 - Last login: 11 days agoPaulherman
- Paul is a single 46 year old person from Arcos De La Frontera, Cadiz, Spain.
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- Member since Jun 04, 2007
Paul Herman is a realist painter working in the Renaissance tradition with impressionist influence. Paintings, murals and sculpture plus Paul's Art-Q quiz, animated shorts, arts and philosophy blog and much more!
Art Workshop in Spain
Herman Studios
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Paintings murals & sculpture by Paul Herman eSnips Folder
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Dec 3, 2007 4:41pm
1 review
arts
http://www.esnips.com/web/PaulHerman
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Great site! Great work, fun quiz, animation, arts & philosophy blog & much more!
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Oct 7, 2007 1:53am
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This stumbleupon text editor is useless! Please go to hermanstudios.com/blog.html [hermanstudios.com/blog.html] if you want to read my blog...
Continued from below:
- A statement/criticism more than definition but interesting especially because of its author’s undisputed status as artist: "Supreme art is a traditional statement of certain heroic and/or religious truths, passed on from age to age, modified by individual genius, but never abandoned. The revolt of individualism came because the tradition had become degraded, or rather because a spurious copy had been accepted in its stead."
[William Butler Yeats]
- Another statement by a universally recognized authority, Leonardo Da Vinci, said in reference to art: “God creates man translates"
Overall, the etymology & traditional definitions point in one direction with relative clarity, in the words of the philosopher Santayana- “Art is for beauty”. The confusion begins, it seems to me, with Freud, photography, the first world war & its consequent search for new beginnings, we eventually arrive at this kind of definition from Wiki-pedia:
- The second, more recent, sense of the word “art” is roughly as an abbreviation for creative art or ‘fine art’ Here we mean that skill is being used to express the artist’s creativity, or to engage the audience’s aesthetic sensibilities, or to draw the audience towards consideration of the “finer” things. Often, if the skill is being used in a lowbrow or practical way, people will consider it a craft instead of art. Likewise, if the skill is being used in a commercial or industrial way, it will be considered Commercial art instead of art. On the other hand, crafts and design are sometimes considered applied art. Some thinkers have argued that the difference between fine art and applied art has more to do with value judgments made about the art than any clear definitional difference (Novitz, 1992). However, even fine art often has goals beyond just pure creativity and self-expression. The purpose of works of art may be to communicate ideas, such as in politically-, spiritually-, or philosophically-motivated art, to create a sense of beauty (see ‘aesthetics’), to explore the nature of perception, for pleasure, or to generate strong emotions. The purpose may also be seemingly nonexistent.
- A definition so broad it hardly seems to qualify as a distinct word, since it essentially allows anything to be labelled as art & anyone to self-designate as artist.
Any philistine can recognise the beauty of a sunset but it takes a Goya to show us the beauty in nightmares. Goya said: Ugliness can be beautiful while prettiness cannot.
I am long accustomed to the response: "Me too", from a great variety of people when they first discover I am an artist. I remember one time, however, when someone I met followed his ‘me too’ with: "I’m a Garbologist!" To the uncomprehending look on my face he explained “A garbage man, that’s my art”. I laughed at what I took to be a joke but as he produced a business card confirming what he claimed, I noted a serious-peeved look, engendered, no doubt, by what he must have taken as a distasteful elitist arrogance on my part.
The archetypical example of the confusion between theory & practice, between novelty & originality, is Duchamp’s urinal proclaimed art by the very right of the
artist who recognizes it as such. A brilliant argument, an original & deep aesthetic philosophy but to me entirely separate from the undeniable fact that though it may even be argued the object has innate beauty in its graceful curves, the urinal remains to me, very simply, a urinal. Dadaism & Duchamp’s elegant language caught the imagination & the idea influenced all art of the rest of the twentieth century & yet he himself didn’t appear to take the object-as-art as seriously as the idea, when he signed it with a tongue-in-cheek pseudonym that made play (in French) on the name of a company that built sewers.
