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Biobob
Famous Hero
the Bobler
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posted September 01, 2013 08:48 PM |
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Edited by Biobob at 21:09, 01 Sep 2013.
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In my opinion graphic and musical arts are basically the ones to be harder to understand than literature. Everyone with some intellect is able read even more complex works like James Joyces, the needed attention span given. What most people however disregard is the understanding of the given, which is the real art. Even if you don't understand the true meaning of a book, you can still read it.
The same thing doesn't apply to music and paintings. There are many people. who can't (for example) listen to Beethoven. Then there are others who can't (under-)stand modern arts (sadly, I count myself into that group). These are not like books, if we don't have a basic understanding of the soil, you can't grasp the beauty that lies within. The marvellous thing about every kind of arts finally lies in the true meaning, which is to be found if the sole person wants to be able to enjoy it.
The sad thing however is, that nowadys sometimes very complex things without any meaning are given. I dislike most kind of modern arts, so this might dilute my view, but to me it seems modern arts is the genre the most vulnerable to this (recently I've been to the museum of modern art, and when I look at things like "strike" (hot rolled steel), I just can't help but think about some person who just tried to put a meaning into a thing that doesn't have a meaning). There are of course plenty of (modern) works which also have the signs of great art, but to me it is generally not speaking.
Greets, Biobob
PS: What is virtuous about a glissando if anybody can perform it? In my opinion it is mostly an effect, only at the right time of musical value...
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Maps
The Mapmaker's Thread
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted September 01, 2013 08:57 PM |
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JollyJoker said:
As long as zou caannot scientifically define that "difference" you have no point.
That's really absurd. Not eveything that is not totally relative is in the field of science. Besides, we also have statistics. In most countries, the classical and jazz sales are like 1-3% of the total. Why do you think that is? Definitely, not because they are bad music, on the contrary, they are very good.
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mvassilev
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted September 01, 2013 09:09 PM |
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When it comes to art, "good" can have two coherent meanings: "made with great skill and/or effort" or "I like it". Jazz may or may not be made with great skill or effort, I'm not a jazz expert, but if you're using the second meaning, you can like something that's unpopular.
If you think something is good but not widely appreciated, that just means that you like something unpopular, nothing more.
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Eccentric Opinion
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Salamandre
Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Wog refugee
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posted September 01, 2013 09:18 PM |
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What I was trying to say, but looks like I am speaking chinese, is that it is not a matter of "I like it or not", if you know to decipher it. It is a matter of "it is good or not", and scientifically demonstrable. Then to each one his own emotional reaction, and this is subjective and depends on his culture, education and instinct.
If you ask to some expert painter or art critic to explain why one painting is great and why another is mediocre, he will give you thousand of technical details about wrong angles, bad lights, wrong colors, unclear details, wrong perspectives, because there ARE rules to follow and goals to obtain. Exactly same is in music but you guys prefer to think it is some black magic, no rules, no science, only subjective analysis possible. Well, it is not.
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Biobob
Famous Hero
the Bobler
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posted September 01, 2013 09:19 PM |
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Isn't that the problem it is all about? Most people enjoy modern music more because it is made of pattern which are more simple to understand. In addition, out of pure "instinct", the mass also prefers the pop channel on the radio more (for examply, in my country, we could get it down to two: oe1, which broadcasts classical pieces and such and oe3, which gives the popular things. I don't want to know the ratio of listeners (not implying I only listen to the first, I also like "normal" music a lot  )), also not because they are not intellectual enough, but also because they are pushed into it. The group of rulers feeds, the mass takes and overlooks the beauty. There are also some modern interprets who state they don't like listening to their own genre of music (techno, dance etc.) only underlining the fact our society is based on pure profit.
Greets, Biobob
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Maps
The Mapmaker's Thread
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted September 01, 2013 09:23 PM |
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Salamandre said:
Listening to Beatles does not require learning anything, as their technical level of creating art is close to people listening. Understanding paintings of some old grotto does not require any knowledge, reading Harry Potter does not require any high culture neither. Those ARE accessible to everyone which already had some brain basic training, in school or family environment. This is basic art level.
