Great video, AmorSciendi! But, when you were talking about how art doesn't "do" anything, I couldn't help but recall Brian Eno's recent explanation of art: Art is all the things we don't have to do. For example, we need to eat, but we don't need cuisine. We need to cover ourselves, but we don't need fashion. We need shelter, but we don't need architecture. Art is one of the most basic human traits, as we have been uselessly beautifying our surroundings since we lived in caves. We don't need music, but without it some of us wouldn't consider life worth living. So, maybe (just maybe) what art "does" is to make life worth living. That's a pretty important function. Oh, yeah, I'd just like to add: If Eno is correct about art, then it won't end until humans are extinct.
C.S. Lewis has a similar commentary re: the arts (or beauty - the aesthetic) not being something with 'survival value' but rather being that which gives value to survival.
@@asimplenameichose151 and therefore, back to Eno, art won't end until humans are extinct. It's in our DNA a constant need for expansion, to sublimate the human condition, a soul's quest if you will. Thank you for your invaluable insight
Makes a lot of sense! And it makes me think of Victor Frankel's book "Man's Search for Meaning," that we are meaning making creatures. Goring off of that, art is a way to transform our suffering - inherent to the human experience - into something that is meaningful to oneself, and even, others
Thank you Amor Sciendi . . . . wow! what a fabulously clear 'gathering' of so many threads of discourse around what art is, what it does, where its been and what's here now. I read Danto's The End of Art and his What Art Is recently and was stimulated but also overwhelmed. Listening to this twice (and I will listen again) was like someone opening the door of a very stuffy room and letting a fresh spring breeze blow through. I cannot begin to express how grateful I am for the work of scholarship, compression, interlacing , capaciousness, pure scope, and brilliant communication that you've created here. You've been of true service to me (and I'm sure to many others). You are a brilliant teacher. I'll be one of your Patreon patrons as long as you're doing such powerful work.
Art is a great hobby and has healing effects. But yes, it's worthless in the marketplace. Almost all westerners have creative hobbies, but there's zero demand for the art pieces. Art is horrible as a business! Art is superb as a hobby!
Thanks for this. I learned a lot, and there's so much to unpack it's hard to know where to start. It seems to me that the focus on Plato and Hegel leaves out half the story. We overlook the Aristotelean idea that an artist does not simply imitate nature, but creates something new--that is, the work of art itself. And Plato never seems to entertain the notion that art might exist in the realm of ideas as much as anything else does.
Actual art is the embodiment of an idea. Not imitation, but the physical manifestation of an idea (idea/image/sentiment, that doesn't need explanations or conceptualizations, it directly manifests itself), so I don't see contrasts between Plato, Aristotle or whatever philosopher.
They overlook the Romantic movement of the XIXcentury which defied the rationalism of philosophers, and which gave us expressionisn, Dada and Surrealism and even psychedelic art through the 1960s, Pluralism is not the end of the story, it is just a conventional mass trend masked by pseudo intelectual efforts on philosophical art
Thank you for sharing your broad and rich understanding of art so clearly. I probably got more out of this video than the many years of art history classes through out my formal education.
Interesting video, but I find it sad that, as an artist who has lived and breathed art as a career and otherwise, that absolutely nothing I love about art is even remotely addressed in this video. I appreciate you sharing the views of these philosophers, and your explanations of their philosophy, but nothing could be more far removed from the thoughts and life of an actual artist. In my opinion at least. Someone who paints, someone who sketches, someone who sculpts with the aim to develop their skills, to create something beautiful and meaningful to them, to tell stories with their art and reach people with their chosen form of expression… the lens through which an actual artist views the meaning and purpose of art is removed from this discussion entirely.
Can't fit everything into every video. This was a video about theory, not practice. I have another video called "art is a process" that focuses on Michelangelo's slave sculptures. That might be more of what you're looking for.
@@AmorSciendi I’m not saying that I think you should have included more. I’m saying that, in my opinion at least, all of the philosophers and their 2 cents each all add up to a bunch of dudes trying to fit something they didn’t understand into their lines of logic. Whether using philosophy to try to tear it down, or build it up, it all sounds like the words and wisdom of people who never actually did it or understood it.
You’re mixing or confusing the discussion of craft with the discussion of the philosophical and academic discourse. And yes, it is an opinion about the thoughts and lives of artists, to politely say the least. For centuries, an immense amount of time and energy has been given to mining the intention, motivation, composition, subject, and so on in order to channel source into the work or arrive and something that really pops or sings or disrupts, etc. The academic discourse was natural and necessary. Competitive inspiration and motivation was/is a major force in human history. If you are a gifted and engaged mathematician you must understand the pillars upon which you stand. They don’t come out of the blue running through the halls exclaiming, “Look what I have discovered!” Only to have an well studied individual look at them and say, “Dude, Pythagoras discovered that centuries ago.” But the discourse of art, int this respect, is not open like the sciences, and does seem to have run its course. Some would/could say that philosophy as a discourse is over as well, but I don’t agree. Not with integration and exponential development of info tech. Anyways, this is what is, at least for a while, “over” with art. Has been for a min. So, yes, enjoy your craft! I just took up oil painting last year. Amazing! X
One issue I had during the majority of the opening was your varying use of the word 'art' to mean either visual art or art as a general concept. For example, Plato may have opined that 'art' is a reflection of a reflection, as you put it... but he also thought (like Confucius) that music shaped the fabric of society and he had all kinds of opinions about the exact musical rules that should be followed to promote certain emotions and values in the minds of the general population. When you bring poetry and jazz into the mix and re-emphasise how certain philosophers had no time for 'art', I legitimately do not know whether you are referring to visual art (sculpting, painting) or everything. Apart from that, I very much enjoyed this. Thanks very much.
When Sciendi or anyone says the word art I don't just think of one kind of art like just visual. Unless they specify. I think of all art, such as music or video games too.
Thanks for engaging thoughtfully with the essay. Near the end I address how Danto's explanation really only deals with visual art, and even more specifically, only painting. Do you have any videos that deal with these kinds of sweeping art theoretical concepts that focus on music? I was thinking of doing an episode on Susanne Langer's philosophy of art which would deal much more with music.
In a nutshell: Danto argued that art has historically been defined by its ability to represent or embody certain aesthetic qualities, and it has gone through various stages and movements throughout history. However, with the advent of modern art and the rejection of traditional aesthetics, Danto claimed that art had reached a point where there were no longer any essential criteria or boundaries that could define what is or is not art.
Its a reflecton . Always has been. If there's some person who has been moved by something created by someone its artistic. Its magical. Because art isn't just visual. Its our culture.
@@fixsationon7244You’re talking about one object or one experience. Danto is talking about art and its history in general. He’s not saying that nothing can be art. He’s saying the opposite: anything and everything can be art, and if anything can be art then there is no more story, no more history of what art is, or can be.
I appreciate the amount of work that went into this video. Clearly a labor of love. It definitely taught me a few things and gave things to think about as I pursue my own vision of what art is.
You have tied together so many of the dangling loose treads of knowledge learned over my life. This video now ranks as a one of the Top Five in my list of MUST SEE on TH-cam. Thank you for being such an effective teacher!
Wow that's a big compliment. I'm so happy you found value in it. As you can imagine this 20 minutes is the result of hours and hours of reading and writing. It's nice to hear that it added value for someone other than myself.
wow ! I'm instantly a fan and will DEFINITELY be checking out all your other videos. Thanks SO much for showing us the direction YT should be taking with it's entire platform...deeper examinations and LESS knee-jerk reactions.
Wonderful video. I've always thought about how art movements have defineable time periods, but with the introduction of the internet, vasts amount of art movement microcosms are constantly being born, and constantly dying. The art world has become so volatile and so complex now that it's within everyone's hands.
Wow! Fascinating! This sounds like something to be concerned about... I've no expertise in the contemporary art world. Just a love of ALL the arts (I'm a writer / poet) throughout the ages... Of course our exponentially evolvinf IT science is going to change everything. Probably destabilize. Maybe destroy art history development as we know it. If only the Geni of technology could ever be put back in the box or kept in check. It determines us when we should determine its development.
@@judeannethecandorchannel2153 It's not something to be concerned about, nor is it destroying art history development, simply because this exact thing was always happening. The reason why art history has defineable periods is for the same reason why we have defineable generations - these are periods of time affected by major events or ways of thinking that trend towards a certain style. Art of different capacities were still being made during the Baroque period, but because those things werent the popular or common thing, the era is defined clearly by the things that were popular, circulated, and taught. But thats a very Eurocentric view because ALSO at the same time, art around the world was being produced, and being popularized, in their respective groups/cultures/populations. Different movements within this current internet era can still be studied, explained, defined, but at the end of the day it allows more avenues for the common person to partake in the arts as opposed to having an aristocratic sum of money to pour into materials and education required. As far as AI goes, it shouldnt be a concern of replacing artists, but moreso that our societies arent properly set up to effectively use AI as a tool. AI is pandering and capitalizing to the masses that dont have the money or time to afford the luxury commodity that is art, and on the flipside AI is being used as a very useful tool by current artists to supplement or expedite workflow. At the end of the day, any amount of work that can be replaced or automated is detrimental in societies that say if you cant work, you starve (aka almost every "modern" human society) Art isnt an entity, but a collection of pieces that are made by people in different periods of time, and the cycle of death and creation of art movements, regardless of the scale and pace, is only healthy for the medium overall.
