Art. How could a concept that is fundamentally as abstract as abstractness itself be defined? Many philosophers have offered opinions throughout human history but few have given a definition with which I can agree. People like Leo Tolstoy, Roger Scruton, and W.E.B. DuBois have made theories with which I can agree. Art is not trendy shock value stunts, paint randomly thrown on canvas, or a family resemblance concept. Art must be made with feeling, must convey emotion to its viewer, and art must be beautiful. In this paper I will show a few examples of what I consider art and explain how they are art based on the beliefs of myself and Tolstoy: that art must be made with emotion and convey emotion, Scruton: that art cleans the world of self-obsession, and DuBois: beauty is married to goodness and truth, while arguing against Wittgenstien’s family resemblance concept and Schopenhauer’s belief that there is beauty in everything.

First, art must be made with feeling and emotion in the process of its creation. Equally important is that art must convey a feeling as theorized by Leo Tolstoy. Let us consider Tolstoy’s criteria for judging art. Tolstoy defines art as a means “To evoke in oneself a feeling one has once experienced, and having evoked it in oneself, then, by means of movements, lines, colors, sounds, or forms expressed in words, so to transmit that feeling that others may experience the same feeling; Art is a human activity consisting in this, that one man consciously, by means of certain external signs, hands on to others feelings he has lived through, and that other people are infected by these feelings and also experience them” (Tolstoy, 1). When examining a piece of art, the first thing that happens when you see it is almost always an immediate emotional reaction. Let us use The Kiss by Gustav Klimt, (a beautiful painting in my opinion) as an example. The painting depicts two people, presumably a couple, who are sharing a kiss. The gold on the canvas conveys a sense of warm familiarity to the viewer. It evokes in me a sense of nostalgia for a past deep love to which words could not ever do justice. There is an aesthetic beauty and there is emotion that is communicated through the paint on the canvas to the viewer. You can feel the emotions that were intended by Klimt to be felt as the subject of the painting is clearly love. The painting carefully treads the line between being realistic and too abstract which allows the viewer to place their own thoughts about love to fill in the abstract gaps in the painting. Another example is The Monk by the Sea by Caspar David Friedrich. In this painting the viewer can see a small figure standing alone by the sea side. The intention of the painting is very clear to the viewer: contemplation. The dark colors of the painting contrast with the lighter ones and force the viewer’s eyes to look closer at the lower parts of the painting but draw the eyes upward. This to me means that we should be focusing on what is above rather than worldly problems. Given that it is a monk perhaps this is it say we should focus on religion. This painting is art as it clearly shows deep emotion and was created with emotion. Art allows the viewer to reflect on their experiences in life and ponder what they may desire, cherish, or deteste through the creation with feeling and the conveying of a feeling. 

Secondly, art must be beautiful. Beauty does not necessarily mean pleasant to look at if we examine paintings such as The Death of Marat by Jacques-Louis David, which is rather grim. Art must be beautiful in the sense that it, to use Scruton’s words, “cleans the world of our self-obsession” (Scruton, 1). Art must be beautiful because as W.E.B. DuBois stated that Beauty is equal and inseparable to truth and right (DuBois, 1). Therefore, to reflect upon and relive the values of life, art must be true and right to accurately show these feelings. If we are to accept that truth and rightness are intertwined with art then art must be beautiful. To elaborate this point let’s examine the painting The Raft of Medusa by Theodore Gericault. This painting shows us that beauty is not always pleasant to look at, the scene is rather grizzly. However, this painting shows the viewer that life can sometimes be horrifying, things do not always go your way, but there is always hope on the horizon. The sun rises in the distance and there is a ship on the horizon of the painting; the pain and suffering of the men and women on the raft will soon be over. The fate of the sailors seems certain to be death and yet Gericault chose to highlight the indomitable human spirit which I believe is beautiful. The waves represent to me the struggles that get in the way of the brighter days ahead and block us from seeing them. The painting reminds us that all struggles are temporary no matter how awful they may seem and better days are always around the corner. In order to see these aspects in this painting, beauty is necessary or else this painting would not be genuine in its emotional portrayal because it would lack truth and rightness. Another example of art being beautiful is The Soul of the Rose by John William Waterhouse. In this painting a woman is passionately smelling a rose in her garden. The woman exudes passion for the rose but perhaps the rose reminds her of a lover, husband, or child and this is why she feels this way about the rose. Clearly, the painting is full of life and emotion and it was intended to be interpreted that way. The Soul of the Rose demonstrates that truth and rightness do not mean a completely accurate portrayal of an event or thing. The rose is not literally love, but a metaphor for it; in this definition the concepts of truth and right are more abstract and closer to a Platonic form in my view. Art must be beautiful as it is synonymous with truth and right.

