Response to Nick

I am commenting on Nicks questions, “Where is my aesthetic experience? In each individual taking of a photograph? In the leaving and returning of a photo-excursion? In the printing and pasting of the photos themselves?”
Because this was posted at the time we were discussing Dewey, I will respond in the context of Dewey.
I would say that the aesthetic experience is in each individual taking of the photograph. This is the time when you are exercising your conscious intention and adding “regulation, power of selection, and redisposition” (Wartenberg 142). It is at the moment you are taking the pictures that you are experiencing so completely that your experience can be an experience, which is what makes your pictures art.
The leaving and returning of the photo-excursion certainly is not the point of your aesthetic experience—you may be conscious, but you are not intervening with your consciousness.
Although I hold that the actual taking of the picture is the moment of aesthetic experience, some difficulty arises with the printing and pasting of the photos themselves. Printing a photo still requires artisanship, and without the conscious intent required by Dewey it most certainly would not end as art. Perhaps photography requires two separate aesthetic experiences—the first where you are intervening in nature (taking the photo), and the second when you are intervening with the photograph (printing).
QUESTION: As discussed at the beginning of the semester, there are many works of art which were created without the intent of the artist (ex. John Lennon’s doodles). Do these prove Dewey’s theory wrong? And if not, then how can they be included under his theory?

Walking and Breathing

A major criticism of Dewey's account of art seems to be it's openness; one could take his definition of a art and apply it to almost anything done in life, perhaps even living itself. This recieve so much criticism because it seems ridiculous to consider wuch things as walking or sitting or breathing as 'art' merely because they were done with conscious intent. However, it has also been noted previously that people have a tendency to dismiss a peice of artwork because we feel that "even I could do that." Perhaps the idea of breathing or walking as art seems so ridiculous because we all do it, and so we degrade it. But really, what if we did include conscious intention into those activities? When do we ever become conscious of how we walk or breathe? Walking, though it seems to simple because "we can all do it" is actually an incredibly complex activity. To quote an article in National Geographic, "These biometrichal windows on walking and running illuminate just how astonishing a feat of balance, coordination, and efficiency is upright locomotion. The legs on a walking human body act not unlike inverted pendulums. Using a stiff leg as a point of support, the body swings up and over it in an arc, so that the potential energy gained in the rise roughly equals the kinetic energy gnerated in the descent. By this trick the body stores and recovers so much of the energy used with each stride that it reduces it's own workload by as much as 65 percent" (Ackerman, J. "The Downside of Upright." National Geographic July 2006: 126-145). True, complexity does not give something art-status, but it seems that we could view walking differently if we walked with conscious intent.

I have no specifc question for this entry. Instead I am interested in a response to the validity of these thoughts.

Subjectivity

We discussed in our last class whether or not it is possible to have ‘bad art.’ My answer to this question is yes, it is very possible to have bad art. The problem we have with evaluating art comes from our insufficient understanding of art’s function. Because we do not truly understand what art is we cannot evaluate it, but this does not mean it is above evaluation. For example; we understand the function of a chair, and thus we can discriminate between good chairs and bad chairs. However, we did not always know the function of a chair. As infants we were probably bewildered by the four legged objects scattered on the floor. At this point in time we were unable to distinguish good chairs from bad chairs—however, the separation did still exist.
One might argue that the function of art is much more subjective that the function of a chair. In that case, consider the function of a chair for a child compared to an adult. A typical chair would be too small for the child, and a child’s chair would be uncomfortable for an adult. In this case, the function of chairs is also subjective. Different chairs are good for different people, but bad chairs still exist. One should not make the mistake of assuming that because the subjectivity of art is emotional or psychological as opposed to physical, it’s evaluation cannot still exist.

QUESTION: Does this analogy make sense?

Response to Kaitland

This is in response to Kaitland’s question, “How does Freud justify his reasoning for his beliefs that art doesn't exist unless unconsciously done?”
Freud justifies this by stating that art is a way of relieving the tension caused by shameful unconscious wishes. Thus, art cannot exist unless unconsciously done. However, Freud’s theory does not allow for anything to be consciously done because our conscience is strongly influenced by our unconscious. As stated by Prof. Johnson, Freud over-applies his theory and so I think this may be one of the cases where his theory is too inflexible. Although Freud does justify this claim in the context of this theory I do not think the application of his theory to art is justified.

QUESTION: According to Freud, humans repress their id (the unconscious desires we are afraid of) with the superego (conscience). Artists gain their talent by coming closer to their unconscious and expresses these wishes in art. Therefore, wouldn’t animals (who have no superego to repress the id) be better suited for artistic talent?

