Sol LeWitt’s “Paragraphs on Conceptual Art,” 1967, contain this: “When an artist uses a conceptual form of art … the idea becomes a machine that makes the art. This kind of art is not theoretical or illustrative of theories; it is intuitive, it is involved with all types of mental processes, and it is purposeless.” LeWitt was a notable innovator and his most complex works still have the aura, however dispersed by time and faulty memory, of the new and unassimilated. But his idea of “purposeless” art is as old as Kantian metaphysics.
There is no way out: you keep pointing at the core of the artistic quandariies of our time. I’ve sent this one to my students at MICA in Baltimore. And I cant resist commenting, hope not to be a bore.
Picasso apparently asked how is it that when several artists “do the same thing, only one, perhaps two, make good art?”
It raises the usual haunting Q question: what is good art, how is Quality measured?
To defend the legitimacy of purposeless art is important. I am among the legions of art people defending that belief. And you are arguing on its behalf in your usual brilliant and understated way.
But I wonder if there isn’t a shadow issue hiding behind these discussions.
And I have no clear answers to a flood of questions I get nervous about.
Why should Quality not happen also in art that is applied to a purpose?
And if targeted art is OK for me, even though I avoid it, is its purpose part of the Q equation? Is it just one of the many factors, like brushstrokes or pixillated flashes or any other condition that occasions the art, but not the key to its quality?
So, what if the purpose of an art is hideous, say targeted at propaganda for ideas I abhor, but the art is good and another art that has noble purposes or is purposeless is instead medioce?
One thought prompted by your comments is that certain artworks commissioned by the Church in previous centuries are among our epitomies of high quality--works by Raphael and Michelangelo, to name two obvious examples. When we get to the 18th century and Greuze, praised by Diderot as a "moral" painter, do we hold his moralizing against him? Maybe, but maybe the problem is not the moral message in itself but the way the message seems to have prompted Greuze to render his subjects a bit melodramatically. One could ask, of course, does melodrama always work against quality? You see I am going around in circles and can only hope that I am closing in on conclusions that make sense. You last comment touches on something that has troubled me since the late 1960s--art that advances admirable ideas but is, as art, uninteresting. And so the circling continues, with the question: what makes a work of art interesting as a work of art?
What a perfect question. I have had the experience of enjoying the beautiful way a painting (or piece of music) has been expressed, then made the mistake of reading about the artist's contrasting view of humanity. Although, not a propaganda piece as you suggested, I still felt "betrayed," at some level. Strange, how I can be so moved only to be shattered by what I can only interpret as prejudice on my part.
I'm not sure any prejudice of yours is in play in the situation you describe. I know several good artists who are, to put it kindly, not-so-good poeple. If only we could believe, as Joshua Reynolds did at the height of the Enlightment, that only morally good people can make good art.
That's a nice reconciliation you arrived at at the end there, Carter: the artist doesn't intentionally make a functional object, but assuming they're not, the product of their creative activity may well result in art with a purpose: "…it has, in its austere way, the social, even ethical purpose of launching an interchange, a conversation, which generates the sorts of meanings that join us to a culture." Well played!
Thank you, Peter. As you know, it is a narrow, winding path one must tread to get even a glimpse of what matters, without falling in dogmatism on one side of the path and a kind of feel-good permissiveness on the other . . .
"...and it is purposeless.” I think Sol LeWitt left out a few words at the end of the sentence. It should read "...and it is purposeless to concerns beyond itself.” That people want to get a use and squeeze a value out of everything on the earth is part of humanity's problem in my opinion. I am reminded of the story of the Useless Tree
Beautiful piece Carter. Thank you. Your writing always gives me something decent to chew on in a world filled with so much doggerel. I’ve been teaching college biology for many years and the emphasis has always been on form and function; form and function. One does not exist without the other. This axiom underwrites every chapter of every textbook I am forced to use. Yet, I would be terminated ( as colleagues have been) were I to state the obvious: the form is engineered purposefully, meaningfully and with absolute usefulness. It is, ironically, a useless profession for me to continue saying what I see is not what I see.
I am equally saddened when the thought of uselessness enters the conversation of art. If nothing else, art is meant to explore, to reveal, the inner workings of the artist; no differently than a microscope or a telescope allows us irrefutable proof of intention. The final product-the work of art- is the moment of true focus. No matter what we choose to believe is right in front of us.
Yes, it's a question of focus and difficulty is always to sharpen the focus while somehow making it as wide as possible, so that we don't miss whatever is crucial in a work of art. There is so much in the way of fad and fashion, theory and dogmatism and so on, that narrows our focus to irrelevancies
It seems that you are riding us through a dressage course, around an obstruction, over a Konigsburg fence to arrive at a wonderful appreciation of the Arts. Often times, even moral novels are so magnificent to read that their purpose is intangible and inseparable from the story (Anna Karenina), while pure aesthetic works are so engaging that they are useful for variable meanings and reflections ( a pale pink Malavich ).
