What is Art?How does one recognize Art?

Is this Art?

Wrapped Coast

By Christo

Just a normal urinal

Brillo Box

By Andy Warhol

Marie Osmond &Child – Christmas Decoration

Is this Art?

Seated Woman

By George Segal

Readymade

By Marcel Duchamp

Michael Jackson & Bubbles

By Jeff Koons

Bull’s Head

By Pablo Picasso

Is this Art?

Wax Fingers

By Anna Blackmore

Chocolate bunnies

Plaster cast of a victim from Pompeii

Yoyo stand

Is this Art?

Just a can of Campbell’s Soup

Just an office stool

House tented for termite fogging

Luncheon in Fur

By Merret Oppenheim

Can we define art by its function?

Aesthetical – Art is created to please

Personal – Art is a means of personal self-expression

Informative – Art is produced to illustrate

Ideological – Art is meant to persuade

Economical – Art is a business

Functions of Art Aesthetical – Art is created to please

Henri Matisse: Pastoral (1905)

Functions of Art Personal – Art as a means of self-expression

Jan Zrzavý: Self-portrait (1907)

Functions of Art Informative – Art is produced to illustrate

Giotto: Fresco in Basilica of St. Francis in Assisi (1297-99)

Functions of Art Ideological – Art is meant to persuade

Taras Gaponyenko: Back to Mother (1935)

Functions of Art Ideological – Art is meant to persuade

Man-made famine in Ukraine (1932-33)

Guide for the Nazi exhibition of so

called Degenerate art (1937)

Art itself becomes an object of Ideology

Functions of Art Economical – Art is a business

Jan Kotík: Money Talks IV (2002)

As means of expression and communication

As a text

As a system of signs

Art can be defined

If art is a system of signs, does it mean that everything could become art?

Are there any limits?

Herman Nitsch: Orgies and Mysteries Theatre

Robert Mapplethorpe: Joe, New York, 1976

Are there any limits?

Alexander Brener: Dollar sign sprayed on

Malevich’s painting White Cross (1997)

Protests against IMF – Prague 2000 Proclaimed as art by Alexander Brener

What is Art then?“A work of art is anything that is said to be a work of

art by people who ought to know.”Sylvan Barnett

Who are these people?

Artists

Art-historians

Art dealers

Gallerists

Etc.

Alfred H. Barr: Cubism and Abstract ArtDiagram for a catalogue (1936)

Are cave paintings objects of art history or archeology?

Deer, Niaux (circa 13 000 BC)

Master Theodorik: Holy Ram, Karlštejn Castle, Chapel of the Holy Cross (1365)

Art object or Cult object?

Screen for ancestor shrine Kalabani, Igbo, Nigeria

Art object or cult object?

Armory Show, New York, 1913

Art and its context

Marcel Duchamp: Fountain (1917) Exhibition of the Society of the Independent Artists

Sherrie Levin: Fountain After Duchamp (1991)

Richard Long: Walking a Line in Peru (1972)

Leaving the Museum

Keith Arnatt: Keith Arnatt Is an Artist (1972)

Embracing the concept

Gillian Wearing: Signs That Say What You Want Them To Say And Not Signs

That Say What Someone Else Wants You To Say (1992-93)

Leaving the artist aside…

Illumination of S. Augustin’s De Civitate Dei (second quarter of 12th c.)

Status of the Artist

Arnold Böcklin: Self Portrait (1893)

Status of the Artist

David Černý: Artist Standing (1995)

Status of the Artist

Jeff Koons: Hand on Breast (1990)

Status of the Artist

Janine Antoni: Loving Care (1992)

Status of the Artist

Description and Analysis

“Until one tries to write about it, the work of art remains a sort of aesthetics blur … After seeing the work, write about it. You cannot be satisfied for very long in simply putting down what you felt. You have to go further.”

Arthur Danto: Embodied Meaning

(1994) “Eye does not mirror but takes and makes.”

Nelson Goodman: The Languages of Art (1968)

“Looking is not as simple as it looks.” Ad Reinhardt

Description and Analysis

To get the meaning you have to interpret the subject matter, the form, the material, the sociohistoric context, and (if known)

artist’s intentions.

Analysis = Concerned with cause and effectHow does the work mean

Meaning x Meanings

Different for the Artist and for the Audience(s) in various times and cultures

Josef Václav Myslbek: Saint Wenceslas (1900-24)

Subject matter x Content

David Černý: Saint Wenceslas (1999)

Subject matter x Content

Michelangelo: Creation in Sixtine Chaple (1508-12)

Technique and its material qualities

Composition and its effect

Color and its effect

Light and its effect

What was the purpose of the work?

Artemisia Gentileschi: Judith and Holofernes (circa 1620)

Gustav Klimt: Judith and Holofernes (1903)