Now, literature is also art, at same level as music, paintings, sculpture. Would you say that reading "Also sprach Zarathustra" is accessible to everyone? Or maybe it does require a lot of reading and training before? Because a book IS art. If you have no idea about painting technicals, how would you argue about Mona Lisa being a more important artwork than let' say Pisano's works? Both look nice and are well done.
If you have no idea about music technicals, how can you argue about what it virtuosity and what's not? Because each instrument has its own technical specificities, and one thing which could require very high virtuosity and ability at piano, is a piece of cake at violin (for example, quick repeating same note). So when you said (in other thread) that x guitar player is a virtuoso because he is improvising glissando's up and down, you are limited by your technical level or understanding. A glissando requires one single brain command then execute the act. Playing all notes within that glissando range means 40+ centralized commands + 40 different actions. This is virtuosity, a glissando everyone can make, playing 40 notes in 1 second not.
About elitism: everything requires elitism if you want to break barriers. Remaining at everyone's comprehension level is promoting the mediocrity. It is up to art spectators to sustain an effort and reach the creator's level, not vice versa.
Dude, you have no point, because
a) an understanding of the technical skills necessary to create something isn't necessary to APPRECIATE something, while
b) technical ability is not enough to make something art. Virtuosity is just that: the result of TRAINING. Finding a neww technique is a feat of its own, but it's nothing if it doesn't produce anything mentionable. Art is more than just technical ability and
c) technical ability isn't necessary to create art (albeit it helps).
People like you make the mistake that they think, you have to rate art, and it's somehow better when "a lot is required to learn" - but why is that? Isn't it just the other way round? THE LESS is required to make people "react", the better it is?
Let's say, someone plays three notes and everyone who hears it smiles.
Art?
The likes of you will say, NO, everyone could do it - it's three notes, for Bach's sake.
But the thing is - everybody DIDN'T.
Let's take something more ... obvious. Ballet.
I don't think, many people can appreciate howmuch training and agony is necessary to dance a complex ballet.
Question: Do you think that UNDERSTANDING the technical mastery (the complexity of figures and moves and their difficulty) is necessary to appreciate the aesthetics, the elegance and the ... speech?
If you answer yes, you are an elitist - and have no idea what art is all about, because understanding the mastery is only blinding you for whaat is actually behind it, because: look at b)
Another example: you watch a "magician" - a trick show. A lot of tricks are actually fairly simple.
Consider what is important: whether the trick is complex or simple
or
whether people are impressed, can't believe what just happenes and cannot imagine WHAT it WAS and HOW it WORKED.
If you KNEW how it worked, the ... assessment of the trick based on that would just keep you from actually registering howw effective it was.
I mean, Steve Vai is pretty impressive in a technical sense, when it comes to playing guitar, but as such he's just someone who has mastered a tool.
It means only he plays well. Whether what he plays is art or just technically apt masturbation ... who can say with such a high level of compkexity? In the end the question is, what his listeners feel.
Your last paragraph about elitism is wrong as well. Mediocrity is just the logical consequence of so many people being ABLE to try and express themselves artfully, and a lot more people that have a need for and can afford it.
If you really think that Bach is better than the Beatles in any quality sense, then you are indeed a racist - because there is no real reason to think so, except that digging Bach and preferring it over the Beatles makes you somewhat better than those who don't appreciate Bach.
Because ACTUALLY it doesn't matter becausse both make a lot of people happy, while everyone who would not be happy about hearing them are not supposed to listen
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted September 01, 2013 09:28 PM |
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mvassilev said:
When it comes to art, "good" can have two coherent meanings: "made with great skill and/or effort" or "I like it". Jazz may or may not be made with great skill or effort, I'm not a jazz expert, but if you're using the second meaning, you can like something that's unpopular.
If you think something is good but not widely appreciated, that just means that you like something unpopular, nothing more.
That was not my point, if you look at the context, JJ says anybody can like any art, while me and Sal emphasize that some art requires more of an educated taste (not necessarily formal education). The reason classical and jazz records sell less is not because they dont contain great skill or quality, on the contrary they require great skill. The reason is not everybody takes that step.