In everyone's hands brilliant just as Duchamp hoped it would be and not just in the hands of the arbitors of taste and what is fashionable Art for all by all There are far too many people especially in the last 30 years who have got seriously off with murder Tracy Emin Damian Hurst amongst many others Complete nonsense Ive came across better discoveries in junk shops and in puddles in the street Art for all not the few who take themselves far too seriously and its tedious in the extreme 😮
that’s just the thing, i’m a young person that loves art and to me art is everywhere, when you look for it and don’t look for it. Your right in terms of microcosms, and my take on it is simply that the artist no longer is bound to a single art form, but instead can be their own, with their own audience. Essentially all i’m saying is everyone has the freedom of being in their own lane, but to not be stagnant have to be able to evolve with our times, truly reflecting their growth as a person
Thought provoking ideas about art which I will have see again and again. One of the ideas that came to my mind is that lots of contemporary art I see to comes with, or requires a commentary by the artist or or an art critic, to explain to the viewer what the resulting painting or sculpture is about or means. There is a part of me that is feels, or believes, or questions that if an art work needs an explanation to understand, or comprehend, or appreciate it, then the artistic endeavor is more of a ‘trick” or hoax. Now I will begin to question that idea or criticism. Thank you.
I am writing my thesis about Danto and I have a doubt, perhaps somebody can discuss it with me! 🙂 So this is how I see it, Danto raises the level of the brillo boxes by saying that two identical things can be one art, the other non art. He sees the Brillo Boxes as normal pieces...On the contrary Warhol was absolutely in love with capitalistic society and its objects, and he considers them as works of art. I interpret Danto and Warhol as having different views on the matter, am I right? Or is there something I am not seeing
Warhol imho gets close. My art presupposes that if art need to be looked at through its utilitarian and social function, then advertising, marketing is the art form of our time. Warhol was taking the art of our time and simply placing it in a gallery, outside of the utilitarian, into a context where the underlying premise is that art has to be produced by an artist, and since artists are limited in the amount of work that they can produce, it becomes a reified commodity that is capable of being a place where the wealthy can park their surplus value: their status as collectors and their excess idle capital.
I suppose Danto means - and if so, I agree - that in Postmodernity (i.e. after the mid 1960s) and due the western subject being on a path of radical boundless emancipation, an object is considered to be art if we so wish, namely by means of a God-like fiat of the subject that, as Nietzsche famously diagnoses, has killed God and has taken God's place.
Extraordinary. Made me think so differently about the idea of depiction as conviction, only to have the idea turned on its head. Compelling ideas here, and now I want to read more of Danto. Such resonant depth of research, related with precision and clarity. I look forward to all the podcasts. Exhilarating way to have one's ideas renewed.
I paint, and acquired a degree from an art school thirty years ago. Though I do, in fact, read and enjoy philosophy, it has nothing directly to do with my painting, and the remark that conceptual art "looks like philosophy" made me smile. This touches upon a central criticism of the contemporary "art world", that it's easy to mimic process or content by being inscrutable. Of note here, the word "like", which can be a synonym for "pretension". Secondly, though Picasso couldn't stop Franco, nor did anyone else, so why pick on art? Thirdly, I've always wondered why painters have to justify their work, while poets and musical composers are not only allowed to engage in, but are even celebrated for their capacity to obtain lyrical sophistication. When I was in school, the word "beauty" was banned, and the worst pejorative imaginable was "decorative", which of course rendered painting, per se, somewhat difficult. I eventually overcame my naïveté by realising that everything in this world is a business, and the "conceptual" was the ideal golden vessel for reification, richly rewarding. What exactly is Jeff Koon's talent, what his contribution to human society?
You make valid comments, robert. I agree with most of them completely. In summary a bit bleak and cynical, though, don't you think. Where's the facet of celebration of art. Of Life..? Just asking..
Even before AI, computers had begun to trivialized the visual image. In NYC, in the 80's, I saw artists lugging around their portfolios to compete with artists who were using Photoshop. They were competing to serve corporations or commerce. AI can imitate but not originate the darker depths of the human mind, or maybe the relationship between an alienated individual and a nurturing or repressive culture. What difference would that make to an AI entity? In the 1850's artists were in a panic over the invention of the camera and yet it gave rise to the impressionists, cubists and modern art. Because artistic expression is an individual act it is subject to change based the unique characteristics of the individual. I guess I view artistic expression as literature.
god is dead. art is dead. rock and roll is dead. I have heard of science dying once AI is self aware. Sports is over. Betting and wall street killed it long ago. I might not hit the ears of everyone but every profession has a naysayer in the back of the room stating such things under their breath.
Great video. I am an artist, I am not dead. Have you read the book, Art and Physics: Parallel Visions in Space, Time and Light by Leonard Shlain? It is about how artist see it first then science follows, ie. first Giotto then Galileo. Its a great read about the parallel developments of Art and Physics. Thank You!
This is more evidence that art is dead. If art was a vigorous and meaningful discipline, it wouldn’t need a book about how if you squint a little it’s kinda like physics, a real living and powerful discipline.
Technology precedes art in society. Artists just suffer from narcisism, they are just the elites that futz around playing with new medias. First you need the new medium! Then you can use the new media to express different ideas - Resulting artifacts just contain the novel thinking that follows from new technologies.
I haven't heard of 'retinal art' before, but it perfectly encapsulates what I like about art (and recontextualises my undying love for art nouveau). I appreciate the philosophy input, but I'll stick to my pretty paintings, sculptures and furniture ;) Thank you so much for this video, even if the conclusions I reach are so different from yours
Excellent summary and analysis. The fact that you closed with a viewpoint is also appreciated. Posters don't always do that. So thanks. That said, a few questions: 1. You say philosophers "relegated" art to expression and emotion. Is emotion also a form of truth inquiry? Can truth only be found or discovered by the application of reason, not intuition? Can something "feel true", and be true, even if one cannot explain it logically? To further this, can a full grasp of a given truth be reached with reason only, absent a feeling of that truth? 2. Art had no reason or utility. This is the narrative philosophers tried to dump art into, unsuccessfully you argue, by stating that it was impotent. But before we get to your conclusion, which argues, correctly one could say, that philosophers failed in this nefarious attempt. Does emotion have a role in the utility or use of an idea or happening or person even? What moves a person to act? Is it not feeling? Reason can and perhaps should provide the structure within which an action is taken, a movement made. But is it not feeling that provides the fuel for that action? Are they not like dance partners, switching leads depending on the time and place of the dance, but dancing most cohesively and beautifully when they are joint/move as one? 3. Perceptual equivalence: how do we know what something really is, is it by its closest or most accurate physical depiction whether in repose or movement? Or is it by searching for a glimpse into its inherent or intrinsic qualities or values? Its nature? The Portrait of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde, for example, examines this. What was the most accurate depiction of Dorian Gray, according to that tale. In other words, does art posses in addition to its "mimetic properties" as you put it, revelatory potential? 4. Pluralism. If this is where art, or at least the progression of Western art (paintings and sculpting mostly, as you point out, but perhaps even other forms of art like music and literature, as I think you imply), is this not to suggest that in the overarching debate about where Western art is progressing toward, Friedrich Nietzsche has won over Friedrich Hegel? For rather than Hegel's historical dialogues between different ages & cultures, where Western art appears to have ended at is Nietzsche's Perspectivism. The view that there is no one direction in art seems to draw from Nietzsche's there is no absolute view of truth, all viewing is attached to some perspective. So did he seed contemporary art? Once again, this is an excellent summary and analysis. Thanks for making and sharing it. I have subscribed.
fantastic! concise and incisive without feeling like a mere synopsis. I had been thinking in terms of every medium reaching a point where it is incapable of creating anything genuinely new (baring an unforeseen technological advancement in tools/raw materials) at which point it resorts to quotation and pluralism. This video is forcing me to reevaluate. Thanks.
Loved it. Subscribed. Not sure agree with Danto, but I do agree to the extent of your final comments: pluralist, stimulating and provoking thought - yes; but having ended in philosophy... apples and oranges (says metaphysicist) Even had a bit of a problem understanding how he gets to that conclusion, the Hegel-Warhol thingy.. I'm afraid seems a bit contrived (to me), but actually loved the rest of his argument - and yours! Thanks for that. Cheers.
I was surprised the end of art was not attributed to Duchamp in full by purposely cutting out the heart of traditional visual aesthetics, an enduring checkmate.
The end of art through dada art was not the real end of that narration, it may had been the end for the average american art critic of the mid 20th century but ironically the 60s was the explosion of psychedelia and mind expansion experience which has yet to be researched and it may well be the new underground within the pluralism of today
@@victormorgado5318 The remark was about Arthur Danto's inability to understand what Duchamp had done to art not with Cubism or Dada but through Conceptual Art not a focus on visual aesthetics but art based on ideas. This was a revengeful thrust against the advance of Western art. Now anyone could think of themselves as artists even businessmen with substantial revenue could join in the fun, It is still a game for the elite. As Fran Lebowitz remarked today the applause is not for the artist but for the price a work achieved. I often wondered at the title In Advance of the Broken Arm. If you can't sculpt, draw or paint due to whatever limitation; you can declare it's art because I am an artist. Democratic perhaps but in very few examples of achievement. On a positive note I hope Cy Twombly's stature in Art History becomes as remarkable as his works.
