art definition
David Christopher Swanson
The Definition of Art
David C. Swanson
September 1994
Esthetics, one learns very quickly, is not limited to,
and is perhaps
not concerned directly at all with, determining how to produce
better art or
how better to experience art. A large section of esthetics
concerns itself, in
all apparent seriousness, first with the question of what
objects ought to be
considered art (whether good, mediocre, or worthless) and also
- because
conflicting theories could select the very same objects - with
the precise
reasoning behind the choices made. Certain of these theories
do, or could be
made to consistently, exclude some of the least esthetically
interesting
objects in the world, but most do not exclude objects on these
grounds, the
interesting question in its entirety thus being transferred
from that of "What
is art?" to that of "What is good art?".
But on what grounds does one answer the question "What
is art?"? When
I ask myself this question, a response (or the beginning of a
response) occurs
to me immediately, and closely corresponds to the first of two
general theories
currently afloat. I examine the two theories, and the second
one, the foriegn
one, clearly breaks with common usages of the term "art".
Nevertheless it may
define a concept which is more than a mere mistake. When it
attempts to make
up for its shortcomings, it becomes either incoherent or
incomplete, but when
it doesn't, it seems to merit some respectable title, if not
"art" then another
word.
When I adopt a historical perspective, I am tempted to
reexamine the
second theory. But this is a mistake. The first theory, the
one which comes
naturally to me, attempts only to define art within a given
cultural context .
. . if, that is, it goes into a certain kind of detail, which
of course it need
not do (depending, in part, as noted above, on which of two
questions we wish
to ask).
In the writings of Stephen Davies, the first theory is
known as a
functional definition of art, the second as a procedural
definition. A
functional definition, in various guises, is founded on art's
performing, or
being capable of performing, or being intended to perform a
particular function
(providing esthetic experience, however defined). One could
give a functional
definition of, for example, a shovel: a shovel is an object
with which one can
extract and lift material. As with art, the shovel is here
defined by what
purpose it serves. In our common usage of the noun shovel, and
especially of
the corresponding verb, we seem to agree with this definition:
a spoon or a
hand can be a shovel. But some detail must be added to the
definition if we
are to avoid calling a drill or a vacuum cleaner a shovel as
well. We must
either add detail to the description of the function, or we
must append another
type of definition, neither functional nor procedural. (Many
concepts, of
course, cannot be defined at all in either of those two
manners).
One might give a functional definition of a senator: a
senator is
someone who performs certain legislative duties. No doubt this
was the origin
of the word, but we call people who perform no such duties,
including people
who have just entered the Senate for the first time,
"senators". The
functional definition, in this case, does not seem a proper
fit. (Unless we
admit that words often serve contradictory purposes, and that
"senator" can be,
on the one hand, a job, and on the other, a title, so that, for
example,
Senator Smith in "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" is rudely
informed that he is
not a senator).
A procedural definition of art contends that when an
object undergoes
the procedure of being deemed art by the proper authorities (it
is never made
clear exactly whom we are to have in mind) it is thereby made
art in fact. One
could give a procedural definition of a shovel: a shovel is
whatever the patent
office or the hardware store says is a shovel. Clearly this is
inferior to
the functional definition, because by this definition a
styrofoam cup used to
make a sandcastle is not a shovel (unless every three-year-old
is given the
same authority as the hardware store; in which case, why
mention the hardware
store at all? There is no meaningful sense in which the child
is following the
hardware store's lead.), and because the hardware store owner
could get drunk
and declare that all bug-zappers and garden hoses are shovels.
The fact that
this procedural definition says nothing about what a shovel is
good for, need
not be a defect, because one would always be permitted to go on
and define a
"good shovel".
A procedural definition of a senator would be: a
senator is someone
elected by the people to the office of senator. This seems to
be the correct
definition (or the preferable of two possible definitions), at
least in the
real world. In a philosophical journal, on the other hand, all
kinds of
absurdities can crop up. What if the people elect an iguana or
a galaxy or an
Oliver North senator, is that reptile or collection of planets
or reptile then
a senator? The election procedures eliminate most of these
possibilities, in a
way which might or might not be considered functional. But one
may take the
liberty of imagining that if anyone were to present an
institutional (that is,
procedural) theory of senators, he or she would be willing if
not eager to
include iguanas and galaxies.