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted September 01, 2013 09:34 PM |
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artu said:
JollyJoker said:
As long as zou caannot scientifically define that "difference" you have no point.
That's really absurd. Not eveything that is not totally relative is in the field of science. Besides, we also have statistics. In most countries, the classical and jazz sales are like 1-3% of the total. Why do you think that is? Definitely, not because they are bad music, on the contrary, they are very good.
It's not absurd, it's just like you have a strong bias in what you would think is art.
I play the Nazi card and say that when the Nazis forbid "degenerate art", Goebbels said "Kunst kommt von Können" (he doesn't invented this aphorism, but used it). Etymologically it is correct for German (it means that art would be a form of ability or prowess or skill), but art is obviously nothing without an audience, so if you don't want to produce art for a chosen few, it's the audience that decides, not the critics.
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Salamandre
Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Wog refugee
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posted September 01, 2013 09:34 PM |
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@Biobob,
Sure, there is no superiority of the complexity over the simplicity. My (failed probably) logic was to suggest to Artu's main post, that once you stocked quantifiable knowledge, you still have the responsibility (or possibility) to pass at next level, and so on. Life, arts, science, they all require consecutive levels of comprehension.
But you can get them only when you metamorphose from spectator to creator, from inactive to active. One thing is to read and stock the informations, and another thing is to know how to use them, create your own world and become part of the history.
In conclusion, there is no time to rest, there is much to do.
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted September 01, 2013 09:40 PM |
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Edited by artu at 21:41, 01 Sep 2013.
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@JJ
As I told you, some of the stuff I admire IS really simple. That doesn't change the fact some art is more sophisticated than other and in sophisticated examples, the more you learn the more there is to appriciate. It's not like you are studying an exam or anything, it's just that there are more dimensions to discover and when that happens your admiration multiplies.
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Salamandre
Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Wog refugee
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posted September 01, 2013 09:53 PM |
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JollyJoker said:
Let's take something more ... obvious. Ballet.
I don't think, many people can appreciate howmuch training and agony is necessary to dance a complex ballet.
Question: Do you think that UNDERSTANDING the technical mastery (the complexity of figures and moves and their difficulty) is necessary to appreciate the aesthetics, the elegance and the ... speech?
It is not so obvious as you think, and your analysis shows how far you are from. Ballet is not a sport. Is an art. Ballet needs music to exist, and body's movements need to breath in and out while matching the musical support heartbeats. So the ballet is indeed an art rarely accessible to the neophyte, as it requires both high understanding of the music, of universal rhythms, of atmospheres, and then of the human body potential. Do you know that in a ballet as Romeo and Juliette, there are up to 170 dancers moving simultaneously but different moves? So it goes very complex, and certainly is not something to give an opinion about after watching once.
JollyJoker said:
If you really think that Bach is better than the Beatles in any quality sense, then you are indeed a racist - because there is no real reason to think so
How do you know there is no real reason? How many years did you study music? Please?
JollyJoker said:
racist
LOL.
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Biobob
Famous Hero
the Bobler
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posted September 01, 2013 10:06 PM |
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Edited by Biobob at 22:11, 01 Sep 2013.
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That is exactly what I was stating in the beginning, we have to get active in the subject to develop the true understanding.
I would love to hear your guys thoughts about these pieces...
Downie- Piano Piece No. 2
4 33
Greets, Biobob
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted September 01, 2013 10:10 PM |
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artu said:
@JJ
As I told you, some of the stuff I admire IS really simple. That doesn't change the fact some art is more sophisticated than other and in sophisticated examples, the more you learn the more there is to appriciate. It's not like you are studying an exam or anything, it's just that there are more dimensions to discover and when that happens your admiration multiplies.
It doesn't. Dissecting something impressive doesn't make it any more impressive.
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted September 01, 2013 10:22 PM |
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Salamandre said:
JollyJoker said:
Let's take something more ... obvious. Ballet.
I don't think, many people can appreciate howmuch training and agony is necessary to dance a complex ballet.
Question: Do you think that UNDERSTANDING the technical mastery (the complexity of figures and moves and their difficulty) is necessary to appreciate the aesthetics, the elegance and the ... speech?