@@k.t.5405 The Society's board rejected Fountain in 1917. Duchamp a member of the board quit as a result of their conservative constraints. However, this readymade plus others manage to change the direction of art while taking a Pi**. Correction: The urinal is mounted on the wall with the opening at the top, So as an artwork it's sitting on its flat side. Signed R. Mutt for the Mott company who designed it
@@asunder6797 "as an artwork it's sitting on its flat side" thats what I said....its an UPSIDE DOWN urinal. You gauge the ENORMOUS interpretive implications.
I like many of the things you say. Painting sculpture music and more can be art. Even a sound or the uncarved block of wood. Just because I can not see 'it' as art does not make it so. Thankfully! I have gone back years later to find amazing surprises. Feels like a connection too... Everything for just a moment... Sometimes. Amazing!!!
I’m so glad I listened to this throughout. I found myself strongly disputing where I thought this was going initially, but it’s marvellously tied up at the end . Thank you. I absolutely agree that the schism comes from the chemical plate process, and the birth of photography. Hockney was done some invaluable exploration in this field I think. So I found myself grasping for a quote from Nietzsche at the start, which admittedly may not be as purposeful as I first thought, but I still think it demonstrates in some regard the self actualisation that art has undergone - “Had we not approved of the arts and invented this type of cult of the untrue. The insight into general truth and mendacity that is not given to us by science. The insight into delusion and error as a condition of cognitive and sensate existence, it would be utterly unbearable. Honesty would lead to nausea and suicide. But now our honesty has a counter force that helps us avoid such consequences. Art has the goodwill to appearance, as an aesthetic phenomenon its existence is still bearable to us. And art furnishes us with the eye and hand, and above all, the good conscience to be able to make such a phenomenon of ourselves “
Really good video that covers so many things like art, philosophy, association with time (context), emotion, technical change (camera) and so forth. This video in a short period, rationally covers so many ideas rather well.
Art now is mainly a hobby, and most people in the West have creative practices. It's just lost its monetary value, infinite number of offers and zero demand.
If you are looking for more ideas for posting, a breakdown of Benjamin’s The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction and idea of aura would be fantastic. I really enjoy your videos! Thank you.
I'm a huge fan of Benjamin. There are a few good explanations of the essay online @broeyDeschanel recently did one focused on Van Gogh immersive "museums". I'm sure I'll do one at some point
After watching this very well done video and chewing on the content for while.... philosophy is like dating someone long distance online and playing head games for your whole life and sitting in shadows trying to understand shadows. Art feels like love, joy, peace, sunshine, a happy marriage, children playing, loving pets, a garden in the backyard, birds singing, and sparkles on crystal clear water. I don't think they mix well without it being a mental tail chase of depression and anxiety and mania that I just can't waste time on or I'll create nothing for no one and end up in a hospital hahahaha. Thanks for the video! I learned a lot as I overthought my overthinking that was overthinking what I overthought... until I couldn't think anymore and just decided to love
you are right: contemporary art is blatantly about philosophical issues and often is straining for self-importance. Your explanation has softened my attitude, or sometimes cynical predisposition, to seeing what a museum considers important "art". Much contemporary art is not really about a "retinal" vision at all- like Duchamp proclaimed to abjure. Nor is the art presented even visionary... sometimes nothing more than hyperbolizing current ideologies in our faces-- but then perhaps that what it always was, as you pointed out? ! Having revealed that bias of mine, I realize that I also am bored with mimetic art, and despite my likes or dislikes, am more often captivated by the effrontery of both the museum and the "artist" or social commentator-cum-"artist". thank you for this broad sweep of an evolution of art. Truly. thank you.
Interesting play on words. The end of art. To what ends will it go? No end is final. Art marches on, signifying whatever the artist and audiences want to signify. We make it all up.
😲Art is the channel that connects Humans to their Divinity. In my opinion it is the most precious of all Human talents. The Artist who is able to deconstruct his own ego can create art which helps Humanity evolve. As Terence McKenna once said: "If the artists, who are self-selected for being able to journey into the other, if they cannot find a way, then the way cannot be found".
Very instructive, using philosophy and the philosophy of art to get into the subject. A thing I noticed was before we got the pop artists like Andie Warhol, we had the Abstract Expressionists, who were more earnest and serious in their intention. Why such a contrast, do you think?
Art is now just a hobby. It helps us heal and feel less stressed. It's indeed required more than ever, therefore it's extremely wide spread and democratic. However, market value of it is zero. For the same reason, too many offers and zero demand, since most people have creative hobbies in the west. Art is democratic and has cultural worth. Just not monetary one.
I asked a young woman who was leaving the Vancouver art gallery if the show was worth seeing. The gallery featured an Irish contemporary artist. The young woman said, "I don't like looking at philosophy on the walls." I saw the show and I thought is it was lazy subjectivism and lacked any evidence of skill. I couldn't tell whether this was art or a con job. I've stopped going to contemporary art shows. They are so uninspiring.
Thats usually quite the case in that gallery....Guess this market is so saturated and ideas are so languishing that most of such places tend to simply following the last trend. In the end It’s the age of marketing...pitching trump the product
As an artist I agree with this woman. Art as philosophy is the living death of contemporary art. It makes it boring and pointless. If it is philosophy then do philosophy instead rather than a crippled form of art. Art I think is a human drive more akin to sex and hunger than to an impoverished rationalism. I think this video is correct in so far as modern art is reflective of the nature of modern society - very damaged and forced to wear blinders.
We need to define how the word “art” is being used here and with Danto. (The End of the) the philosophical discourse of art, the academic linear development of art as a discipline, the conventional critic and market based hierarchy of art, and so on. Medium is literally what it says. It’s in between being and experience. Thought/concept is still a medium. So, yes, it’s problematic lol. And this is a youtube comment, so I’ll get to the punch. Art as a cultural, social, economic entity is pretty impotent at the moment. BUT, as an endeavor for an individual it is as rich as ever. I started oil painting this past winter at the age of 45. It has improved my life and my relationship with the world that I see. Just as playing and recording music made all of music, including birdsong and water and wind, all the more beautiful. I got all tangled up with post modernism and critical theory decades ago and it led nowhere. Life and time is too precious to get lost in a maze of rhetoric and negation. There is no conclusion. There is no absolute good or bad. Seek and find and push your own boundaries.
And I want to add that I very much value the discourse and development that occurred up until “post post”. For centuries, an immense amount of time and energy has been given to mining the intention, motivation, composition, subject, and so on in order to channel source into the work or arrive and something that really pops or sings or disrupts, etc. The academic discourse was natural and necessary. Competitive inspiration and motivation was/is a major force in human history. If you are a gifted and engaged mathematician you must understand the pillars upon which you stand. They don’t come out of the blue running through the halls exclaiming, “Look what I have discovered!” Only to have an well studied individual look at them and say, “Dude, Pythagoras discovered that centuries ago.” But the discourse of art, in this respect, is not open and direct and clearly accepted or negated like the sciences, and it does seem to have run its course. Some would/could say that philosophy as a discourse is over as well, but I don’t agree. Not with integration and exponential development of info tech. Anyways, this is what is, at least for a while, “over” with art. Has been for a min. So, yes, enjoy your craft!
Image proves concept, perspective geometry proves image, that is why Renaissance art was so highly prized because it provided external proof of metaphysical contemplation and where the pictorial acreage of the visual field is a channel of immanence.
If art is useless, then so is philosophy. Art should make you think, reconsider, muse, experience emotion. So, like philosophy but with added value. Philosophers should be afraid of art, because it overpowers and belittles philosophy as a clumsy mechanism that can only use essay to logically convince. Talking about devices and techniques is irrelevant, talking about that is missing the point and the point existed long before the camera. The very first cave paintings captured and stored the values of the people who drew them long after their camp-fire musings were lost to the wind.
As an 18 year old Pre BA Foundation Course student I thought I understood Duchamp's Fountain but I didn't- simply because I did not know that such a thing as a urinal existed and as an 18 year old student why should I? Where would I have to go to know what a urinal is? Mrs Darley, Yorkshire Great Britain
The new antithesis is what i call Beautiful Bizar (after the magazine) versus Conceptual Art - which is for instance visible in the Boros collection since it consists of examples of both. Conceptual art is the current status quo and Beautiful Bizare is challenging that with an enhanced reality, a more fantastic reality. I think the Boros Collection shows that this newer art direction will be in museums next.
I think Kazimir Malevichs The Black Square (1913?/1914?/1915?) has been often viewed as the end of art. For example Tatyana Tolstaya wrote about the Square in The Newyorker in 2015. "A “post-Square” artist, an artist who has prayed to the Square, who has peeked inside the black hole without recoiling in horror, doesn’t believe the muses and the angels; he has his own black angels, with short metallic wings-pragmatic and smug beings who know the value of earthly glory and how to capture its most dense and multilayered sections. Craft is unnecessary, what you need is a brain; inspiration is unnecessary, what’s needed is calculation. People love innovation, you need to come up with something new; people love to fume, you need to give them something to fume about; people are indifferent, you need to shock them: shove something smelly in their face, something offensive, something repugnant." I think in all times there has been a public for something NEW, anything new, just as long as it is new. A consumerist viewer who won't perhaps buy anything, but will want something to consume in a Twitter feed or on TikTok.
