“True art is modest”: On Real Art in Tolstoy’s What is Art? For majority of people, cruising through a fine arts museum or gallery is nothing short of browsing through a textbook and failing to grasping knowledge of the content. A casual activity and check off ones list of to-dos, sometimes done just for the appearance it offers. Of that majority, one might look at a painting for a long while before connecting the uncommunicated dots from gallery label. But for the small remaining others, a trip to an art exhibition is a journey through emotions and feelings rendered by the artists of the particular works of art. Leo Tolstoy deems this to be the appropriate response to “true art” in his What is Art?, published in 1897. Tolstoy responds to the …show more content…
Their handwork is seen as vandalizing of property despite the effort and intricacy of their lines to execute a printed-like work of art that may be a remembrance portrait or sometimes just a word. In cases like these, Tolstoy advises his audience to divide the two because one has absolutely no effect on the other. He says “subject matter” that the artist is portraying through the art are “independent” and “set apart form the quality of the art” (155). Bad art depends solely on its level of effects on its auditor. “The stronger the infection, the better is the art as art” as it cannot be judged by the content according to Tolstoy (153). He also sees art more or so moral if spiritual. Tolstoy says “it is not a work of art if it does not evoke that feeling of… spiritual union” between the auditor and the artist. The artist is supposed to portray a work of art that aim’s at the “spiritual life of man and humanity” (174). So the mural graffiti artist does not have the motive of “passing on spiritual strength” through the composition of his or her work of art, providing Christian context, then according to Tolstoy, it is not “true art” (195). Being that he is a devout Christian, as confirmed in his book What I Believe, Tolstoy believes that everyone should follow his way, which seems like he feels is the only right way. Instead of leaving the realms of religion …show more content…
The color way choice, chaotic lines and idea at a glance is meant to “push the experience of the artist” onto the audience and when it actually succeeds in doing so, Tolstoy defines that as “art” (108). He makes the argument that the real purpose of art is beyond creating “pleasure”(43). Connecting his views back to his religion, he believes that “the purpose of true and good art” is meant to “rid ourselves of the pernicious results of harmful art” (174). He lays out his main definition of art, saying the activity of at is “to evoke in oneself a feeling one has once experienced, and having evoked it in oneself, then, by means of movements, lines, colors, sounds, or forms expressed in ivords, so to transmit that feeling that others may experience the same feeling”, all don’t through “external signs” (50). The entire purpose of this text is to try and figure out the purpose and functionality of art. What does art do? What is art made for and how is this proven? With such an abstract idea, Tolstoy manages to give a concrete idea of what art is and from that, a solid distinguishing format can be formed to discern what “good” art really is, instead of basing it solely on execution of realism. He does this in a format that can come off as if he listing requirements for a composition to be considered art. As long as all the requirements or qualifications are met,
For the first cultural event, I decided to visit the Orlando Museum of Art. Personally, I had never been to an art museum until now so I wasn’t sure what the art would like. I never had an interest to go to an art museum or an interest for art in general because it is very uninteresting in my opinion. I felt like I didn’t belong in the art world. I felt like art was meant for intelligent individuals who understood complex art and the intentions behind a piece of art. Even if I tried to understand art, I was always very critical of it because I never understood what makes art “art” and why it is so important to others. By touring the Orlando Museum of Art, I was hoping to gain a deeper appreciation and understanding for art.
Though people can look into color and composition, others can still even look into the source of the art itself. Cole goes deeper, delving into the source of the art, looking in particular into the idea of cultural appropriation and the view a person can give others. Though it is good for people to be exposed to different opinions of a group or an object, sometimes people can find it difficult to tell the difference between the reality and the art itself. Sometimes art can be so powerful that its message stays and impacts its audience to the point where the viewer’s image of the subject of the art changes entirely. Cole brings up an important question about art, however. Art has become some kind of media for spreading awareness and even wisdom at times, but in reality, “there is also the question of what the photograph is for, what role it plays within the economic circulation of images” (973). Cole might even be implying that Nussbaum’s advertisement can sometimes be the point of some media, and that sometimes the different genres of art can just be to make someone with a particular interest happy. One more point that Cole makes is that “[a]rt is always difficult, but it is especially difficult when it comes to telling other people’s stories.” (974) Truthfully, awareness and other like-concepts are difficult to keep going when a person or a group is not directly involved.
