they'll make a statue of us

Today, as a sort of "let's cheer you up!" present, my roommate brought me two cupcakes that she and a couple of our suite-mates made earlier tonight. They were both frosted and decorated. One had a tiny little white smilie face, and the other - decorated by my roommate - had a large frosting-made vagina on it. While of course I laughed at the idea, it also sparked a thought: is the human body art? Are we - or any living organism, I suppose - some divinity's idea of artistic expression? I don't necessarily believe in any particular God - I don't like assuming anything about the world, actually - but the thought's kind of intriguing. Are we just random happenstance, or are we a particular, well-thought our masterpiece of something else? Is it pretentious to call ourselves works of art? We are - most of the time - created intentionally, after all.

and there was no sunlight

I think Tolstoy might have had the right idea, saying that art is nothing but pure emotion. The meaning hidden in the piece - because there is always meaning - isn't some complicated thesis statement that takes half a page to record, but an idea that is impossible to capture in print. Even literature - a collection of print - conveys this; the words are built up around the nameless idea of whatever emotion the writer felt that he wanted his readers to feel. The emotion isn't something that can be felt simple by saying the name of the emotion. Hearing the words "happy" or "sad" or "angry" don't make anyone happy or sad. But a painting painted to capture happiness, or a book written to capture sadness, or a musical piece composed to capture anger, does make people happy and sad and angry. Human emotions are complicated things that are not affected by mere speech. We pride ourselves on the fact that we are complicated beings with more depth than most. We can read a book and analyze it and grasp some meaning, some feeling, from it, whether it be the right one or not. But if we spend so much time thinking about what the emotion behind a piece is - what the artist really wanted us to feel - do we lose some key point in the discovering process? Does trying so hard to feel what the artist felt when they decided to create the piece keep us from fully appreciating and understanding a work of art? Or can we never really appreciate it until we understand what the artist wanted of us? In other words, can we derive our own meaning from things, or must we understand what the artist wanted us to before we can appreciate a work of art?

Response to Fallon's "are humans the only beings able to make artwork and show the intentionality behind it?"

Art, being a human-made trade, is, I think, only able to be created by humans. While we can appreciate nature and all its beauty, I don't think we can appreciate it as art, because when nature creates something that happens to be beautiful, they don't do it with the same kind of intention that humans do when they create something. Though they are intending to create, there is no meaning behind what they have created, except usefulness. There is intention, but, I think a big part in defining what is and isn't art is the intention for it to mean something. When a bird creates an exceptionally beautiful nest, it is to attract a mate. When a human creates a n exceptionally beautiful piece of art, it is to share with the world a bit of the artist's own mind, or heart - it is to teach the world something about the artist, and the world around them. If we were to take every random occurance in nature as a work of art...well, then, art is all the world would be. And while a world filled with beauty is in many person's mind an ideal one, where would that leave us? If everything around us was art, would we continue to produce it, or would we be bound to an art-filled - though at the same time, art-less - world?

Response to Hanna's "Is Art A Private Experience?"

Art, I think, is something we have come to value because of its versatility. A book might not mean anything to you, it could be the world to me, the idea by which I set my life, something I strive to put to everyday use. While the creation of the art itself is - in its way - important, I can't help but believe that it is the viewing of the piece that holds the most weight.

It's universally known that everyone is unique. There isn't one person in the world who thinks exactly the same way you do, or I do. We are all, in some - almost magical - way, different. So, of course looking at a piece of art is a personal experience. We scourge the piece for some semblance of a "meaning" and we find one, hopefully, eventually.

Humans, I think, enjoy art because it is something in which we have to work at. We like thinking, searching for something that is hidden to us. Looking for a meaning in a piece of artwork is a challenge - one that we love rising to. We like art because we can find something in it that - maybe - no one else has seen, and that makes us feel like we conquered the unknown, something humans are always struggling against. Giving something a meaning is in our nature and, one some level, it doesn't matter what the meaning is, as long as we think we have found one. It doesn't have to be right, it just has to be there.

If art is something personal though - and, of course, I think it is - why do we strive to find something universal? Why do we care what others think? Is our fear of being wrong so strong that we are willing to fight against our own feelings, our own minds, even, because we want someone to agree with us? Is it actually possible to hear someone else's interpretation of something and actually see it, or are we just all about lying in order to look better to the people around us?

good and bad and feeling small

If I were to say I knew what "art" was, I'd be lying. I don't know one single thing about what makes art good, or what makes it bad. I know what I like for the sole fact that I like it - that somewhere in me something stirs when I look at or listen to or read it. I won't claim to know what an artist was thinking when they created their work, but I'll tell you, in a heartbeat, what I think it means, because that's why I like it. It makes me think. It strikes me in a way that I find some meaning in it, and that meaning is what I like about it. I'm not the type who's about to say that I know anything - let alone everything - except myself. Half the time I don't even know what that is. But, I am the type who'll try to find meaning in the world around me. I like meaning. I like definitions. But I also like broad subjects that I can't even begin to identify. I like looking at the sky and feeling like a small, dark, sinful speck who's poisoning the innocence of the world around me, for the sole fact that it makes me feel something. Is that what makes art something people like so much? Or is it something else? Are there really people out there who can look at a painting and find every caress the artist put onto the canvas, every possible thought that passed through the painter's head as he worked, or are we all just kidding ourselves?