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| Thread: Do you think acting is really art? |  This thread is pages long: 1 2 · «PREV |
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Sleeping_Sun
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posted February 04, 2015 10:38 PM |
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Galaad said:
JollyJoker said:
Now, a completely different problem is the influence of the director: they may demand a certain interpretation or attitude or gesture, and the actor just does what they are told.
This is true. But I believe an actor who is really faithful to his art will not work with a director who disagrees on a conceptual level. Unless he's a sellout, but then follows the poor performance.
But Director is the one in charge, not the actor. I'm sure an actor can provide his own opinion and his own vision, but I'm sure that director has a final word, after all HE is the one who is making a movie, while actor is just a piece, though a totally artistic piece.
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artu
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posted February 04, 2015 10:40 PM |
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I wonder if there is a recorded version of Orson Welles' version of Julius Caesar from the 1930's, where he made the setting to resemble facist Italy. I'd really like to see that.
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blizzardboy
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posted February 05, 2015 12:11 AM |
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If you're demonstrating your technical skill at something (in this case, the ability to imitate a fictional person or another person) then it is a craft. If your demonstrating self-expression of some idea, then it is an art.
Generally speaking, craftsmanship and art overlap. How much of an artist or a craftsmen the actor is depends on how much freedom they have with whoever they've signed their contract under. It's inescapable to have some level of personal interpretation based on the approach & personality of the actor that is taking on a different persona.
In an education setting, most of the time, the fine arts classes are actually a craft, because it's about demonstrating technical skill. It doesn't really become an art until what you do is actually yours.
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Corribus
Hero of Order
The Abyss Staring Back at You
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posted February 05, 2015 02:41 AM |
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Edited by Corribus at 03:08, 05 Feb 2015.
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Is Rubinstein playing Chopin art?
Yes.
If it's something that you do that involves creative expression, it qualifies as artistic.
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blizzardboy
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posted February 05, 2015 05:28 AM |
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Chopin is art, but somebody else playing Chopin is an exercise in technical skill. When you listen to Bob playing Chopin, would you announce the artist to be Chopin or Bob? You would say "So and so, by Chopin" played by "so and so". So yes, a piece being played is art in action, but that's on behalf of Chopin.
I mean, an exercise in technical skill is awesome too, but when your sole purpose is to perform somebody's work, it's the writer that's being the artist, and the pianist is demonstrating her technical skill. In a piano performance, there's going to be almost zero interpretation from the pianist. It might even be severely frowned upon, if the audience wants to hear the piece exactly as Chopin wrote it, with every denotation in the music obeyed. With acting it's different, because the script isn't going to bother attempting to articulate every single nuance of timing, emotion, body language, etc. That simply isn't possible in the way it is possible in an instrumental. That leaves the actor with a limited scope of interpretation when it comes to bringing the script to life, which makes them a shareholder in the art of the movie.
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted February 05, 2015 06:12 AM |
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Edited by artu at 06:14, 05 Feb 2015.
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Actually, I was going to give you the example of classical performers when you talked about "demonstrating self-expression" but then I thought, the great performers, in a way, put their own self-expression in their performance. So, I think that is also a little bit like acting itself. Not everybody playing sheet music can be called an artist, the performance may not be art when Bob plays it but it sure is when Rubinstein plays Chopin.
Also, defining art based on self-expression is not totally off but it's a very historical context. Before the Romantic Era they were considered people of service just like craftsmen. When Shakespeare was asked to write a comedy, he wrote a comedy. But I guess, you can say true artists were beyond that even if they werent aware of it.
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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markkur
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Once upon a time
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posted February 05, 2015 11:00 AM |
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Tsar-Ivor said:
They were considered freeloaders back in the 16th century. However, I believe that acting is an art, as per my definition of the term ofc.
Yeah they were Players...thus the Play and Play-acting.  Possums are some of the best.
Artu, of course acting is an Art. Although maybe, perceived-necessary-social-behavior-development might fit the bill.<L>
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Salamandre
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Wog refugee
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posted February 05, 2015 01:00 PM |
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blizzardboy said:
In a piano performance, there's going to be almost zero interpretation from the pianist.
