HOME | DD

Description
I made this at random on Photoshop and really liked how it turned out, so I decided to share it.

I enjoyed the visual breakdown of the play-on-words between "fine art" and "define art". or rather, "define fine art." Which is certainly something that gave me a headache toward the end of my college career, just due to the fact that there are so many multi-faceted layers of meaning that get drug into the conversation by people who are so much more educated on the subject than I am. Each era of history has its own ways of defining art. Significant fine art is often art that has in some way pushed the boundaries to expand beyond each era's definition of what defines art. And, of course, now we're at a place in history where, there is no one simple answer to the question, "what is art?" Art is an image. Art is an object. Art is an idea. Art is life.

Photography and the invention of the camera, in my opinion, is one of the primary pivotal points on which the definition of art is hinged. Prior to photography, it seems that art's primary purpose (or western art's primary purpose, anyway) was to capture images from life. After photography, art was, in a sense, retired from its life-capturing responsibilities by this more-efficient technology, which freed art to be used for... whatever. Just for the sake of making... whatever. Like a bunch of women whose faces resemble African masks. Or splatters of paint on a canvas. Or a urinal flipped over with "R. Mutt" painted on its side. (the statement of Duchamp's "Fountain" being, "if the creator calls it art, and those who define art--the collectors, the dealers, the critics, those who put art in galleries and museums, those who pay money for it--call it art, regardless of the object or its appearance (or lack thereof), then it's art.)

At least, I think that's sort-of how it goes...
as a very brief and limited summary of a very small portion of art history... ^__^

Description
I made this at random on Photoshop and really liked how it turned out, so I decided to share it.

I enjoyed the visual breakdown of the play-on-words between "fine art" and "define art". or rather, "define fine art." Which is certainly something that gave me a headache toward the end of my college career, just due to the fact that there are so many multi-faceted layers of meaning that get drug into the conversation by people who are so much more educated on the subject than I am. Each era of history has its own ways of defining art. Significant fine art is often art that has in some way pushed the boundaries to expand beyond each era's definition of what defines art. And, of course, now we're at a place in history where, there is no one simple answer to the question, "what is art?" Art is an image. Art is an object. Art is an idea. Art is life.

Photography and the invention of the camera, in my opinion, is one of the primary pivotal points on which the definition of art is hinged. Prior to photography, it seems that art's primary purpose (or western art's primary purpose, anyway) was to capture images from life. After photography, art was, in a sense, retired from its life-capturing responsibilities by this more-efficient technology, which freed art to be used for... whatever. Just for the sake of making... whatever. Like a bunch of women whose faces resemble African masks. Or splatters of paint on a canvas. Or a urinal flipped over with "R. Mutt" painted on its side. (the statement of Duchamp's "Fountain" being, "if the creator calls it art, and those who define art--the collectors, the dealers, the critics, those who put art in galleries and museums, those who pay money for it--call it art, regardless of the object or its appearance (or lack thereof), then it's art.)

At least, I think that's sort-of how it goes...
as a very brief and limited summary of a very small portion of art history... ^__^