On Tuesday, September 12, 2000 8:14 AM QueeneMUSE@aol.com wrote:
> > I don't think this is entirely true: There have been "official"
> definitions
> >
> > of art, high and low, in many other periods, from the influence of the
> > National Academies in France and the UK in the 18th-19th centuries back
to
> > the impact of royal or ecclesiastical patronage in earlier times.
Those
> > institutions sought to create a bright line between art/not-art.
>
> True Greg, true. And those standards were severely challenged when the
camera
> was invented. Even the camera obscura (15th century) made realism less of
an
> art and more of a science.
>
> My point is: Technology lead us out of classical art, which went in search
of
> the perfection in 2 dimensional representational imagery. When the color
> camera was able to take far better images of "reality" with just the click
of
> a button, mere copying became boring. People's attention turned back to
> composition, form.. and abstract expression.
Classical art? The classical period in painting ended before photography
was invented. Also, by the time photography got going, Impressionism was
already dominating the art scene. The painterly style -- impressionism with
a small "i" -- existed long before and the best preClassical example is
Rembrandt.
If by "classical art" is meant only "the perfection in 2 dimensional
representational imagery," then the Romantic Period -- again, before
photography -- really did that in. Romanticism in painting was more
concerned with portraying the particular, even the ugly. Hence Goya (d.
1828!).
Composition and form have been conscious concerns with painting at least
since the Ancient Greeks, Indians, and Chinese. Composition and form were
not ignored from 1500 until 1850! Representational painting is not slavish
imitation of whatever is in front of the painter at the moment. (I paint
and draw representationally, and when I work from directly from life I have
to choose not only the lighting and direction, but what I'm going to leave
out or emphasize. Such choices are bound up, for decent representational
painters, with trying to achieve the best composition for the subject.)
> Technology today will also lead us out of our current narrow views of art.
> It's best to observe, learn..or more exciting - to explore. "What is"
>(was?)
> art (when the rapid changes in mediums present a landscape in wild
>upheaval)
> has been left behind in the 20th century, or discussed in the far far
>future.
Of course, when humans change into something else or something new is
created which can respond to art, then the defining trait of art for that
form of being will have to be defined according its nature. In this vein,
Olaf Stapeldon's _Sirius_ gives an excellent portrayal of an uplifted dog
making odor art.
Cheers!
Daniel Ust
http://uweb.superlink.net/neptune/
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