The Black Square and Suprematism itself is the idea you can create expressiveness wilst you avoid the representation of known objects; it's the foundation of all astract art. It's the end of the memesis, but begining for the new huge practices. It's revolutional like a step from arithmetics to algebra
To get one answer to this great video: What advertisement plays immediately following it? I got an ad for Neo Lucida, a tool for making exact drawn copies of something you’re looking at. Huh.
Centuries ago they used an "optical chamber" to copy scenes... from the NeoLucida site: "What happens when two art professors revive an obsolete art technology?"...
Nice video on describing Danto's book and influence. The narrator here reflects greatly on Danto's book, especially within the philosophical viewpoints. I enjoy reading Arthur C Danto's After the End of Art, if only that I need to open to a random page every few days, and read his excellent art and related philosophy vernacular. I keep a glossy soft cover copy with me at all times, in my business valise, that a lady friend gave me some years ago. She had many handwritten footnotes on the pages. Also as a somewhat accomplished artist in the technical field of scientific and astronomy art, which my works have been published by NASA many times, I can't help but to think of a phrase I saw some years ago in the local newspapers during a big art event here in Portland Oregon. Art is not a product, it's a process. I find many people discussing it as only in the post process, as only a product, to either sell or critique. I see very few artists or commenters here, that are perhaps not artists, as to why they may only speak of art as if only a completed project, but very few mention the process of producing art.
Great talk/setting out of issues. Is the end of art the realisation .. I and a separate Uni-verse .. is an illusion? One .. all that is was and will be and no-thing. The end of art, the end of the centre, the end of boundary. Infinite.
I've been to many art museums, and every other. I don't always read the stories behind the images, because stories are mostly fictional. I enjoy looking at art, but like you explain it is just images that people created many years ago. I don't really care about the stories. It is sad that the people were not as famous then. I'm an artist also, but I don't place a high value on anything that I create. What I think means nothing to the world. My art work doesn't mean anything. This is why my thoughts on art doesn't matter. I create it, because I enjoy it. I don't create it to change the world, or share the end of times. People always have a story to tell. Probably they will have stories to tell about a chewing gum wrapper they find in the near future. The tales they tell for entertainment these days is something else. Not everything have meaning.
As a fine artist and game / VR developer, my take is that this line of thinking comes from following a certain path and thinking that you've found the end of the path, when in reality, the path joined up with other paths to create a road. 2D visual art is rapidly becoming just one element in an overall experience. When I create a VR application, that is an immersive experience that builds on the history of visual art and sculpture (and so much more) while becoming something very different and bigger and of a different scale. The direct line to painters of the past may become strained, especially in the age of AI, but the intent to create an experience is just as strong as ever even if the tools are different. If anything, we're bringing art history with us to reuse and extend it into new experiences.
All visual media can be subsumed by the transcndental pictorial context of perspective geometry, whatever the visual product. God and the devil still winning, so far.
Excellent synthesis and presentation, trying to be as fair as the format allows to both philosophy & art, very informative and refreshing, much appreciated kind Sir.
When I saw "the end of art" in your title, I remembered my university art history teacher attributing it to the square of Malevich, but I didn't remember the art historian or philosopher she was referring to. So you can imagine my surprise to see the Brillo Box's as the "end of art" !!!...Obviously Danto was not the Auther I could not remember. Could this be a trend in art history and philosophy? That means there could be more "end of art" proposed art works and more proponents of this weird idea. And not all of them Hegelian either. Because it took me a life time to understand how Malevich's Black Square is the "End of Art" and it's not Hegelian, ..... there is another type of reasoning that doesn't matter now. My point is that I would find a more comprehensive presentation of all the proposed "end of art" works very interesting along with the "why" of course.
Really great video, you were able to explain complex philosophical position's in a lucid and concise way that made it accessable to a broad audience. Well done.
Great vid my dude. I'd love to see a video where you expand on the thoughts you close with and investigate where the holes in the approach is. As an artist I'm deeply concerned with all of this!
I like "The end of art is the philosophy of art" idea. While I wouldn't negate the impact of philosophy, philosophy is a language of objectification, i.e., a certain kind of limitation and as such does not have the tools to wholly explicate the power of aesthetics, however hard it tries. At least in part Philosophy is for philosophers and art is for the sensorial.
Guess its a moment in history where most of the basic conceivable ideas have already been elaborated and explored. The actual trend shifted to shock, provoke, imply, insinuate and over all pitch an idea that trump the product itself. I think it’s quite a mirror of the marketing era we are living in. If art is philosophy and viceversa, the distinction between the two should be removed, same goes for their respective labels: if art is something pushing people to think about it, all the creative works of any possible sort should be labelled as art:writing, acting, singing etccc...and they should all end up in the same place, ergo museum would become a collective collection o fa typing that may inspire people to think. Just my two bits worth on it. Very Nice video, truly well thought and explained, thanks for sharing it
The idea that art asks phillosophical questions usually fall short because art doesn't have a constraint that is core to philosophy: intellectual rigor. On the other hand, art is a much larger field than philosophy and it should not try to constraint itself.
Gosh, thank you! I would love to find some discussion of other art histories beyond Western and European. Huge topics, l realize. But Hockney has presented some discussion of the way Eastern scroll paintings work to, in the end, influence Cubism. And Picasso and African masks…but there must be more.
When an art piece can move one to tears or to a joyous place, all the philosophers and experts fall to dust in importance. Like the difference in Humans... art exists... is all that is necessary! Experts and judges of Art are no more than those who can not create therefore they attack. I do wonder why there are no painters of Hyperrealism in the Classic age. There existed savants - there fore hyperrealism had to be a thing - yet no examples. What mechanisms stopped hyperrealism? So Danto discovered what the purpose of art is - for himself... as others have done since the beginning of time. He solved his dilemma, not a bigger truth - simply his dilemma.
Great video, AmorSciendi! But, when you were talking about how art doesn't "do" anything, I couldn't help but recall Brian Eno's recent explanation of art: Art is all the things we don't have to do. For example, we need to eat, but we don't need cuisine. We need to cover ourselves, but we don't need fashion. We need shelter, but we don't need architecture. Art is one of the most basic human traits, as we have been uselessly beautifying our surroundings since we lived in caves. We don't need music, but without it some of us wouldn't consider life worth living. So, maybe (just maybe) what art "does" is to make life worth living. That's a pretty important function.
Oh, yeah, I'd just like to add: If Eno is correct about art, then it won't end until humans are extinct.
Yeah. One day I'll make a video about Brian Enos art theory. He actually has quite a lot to disagree with Danto.
C.S. Lewis has a similar commentary re: the arts (or beauty - the aesthetic) not being something with 'survival value' but rather being that which gives value to survival.
@@asimplenameichose151 and therefore, back to Eno, art won't end until humans are extinct. It's in our DNA a constant need for expansion, to sublimate the human condition, a soul's quest if you will. Thank you for your invaluable insight
Makes a lot of sense! And it makes me think of Victor Frankel's book "Man's Search for Meaning," that we are meaning making creatures. Goring off of that, art is a way to transform our suffering - inherent to the human experience - into something that is meaningful to oneself, and even, others
Correct: Art is nourishment for the spirit/soul.
Thank you Amor Sciendi . . . . wow! what a fabulously clear 'gathering' of so many threads of discourse around what art is, what it does, where its been and what's here now. I read Danto's The End of Art and his What Art Is recently and was stimulated but also overwhelmed. Listening to this twice (and I will listen again) was like someone opening the door of a very stuffy room and letting a fresh spring breeze blow through. I cannot begin to express how grateful I am for the work of scholarship, compression, interlacing , capaciousness, pure scope, and brilliant communication that you've created here. You've been of true service to me (and I'm sure to many others). You are a brilliant teacher. I'll be one of your Patreon patrons as long as you're doing such powerful work.
Wow. Thank you so much for this. That is so kind. Really, thank you
Wow. Big praise there, gray. Deserving, I'd agree
[wouldn't condition my support this way, though..]
"The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely.
All art is quite useless.”
OSCAR WILDE
Art is a great hobby and has healing effects. But yes, it's worthless in the marketplace. Almost all westerners have creative hobbies, but there's zero demand for the art pieces. Art is horrible as a business! Art is superb as a hobby!
@@mikesamovarov4054 Indeed. But the reason I posted Wilde how brilliant and simple his insight is towards art.
Thanks for this. I learned a lot, and there's so much to unpack it's hard to know where to start. It seems to me that the focus on Plato and Hegel leaves out half the story. We overlook the Aristotelean idea that an artist does not simply imitate nature, but creates something new--that is, the work of art itself. And Plato never seems to entertain the notion that art might exist in the realm of ideas as much as anything else does.
Actual art is the embodiment of an idea. Not imitation, but the physical manifestation of an idea (idea/image/sentiment, that doesn't need explanations or conceptualizations, it directly manifests itself), so I don't see contrasts between Plato, Aristotle or whatever philosopher.