I believe that since the aforementioned influences, WWI, photography & Freud confusing everyone, art’s democratization
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Oct 7, 2007 1:51am
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The big question: What is art?
Part I
As a painter I have had a thousand conversations that begin with the question: What is art? Why is that art? Or: Why isn’t that art? And a dozen other variations that all mean the same thing. Sometimes the conversation is with someone without education in the arts who is genuinely looking to me for an answer; sometimes it takes the form of debate with another artist or cognoscenti. But however naïve the person I’m speaking with is, they always have a vague if distorted view of what ‘art’ is, even if only garnered from Charlton Heston & Anthony Quinn movies on television. But it is easy to forget that the Orient has other ideas & here in Thailand no tradition of visual arts whatever. I began thinking about what I intend to write as a result of an earnest request by a Thai person to explain this strange Occidental concept of ‘art’ to her.
The elusive answer is of considerable interest to me & I have therefore studied the conclusions other artists in history have come to, listened to those of my contemporaries & been particularly curious about the reasons given by philosophers. Why would I place more weight on the opinion of philosophers than artists? Because the answer to the question lies in the realm of theory while the act of painting is in the thoroughly distinct realm of practice.
Although I was shown early on by some art appreciation teacher how neatly Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel ceiling can be divided up into graceful compositional triangles, I believe it only came out that way because the Maestro’s instincts bade it & not because he consciously designed the figural placement according to a geometric formulisation. In this case at least, theory follows practice.
I have a good friend who is a talented & dedicated artist whose work I respect; indeed, I like his paintings so well that I have bought several over the years. (The only real compliment one can offer an artist!). He, however, has an entirely different approach to mine & paints ideas. In other words, his inspiration is the idea the painting illustrates. To me this approach is just that: illustration instead of art. But it is also a good example of where theory & practice diverge since, as an artist, I don’t agree with his approach but find his paintings are none-the-less, often beautiful.
Let’s start by defining terms- dictionary/encyclopaedia descriptions & etymology:
- c.1225, "skill as a result of learning or practice," from O.Fr. art, from L. artem, (nom. ars) "art, skill, craft," from PIE *ar-ti- (cf. Skt. rtih "manner, mode;" Gk. arti "just," artios "complete;" Armenian arnam "make," Ger. art "manner, mode"), from base *ar- "fit together, join" (see arm). In M.E. usually with sense of "skill in scholarship and learning" (c.1305), especially in the seven sciences, or liberal arts (divided into the trivium -- grammar, logic, rhetoric -- and the quadrivium --arithmetic, geometry, music, astronomy). This sense remains in Bachelor of Arts, etc. Meaning "human workmanship" (as opposed to nature) is from 1386. Sense of "cunning and trickery" first attested c.1600. Meaning "skill in creative arts" is first recorded 1620; esp. of painting, sculpture, etc., from 1668. Broader sense of the word remains in artless (1589). As an adj. meaning "produced with conscious artistry (as opposed to popular or folk) it is attested from 1890, possibly from infl. of Ger. kunstlied "art song" (cf. art film, 1960; art rock, c.1970). Fine arts, "those which appeal to the mind and the imagination" first recorded 1767. Art brut "art done by prisoners, lunatics, etc.," is 1955, from Fr., lit. "raw art." Artsy "pretentiously artistic" is from 1902. Expression art for art's sake (1836) translates Fr. l'art pour l'art. First record of art critic is from 1865. Arts and crafts "decorative design and handcraft" first attested in the Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society, founded in London, 1888.
- The modern use of the word "art", which rose to prominence after 1750 is commonly understood to be skill used to produce an aesthetic result (Hatcher, 1999).
- The quality, production, expression, or realm, according to aesthetic principles, of what is beautiful, appealing, or of more than ordinary significance.
(Dictionary.com)
- "The use of skill and imagination in the creation of aesthetic objects, environments, or experiences that can be shared with others"
(Britannica Onl
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