It is not so obvious as you think, and your analysis shows how far you are from. Ballet is not a sport. Is an art. Ballet needs music to exist, and body's movements need to breath in and out while matching the musical support heartbeats. So the ballet is indeed an art rarely accessible to the neophyte, as it requires both high understanding of the music, of universal rhythms, of atmospheres, and then of the human body potential. Do you know that in a ballet as Romeo and Juliette, there are up to 170 dancers moving simultaneously but different moves? So it goes very complex, and certainly is not something to give an opinion about after watching once.
JollyJoker said:
If you really think that Bach is better than the Beatles in any quality sense, then you are indeed a racist - because there is no real reason to think so
How do you know there is no real reason? How many years did you study music? Please?
You are warping my words and you are not answering to the point.
You have to understand that it doesn't matter how many spices are in a dish or how long it took to make it - the only interesting thing is how it TASTES.
In fact - the more things were necessary to create it the better it must taste to justify the effort
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Salamandre
Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Wog refugee
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posted September 01, 2013 10:59 PM |
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@Biobob,
Well, this is modern music, and in my opinion it does very well what every music of every time did: shows the state of humanity current spirituality level (abysmal now). You judge...I already did.
@JJ
One thing is see most often is that our democratic society is uneasy with the idea that traditional high culture (symphonies, Shakespeare, Bach) is superior to popular culture (rap music, TV dramas, pop etc).
Our medias so often make a point by blurring the distinction: newspapers and magazines review rock concerts alongside the Covent Garden operas and Batman sequels next to Pushkin plays. Sophisticated academic critics apply the same methods of analysis and appreciation to Proust and to comic books. And at all levels, claims of objective artistic superiority are likely to be met with smug assertions that all such claims are merely relative to subjective individual preferences.
Our democratic unease is understandable, since the alleged superiority of high culture has often supported the pretensions of an aristocratic class claiming to have privileged access to it, and you nailed it in your previous post. At this point, however, we can no longer avoid the following objection: how do we know that there are any objective criteria that authorize claims that one kind of art is better than another?
Centuries of unresolved philosophical debate show that there is, in fact, little hope of refuting someone who insists on a thoroughly relativist view of art, as you do. We should not expect, for example, to provide a definition of beauty (or some other criterion of artistic excellence) that we can use to prove to all doubters that, let's say, Bach's St Mathew cantata is objectively superior as art to "Yellow submarine". But in practice there is no need for such a proof, since hardly anyone really holds the relativist view. We may say, "you can’t argue about taste", but when it comes to art we care about, we almost always do.
For example, fans of popular music often respond to the elitist claims of classical music with a facile relativism. But they abandon this relativism when arguing, let's say, the comparative merits of the early Beatles and the Rolling Stones. I often heard fans maintaining that the Stones were superior to the Beatles (or vice versa) because their music is more complex, less derivative, and has greater emotional range and deeper intellectual content. Arguing from such criteria implicitly rejects the view that artistic evaluations are simply matters of personal taste. You are giving reasons for your view that you think others ought to accept.
Further, given the standards fans use to show that their favorites are superior, we can typically show by those same standards that works of high art are overall superior to works of popular art. If the Beatles are better than the Stones in complexity, originality, emotional impact, and intellectual content, then Bach's cantatas are, by those standards, superior to the Beatles’ songs, right?
Similarly, a case for the superiority of one blockbuster movie over another would most likely invoke standards of dramatic power, penetration into character, and quality of dialogue by which almost all blockbuster movies would pale in comparison to Sophocles or Shakespeare.
On reflection, it's not hard to see why (sticking to the example of music) classical works are in general capable of much higher levels of aesthetic value than popular ones. Compared to a classical composer, someone writing a popular song can utilize only a very small range of musical possibilities: a shorter time span, fewer kinds of instruments, a lower level of virtuosity and a greatly restricted range of compositional techniques.
We love various works of art for many reasons. The Beatles, for example, attracted people for their catchy melodies, teasing lyrics, cool attitudes, sense of musical adventure, political views, and by now even the memories they evoke. More generally, the popular movies, TV shows, and hit songs of the day will attract simply because they connect to what currently seems most vivid and fascinating: they speak to the way we live now. Many of these reasons have little to do with the purely aesthetic qualities of the work. The same can be true of works of high art, which may attract us more as expressions of the artist’s personality or as evocations of a fascinating age than for their aesthetic merit.