They overlook the Romantic movement of the XIXcentury which defied the rationalism of philosophers, and which gave us expressionisn, Dada and Surrealism and even psychedelic art through the 1960s, Pluralism is not the end of the story, it is just a conventional mass trend masked by pseudo intelectual efforts on philosophical art
These ideas have been swirling around in my brain, thank you Amor Science for contextualizing it so beautifully.
Thank you, what a great, insightful presentation, a very rare find on this platform. A gem indeed!
Thank you for sharing your broad and rich understanding of art so clearly. I probably got more out of this video than the many years of art history classes through out my formal education.
Interesting video, but I find it sad that, as an artist who has lived and breathed art as a career and otherwise, that absolutely nothing I love about art is even remotely addressed in this video.
I appreciate you sharing the views of these philosophers, and your explanations of their philosophy, but nothing could be more far removed from the thoughts and life of an actual artist. In my opinion at least.
Someone who paints, someone who sketches, someone who sculpts with the aim to develop their skills, to create something beautiful and meaningful to them, to tell stories with their art and reach people with their chosen form of expression… the lens through which an actual artist views the meaning and purpose of art is removed from this discussion entirely.
Can't fit everything into every video. This was a video about theory, not practice. I have another video called "art is a process" that focuses on Michelangelo's slave sculptures. That might be more of what you're looking for.
@@AmorSciendi I’m not saying that I think you should have included more. I’m saying that, in my opinion at least, all of the philosophers and their 2 cents each all add up to a bunch of dudes trying to fit something they didn’t understand into their lines of logic.
Whether using philosophy to try to tear it down, or build it up, it all sounds like the words and wisdom of people who never actually did it or understood it.
AGREED!
Art is wordless. Your lecture is words. Perhaps Danto was the contemporary equivalent of Warhol in art history/philosophy etc.
You’re mixing or confusing the discussion of craft with the discussion of the philosophical and academic discourse. And yes, it is an opinion about the thoughts and lives of artists, to politely say the least. For centuries, an immense amount of time and energy has been given to mining the intention, motivation, composition, subject, and so on in order to channel source into the work or arrive and something that really pops or sings or disrupts, etc. The academic discourse was natural and necessary. Competitive inspiration and motivation was/is a major force in human history. If you are a gifted and engaged mathematician you must understand the pillars upon which you stand. They don’t come out of the blue running through the halls exclaiming, “Look what I have discovered!” Only to have an well studied individual look at them and say, “Dude, Pythagoras discovered that centuries ago.” But the discourse of art, int this respect, is not open like the sciences, and does seem to have run its course. Some would/could say that philosophy as a discourse is over as well, but I don’t agree. Not with integration and exponential development of info tech. Anyways, this is what is, at least for a while, “over” with art. Has been for a min. So, yes, enjoy your craft! I just took up oil painting last year. Amazing! X
One issue I had during the majority of the opening was your varying use of the word 'art' to mean either visual art or art as a general concept. For example, Plato may have opined that 'art' is a reflection of a reflection, as you put it... but he also thought (like Confucius) that music shaped the fabric of society and he had all kinds of opinions about the exact musical rules that should be followed to promote certain emotions and values in the minds of the general population.
When you bring poetry and jazz into the mix and re-emphasise how certain philosophers had no time for 'art', I legitimately do not know whether you are referring to visual art (sculpting, painting) or everything.
Apart from that, I very much enjoyed this. Thanks very much.
When Sciendi or anyone says the word art I don't just think of one kind of art like just visual. Unless they specify.
I think of all art, such as music or video games too.
Thanks for engaging thoughtfully with the essay. Near the end I address how Danto's explanation really only deals with visual art, and even more specifically, only painting. Do you have any videos that deal with these kinds of sweeping art theoretical concepts that focus on music? I was thinking of doing an episode on Susanne Langer's philosophy of art which would deal much more with music.
Okay, mind sufficiently blown. A lot to take in, concisely and sincerely expressed, thank you.
In a nutshell: Danto argued that art has historically been defined by its ability to represent or embody certain aesthetic qualities, and it has gone through various stages and movements throughout history. However, with the advent of modern art and the rejection of traditional aesthetics, Danto claimed that art had reached a point where there were no longer any essential criteria or boundaries that could define what is or is not art.
Its a reflecton . Always has been. If there's some person who has been moved by something created by someone its artistic. Its magical. Because art isn't just visual. Its our culture.
@@fixsationon7244You’re talking about one object or one experience. Danto is talking about art and its history in general. He’s not saying that nothing can be art. He’s saying the opposite: anything and everything can be art, and if anything can be art then there is no more story, no more history of what art is, or can be.
I appreciate the amount of work that went into this video. Clearly a labor of love. It definitely taught me a few things and gave things to think about as I pursue my own vision of what art is.
You took the words right out me mind mon
You have tied together so many of the dangling loose treads of knowledge learned over my life. This video now ranks as a one of the Top Five in my list of MUST SEE on TH-cam. Thank you for being such an effective teacher!
Wow that's a big compliment. I'm so happy you found value in it. As you can imagine this 20 minutes is the result of hours and hours of reading and writing. It's nice to hear that it added value for someone other than myself.
lol word salad nonsense
wow ! I'm instantly a fan and will DEFINITELY be checking out all your other videos. Thanks SO much for showing us the direction YT should be taking with it's entire platform...deeper examinations and LESS knee-jerk reactions.
Wonderful video. I've always thought about how art movements have defineable time periods, but with the introduction of the internet, vasts amount of art movement microcosms are constantly being born, and constantly dying. The art world has become so volatile and so complex now that it's within everyone's hands.
Wow! Fascinating! This sounds like something to be concerned about...
I've no expertise in the contemporary art world. Just a love of ALL the arts (I'm a writer / poet) throughout the ages...
Of course our exponentially evolvinf IT science is going to change everything. Probably destabilize. Maybe destroy art history development as we know it.
If only the Geni of technology could ever be put back in the box or kept in check. It determines us when we should determine its development.
@@judeannethecandorchannel2153 It's not something to be concerned about, nor is it destroying art history development, simply because this exact thing was always happening. The reason why art history has defineable periods is for the same reason why we have defineable generations - these are periods of time affected by major events or ways of thinking that trend towards a certain style. Art of different capacities were still being made during the Baroque period, but because those things werent the popular or common thing, the era is defined clearly by the things that were popular, circulated, and taught. But thats a very Eurocentric view because ALSO at the same time, art around the world was being produced, and being popularized, in their respective groups/cultures/populations.
Different movements within this current internet era can still be studied, explained, defined, but at the end of the day it allows more avenues for the common person to partake in the arts as opposed to having an aristocratic sum of money to pour into materials and education required.
As far as AI goes, it shouldnt be a concern of replacing artists, but moreso that our societies arent properly set up to effectively use AI as a tool. AI is pandering and capitalizing to the masses that dont have the money or time to afford the luxury commodity that is art, and on the flipside AI is being used as a very useful tool by current artists to supplement or expedite workflow. At the end of the day, any amount of work that can be replaced or automated is detrimental in societies that say if you cant work, you starve (aka almost every "modern" human society)
Art isnt an entity, but a collection of pieces that are made by people in different periods of time, and the cycle of death and creation of art movements, regardless of the scale and pace, is only healthy for the medium overall.
In everyone's hands brilliant just as Duchamp hoped it would be and not just in the hands of the arbitors of taste and what is fashionable
Art for all by all
There are far too many people especially in the last 30 years who have got seriously off with murder Tracy Emin Damian Hurst amongst many others
Complete nonsense
Ive came across better discoveries in junk shops and in puddles in the street
Art for all not the few who take themselves far too seriously and its tedious in the extreme 😮
that’s just the thing, i’m a young person that loves art and to me art is everywhere, when you look for it and don’t look for it. Your right in terms of microcosms, and my take on it is simply that the artist no longer is bound to a single art form, but instead can be their own, with their own audience. Essentially all i’m saying is everyone has the freedom of being in their own lane, but to not be stagnant have to be able to evolve with our times, truly reflecting their growth as a person
@@rakeemkoroma2398 Spot on young person 👌
Thought provoking ideas about art which I will have see again and again. One of the ideas that came to my mind is that lots of contemporary art I see to comes with, or requires a commentary by the artist or or an art critic, to explain to the viewer what the resulting painting or sculpture is about or means. There is a part of me that is feels, or believes, or questions that if an art work needs an explanation to understand, or comprehend, or appreciate it, then the artistic endeavor is more of a ‘trick” or hoax. Now I will begin to question that idea or criticism. Thank you.
wow this is very good and highly informative. i really appreciated how you explained such a complicated topic in a clear manner. Great work!
Thanks
I am writing my thesis about Danto and I have a doubt, perhaps somebody can discuss it with me! 🙂
So this is how I see it, Danto raises the level of the brillo boxes by saying that two identical things can be one art, the other non art. He sees the Brillo Boxes as normal pieces...On the contrary Warhol was absolutely in love with capitalistic society and its objects, and he considers them as works of art. I interpret Danto and Warhol as having different views on the matter, am I right? Or is there something I am not seeing
Warhol imho gets close.
My art presupposes that if art need to be looked at through its utilitarian and social function, then advertising, marketing is the art form of our time.