Response to Sarah

This is in response to Sarah’s question, “is becoming an artist an acquired talent?”
In regard to technical ability, the answer is an obvious yes. Becoming skillful at shading, coloring, etc., requires practice and thus is an acquired talent. However, whether or not these skills constitute artistic ability is questionable.
For this reason I suspect that a formalist, such as Clive Bell, could argue that artistic ability is an innate ability. Bell considers technical ability as unnecessary and seems to consider the appreciation of significant form as an inborn ability. However, the viewpoint of Freud states that artistic ability arises overcoming our shame for our repressed desires, and so by learning to overcome our shame we can acquire artistic ability.
To take another approach to this question I will focus on the artistic ability of autistic children, some of whom (savants) seem to be born with an innate artistic ability. One theory of why this happens lies in a possible explanation of autism. Some people have hypothesized that autistic persons are born with an inability to mesh all the information of the sensory world into one single concept. For example, when non-autistic people look at a sphere they see the circular shape and the shading of the light When they put this information together they become aware that they are looking at the sphere—at first glance they are unaware of the shape or the shading as separate qualities, and are only aware of the two combined. An autistic person, however, would not be able to combine the two qualities and would be aware of both the shape and the shading independently of each other; this gives them a unique ability to artistically express both qualities in their purest form. In this sense, artistic ability could be innate. However, this knowledge gives us an ability to try and overcome the natural conceptualization of our senses as some artists have apparently done. In this way artistic ability can be acquired. (Fox, D. (2009) The inner savant. Discover Presents the Brain, pp.10-15.)

QUESTION: Is there a relationship between Plato’s forms and formalism?

The Principle of Isolation

In class we seem to agree that Clive Bell’s theory of significant form is inadequate to define art. Despite the problems with formalism, however, he did make some interesting statements concerning the role of exact representation in aesthetics.
Bell’s criticism of accurate representation (artwork which imitates real life exactly) actually has some scientific support. There is an article in the July 2008 edition of Scientific American Mind entitled “The Neurology of Aesthetics.” In this article, the author presents a series of principles for aesthetics, one of which is the principle of isolation.
The principle of isolation states that art tends to have more aesthetic value when certain qualities (such as shading, color, texture, etc.) are left out of the work. Bell would have described this as “absence of representation” and “absence of technical swagger” (Wartenberg 121). This happens because our brains have limited attentional resources; basically, we can only focus on so much at a time. Because of this, when certain qualities are left out, the qualities which remain in the painting are given more attention (Ramachandran, V., Rogers-Ramachandran, D. (2008). The Neurology of Aesthetics. Scientific American Mind, Vol. 18, pp. 74-77). Perhaps Bell was on to something when he criticized representation.

QUESTION: The fact that our brains can only focus on limited aspects of a painting reminds me of Jason’s entry from February 12th, entitled” An Artist’s Perception Verse That of a Psychologist’s.” I feel like there is a connection, but am having trouble making it. Can anyone help?

Response to Sarah

I am responding to Sarah’s question “why is art so important in life?”
Because my own answer to this question is not yet fully developed, I will answer this question first in reference to the definitions we have encountered so far from Tolstoy, Freud, Bell, and Plato.
According to Tolstoy, art is significant in life because it advances mankind both individually and collectively. Art serves as a form of emotional communication which unites the artist and the audience. This helps us to understand each other, thus catalyzing advancement.
Freud’s definition depends upon some of his prior theories. According to Freud, we are constantly experiencing tension between our conscious and our unconscious because we are ashamed of some of the wishes of our unconscious. To deal with these shameful wishes, we suppress them and allow them to be manifested in dreams. Artists are more in touch with their unconscious, and reveal these wishes through their art to help relieve the tension. For Freud, art is important to life because it maintains our sanity by helping us to relieve the tension.
Bell believes art is important because it enables us to experience aesthetic emotion and to transport us “from the world of man’s activity to a world of aesthetic exaltation” (Wartenberg 122). Apparently Bell believes the experience of aesthetic emotion is important to human life; however, he also recognizes that many people do not experience it and, if they do, the experiences of many are impure. This shows that however important Bell may consider art may be, unlike Freud and Tolstoy he does not consider art vital.
Plato does not consider art important—in fact, he claims that art should be omitted from an ideal state for its power to invoke emotion. (The ideal state would be dominated by reason).
If I were to offer my own opinion, I would agree most with Freud. It seems to me that art does act to relieve us from something, although I am not exactly sure what that something is.
QUESTION: If art does act to as a form of relief, does it help to relieve the audience in a way which is different from the artist?