Is your artwork saying something?

[Halo_n_horns]

This discussion has come up several times in other threads, I thought a thread of its own might be interesting. I'm going to stay out of this one for a while to see what develops.

A lot of people look at artwork and seem to come up with a whole slew of messages or storytelling or just emotions that they believe the artist was trying to convey through the work. Others seem to just see the work and either find it appealing, unappetizing or appalling but not conveying of anything.

So, two questions. One to the artists, one to the viewers.

Artists, do you consciously try convey statements, emotions, moods? Or are you creating a piece just to be appealing to look at to a wide or focused group?

Viewers, what are you seeing and/or looking for when viewing artworks?

 

[Guest]

.....

 

[Typo Fu Master]

I don't think he's asking whether it's art or not. He wants to know if, when you create something, you're intentionally including some kind of message for the viewer.

In my own stuff, I have made funny images. At least, I thought they were funny, and my goal in making them was to make other people laugh. As a general rule, when I create something, unless it is obviously meant to make the viewer feel a certain way, I don't have a "message" I'm trying to send. Usually, I get an idea about a pic I'd like to do and I make it. Not much thought goes into delivering a message with it.

As a viewer, I don't tend to get too deep, or try to read complex meanings into an image. It boils down to either "I like it", or "I don't."

As an aside to dark-glasses, at one time, I thought any attempt at visual expression was art. Some good, some bad, but all art. I have since modified my perceptions, and I agree that there is art, and then there is self-expression. I'd add a third category: visual communication. That is for all the visual cues we see, such as stop signs, male/female bathroom indicators, etc. They aren't art, but they aren't self-expression either.

I do disagree that all art must have a message though. Or perhaps I'm just too dense to get it.

 

[Guest]

......

 

[Typo Fu Master]

I think there are some paintings/sculptures out there that have been classified as art, but are simply well done examples of self-expression. I'm a bit culturally challenged, but for example: The Scream, by Edvard Munch, is widely touted as "art." I would argue that even though his message is quite clear, it's not art because overall the painting itself leaves something to be desired in terms of quality. But that's just me.

And what about the Mona Lisa? Where is the message? It's another classic example of art, but when I see it, I see a painting of a woman. It's very well done, in contrast to The Scream, and I'd consider it art, even though I'm missing the message.

I guess I'm quality conscious. It needs to look good for me to even consider it as art. But then, you have someone that can look at random paint blotches and derive some deep philisophical meaning from them. I guess art, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.

 

[Saiyaman]

Well, the message in my erotic comics is one of sex being a fun thing and it also shows my personal preferrence of the woman being in charge. (All the lead characters in my comics are girls)

Another message is that sex can be Fun in the hillarious way, I always include a lot of humor.

 

[Guest]

.......

 

[Halo_n_horns]

As a true Artist...I believe that one has to knwo and explore an Artistic vision....be able to articulate (even if not an articulate person) an Artist's Statement.

Here's a painting called "White Center" [1950] by Mark Rothko ...

http://www.harley.com/art/abstract-art/images/(rothko)-white-center-(small).jpg

What's the message/interpretation/articulation? Is it art?

 

[Guest]

........

 

[Halo_n_horns]

yes.

let me look it up.

I can do my own art shool BS...but I think I should be true to Rothko's intent and the contextual period.

I'd be interested in your art school BS, and personal opinion, before you find the info on that painting and the atmosphere of the day that it was created.

 

[Guest]

.........

 

[Typo Fu Master]

Here's a painting called "White Center" [1950] by Mark Rothko ...

http://www.harley.com/art/abstract-art/images/(rothko)-white-center-(small).jpg

What's the message/interpretation/articulation? Is it art?

To me, it's not art. The only good thing I have to say about it is that it's a fair job at recreating a 3D cylinder. I am undoubtedly missing something significant. If I were in an art gallery, this would receive maybe 3 seconds of my time.

 

[Halo_n_horns]

DG and Type Fu Master, I think we've hit a conundrum. One of DG's comments in another thread was something to the affect of (correct me if I'm stating this incorrectly) that to be an artist there must be degrees of mastery.

The artist whose work I've presented has been recognized as having mastery over his artistic expressions. From what I found on this artist, his paintings did/do well on the market. The colors of the painting I grabbed are warm, not displeasing. But what is the painting beyond that?

I'm in complete agreeance with the two of you that this piece wouldn't be able to earn much more than a few seconds of my time were I to see it on a gallery wall, or any wall for that matter. But we all know damn good and well that there are those who have spent a good deal of time looking this painting all over, up and down, and then did so some more after the artist pointed out that it had been hung upside down. *Joking *

I see the works that have been generated here in our little forum and there's been a few I haven't been particularly fond of, but for the most part I've been gaining appreciation for styles that I didn't previously have any real appreciation for.