Warhol was taking the art of our time and simply placing it in a gallery, outside of the utilitarian, into a context where the underlying premise is that art has to be produced by an artist, and since artists are limited in the amount of work that they can produce, it becomes a reified commodity that is capable of being a place where the wealthy can park their surplus value: their status as collectors and their excess idle capital.
I suppose Danto means - and if so, I agree - that in Postmodernity (i.e. after the mid 1960s) and due the western subject being on a path of radical boundless emancipation, an object is considered to be art if we so wish, namely by means of a God-like fiat of the subject that, as Nietzsche famously diagnoses, has killed God and has taken God's place.
Extraordinary. Made me think so differently about the idea of depiction as conviction, only to have the idea turned on its head. Compelling ideas here, and now I want to read more of Danto. Such resonant depth of research, related with precision and clarity. I look forward to all the podcasts. Exhilarating way to have one's ideas renewed.
I paint, and acquired a degree from an art school thirty years ago. Though I do, in fact, read and enjoy philosophy, it has nothing directly to do with my painting, and the remark that conceptual art "looks like philosophy" made me smile. This touches upon a central criticism of the contemporary "art world", that it's easy to mimic process or content by being inscrutable. Of note here, the word "like", which can be a synonym for "pretension". Secondly, though Picasso couldn't stop Franco, nor did anyone else, so why pick on art? Thirdly, I've always wondered why painters have to justify their work, while poets and musical composers are not only allowed to engage in, but are even celebrated for their capacity to obtain lyrical sophistication. When I was in school, the word "beauty" was banned, and the worst pejorative imaginable was "decorative", which of course rendered painting, per se, somewhat difficult. I eventually overcame my naïveté by realising that everything in this world is a business, and the "conceptual" was the ideal golden vessel for reification, richly rewarding. What exactly is Jeff Koon's talent, what his contribution to human society?
You make valid comments, robert. I agree with most of them completely. In summary a bit bleak and cynical, though, don't you think. Where's the facet of celebration of art. Of Life..? Just asking..
@@BailelaVida It's a deeply meaningful activity for me. Society is cynical, not me.
How much money did you make selling your original art pieces?
Beauty will again!
Even before AI, computers had begun to trivialized the visual image. In NYC, in the 80's, I saw artists lugging around their portfolios to compete with artists who were using Photoshop. They were competing to serve corporations or commerce. AI can imitate but not originate the darker depths of the human mind, or maybe the relationship between an alienated individual and a nurturing or repressive culture. What difference would that make to an AI entity? In the 1850's artists were in a panic over the invention of the camera and yet it gave rise to the impressionists, cubists and modern art. Because artistic expression is an individual act it is subject to change based the unique characteristics of the individual. I guess I view artistic expression as literature.
Danke!
Thank you!
Thank you for your summary. I have just read this book. Now everything is on place.
You never hear about “the end of sports” or the “the end of business”, or the “end of audio-visual storytelling”….just art.
god is dead. art is dead. rock and roll is dead. I have heard of science dying once AI is self aware. Sports is over. Betting and wall street killed it long ago. I might not hit the ears of everyone but every profession has a naysayer in the back of the room stating such things under their breath.
Is the theatre really dead?
@@johnnyxmusic Only art! Apparently
We did hear about "The end of history" a few years back. But the idea looks pretty stupid now.
@@joebeamishdude like half of those things are art
This video was so thought provoking and interesting, after watching I went immediately and joined your Patreon. Keep up the good work.
Wow thanks so much
Great video. I am an artist, I am not dead. Have you read the book, Art and Physics: Parallel Visions in Space, Time and Light by Leonard Shlain? It is about how artist see it first then science follows, ie. first Giotto then Galileo. Its a great read about the parallel developments of Art and Physics. Thank You!
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Yes, have read all of these books leonard Shlain is amazing. Enjoyed this video as well.
This is more evidence that art is dead. If art was a vigorous and meaningful discipline, it wouldn’t need a book about how if you squint a little it’s kinda like physics, a real living and powerful discipline.
@@HkFinn83horrible take lmao
Technology precedes art in society. Artists just suffer from narcisism, they are just the elites that futz around playing with new medias. First you need the new medium! Then you can use the new media to express different ideas - Resulting artifacts just contain the novel thinking that follows from new technologies.
Wonderful, thoughtful, critical analysis. I really enjoyed! Thank you for posting! ❤
I haven't heard of 'retinal art' before, but it perfectly encapsulates what I like about art (and recontextualises my undying love for art nouveau). I appreciate the philosophy input, but I'll stick to my pretty paintings, sculptures and furniture ;)
Thank you so much for this video, even if the conclusions I reach are so different from yours
As a contemporary artist myself this video very concisely the argument I have against most “retinal art” in how it is a product and not an artwork
Clear, educational and delightful!
I totally agree with the.complete 25:20 absence of value atributed to technique and meaning and mystery which are the true components or lasting art
Thank you so much for providing so much context and tying it all together, fantastic video!
Art is the ACT of creation in which you enjoy the creation thereof in the present moment. What becomes of the work afterwards is immaterial.
Yes, art is a fantastic hobby!
Excellent summary and analysis. The fact that you closed with a viewpoint is also appreciated. Posters don't always do that. So thanks. That said, a few questions:
1. You say philosophers "relegated" art to expression and emotion. Is emotion also a form of truth inquiry? Can truth only be found or discovered by the application of reason, not intuition? Can something "feel true", and be true, even if one cannot explain it logically? To further this, can a full grasp of a given truth be reached with reason only, absent a feeling of that truth?
2. Art had no reason or utility. This is the narrative philosophers tried to dump art into, unsuccessfully you argue, by stating that it was impotent. But before we get to your conclusion, which argues, correctly one could say, that philosophers failed in this nefarious attempt. Does emotion have a role in the utility or use of an idea or happening or person even? What moves a person to act? Is it not feeling? Reason can and perhaps should provide the structure within which an action is taken, a movement made. But is it not feeling that provides the fuel for that action? Are they not like dance partners, switching leads depending on the time and place of the dance, but dancing most cohesively and beautifully when they are joint/move as one?
3. Perceptual equivalence: how do we know what something really is, is it by its closest or most accurate physical depiction whether in repose or movement? Or is it by searching for a glimpse into its inherent or intrinsic qualities or values? Its nature? The Portrait of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde, for example, examines this. What was the most accurate depiction of Dorian Gray, according to that tale. In other words, does art posses in addition to its "mimetic properties" as you put it, revelatory potential?
4. Pluralism. If this is where art, or at least the progression of Western art (paintings and sculpting mostly, as you point out, but perhaps even other forms of art like music and literature, as I think you imply), is this not to suggest that in the overarching debate about where Western art is progressing toward, Friedrich Nietzsche has won over Friedrich Hegel? For rather than Hegel's historical dialogues between different ages & cultures, where Western art appears to have ended at is Nietzsche's Perspectivism. The view that there is no one direction in art seems to draw from Nietzsche's there is no absolute view of truth, all viewing is attached to some perspective. So did he seed contemporary art?
Once again, this is an excellent summary and analysis. Thanks for making and sharing it. I have subscribed.
fantastic! concise and incisive without feeling like a mere synopsis. I had been thinking in terms of every medium reaching a point where it is incapable of creating anything genuinely new (baring an unforeseen technological advancement in tools/raw materials) at which point it resorts to quotation and pluralism. This video is forcing me to reevaluate. Thanks.
Loved it. Subscribed.
Not sure agree with Danto, but I do agree to the extent of your final comments: pluralist, stimulating and provoking thought - yes; but having ended in philosophy... apples and oranges (says metaphysicist) Even had a bit of a problem understanding how he gets to that conclusion, the Hegel-Warhol thingy.. I'm afraid seems a bit contrived (to me), but actually loved the rest of his argument - and yours! Thanks for that. Cheers.
I was surprised the end of art was not attributed to Duchamp in full by purposely cutting out the heart of traditional visual aesthetics, an enduring checkmate.
The end of art through dada art was not the real end of that narration, it may had been the end for the average american art critic of the mid 20th century but ironically the 60s was the explosion of psychedelia and mind expansion experience which has yet to be researched and it may well be the new underground within the pluralism of today
@@victormorgado5318 The remark was about Arthur Danto's inability to understand what Duchamp had done to art not with Cubism or Dada but through Conceptual Art not a focus on visual aesthetics but art based on ideas. This was a revengeful thrust against the advance of Western art. Now anyone could think of themselves as artists even businessmen with substantial revenue could join in the fun, It is still a game for the elite. As Fran Lebowitz remarked today the applause is not for the artist but for the price a work achieved. I often wondered at the title In Advance of the Broken Arm. If you can't sculpt, draw or paint due to whatever limitation; you can declare it's art because I am an artist. Democratic perhaps but in very few examples of achievement. On a positive note I hope Cy Twombly's stature in Art History becomes as remarkable as his works.
Its an UPSIDE DOWN urinal, BTW... Big difference.
@@k.t.5405 The Society's board rejected Fountain in 1917. Duchamp a member of the board quit as a result of their conservative constraints. However, this readymade plus others manage to change the direction of art while taking a Pi**. Correction: The urinal is mounted on the wall with the opening at the top, So as an artwork it's sitting on its flat side. Signed R. Mutt for the Mott company who designed it
@@asunder6797 "as an artwork it's sitting on its flat side" thats what I said....its an UPSIDE DOWN urinal. You gauge the ENORMOUS interpretive implications.