The most intriguing functional definition of art to
which I have been
exposed is (apart from Kant) Monroe Beardsley's as presented in
Definitions of
Art by Stephen Davies. But before coming to the present
debate, let me give
two earlier examples of functional definitions from the
assigned list of
choices. The earliest definition, by a considerable margin, is
that of
Socrates in Plato's Republic. Socrates does not give a
definition at all in
the contemporary sense, and if he did it would be quite a
stretch to call it
functional. But he does tell us something about what he thinks
art does, and I
suppose that's all that matters. Art, he tells us, is
imitation. He does not
mean that all imitation is art, but rather that what we all
understand to be
works of art imitate those things which we all understand not
to be works of
art. With his usual repulsive pseudo-logic, the old sage
maintains that a poem
about a battle, for example, imitates a battle. He suggests
that a poet speaks
of many fields of knowledge, none of which are his own, and
that thus, despite
his pretentiousness, he remains inferior to a tailor or a
blacksmith or a
general or whatever the case might be. Socrates is somehow
intent on ignoring
the obvious fact that a poem about a woman weaving is not about
weaving, but
about, for example, determination, guile, enduring love, and
such things in
which the poet is the expert. Even the poem about a battle, if
a good one,
tells what at most one single perceptive participant could
already understand.
It is curious, for one who wished to be rid of art (or,
anyway, of
most of it), that part of the explanation for the seemingly
inexplicable
enduring interest in Plato is that he presented his thoughts in
an artistic
manner. What can be said in his favor is that if asked for a
definition of
art, he would have given one based on a description of art. At
one time this
might not have seemed much of an accomplishment, a mere
inevitability perhaps.
Today it does seem noticeable. Such is the power of the
procedural theorist.
A more recent functional definition can be found in the
aptly titled
paper "The Communication of Emotion" by Leo Tolstoy. Again,
this is not a
definition in precisely the sense which 1990s philosophers are
looking for.
Tolstoy is out to define the experience of art, not to draw
hyper-precise
boundaries around the objects which do or could produce that
experience. His
intention (infinitely endearing) is to describe the highest, or
the only,
esthetic experience. If he creates a functional definition
along the way, so
be it.
For Tolstoy, art is defined as the communication of
emotion by the
artist to the spectator(s). Tolstoy understands precisely what
Plato did not.
And what's more, he gives demonstrations in his own novels of
the theory he
puts forth. Yet one suspects that the term "emotion" is
insufficiently
specific, and perhaps slanted toward the experience of literary
art in
particular (including dramatic art as the clearest possible
example). If we
make a definition out of Tolstoy's idea, we may eliminate from
the realm of art
not only such lesser arts as clothes designing (though this
might possibly be
included) and perfume mixing - both of which Tolstoy does not
regard as art -
and works such as a sculpture in which the only emotion
discernible (albeit an
intense one) is the artist's love for the medium itself, but
also much music
and abstract visual art and even some literary art the
experience of which
cannot but be called emotional, but which does not correspond
to the emotions
felt by the artist.
Even if we allow that Tolstoy is right, either finding
a way to
include all important art, or coming to see that what is
excluded is really of
lesser value, there is certainly much more to be said about the
experience of
emotion by means of art, as differentiated from the experience
of emotion due
to direct or "real world" causes. There is also much to be
said about the
process of creation. The artist does not feel the same emotion
throughout, nor
does he feel the same emotion he has felt in his "real life";
he is outside the
emotion in a more peculiar way and to a greater degree than the
(proper or
ideal) spectator(s).
George Dickie, drawing on the ideas of Arthur Danto,
presents a
procedural definition of art. Art, he says, is "(1) an
artifact (2) a set of
the aspects of which has had conferred upon it the status of
candidate for
appreciation by some person or persons acting on behalf of a
certain social
institution (the artworld)." [1] This is his "classificatory"
definition, for
he maintains that "art" also has a "derivative" and an
"evaluative" sense. If
a natural object is called "art", Dickie explains that the word
is being used
only in the evaluative sense. He is wrong, of course. It is
being used as a
metaphor. Slafani has pointed this out, and hence we have the
derivative
sense. An object is art in the derivative sense, according to
Dickie, if it
resembles a specific work of art in the classificatory sense.
This is a
mistake. The resemblance is actually to a field of art:
sculpture or music,
etc. Dickie is forced into the idea of resemblance to a
specific object,
because how could anything resemble artifactuality and status?
He later says
that the act of putting a natural object in a museum would give
it not only
status but also "artifactuality", thus making it
(classificatory) art. But if
I go for a walk in the woods with a museum curator, must I
distinguish between
objects I spot for myself, and those he points out to me? And
if not, why
not? Dickie doesn't say.
