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Nah,
That's craft. Art has no intrinsic value and no real use other than decoration. A gun clearly has other uses.
Getting back to some sort of discussion, what percentage of all art would you say you like? 10%? 40%? More?
I probably like less than 10%, which sounds odd, coming from someone for whom art is an important part of life. But, there are entire genres of the stuff that doesn't do anything for me, even thought I might be able to appreciate the skill or vision of the artist. I don't particularly like Egyptian art, most Chinese or Japanese art, Indian Art, religious art, most modern art, folk art... the list goes on and on.
The stuff that I do like, I am pretty passionate about. As I get older, I seem to focus more narrowly on specific works. While Jackson Pollock is probably my favorite modern artist, I find that I only get excited about a fraction of his works and of those, only a half dozen are good enough that I would shoot Tabs to get one.
Having said that, I don't generally criticize the works that I don't like, or harass people that don't share my particular views on art. I don't play the "this is art, that is not" game, as I think art really has no rules, nor should it. It's like freedom of speech.
I do find that I have a better appreciation for art that at first might confound me, if I can learn what the artist was trying to achieve with a particular piece. In some cases, I end up really liking a piece after being educated a little bit. As much as we study the world around us on a daily basis, we seldom do so with any serious intent and many things lie hidden from our understanding, until we dig a little deeper. Certain works have a definite psychological or emotional effect upon me and sometimes I cannot explain why, although someone with a better understanding of the human brain could identify the reason. Last year I viewed an installation that dealt with the effects of light of a single wavelength and it was very interesting; there was an amazing change in how my brain percieved what came through my eyes. Color was removed from my sight; I was seeing things soley in shades of black and white. I appeciated the experience very much.
There is a lot of modern art out there that works well in person and not at all in a picture. The same might be said for some Impressionist paintings. There are things that just don't translate well. On the other hand, I may be totally disinterested in a particular piece, even if I understand the intent. Maybe I just don't think that the idea was worth expressing. It doesn't matter, someone else is bound to like it. I just go on to the next piece.
You might like a certain painting for no particular reason that you can identify. I might be able to point out things to you that the artist has done that make the painting more interesting to your eye. For example, I could paint a still life of an orange against a plain dark background. If I then take a little of the color of the orange and work it into the background adjacent to the orange, the orange will now appear brighter to you and stand out from the background in a more pleasing way. It's a subtle effect and one that you might not notice on your own but, once it is pointed out to you, you might see that same techinique used pretty frequently. There are dozens of things like that and if you studied art a little bit you might be better equipped to understand why you like a particular piece. Spend a couple hours studying a Renoir up close and see if you don't learn something.
JR
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