This is fascinating. Thank you for the video.
this is a good- BUT THE EMOJI PAINTING BEHIND YOU I CANT
It's so good. I have a video about it
This was really interesting and offered insights I hadn’t considered before. Thank you!
This is just brilliant!
Thanks James!
You're easily impressed.
@@grosbeak6130 Nah. Might be you have a tendency to be easily unimpressed, gros. Just saying.. Cheers
Really high quality survey and analysis of the issue and relevant theory
Thank you ❤
You're welcome
Well done, Amor. Instant subscriber.
I like many of the things you say. Painting sculpture music and more can be art. Even a sound or the uncarved block of wood. Just because I can not see 'it' as art does not make it so. Thankfully! I have gone back years later to find amazing surprises. Feels like a connection too... Everything for just a moment... Sometimes. Amazing!!!
Yes, art is a nice hobby.
@@mikesamovarov4054 The art is just fine, just fine you see... What piece of furniture should it go by? Oh dear!
I’m so glad I listened to this throughout. I found myself strongly disputing where I thought this was going initially, but it’s marvellously tied up at the end . Thank you. I absolutely agree that the schism comes from the chemical plate process, and the birth of photography. Hockney was done some invaluable exploration in this field I think. So I found myself grasping for a quote from Nietzsche at the start, which admittedly may not be as purposeful as I first thought, but I still think it demonstrates in some regard the self actualisation that art has undergone - “Had we not approved of the arts and invented this type of cult of the untrue. The insight into general truth and mendacity that is not given to us by science. The insight into delusion and error as a condition of cognitive and sensate existence, it would be utterly unbearable. Honesty would lead to nausea and suicide. But now our honesty has a counter force that helps us avoid such consequences. Art has the goodwill to appearance, as an aesthetic phenomenon its existence is still bearable to us. And art furnishes us with the eye and hand, and above all, the good conscience to be able to make such a phenomenon of ourselves “
Thanks for leaving this. I hope you found it useful/interesting enough to check out some of my other videos.
So many thought provoking points in this video. Thank you for sharing!!
This was amazing. Great presentation ❤
so much knowledge in a single video i love itttt
A rhyme of mine.
Time defines the rhyme
From the macabre to the sublime
Time, an infinite line
Through verse, defined.
Hey! You taught at Ross school! Fascinating video, gave me a lot of pause. Thank you.
I did. What's up Sergei. You still making metal sculptures? Your senior project was legendary
Really useful thanks, I wonder how known Luhmann's Art as a Social System is in Art Theory
The book to check out is Elie Faure's History of Art
Really good video that covers so many things like art, philosophy, association with time (context), emotion, technical change (camera) and so forth. This video in a short period, rationally covers so many ideas rather well.
what about some discussion -dialogue -thoughts- on this ?
the best content on youtube!
Wow. That's high praise when The Assignment and CJ the X exist. Thank you
Where? 😂
Another great video, really interesting to see how things have moved on since I studied Art History back in the late 80's
Art now is mainly a hobby, and most people in the West have creative practices. It's just lost its monetary value, infinite number of offers and zero demand.
Thank you for your work and for sharing your knowledge and thoughts with us.
Thank you for watching and taking the time to comment!
If you are looking for more ideas for posting, a breakdown of Benjamin’s The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction and idea of aura would be fantastic.
I really enjoy your videos! Thank you.
I'm a huge fan of Benjamin. There are a few good explanations of the essay online @broeyDeschanel recently did one focused on Van Gogh immersive "museums". I'm sure I'll do one at some point
After watching this very well done video and chewing on the content for while.... philosophy is like dating someone long distance online and playing head games for your whole life and sitting in shadows trying to understand shadows. Art feels like love, joy, peace, sunshine, a happy marriage, children playing, loving pets, a garden in the backyard, birds singing, and sparkles on crystal clear water. I don't think they mix well without it being a mental tail chase of depression and anxiety and mania that I just can't waste time on or I'll create nothing for no one and end up in a hospital hahahaha. Thanks for the video! I learned a lot as I overthought my overthinking that was overthinking what I overthought... until I couldn't think anymore and just decided to love
If art feels like that to you, how do you rank Goya's Black Paintings, for starters?
@@danieldonaldson8634 Well, I can't speak for Goya about his art. I was just speaking for myself.
you are right: contemporary art is blatantly about philosophical issues and often is straining for self-importance. Your explanation has softened my attitude, or sometimes cynical predisposition, to seeing what a museum considers important "art". Much contemporary art is not really about a "retinal" vision at all- like Duchamp proclaimed to abjure. Nor is the art presented even visionary... sometimes nothing more than hyperbolizing current ideologies in our faces-- but then perhaps that what it always was, as you pointed out? ! Having revealed that bias of mine, I realize that I also am bored with mimetic art, and despite my likes or dislikes, am more often captivated by the effrontery of both the museum and the "artist" or social commentator-cum-"artist". thank you for this broad sweep of an evolution of art. Truly. thank you.
Interesting play on words. The end of art. To what ends will it go? No end is final. Art marches on, signifying whatever the artist and audiences want to signify. We make it all up.
😲Art is the channel that connects Humans to their Divinity. In my opinion it is the most precious of all Human talents. The Artist who is able to deconstruct his own ego can create art which helps Humanity evolve. As Terence McKenna once said: "If the artists, who are self-selected for being able to journey into the other, if they cannot find a way, then the way cannot be found".
Pictorial acreage provides the channel of immanence.
謝謝！
Thank you so much!
Very instructive, using philosophy and the philosophy of art to get into the subject. A thing I noticed was
before we got the pop artists like Andie Warhol, we had the Abstract Expressionists, who were more earnest and serious in their intention. Why such a contrast, do you think?
So the end of history/art is not actually the end of history/art but a sign that art is needed more than ever.
Spot on
Art is now just a hobby. It helps us heal and feel less stressed. It's indeed required more than ever, therefore it's extremely wide spread and democratic. However, market value of it is zero. For the same reason, too many offers and zero demand, since most people have creative hobbies in the west. Art is democratic and has cultural worth. Just not monetary one.
I asked a young woman who was leaving the Vancouver art gallery if the show was worth seeing. The gallery featured an Irish contemporary artist. The young woman said, "I don't like looking at philosophy on the walls." I saw the show and I thought is it was lazy subjectivism and lacked any evidence of skill. I couldn't tell whether this was art or a con job. I've stopped going to contemporary art shows. They are so uninspiring.
Thats usually quite the case in that gallery....Guess this market is so saturated and ideas are so languishing that most of such places tend to simply following the last trend. In the end It’s the age of marketing...pitching trump the product
As an artist I agree with this woman. Art as philosophy is the living death of contemporary art. It makes it boring and pointless. If it is philosophy then do philosophy instead rather than a crippled form of art.
Art I think is a human drive more akin to sex and hunger than to an impoverished rationalism. I think this video is correct in so far as modern art is reflective of the nature of modern society - very damaged and forced to wear blinders.
Art is now a hobby. Galleries are simply resisting this fact, which is obvious with their laughable fake ВS.
Definitely thought-provoking. Thanks, and
Happy Trails
Thanks for this really good reflection.
We need to define how the word “art” is being used here and with Danto. (The End of the) the philosophical discourse of art, the academic linear development of art as a discipline, the conventional critic and market based hierarchy of art, and so on. Medium is literally what it says. It’s in between being and experience. Thought/concept is still a medium. So, yes, it’s problematic lol. And this is a youtube comment, so I’ll get to the punch. Art as a cultural, social, economic entity is pretty impotent at the moment. BUT, as an endeavor for an individual it is as rich as ever. I started oil painting this past winter at the age of 45. It has improved my life and my relationship with the world that I see. Just as playing and recording music made all of music, including birdsong and water and wind, all the more beautiful. I got all tangled up with post modernism and critical theory decades ago and it led nowhere. Life and time is too precious to get lost in a maze of rhetoric and negation. There is no conclusion. There is no absolute good or bad. Seek and find and push your own boundaries.
And I want to add that I very much value the discourse and development that occurred up until “post post”. For centuries, an immense amount of time and energy has been given to mining the intention, motivation, composition, subject, and so on in order to channel source into the work or arrive and something that really pops or sings or disrupts, etc. The academic discourse was natural and necessary. Competitive inspiration and motivation was/is a major force in human history. If you are a gifted and engaged mathematician you must understand the pillars upon which you stand. They don’t come out of the blue running through the halls exclaiming, “Look what I have discovered!” Only to have an well studied individual look at them and say, “Dude, Pythagoras discovered that centuries ago.” But the discourse of art, in this respect, is not open and direct and clearly accepted or negated like the sciences, and it does seem to have run its course. Some would/could say that philosophy as a discourse is over as well, but I don’t agree. Not with integration and exponential development of info tech. Anyways, this is what is, at least for a while, “over” with art. Has been for a min. So, yes, enjoy your craft!
Image proves concept, perspective geometry proves image, that is why Renaissance art was so highly prized because it provided external proof of metaphysical contemplation and where the pictorial acreage of the visual field is a channel of immanence.
Thank you for this vidéo ! It is liberating . I am not crazy to enjoy both ancient art and modern art in very different ways 😊
Well, this is as good as it gets in youtube.