According to the Oxford dictionary, Art is an expression or application of human creative skill and imagination producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power. (oxforddictionaries.com). In the area of the Arts, it seems that knowledge is attained through a holistic lens, where its approach towards knowledge emphasizes the whole of an artwork rather than their constituent parts (simplyphyschology.com). Art can be accessible since the audience is able to experience it directly, with the help of our senses. As viewer we enjoy aesthetic pleasure, which involves an appreciation of the contents in relation to vehicles or supports. (Levinson, 1996) In fact, according to Jerrold Levinson’s ‘The Pleasures of Aesthetics’
Culture in the Soviet Union possessed many stages as different leaders enforced very different rules in regard to accepted art forms. Under Lenin, many forms and styles of art were accepted as long as they were not overly detrimental to the party mission. Lenin wanted to find a signature style of art that would be unique to the Soviet Union. In order to do this Lenin put very little restriction on the arts. Great experimentation was done in writing and painting and many radical styles were developed during this time. When Lenin died, Joseph Stalin came into power and accepted art that looked drastically different from its previous years. Stalin enforced a much stricter policy on art. Stalin’s policy was named Socialist realism and featured
The comparison of the authors’ views on the role of art in society falls from their overarching views on leading satisfying lives. Voltaire thinks one should cultivate their garden, and so art – much like many divertimentos – are unnecessary and possibly harmful. Dostoyevsky believes in becoming free by rejecting reason-based existence. There is hardly a better way to do this than by creating art. Despite their differences, the commentary on society present in the works of both authors caused them great trouble and – necessary in living a fulfilling life or not – it’s clear that great art drastically affects those who view it.
Malevich’s description of the cutting-edge zaum style speaks to his view on the intimate connection between the spiritual and the non-objective. Specifically, he wrote in a personal correspondence from 1913 that zaum stylists in both literature and in painting rejected conventional reason for the simple yet persuasive fact that another kind of reason had been stirred within them that had its own peculiar law, construction and sense; Malevich chose to describe this new kind of reason as “beyond-reason-ness” and he argued that this “beyond-reason” gave pictures their right to exist. Malevich wanted to produce a new kind of art that would employ a logic using the full range of the human psyche – including its capacity for vitality, for novelty and for true creation. Ultimately, what Malevich was really after, c...
For Leo Tolstoy, in order for something to be considered art, it must evoke some form of emotion that acts as a means of unification and communication for humanity. As long as the intent of the artist hopes to unify, it is a positive necessity for the human experience, “art begins when one person, with the object of joining another or others to himself in one and the same feeling, expresses that feeling by certain indications.” For Tolstoy’s theory, the idea of intent is paramount to the execution of art. If something is not made with the intent of evoking a pure emotion, then it is not art. Tolstoy believes that art is “a means of union among men, joining them together in the same feelings and indispensable for the life and progress toward well-beings of individuals and of humanity.” When m...
In the book “Ways of Seeing,” John Berger explains several essential aspects of art through the influence of the Marxism and art history that relate to social history and the sense of sight. Berger examines the dominance of ideologies in the history of traditional art and reflects on the history, class, and ideology as a field of cultural discourse, cultural consumption and cultural practice. Berger argues, “Realism is a powerful link to ownership and money through the dominance of power. ”(p.90)[1] The aesthetics of art and present historical methodology lack focus in comparison to the pictorial essay.
Introduction Upon my first encounter with Kandinsky's painting, my eyes and indeed my mind were overcome with a sense of puzzlement, as it seemed impossible to decipher what lay beneath his passionate use of colour and distorted forms. Kandinsky hoped by freeing colour from its representational restrictions, it, like music could conjure up a series of emotions in the soul of viewer, reinforced by corresponding forms. Throughout this essay, I will follow Kandinsky's quest for a pure, abstract art and attempt to determine whether his passionate belief in this spiritual art and his theories on its effects on the soul, can truly be felt and appreciated by the average viewer, who at first glance would most likely view Kandinsky's paintings as simply abstract. Kandinsky was indeed a visionary, an artist who through his theoretical ideas of creating a new pictorial language sought to revolutionize the art of the twentieth-century. Regarded as the founder of abstract painting, he broke free from arts traditional limitations and invented the first painting for paintings sake, whereby the dissolution of the object and subsequent promotion of colour and form became means of expression in their own right.