But another reason to love a work of art is that it has the stunning intellectual and emotional complexity and depth of Homer’s "Iliad", the Chartres cathedral, or Bach’s Mass in B minor. My argument is that this distinctively aesthetic value is of great importance in our lives and that works of high art achieve it much more fully than do works of popular art.
What follows from this superiority of high art? Not that all such art is of high quality. An wrongly conceived and wrongly executed symphony, cathedral, or poetic drama may be as decisively bad as the most inane sitcom or trashy popular song. Nor that popular works cannot achieve high levels of artistic excellence. Nor, finally, that any hour spent on art of lesser aesthetic value is never well spent.
But the danger for many of us is that love of popular art is so easy, so comfortable, so insisted on by our commercialized environment that the less accessible world of high art is ignored. To some extent, this is the fault of the way high art currently presents itself. But it is also due to the blindness of the lover to any merits the beloved lacks.
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted September 01, 2013 11:01 PM |
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Edited by artu at 23:19, 01 Sep 2013.
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It's not dissecting, it's exploring. It all comes down to this, JJ, tastes can evolve. That's why you dont usually have 10 year olds listening to Charlie Parker or admiring Van Gogh and thats why cave men didn't have polyphony or surrealism. And if tastes can evolve there will be works of art made for people who invested more time in that evolution and those works will be more sophisticated. Saying there's no scientific measurement for that is irrelevant because it's not the field of science. Wasn't it you just the other day who said most Iron Maiden stuff is cliche and dumb? Where was the scientific criteria then?
Simplicity is not necessarily a bad thing in art, but ironically, sometimes even that is something to reach and takes years of practice.
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mvassilev
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted September 01, 2013 11:22 PM |
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One piece of art can only be said to be better than another in the sense that more people find it more appealing in comparison to other things. It's entirely subjective, just like vanilla vs chocolate ice cream, and indeed that is why we talk about aesthetic taste, not an objective aesthetic quality of any kind. The only sense in which Bach is better than Justin Bieber is according to your own tastes - you can't say that someone is wrong for liking Bieber, because right and wrong don't enter into it anywhere.
However, one's appreciation of a certain work may change depending on a variety of factors. Sometimes, it's just random - there's music that I used to listen to all the time when I was younger, but I no longer enjoy as much, or music that I wouldn't have liked at a younger age, but now I like it. Sometimes it takes simple exposure to it, or cultural/social affiliation - if you're exposed to certain music as a child, you're more likely to enjoy it as an adult. But sometimes actual knowledge increases appreciation of an artistic work (though this is much more the case for literature than for music). For example, if you're completely unfamiliar with the Bible, Shakespeare, etc, your enjoyment of other English literature will be lower, as there will be stuff you just don't understand. So, if you read a book and don't like it, it's probably because it's just not compatible with your tastes, but it's also possible that there are prerequisites to appreciating it.
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Eccentric Opinion
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted September 01, 2013 11:34 PM |
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After all the argument in here and especially after Sal's long and richly detailed objection on relativity of tastes, still going by the cliche of "Bach or Bieber, it's all relative baby" doesnt mean much. Knowledge is always more crucial in literature compared to other arts, that I agree and already had stated anyway.
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mvassilev
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted September 01, 2013 11:40 PM |
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Sal's argument goes in the wrong direction. He says, "People say that comparing the Beatles to Bach is all relative, but they compare the Beatles to the Rolling Stones. That's inconsistent, so the Beatles can also be compared to Bach." I agree that it's inconsistent, but that doesn't mean the Beatles can be compared to Bach. Instead, it's that people are wrong to compare the quality of the Beatles to the Rolling Stones, because that's relative too. People argue about tastes, but there's no truth to be determined in those arguments.
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Eccentric Opinion
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Corribus
Hero of Order
The Abyss Staring Back at You
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posted September 01, 2013 11:48 PM |
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You can compare anything you want, provided you have a proper metric to do so.
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This thread is pages long: 