Playing Chopin -or whatever classical composer- is not only an exercise of skill for a mature musician, otherwise the most skilled will always prevail. What is skill anyway, ability to move fast its fingers, ability to stare at the public in a gentle way, ability to memorize 30k notes in the right order, [... could go on for hours...]
or ability to suggest and communicate emotions? Bingo!
Playing an instrument is easy for a professional which trained dozens of years. Once this training accomplished, it is a tool allowing an artistic challenge, which consists in training our ear and sensibility to be able to command your hands this of that tempo or harmonic inflexion, play slowly or faster this or that note, so the full meaning of this of that phrase is perceived clearly by the listener. Or there is no skill when your ear perceive things that others can't, it is great sensibility. Besides this, to gain further insight into a composer's unique musical language and stylistic practices it is essential to comprehend as far as possible his expressed intentions, to read and document yourself about it, then translate all this intellectual data into emotions, as the people assisting to your performance didn't come to hear you talk, but play.
So next time when you interrogate yourself about art and its interpretation, make an easy experiment not requiring any special skill: read some text from famous writer and try to make someone pour tears when listening to you. You will now see the challenge an interpret has to overcome in his work.
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Galaad
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posted February 05, 2015 02:02 PM |
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As someone who was nurtured in classical music, I must support Salamandre on this one. When an interpreter is lifeless, is boring to listen to him, even if the composition is great. Rubinstein here is a great example of how an interpreter can bring tears to the listener.
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Corribus
Hero of Order
The Abyss Staring Back at You
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posted February 05, 2015 02:27 PM |
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Edited by Corribus at 14:37, 05 Feb 2015.
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blizzardboy said:
Chopin is art, but somebody else playing Chopin is an exercise in technical skill. When you listen to Bob playing Chopin, would you announce the artist to be Chopin or Bob? You would say "So and so, by Chopin" played by "so and so". So yes, a piece being played is art in action, but that's on behalf of Chopin.
I can't express how vehemently I disagree with this post. When I hear a piece of music I look for the performer as well as the composer - particularly if I'm about to buy it - and a good classical radio station always reports both. And I like listening to pieces of music as played by different performers. My personal library includes, for example, the entire set of Chopin nocturnes as played by four different pianists, and I have all of Beethoven's sonatas by three. A piece of music can sound wholly different depending on how the pianist approaches the music. The Waldstein played by Brendel with his pendanticism sounds very different than it does Barenboim's more liberal interpretation. In some cases, an interpretation by a pianist is simply off-putting. In my own collection, I really dislike Igo Pogorelic's interpretation of Brahm's Rhapsodies, to the extent I rarely listen to it, much preferring Radu Lupu's. To be clear, none of this has anything to do with the pianists' technical skills. Any professional pianist is going to have excellent technical skills. It's solely the way they bring their individual philosophy and character to a piece of music.
Let me put it another way. If I sit down and play Chopin, you do not regard it is as art but rather just an exercise in technical skill. But if I sit down and make up my own song as I go along, this is art? What's the difference? Playing notes is playing notes, right? Your post would seem to indicate that you feel a piece of music is only art the first time it is played. And beyond that, a computer can be made to play a piece of music with technical perfection, if we just define technique as a matter of playing the right notes at the right time. Yet we do not listen to piano music played by computers, because the artificial quality sounds false. There is a human element to music performance that is removed from the technical aspect of it. That's what makes it art.
EDIT: Let me add - I am an amateur pianist with admittedly limited technical skills despite twenty some years of playing on and off. I don't play to hone those skills. I play because it is a creative outlet. You close your eyes, you feel the music coming out of you. You try out different ways to form the musical phrases, to understand what the music is trying to say. There's something magical about the process, even if nobody else is around to hear it except for you. That's why performing a piece of music is art.
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I'm sick of following my dreams. I'm just going to ask them where they're goin', and hook up with them later. -Mitch Hedberg
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