This paper will explore Vladimir Tatlin and Naum Gabo's differences in the role of the Avant-Garde artists and how their beliefs influence the kind of work they produce. A pioneer of Russian design, Vladimir Tatlin is a representative of Russian Realism. He left home when he was fifteen and served on the shipboard. When he became a painter, he often represented sailors in his pictures. Art and culture in Russia after Revolution was a tool for creating industrially aesthetic reality.
One pleasant afternoon, my classmates and I decided to visit the Houston Museum of Fine Arts to begin on our museum assignment in world literature class. According to Houston Museum of Fine Art’s staff, MFAH considers as one of the largest museums in the nation and it contains many variety forms of art with more than several thousand years of unique history. Also, I have never been in a museum in a very long time especially as big as MFAH, and my experience about the museum was unique and pleasant. Although I have observed many great types and forms of art in the museum, there were few that interested me the most.
In Confronting Images, Didi-Huberman considers disadvantages he sees in the academic approach of art history, and offers an alternative method for engaging art. His approach concentrates on that which is ‘visual’ long before coming to conclusive knowledge. Drawing support from the field of psycho analytics (Lacan, Freud, and Kant and Panofsky), Didi-Huberman argues that viewers connect with art through what he might describe as an instance of receptivity, as opposed to a linear, step-by-step analytical process. He underscores the perceptive mode of engaging the imagery of a painting or other work of art, which he argues comes before any rational ‘knowing’, thinking, or discerning. In other words, Didi-Huberman believes one’s mind ‘sees’ well before realizing and processing the object being looked at, let alone before understanding it. Well before the observer can gain any useful insights by scrutinizing and decoding what she sees, she is absorbed by the work of art in an irrational and unpredictable way. What Didi-Huberman is s...
From his work, the audience could see his freedom. Free of doing anything and everything that he wants and that’s what art is. Krammer tells the relationship between art and freedom by evaluating Rothko’s artwork and style. Also, another book called, “Inclusive Design Patterns,” by Heydon Pickering contained the discussion of what art is. In this book, Pickering gave more than one definition to art. However, a unique writing in his book is that he metaphors art to view. Everyone in the world has different perspective, which means people see the world differently. Although people were looking the same artwork, they might get the totally opposite meaning. This proves two things; one is that art is free. Not only the creator of the production would have that freedom of making art, but also the audience could have the freedom of understanding the art. The other point is that the art may have more than a million meanings and that are related to the concept of “Narrative
Russian Avant-Garde was born at the start of the 20th century out of intellectual and cultural turmoil. Through the analysis of artworks by Aleksandr Rodchenko and El Lissitzky, this essay attempts to explore the freedom experienced by artists after the Russian Revolution in 1917. This avant-garde movement was among the boldest and most advanced in Europe. It signified for many artists an end to the past academic conventions as they began to experiment with the notions of space, following the basic elements of colour, shape and line. They strove for a utopian existence for all, benefited by and inspired through the art they created.
Art has had its roots, one may argue, when civilization was born. With each respective civilization and time periods from the past, humans have formed a diverse and unique society, a group of people with their own individual characteristics, cultures, as well as philosophies within which all kinds of differing ideas, thoughts and opinions are always brought upon for challenge and evaluation. These distinct aspects of a culture and/or time period may be recorded by people in varying forms of expression we all know as art. Directly from where culture had originated, events and/or emotions from that time period have been reflected or directly recorded in the arrangement of pictures i.e. paintings from the past which inform us about the people’s experiences and events in the past historical periods. Ultimately, History is the record of the development and how we have evolved as humans together in a society. History can be expressed and reflected in different kinds of music, sculptures, as well as paintings. There are several different periods of Art, each has contributed and reflected to how a society was. Art has been usually used by historians as one of the vehicles of history to illustrate and illuminate it as they are able to recognize that some types of art may be able to help them identify and explain the nature of societies and periods in history. Art and society have counteracted with each different type bringing forth new arts and new societies for many generations to come. Ideas have caused responses by citizens and therefore bring forth several different types of influences on a period’s background, heredity, and environments. These influences are then translated into new a idea, which then triggers the circle to repeat it...