Lastly, art is not a familial resemblance concept as proposed by Wittgenstien and most modern and postmodern art is not art at all. Artists like Damien Hirst, Tracey Emin, and Adrian Piper are loose abstractions on what the term artist defines. The things that these people produced are something you might find in a mental asylum patient’s dreams. Mutilating animals, wearing ketchup, and an utterly repulsive bed are all not art; these are displays of mental instability and insanity which are reflective of a truly postmodern time. Where seemingly nothing matters, all is replaceable, money is God, and beauty is superficial; the so-called “art” of the postmodern era reflects this entirely too well and for these reasons art cannot be a Wittgenstienian family resemblance concept. A Jackson Pollock painting is done by a painter, on a canvas with multiple colors of paint, intermixed, with some similar shapes, like a Rembrandt painting but Pollock is not art, it is paint on a canvas. Pollock captures nothing while Rembrandt captures “something of the life within, so that the formal harmony of the colours conveys the completeness and unity of the person” (Scruton, 1).Emin’s My Bed is just that, a bed; Piper’s Catalysis III is a glorified stunt. Furthermore, not everything is beautiful as Schopenhauer claimed. If this was true then the aforementioned works of art would be beautiful which is not the case. Schopenhauer used the example of Dutch still life paintings which is a very poor example as they are masterful paintings done by professionals who spent years perfecting their craft. If his idea is correct then why not use an example of a pile of excrement; probably because this would be insane and no one would agree with his ideas. Schopenhauer’s Dutch still life example also falls short because as Scruton stated “The true work of art is not beautiful in the way an animal… is beautiful. It is a consciously created thing, in which the human need for form triumphs over the randomness of objects” (Scruton, 1). Simply pulling the plug out from a sand bucket and watching the tower fall has no beauty in it and no skill involved. This communicates no emotion; it is a sterile attention grabbing stunt. Dutch still life paintings are beautiful; oranges and a vase on a table are not, they communicate no emotion. It is as Scruton said “real knowledge of colour comes through studying the natural world, and finding our own emotions mirrored in the secret tints of things…” (Scruton, 1). No banana taped to a wall, dot on a canvas, or falling sand bucket tower can convey the emotions that were presented to the viewer of van Gogh’s The Starry Night. Warhol’s Brillo Boxes are less of an art piece than the real Brillo boxes you find in the supermarket as they are an unoriginal copy posing an unoriginal question. These works do not communicate a shared emotion or have any semblance of beauty in them. They might have been made with emotion; although, I do not know what emotion a Brillo box is intended to evoke in its viewer. As wrong as Freud may have been in his medical beliefs, even he understood that art needed to be influenced by emotion: Eros or Thanatos; neither of these really seem present in the Brillo Boxes either. Art is not trendy, it is timeless. Art is The Kiss, The Raft of Medusa, and The Soul of the Rose; these paintings allow the viewer to search deep within themselves to discover some worldly or otherworldly truth.

In conclusion, art must be created with emotion and convey emotion to the viewer. Art must be a vessel for which the viewer can reflect on their experiences in life and ponder what they may desire, cherish, or deteste. Art must be beautiful to accurately represent the intended emotion through truth and rightness. Art is not a Wittgenstienian family resemblance concept because then Pollock paintings would be art, which they are not by my definition. Art is something that is fundamental to understanding the human condition and gives us a window in which to view ourselves from the outside in. This incredible gift should never be confused with grotesque animal mutilation or public stunts that would have landed you in a sanitarium 100 years ago. Scruton is absolutely correct in his statement that “Real art is full of love. Fake art is a work of deception” (Scruton, 1). However, it is the viewer that is deceived by this “art,” the viewer that is robbed, and the viewer that is cheated by the abomination of postmodern art. The great inventor Nikola Tesla once stated, “You may live to see man-made horrors beyond your comprehension” (Quoteresearch, 1) today you can experience them in an art gallery under the name: postmodern art.

 

Reflection

I really enjoyed writing this essay as I felt I was able to express a lot of my more personal feelings regarding art. I am very grateful that I get to take a class that virtually revolves around art because I enjoy it. It was great getting to explore more about Wittgenstien, Tolstoy and Scruton’s beliefs on art as I felt like they were the most in line with my beliefs surrounding it. Also, I wanted to learn more about their views to see where I might disagree too, which I felt was very productive.

 

Bibliography

DuBois, W.E.B. Criteria of Negro Art. 1926. 

Tolstoy, Leo. What is Art? (excerpts), Translated by Alymer Maude. 1899. 

Scruton, Roger. A Point of View: How Do We Know Real Art When We See It?. 2014.