The evaluative sense may or may not actually exist,
depending once
again on when we discuss art and when good art. To call
something art in the
classificatory sense is for most people an evaluation, because
art is always
something good. Similarly, most uses of the word "food", at
least in a poor
country, could be called evaluative although they are certainly
classificatory
as well. This is not an undesirable state for a language to be
in. The
situation which Dickie describes would be. If by art one may
mean either art
or good art, confusion is highly likely, even when the
evaluative sense is
carefully reserved for objects supposed to be universally
recognized in the
classificatory sense, such as Rembrandts.
Dickie suggests that the existence of long artistic
traditions and
common artistic conventions support an institutional theory.
Certainly, these
factors effect the value of a work, but they do not even begin
to come into any
conflict with a functional theory, and Dickie gives no reason
why they should.
Only in the case of "readymades" does he suggest actual
evidence for his view.
Duchamp, and all other artists, seem to him to be capable of
"conferring art
status" on anything. What problem could readymades possibly
create for a
functional theory? A urinal in a museum is possibly sculpture
(or, anyway,
visual design), to the credit or shame of whoever made it, not
to Duchamp. An
artist does not have the power to close people's eyes. Duchamp
cannot instruct
anyone not to view the urinal as sculpture. And it is
certainly theater - bad
theater designed around shockingness. Duchamp is powerless to
deny this, and
on the contrary, probably intended it. One functional theory
might consider
this theatrical sculpture to be art; another might not.
Neither would thereby
be threatened as a theory. Similarly, a functional theory will
without
difficulty consider "conceptual art" either bad poetry or not
art at all.
Most functional theories will not consider natural
objects art,
recognizing that the experience of artifacts is significantly
different from,
though in many ways similar to, the experience of nature, just
as it is
distinct from but similar to the experience of some human
actions which produce
no artifacts, and again, to one's own dreams and daydreams.
Although a
functional theorist will admit that a concert given in a
concert hall is
different from one given in a cow pasture, and that a urinal in
a museum is
different from one in a men's room, he will not perceive any
substantial
alteration in a hunk of driftwood when it is taken indoors and
displayed. What
difference there is, is a difference in a natural object. The
question of art
does not even arise. Neither art nor non-art is meaningfully
altered by being
called art. The suggestion that the term "artifactuality" be
distorted to
encompass this case is absurd.
But who are the authorities in Dickie's scheme who are
supposed to
confer art status? He says: "The core personnel of the
artworld is a loosely
organized, but nevertheless related set of persons including
artists . . .
museum directors . . . theater goers . . . and others".[2] This
sounds
reasonable, if we ignore the "and others". We are closing in
on a definition.
When I enter a museum, I think of "going to look at the art".
Probably this
is a justifiable expectation understandable from a functional
theory point of
view. But it could conceivably be based on the idea that what
a museum calls
art, I ought to call art too. Is Dickie's definition
convincing, as thus far
stated? Unfortunately it isn't. Our authorities have
(roughly) been named,
but no hierarchy given. How does one settle disputes among
members of the
artworld? (One could, I suppose, accept all assertions that
things are art,
and reject all but unanimous statements that things are not
art, though this
gives a highly peculiar idea of authority). And what of art
which appears
"before its time" or in the wrong culture? What of art which
is simply
idiosyncratic, appreciated only by a few? Must we say that
this art is not
really art because the proper authorities have not conferred
that status upon
it?
Not at all. Dickie adds a little note at the bottom of
the
definition: "In addition, every person who sees himself as a
member of the
artworld is thereby a member."[3] Presumably anyone who
intentionally attempts
to produce something he wishes to call "art", even if he
despises all other
existing "art" and all museum curators, is thus seeing himself
as a member of
the artworld. In other words, potentially all artifacts are
art. As with the
hardware store owner conferring shovel status on a garden hose,
a mechanic
might confer art status on an oily rag. But what about those
artists in
cultures which lack our concept of art and produce artwork for
religious
purposes, for example? Do they too "see themselves as members
of the
artworld"? If so, as in the case of the three-year-old
shoveler, why mention
museums at all?
The reason is that Dickie didn't really mean it when he
said anybody
could join the artworld. He doesn't stand by that rule in his
analysis of
chimpanzee art and unusual forgeries. In the first case, he
does not view a
zookeeper in the same light as a museum director; in the second
he coolly
eliminates an artwork because it involves dishonesty.
