the original artwork to be insignificant. You can artificially create just about anything (pictures of a soup can, random splatters of paint on a canvas, etc.) but if society draws meaning from it … or ingests meaning into it … suddenly it qualifies as “art.”
That leads to redefining art as provocative, because the cash value of the artwork comes, no longer from its skill,but in whether it catches the attention of society. It becomes art because it is noticed.
The theory that art is only art when it catches the interest of the observing community is a theory promoted by … professional art observers (critics, patrons, fellow professional artists). Art is only interesting when it interests them.
And that makes the art world to be quite a nifty little racket.
This is due to the fact that for the left everything is political. They live in a world where the social has a framework of their devising (with constant modifications from on high by the latest dicktat) and with which everyone must align themselves — not with principles in mind but with those ideas which spew forth from the hive.
Reading (or re-reading) Wolfe’s THE PAINTED WORD is a great way to “get” the point of art which someone will pay money for in today’s world: something that someone will pay money for. With a little somethin’ somethin’ left over for the taste makers/brokers/pimps.
Yes, great book. And “From Bauhaus to Our House” is good, also.
I remember seeing a picture of a man with a whip coming out of his anus and knew that whatever it represented, it wasn’t art. Rather it seemed to me to describe great pain, pain of a kind that the man was willing not to lose. I wasn’t provoked, I was repelled. I believe that someone somewhere paid a great sum of money for this, and I have no idea why one would pay for such an item.
At the beginning of this conversation is a picture of a Man dying or dead on a cross. It represents the apex of love, His love for us. It is utterly unlike the picture of the man with his own pain and his desire to keep that pain in spite of what it is doing to him.
Of note, the man who refused to lose his own pain also painted a picture of crucifix in a pail of urine. Not only was he refusing to surrender his own pain, he was unwilling to accept the vicarious suffering of the Man on the cross.
It is probable that what is offered for art reflects the age or the temperament of a particular people of that age. It is an art that won’t translate into another age, rather like music that dates itself. I hope the age to come wants better, wants the timeless rather than the dated.
The timeless is a better representation of the shape of the human heart.
I believe Art let’s us see true things about the world as it is and Great Art gives us a glimpse of the world as it could be, at times of Heaven.
I like this Raymond Chandler quotes, “In everything that can be called Art there is a quality of redemption.”
The left, secure in its position of cultural dominance, has compiled an impressive list of taboos and shibboleths. They are extremely vulnerable to getting a comeuppance. I expect the next 20 years of culturally significant behavior to be mostly one outrage against the liberal establishment after the other. We have the advantage; let us enjoy it.
Fred’s claim was certainly provocative….
Oh, my. I agree with what others have already said. That “the whole point of art is to be provocative” is absurd. Who says? Those who stand to benefit from “provocative” art — that’s who! It so happen they’re leftists and anti-Christians (as Piss Christ depicted above so readily proves). The devil always proffers a cheap knockoff of the good, the true, and the beautiful. Always.
This is what happens when we try to live without standards. Ugly, poorly crafted crap delivered as “art.”
Prager University has a 5-minute course:
Even if you don’t accept traditional standards for art, I think most people know it when they see it. Which is not to say art can’t be provocative. Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus was provocative in its day. Not because of the nudity, but because it depicted a pagan goddess. Is it art? Obviously. Although not because it provoked Renaissance era Italians. Puhleaze!
Though not artful….
The creation of art is an end that serves no further end. It does not seek to serve as a means for any other end. That is, it is not utilitarian. To the extent that it serves another, higher, end, it is not an end in itself. This is the essence of the liberal arts. Liberal arts is the pursuit of ends. The pursuit of technical knowledge, like medicine, law, engineering, is the pursuit of means, not ends.
Apex of minimalism.
Brilliant!
After lifetime of working in the arts I have come to believe there is ‘art’, a personal expression that you try to ‘create’ for your self and exhibitionism which is built to demonstrate something to others. Neither is inherently ‘Art’ but exhibitionism seems inherently narcissistic and not particularly artistic.
Art is a constantly moving target and many, many very talented people have been insecure and narcissistic needing others to tell them they were/are of value, take a look at the history of James McNeill Whistler. Not all ‘Art’ was accepted in its time, the Impressionists are the easy example, in which time won over hearts. But the Impressionists loved what they did, that was the creative spark.
Putting a previously manufactured cross into an acquired glass jar and filling it with urine seems to miss all artistic merit except exhibitionism. This would seem to be a simple and easy attempt of leftists to poke Christians in the eye but has nothing to offer as an artistic expression and to accept the piece as art diminishes the real artist trying to find their personal expression.
There is so much to enjoy in the various arts that to use this worthless and meaningless piece as any art example diminishes art overall.
Does it even need to be asked? Of course it’s not.
It’s an excuse for talent-less hacks to claim that they too, are making art.
I guess I unintentionally made an artistic statement. I’m the Phillip Glass of Ricochet.
A literature professor of mine once proposed that good art balances the artist’s focus during the creative act between the idea, himself, and others.
If an artist makes something completely for himself, then he should keep it to himself.
If an artist makes something that could have been made by a child, then he can claim no more credit than a child would.
If a work is open to reasonable interpretations which the author did not intend, then that author has failed in communication. He may not claim credit for interpretations he did not anticipate and encourage through the work.
The list could go ever on, of course.
I’m no fan of Serrano, but if it wasn’t for the vulgar name – and the suggestion that the medium really is the message in this case – the photo accompanying this article might be viewed by some as a rather mysterious and respectful image.
Is there anything inherently nihilistic or provocative about the image below? Do you have to know anything more about it to consider whether it should be applauded or condemned for reasons other than its artistic merits?
BTW, I agree with Larry’s point about provocation, which ceased to be a brave stance around the time a Duchamp urinal was installed in a museum gallery.
A corollary to this trend is what Father Neuhaus (RIP) called “neophilism”. It’s natural to respect originality in art. But originality by itself is not an accomplishment.
If I start using “skfjkadf” like a word (not Finnish, is it?), I have not invented anything valuable. Likewise in painting, sculpture, music, and theater, some things have never been done before because they are not worth doing.
Sometimes neophilism shows up as a knee-jerk rejection of an artwork precisely because it is popular. A person does not want to appear unsophisticated, so he seeks art which will prove his sophistication while rejecting obviously worthy works.
In any society, there is a tension between folk cultures and refinement. The pendulum can swing too far in either direction. Consumers who seek refinement sometimes reject simple beauties and truths. Consumers who value simplicity often cheat themselves by failing to learn the intricacies of more complex or nuanced designs.
As an artist, I’ve always felt a tension between originality and training. Education can simultaneously empower and suppress creativity, offering options and accuracy while squashing experimentation with old routines.
Thanks so much for reminding me about this, WC. Much appreciated.
I hope that everyone will take the 5 minutes and get the common sense explanations that are the essence of Prager University videos.
Thanks for sharing that video. It was great.
It is easier to provoke than it is to inspire.
The art world, like most worlds, is full of talentless hacks.
I’m off to YouTube to watch some Roger Scruton.
Art for art’s sake, money for god’s sake. This is the cry of an artist that depends upon the state to subsidize mediocrity, or worse. At least the transient’s sign that states; “need money for drugs and alcohol” is honest, and satirical.