For example:
http://img16.imagevenue.com/aAfkjfp01fo1i-27362/loc24/92824_001__leaf.jpg
By Sensual Cealy

I've been finding myself wanting a print of this, if not the original, to frame and hang on my wall. I find its simplicity to be seemingly hypnotic. I can promise you that this is far and wide from the types of artwork that I would spend any amounts of time admiring just some months ago.

But I'm not getting any conscious thoughts from it. I'm not getting anything that says a message is trying to be conveyed. That, to me, is true, pure art. Uncontrived. Certainly uncluttered in a very broad spectrum of ways. Meaningful without needing, wanting or even so much as trying to convey meaning. That's art.

Its when art is planned out to convey something that it becomes ... tainted, for lack of a better term. Why does art have to say something to be art? At the very heart of art isn't it just creation and not conveyance? I read an interview of Pablo Picasso once. In it he was asked what it was that a particular one of his pieces was trying to say. His answer was something to the affect of, "If I wanted to tell you what it was saying I would have written it out rather than painting it." My first thought was something to the affect of, "Why the hell did it have to say something in the first place???!!!"

Its getting late. Me and my hydrocodone are moving to the bedroom .

Until tomorrow ...

 

[Guest]

..........

 

[SensualCealy]

WELL HOLY SHITSKIS!!!

How did my sketch become a topic of discussion? lmao

Anyway, Halo, you send me your personal mailing address, I will send you the picture, signed! ( Like it will be worth something some day! lmao)

IMHO,

Art is what one perceives.

Something that looks like Hell to one person may be Beautiful to another.

A Childs art work from school is meaningful to a parent, yet to an aristocrat it means diddly.

A doodle to DG is just a doodle, but to someone less talented like myself, I see it as art!

I personally think, thats why we have so many different forms of art in galleries, you have to have something to please everyone.

For instance, Picasso (was he on drugs?) chopping up pictures and putting ears where eyes should be and lips where foreheads should be (just an example) is that art? Well it sure as hell must of been for someone to "like" it and buy it.

Monet, a personal favourite, is art without saying in my eyes, the serenity within his paintings is calming and almost makes you drift off into his world. Both totally different artists, both made a bundle, more after their deaths of course.

I dont pretend to know squat about art, I know a little, thanks to a formal art teacher in Highschool.
This is only my opinion and that alone.
Cealy to both Halo and DG!

 

[Guest]

...........

 

[Typo Fu Master]

Clearly, "art" is different things to different people. I think the only common ground for true art is that it's done well. I can appreciate something without needing or getting a specific message if it's done well. I actually appreciate some things more than I would if I didn't understand the process that went into making them. Things such as painting/sketching and 3D art/animation are things I have had experience attempting, and I marvel at those that have mastered the techniques to turn out quality paintings and renderings. I can appreciate those things far more than something like photography. No doubt if I knew more about it than simply aiming and pressing a button, I'd have a better understanding of the medium and could get into it more than I do now.

 

[Halo_n_horns]

again...


I say "Art" is not about "liking"


it has to do with a combination of factors.
INCLUDING (but not limited to):

Mastery
Communication (the message is not always profound
Aesthetic
Context

look at Dance for example....to be really Art...there has to be mastery... some master it soon than others..some have a natural ability...but it need sto be nutured and practiced (just as with static, visual Art)...such thta it does not become contrived.

you practice and refine so that you CAN create with ease and no pretence so that the movemnet BECOME natural.

To say that A child's drawing is "Art" because we love the child...is misnaming the creation. That is just sentimentality. OF course sentiments factor INTO what Art is...it is part of human existance.


The word "Art" is misused.

I have heard the same people say..."Art is any human creation"...then turn around and say "Art is what the beholder believes is Art"..or "Art is what we like".

there is a distinction. As the distinction between masturbation and "making love". One is just for self pleasure...it is valid and important. The other is a shared thing and with practice and attention and thought becomes FANTASTIC...you learn "techniques" and with mastery..they are no longer "tricks" but become assimilated and used naturally to convey something even more primal, powerful and communicative.

I reckon that Cealy is on to something with that leaf image....HOWEVER I also suspect that she has not yet reached the point pf mastery in which she can, without effort, create as sensous, minimal group of lines which have the same impact whenever she chooses. She has the talent and eye and hand.


ok.... I'm off to "masturbate"...some more

I'm getting your point. I actually did a long time ago. The question that I'm still not getting answered is why does art have to convey a message in order to be art? Why is art without a message somehow not art?