But this is nitpicking. The problem with Dickie's
theory is a major
one. He states it well himself: "I do not think there is any
reason to think
that there is a special kind of esthetic appreciation."[4]
Dickie doesn't just
believe that art has evolved, as in the case of "senator", away
from its
original meaning. He believes that art never had any meaning,
or that if it
did, humanity was simply mistaken. One obvious problem with
this is that
Dickie's "evaluative" and "derivative" senses of art are based
on the meaning
which he denies, or which he at least maintains is not
"special". Would Dickie
contend that one praises a Rembrandt in the same way that one
praises a
dogfood?
Moving beyond Dickie, could an institutional theory be
acceptable, if,
as Stephen Davies (rather obviously) recommends, it clarified
exactly who or
what the artworld is, and if it allowed for the further
definition of good as
opposed to bad art? Even if it also resolved the question of
art out of
culture or time, I am convinced that it could not. The reason
is that the
conferment of art status, as described, is foundationless.
Let's look at the oft-cited example of "speeding".
Even if driving
safely, one may be legally guilty of speeding. But the
decision as to what a
legal speedlimit ought to be is based, with few exceptions, on
the concept of
safety. Similarly, a senator is whomever the people elect, but
the people,
with few exceptions, elect whoever they want to perform certain
legislative
duties. In the institutional definition of art, art is
whatever the artworld
declares to be art, and the decisions of the artworld are based
on absolutely
nothing: "artifactuality" and "candidacy for appreciation",
said candidacy
being vague to the point of meaninglessness. One is thus
virtually
guaranteed (unless all art is deemed equal) of defining as art,
objects which
will be evaluated as being absolutely worthless as art
(paintings less
interesting than white walls, for example) - which need not be
a contradiction,
but is certainly a recognition of a functional conception of
art, if we allow
for the sake of sanity some meaning to the term "evaluate".
Can the artworld,
in the majority of cases, confer status on the basis of a
functional
understanding? It might if it were properly defined.
It is doubtful that any functional theory would
encompass quite as
broad a range of objects as those possessing artifactuality and
candidacy, but
the possibility exists. The actions of the artworld could
conceivably be found
to have some basis, a situation which might require the
elimination of any
decisions by committee or board in the artworld, functional
understanding of
art possibly being subjective.
Nevertheless, until someone presents such an acceptable
procedural
theory, I will go ahead with trying to develop my own theory,
which will
naturally be functional - a task which must be done in either
case, whether the
object of my efforts be a definition of art or a foundation of
a procedural
definition of art.
Wittgenstein tells us that some concepts, such as
"game", may
encompass specific items which have nothing in common but only
an indirect
commonality by means of items situated between them. I agree,
but I do not
think that "art" is one of these concepts. Neither did
Wittgenstein. In his
Lecture on Ethics, Wittgenstein (very sensibly) defines ethics
as including
"the most essential part of what is generally called
aesthetics"; he then goes
on to list ethical concepts, asking the listener to "see the
characteristic
features they will all have in common and these are the
characteristic features
of Ethics".[5] That Wittgenstein believes esthetics to have a
"most essential
part" could conceivably be consistent with his believing art
not to have such a
thing. Fortunately, my purpose is not to discover what
Wittgenstein may or
could have believed. I myself take esthetic experience to be
the defining
feature of art, and both esthetics and art - as most reasonably
defined - to
possess a consistent essence.
This was the idea which came to me immediately upon
asking myself
"What is art?". There is, and for humanity always has been, a
common
experience in appreciating a good piece of music, a good book,
a good
sculpture, etc. (In the separate fields I do not hesitate to
use the modifier
"good", it seeming clear to me that a bad book, for instance,
is not art at
all). I do not, as some theorists do, see any one field of art
as holding a
special position above all the others. If architecture is
frozen music, by the
same token music is melted architecture. There are differences
among the
various fields; and non-common factors significantly effect
one's experiences,
but not in as important a manner or as esthetic a manner as
that which is
common.
But what is this common experience? I cannot tell
you, and not for
lack of vocabulary, but for lack of understanding. Certainly
communication is
involved. But communication of what? I don't think it is just
emotion, or
even just emotion plus the importance and affirmation implied
by the artist's
finding an emotion worth communicating. I suspect that a clue
lies in the
artist's possessing a certain minimum of specifically artistic
skill. Artistic
skill is creation which utilizes more than conscious thought.
