On Nov 24, 7:19Â pm, John Jones
aol.com> wrote:> On Nov 23, 8:28Â pm, tg
earthlink.net> wrote:
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>>> On Nov 21, 6:06 pm, John Jones
aol.com> wrote:>
>>> On Nov 21, 11:01�pm, "brian fletcher"
bigpond.net.au> wrote:>
>>>> "John Jones"
aol.com> wrote in message>
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>>>>> The art' object or artefact has significance not by its own merits but
>>>>> by acting as a focus or reminder of humankind �'coming together' in a
>>>>> particular way, through religion, song, etc. The artefact has no
>>>>> 'aesthetic' property itself.
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>>>>> Artefacts that are taken from a culture are called 'art'. Art is
>>>>> therefore trophyism, or as Tolstoy put it 'counterfeits' that replace
>>>>> the true, cultural meaning of these objects with culturally divisive
>>>>> alternatives that promote privilege in one form or another.
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>>>>> In this sense, where artefacts are said to be independently
>>>>> aesthetically beautiful, 'beauty' here is trophyism and divisive, and
>>>>> the viewed object reduced to a counterfeit of its original. The stolen
>>>>> object, art, is now said to 'possess' aesthetic properties. This is
>>>>> the reasoning of the miser, the thief, and the scientist.
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>>>>> Aesthetic pleasure is the pleasure of the thief enjoying stand-alone,
>>>>> stolen cultural objects -the divisive pleasure of retaining symbols of
>>>>> cultural power.
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>>>>> That is why the Tate is like a Frankenstein monster - not so much
>>>>> alive but, like abattoir flesh warmed up, its objects are torn from
>>>>> their roots and stitched together in an aesthetic-conferring
>>>>> institution or museum. The modern art room in Cardiff Museum is
>>>>> likewise a house of horrors, a blood soaked butcher's block where
>>>>> artists in urgency throw us the offal of slain culture.
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>>>>> THAT is what art is!
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>>>> At one level it meets the need of those with poor self esteem. Having a
>>>> "famous" friend or such an artifact gives a boost to those who need it. Of
>>>> course that applies to everything materialistically, other that the basics .
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>>>> At a higher level, a work of art, by definition, is a creation which
>>>> inspires the observer to create, and thereby transending the 'posession
>>>> mentality'.
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>>>> Visual art does little for, or to me, but when I hear a great singer, I have
>>>> to hide away and sing my 'head off" :-).
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>>>> But what would you know about that "Welshie" ;-))...
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>>>> BOfL- Hide quoted text -
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>>>> - Show quoted text -
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>>> Yes, but take your spontaneous song, or the picture you paint for all
>>> to see, and put it in a competition, and grade it artistically. And
>>> what does it become? Counterfeit, empty! Theft of the soul!
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>>> A
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>> Well, JJ, if I have sung the song or painted the picture, you can't
>> steal that from me by hearing the song or 'owning' the picture. What
>> artists like to think happens is that the artist and the 'customer'
>> are the ones who share something, who are brought together. And at
>> some point, it is even possible to forgive critics and gallery owners,
>> who are simply practicing their own 'art', (bizzarre and creepy as it
>> seems at times,) using you and the customer as their medium.
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>> -tg- Hide quoted text -
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>> - Show quoted text -
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> Tolstoy would say that you have sung or painted as a communal act, and
> that this act can be debased if your community intellectualises that
> act or asesses it.- Hide quoted text -
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If you could kindly post some quotations or excerpts from Tolstoy
himself, it might help to make this clearer. For example, what did
Tolstoy consider was the role of education, of criticism, of
evaluation, of emulation, and of any type of learning which was
prompted by intellectual analysis and scrutiny, but not limited
thereto? Is he not referring to the _excess_ of intellectualizing, to
the exclusion of genuine human appreciation, rather than its mere
presence to a small degree which may not necessarily eclipse real
understanding, and which some may consider vital to real
understanding?