I remember once discussing Columbian Red-Tail Boa Constrictors with someone who was a noted herpetologist. In the reptile world, despite having basically the same red saddles on their tails that other "true Red-Tailed Boa Constrictors" have, Columbian Red-Tail Boa Constrictors are not considered true Red-Tail Boa Constrictors. I asked why that was. An hour and a half later this guy had to admit that there was no real, definitive, concrete reasoning behind the distinction.

This is what I'm seeing in this discussion of art.

Above the word "communication" was used. Also the distinction that artwork that a child creates is not actually art. But it communicates. I can look at a picture of mommy stick-figure, daddy stick-figure and son/daughter stick-figure standing outside a white, two-dimensional house with green grass done in green crayon and a yellow quarter-circle sun up in one of the corners of the paper and easily find ...

Communication) This is a pleasant picture and because the child drew it he/she must be showing that he/she is fond of this scenario.

Aesthetics) The picture is bright and warm colors were used that are pleasing to view and which communicate pleasing circumstances that the child enjoys.

Context) The circumstance of the picture is obvious and therefore well-communicated and without being gaudy or overdone.

Mastery) The child has given communication, context and aesthetics and because of all of that has proven mastery at the skill level relative to that child's age.

Skill mastery (not really covered above), while often advancing with age, is actually more directly linked to the individual's comprehension of the raw materials and how to use them. That comprehension may or may not come from formal learning.

 

[Guest]

............

 

[SensualCealy]

I guess what I was trying to say is that a piece of 'art' can say so many things to try to communicate what the artist was trying to say to different people.
That would be why people take different pieces to mean different things.

For instance, in my opinion only, the piece of work that Halo put up , the orange, white and Pink one says a few things to me:

Void, there is something missing, the absence of colour in the centre leaves you floating looking for a focal point, as your eyes drift, they catch the black solid line.

Happiness, the colours evoke the sense of being in Mexico, sipping a margarita, watching the babes on the beach.

If you look deeper, you can actually see that there is curvature to the blocks of colour, does this resemble the look of multiple cylinders stacked together? What would or could this say?

I guess thats why I was saying that "like" has a major play in what one calls art.
If you truly LIKE something, why can't it be art? To someone that naive when it comes to putting lines together to tell a story, they may see the 'beauty' in something that others just cant see.

I know my views are rather basic, but that too I guess is why I see the artistic value in simple things as well as intricate pieces.

DG, I am not disagreeing with you by any means, you are much more knowledgable in this department than I, just a different view point.
C

ps, thanks for the kudos and you are right, I know I dont have 'it' yet, only in the last couple years have I even tried to develope my work into 'something'. One thing I do have alot of problems with is, I can easily copy, look at a picture and sketch it out, but to see in my head a picture and put it on paper is much much more difficult for me. I think that would be why my leaf picture and the last one I did, are so simple. When it comes from my head, it has to be simple for it to come out 'clean', IMHO.
Thanks again!

 

[Halo_n_horns]

ps, thanks for the kudos and you are right, I know I dont have 'it' yet, only in the last couple years have I even tried to develope my work into 'something'. One thing I do have alot of problems with is, I can easily copy, look at a picture and sketch it out, but to see in my head a picture and put it on paper is much much more difficult for me. I think that would be why my leaf picture and the last one I did, are so simple. When it comes from my head, it has to be simple for it to come out 'clean', IMHO.
Thanks again!

Please, by all means, keep going after "it."

 

[SensualCealy]

Im trying, honest I am!
C

 

[~Coquette~]

Well, sometimes I will have a mood or message to my work. Other times I don't and even with a message people will see what they want to and I don't mind at all. I like when people tell me what they see, or try and match what I see, it's interesting.

 

[Halo_n_horns]

Well, sometimes I will have a mood or message to my work. Other times I don't and even with a message people will see what they want to and I don't mind at all. I like when people tell me what they see, or try and match what I see, it's interesting.

I've gotten that sort of reaction a few times myself. I don't mind that people see what they want, I just hope they don't expect me to agree with whatever they think they've found.

I don't see a gallery here from you. Do you have works you can share with us?

 

[~Coquette~]

I've gotten that sort of reaction a few times myself. I don't mind that people see what they want, I just hope they don't expect me to agree with whatever they think they've found.

I don't see a gallery here from you. Do you have works you can share with us?

I don't have a gallery here, I have my own site with my work...and a gallery at deviant art. I thought about starting one here though.