A painter paints
for a moment, and stops to examine his work, not because he's
afraid he may
have failed in his intentions, but because he is only just now
finding out what
his intentions were. Work executed in this manner bears an
artistic stamp, a
stamp of talent and honesty. Without this stamp, an object
ought not to be
called art.
Many non-artists make use of what I have called
"artistic skill", but
in most cases that fact is not observable in their creations,
and in none is
it emotionally observable. I do not wish to make Thomas Edison
into an artist,
but to account for the fact that he has on occasion been called
one. The
combination of two necessary conditions for art (communication
of emotion, and
evidence of artistic skill) avoids this problem, though it does
not at all
satisfy me, and should be read as nothing more than a beginning.
In speaking of artistic skill, I am not just speaking
of
individuality. I agree with Tolstoy that individuality is a
criterion for
ranking art, but it need not be prominent in all art. I can
illustrate what I
mean by "more-than-conscious thought" with a simple example.
Very seldom can
an architect who qualifies as an art-maker think separately
about commodity,
firmness, and delight, and combine his ideas into a finished
product. His only
option is to think simultaneously about all three problems.
The result is a
surprise even to him. It is this subconscious combination
which gives art the
quality of drawing one back to it repeatedly. Art has depth
because its
creation has depth. This view of artistic creation helps
explain the idea of
"inspiration" as well as the Hegelian ideas found in Heidegger.
It is clear from this that an artist is not always the
final authority
on his own intentions. In a definition of art based on
communication,
intention is involved, but intention at a certain level of
competence, and
intention sufficiently integral to the object. It is not
enough that an artist
intend to create a masterpiece for any work of art to come into
existence.
There are cases (such as Danto's chained cat) in which stated
intention becomes
an issue. My view of the matter is this: if the stated
intention is confirmed
by the artwork it may in fact be significantly helpful;
otherwise it is at most
its own artwork (poetry), but is not significantly relevant to
one's experience
of the object commented on. I do not believe that as a
functionalist I must
make esthetic properties supervene on physical properties. I
can ignore
neither a useful comment by an artist nor any more general form
of art
education. Such information alters my esthetic experience,
without however
altering the artwork so much as my understanding thereof.
There are other
cases in which an artist's stated intention contradicts what
the spectator
perceives (as having been the artist's real intentions), and
must therefore be
rejected.
Perhaps I can hint at my as yet inadequately stated
definition by
passing judgments on particular objects: a known forgery of an
artwork will
often be an artwork - largely to the credit of the original
artist, Duchamp's
urinal and Mona Lisa jokes are not art, some conceptual art is
art (poetry) and
would have been at any point in recorded history, four minutes
of silence is
not art, and in fact quite a number of pieces in museums are
not art. How do I
explain this? How do I account for the importance attributed
to "Fountain"?
Why should I have to account for this? "Fountain" is
seen as good
evidence in support of a popular theory. Must I account for
the theory's
popularity? It is new. It is scandalous. It is brainless.
Isn't that
enough? Or must I also account for my pessimism?
SAY WHAT YOU CHOOSE, SO LONG AS IT DOES NOT PREVENT YOU FROM
SEEING THE FACTS.
-Wittgenstein, P.I. 79
NOTES
1 George Dickie, "What is art? An Institutional
Analysis" (1974) 464
2 Dickie, 465
3 Dickie, 465
4 Dickie, 467
5 Wittgenstein, "Wittgenstein's Lecture on Ethics" 2nd
paragraph
Oliver Sparrow
punchline does not encourage a deep read. The best way of thinking about
what is or is not art is to see the concept as essentially historical: we
define as art that which has survived long enough and which has embedded
itself into the context from which art is generated sufficiently to have
influence on what follows. Decoration, by contrast, is that which is both
artefactual and pretty. The K complexity of accredited art is higher than
the complexity of craft, in part from the complexity of the origins from which
it sprang and in part because of the complexity of the framework whiuch its
existence has modified. Decoration arises from a commoditised craft mechanism
and adds nothing to what follows.
Beyond that, of course, there is nothing to seperate "art" from "kitsch" from
"decoration" from "scribble" from rats' droppings save that we find it useful
to draw judgemental lines about which we differ and upon which we are able to
mount no objective linguistic structure. In parallel, there is an "art" market,
which has proven poorly parallel to the working through of informed judgement
over the decades as to what constitutes art. Finally, there are the experts and
the practitioners, who are the very embodiment of fallibility.
_________________________________________________
Oliver Sparrow
oh...@chatham.demon.co.uk