If art is useless, then so is philosophy.
Art should make you think, reconsider, muse, experience emotion.
So, like philosophy but with added value.
Philosophers should be afraid of art, because it overpowers and belittles philosophy as a clumsy mechanism that can only use essay to logically convince.
Talking about devices and techniques is irrelevant, talking about that is missing the point and the point existed long before the camera.
The very first cave paintings captured and stored the values of the people who drew them long after their camp-fire musings were lost to the wind.
Art is a branch of Philosophy. (Aesthetics)
@@fromthepeanutgallery1084writing and ideas are both froms of art
@@asherroodcreel640 Ideas are abstractions they don't exist.
@@fromthepeanutgallery1084 if you blow up a computer the data inside ceases to exist
@@asherroodcreel640 Not if you've been a good girl and backed it up.
Great ! Thank you for your time and explanation.
Extremely clearly explained.
As an 18 year old Pre BA Foundation Course student I thought I understood Duchamp's Fountain but I didn't- simply because I did not know that such a thing as a urinal existed and as an 18 year old student why should I? Where would I have to go to know what a urinal is?
Mrs Darley,
Yorkshire
Great Britain
Beautiful way of speaking, thanks.
The new antithesis is what i call Beautiful Bizar (after the magazine) versus Conceptual Art - which is for instance visible in the Boros collection since it consists of examples of both. Conceptual art is the current status quo and Beautiful Bizare is challenging that with an enhanced reality, a more fantastic reality. I think the Boros Collection shows that this newer art direction will be in museums next.
I really enjoyed this video. Thanks!
I think Kazimir Malevichs The Black Square (1913?/1914?/1915?) has been often viewed as the end of art. For example Tatyana Tolstaya wrote about the Square in The Newyorker in 2015. "A “post-Square” artist, an artist who has prayed to the Square, who has peeked inside the black hole without recoiling in horror, doesn’t believe the muses and the angels; he has his own black angels, with short metallic wings-pragmatic and smug beings who know the value of earthly glory and how to capture its most dense and multilayered sections. Craft is unnecessary, what you need is a brain; inspiration is unnecessary, what’s needed is calculation. People love innovation, you need to come up with something new; people love to fume, you need to give them something to fume about; people are indifferent, you need to shock them: shove something smelly in their face, something offensive, something repugnant."
I think in all times there has been a public for something NEW, anything new, just as long as it is new. A consumerist viewer who won't perhaps buy anything, but will want something to consume in a Twitter feed or on TikTok.
Malevich's 🔳 is art (just not a visual one, but rather art of selling such garbage) 😂 Art of marketing, I guess 🙄
The Black Square and Suprematism itself is the idea you can create expressiveness wilst you avoid the representation of known objects; it's the foundation of all astract art. It's the end of the memesis, but begining for the new huge practices. It's revolutional like a step from arithmetics to algebra
@@mikesamovarov4054 Malevich never did the art for sale. NEVER. Stop the ignorance, please.
To get one answer to this great video: What advertisement plays immediately following it? I got an ad for Neo Lucida, a tool for making exact drawn copies of something you’re looking at. Huh.
Centuries ago they used an "optical chamber" to copy scenes...
from the NeoLucida site: "What happens when two art professors revive an obsolete art technology?"...
@@andsalomoni funny that we just watched a video on the expanding role of art, and we're brought right back to the replication of visual dictation.
Nice video on describing Danto's book and influence. The narrator here reflects greatly on Danto's book, especially within the philosophical viewpoints.
I enjoy reading Arthur C Danto's After the End of Art, if only that I need to open to a random page every few days, and read his excellent art and related philosophy vernacular. I keep a glossy soft cover copy with me at all times, in my business valise, that a lady friend gave me some years ago. She had many handwritten footnotes on the pages.
Also as a somewhat accomplished artist in the technical field of scientific and astronomy art, which my works have been published by NASA many times, I can't help but to think of a phrase I saw some years ago in the local newspapers during a big art event here in Portland Oregon.
Art is not a product, it's a process.
I find many people discussing it as only in the post process, as only a product, to either sell or critique.
I see very few artists or commenters here, that are perhaps not artists, as to why they may only speak of art as if only a completed project, but very few mention the process of producing art.
Great talk/setting out of issues.
Is the end of art the realisation .. I and a separate Uni-verse .. is an illusion?
One .. all that is was and will be and no-thing.
The end of art, the end of the centre, the end of boundary. Infinite.
thank toy for the interesting video. in some point i had to slow it down so i can keep up with all the ideas...
Excellent! So much to ruminate on here…
I've been to many art museums, and every other. I don't always read the stories behind the images, because stories are mostly fictional. I enjoy looking at art, but like you explain it is just images that people created many years ago. I don't really care about the stories. It is sad that the people were not as famous then. I'm an artist also, but I don't place a high value on anything that I create. What I think means nothing to the world. My art work doesn't mean anything. This is why my thoughts on art doesn't matter. I create it, because I enjoy it. I don't create it to change the world, or share the end of times. People always have a story to tell. Probably they will have stories to tell about a chewing gum wrapper they find in the near future. The tales they tell for entertainment these days is something else. Not everything have meaning.
Exactly.
As a fine artist and game / VR developer, my take is that this line of thinking comes from following a certain path and thinking that you've found the end of the path, when in reality, the path joined up with other paths to create a road. 2D visual art is rapidly becoming just one element in an overall experience. When I create a VR application, that is an immersive experience that builds on the history of visual art and sculpture (and so much more) while becoming something very different and bigger and of a different scale. The direct line to painters of the past may become strained, especially in the age of AI, but the intent to create an experience is just as strong as ever even if the tools are different. If anything, we're bringing art history with us to reuse and extend it into new experiences.
All visual media can be subsumed by the transcndental pictorial context of perspective geometry, whatever the visual product. God and the devil still winning, so far.
So glad I found this!
Excellent synthesis and presentation, trying to be as fair as the format allows to both philosophy & art, very informative and refreshing, much appreciated kind Sir.
Thanks for leaving this comment. Warms my heart
When I saw "the end of art" in your title, I remembered my university art history teacher attributing it to the square of Malevich, but I didn't remember the art historian or philosopher she was referring to. So you can imagine my surprise to see the Brillo Box's as the "end of art" !!!...Obviously Danto was not the Auther I could not remember. Could this be a trend in art history and philosophy? That means there could be more "end of art" proposed art works and more proponents of this weird idea. And not all of them Hegelian either. Because it took me a life time to understand how Malevich's Black Square is the "End of Art" and it's not Hegelian, ..... there is another type of reasoning that doesn't matter now. My point is that I would find a more comprehensive presentation of all the proposed "end of art" works very interesting along with the "why" of course.
Really great video, you were able to explain complex philosophical position's in a lucid and concise way that made it accessable to a broad audience. Well done.
Great video great explanations!
Wow! that was great! Thank you for one of the best lectures I´ve listened to in quite a while. I learned from it. Thank you.
You're welcome! Thanks for taking the time to comment
Great vid my dude. I'd love to see a video where you expand on the thoughts you close with and investigate where the holes in the approach is. As an artist I'm deeply concerned with all of this!
I like "The end of art is the philosophy of art" idea. While I wouldn't negate the impact of philosophy, philosophy is a language of objectification, i.e., a certain kind of limitation and as such does not have the tools to wholly explicate the power of aesthetics, however hard it tries. At least in part Philosophy is for philosophers and art is for the sensorial.
Guess its a moment in history where most of the basic conceivable ideas have already been elaborated and explored. The actual trend shifted to shock, provoke, imply, insinuate and over all pitch an idea that trump the product itself. I think it’s quite a mirror of the marketing era we are living in. If art is philosophy and viceversa, the distinction between the two should be removed, same goes for their respective labels: if art is something pushing people to think about it, all the creative works of any possible sort should be labelled as art:writing, acting, singing etccc...and they should all end up in the same place, ergo museum would become a collective collection o fa typing that may inspire people to think. Just my two bits worth on it. Very Nice video, truly well thought and explained, thanks for sharing it
Great talk… made me Think - and I love that. Now I need to explore ✌🏼
Taurus with thesaurus...
The idea that art asks phillosophical questions usually fall short because art doesn't have a constraint that is core to philosophy: intellectual rigor. On the other hand, art is a much larger field than philosophy and it should not try to constraint itself.
Art is an ambit that is not "intellectual", so it can't have "intellectual" rigor.
This doesn't mean that it can't have its own "rigor".
Art is not a philosophy. But philosophy is kind of art!
Gosh, thank you! I would love to find some discussion of other art histories beyond Western and European. Huge topics, l realize. But Hockney has presented some discussion of the way Eastern scroll paintings work to, in the end, influence Cubism. And Picasso and African masks…but there must be more.
When an art piece can move one to tears or to a joyous place, all the philosophers and experts fall to dust in importance. Like the difference in Humans... art exists... is all that is necessary! Experts and judges of Art are no more than those who can not create therefore they attack. I do wonder why there are no painters of Hyperrealism in the Classic age. There existed savants - there fore hyperrealism had to be a thing - yet no examples. What mechanisms stopped hyperrealism? So Danto discovered what the purpose of art is - for himself... as others have done since the beginning of time. He solved his dilemma, not a bigger truth - simply his dilemma.