"None of these effects result from a conscious, purposeful program" is a good expression for that hefty thump we feel from those "Get with the Program !" works. The message is plain and without interpretation, by intention. Such works "mean what they say" and are as short-lived as they are blunt. This counterpoint displays what you are guiding us to perceive: the rich layers of meanings and reflections within great works.
Thank you, George. "Circuit" is the right word here, because I feel that I am circling whatever it is that I want to say or to conclude, and I keep going, hoping that I'm closing in on it.
In a sense, all these posts are unfinished because they're all trying to approach an understanding I haven't yet achieved . . . but I'm going to keep trying
There is no way out: you keep pointing at the core of the artistic quandariies of our time. I’ve sent this one to my students at MICA in Baltimore. And I cant resist commenting, hope not to be a bore.
Picasso apparently asked how is it that when several artists “do the same thing, only one, perhaps two, make good art?”
It raises the usual haunting Q question: what is good art, how is Quality measured?
To defend the legitimacy of purposeless art is important. I am among the legions of art people defending that belief. And you are arguing on its behalf in your usual brilliant and understated way.
But I wonder if there isn’t a shadow issue hiding behind these discussions.
And I have no clear answers to a flood of questions I get nervous about.
Why should Quality not happen also in art that is applied to a purpose?
And if targeted art is OK for me, even though I avoid it, is its purpose part of the Q equation? Is it just one of the many factors, like brushstrokes or pixillated flashes or any other condition that occasions the art, but not the key to its quality?
So, what if the purpose of an art is hideous, say targeted at propaganda for ideas I abhor, but the art is good and another art that has noble purposes or is purposeless is instead medioce?
Best, Lucio.
One thought prompted by your comments is that certain artworks commissioned by the Church in previous centuries are among our epitomies of high quality--works by Raphael and Michelangelo, to name two obvious examples. When we get to the 18th century and Greuze, praised by Diderot as a "moral" painter, do we hold his moralizing against him? Maybe, but maybe the problem is not the moral message in itself but the way the message seems to have prompted Greuze to render his subjects a bit melodramatically. One could ask, of course, does melodrama always work against quality? You see I am going around in circles and can only hope that I am closing in on conclusions that make sense. You last comment touches on something that has troubled me since the late 1960s--art that advances admirable ideas but is, as art, uninteresting. And so the circling continues, with the question: what makes a work of art interesting as a work of art?
What a perfect question. I have had the experience of enjoying the beautiful way a painting (or piece of music) has been expressed, then made the mistake of reading about the artist's contrasting view of humanity. Although, not a propaganda piece as you suggested, I still felt "betrayed," at some level. Strange, how I can be so moved only to be shattered by what I can only interpret as prejudice on my part.
I'm not sure any prejudice of yours is in play in the situation you describe. I know several good artists who are, to put it kindly, not-so-good poeple. If only we could believe, as Joshua Reynolds did at the height of the Enlightment, that only morally good people can make good art.
That's a nice reconciliation you arrived at at the end there, Carter: the artist doesn't intentionally make a functional object, but assuming they're not, the product of their creative activity may well result in art with a purpose: "…it has, in its austere way, the social, even ethical purpose of launching an interchange, a conversation, which generates the sorts of meanings that join us to a culture." Well played!
Thank you, Peter. As you know, it is a narrow, winding path one must tread to get even a glimpse of what matters, without falling in dogmatism on one side of the path and a kind of feel-good permissiveness on the other . . .
"...and it is purposeless.” I think Sol LeWitt left out a few words at the end of the sentence. It should read "...and it is purposeless to concerns beyond itself.” That people want to get a use and squeeze a value out of everything on the earth is part of humanity's problem in my opinion. I am reminded of the story of the Useless Tree
https://ando.life/journal/the-useless-tree
Beautiful piece Carter. Thank you. Your writing always gives me something decent to chew on in a world filled with so much doggerel. I’ve been teaching college biology for many years and the emphasis has always been on form and function; form and function. One does not exist without the other. This axiom underwrites every chapter of every textbook I am forced to use. Yet, I would be terminated ( as colleagues have been) were I to state the obvious: the form is engineered purposefully, meaningfully and with absolute usefulness. It is, ironically, a useless profession for me to continue saying what I see is not what I see.
I am equally saddened when the thought of uselessness enters the conversation of art. If nothing else, art is meant to explore, to reveal, the inner workings of the artist; no differently than a microscope or a telescope allows us irrefutable proof of intention. The final product-the work of art- is the moment of true focus. No matter what we choose to believe is right in front of us.
Yes, it's a question of focus and difficulty is always to sharpen the focus while somehow making it as wide as possible, so that we don't miss whatever is crucial in a work of art. There is so much in the way of fad and fashion, theory and dogmatism and so on, that narrows our focus to irrelevancies
It seems that you are riding us through a dressage course, around an obstruction, over a Konigsburg fence to arrive at a wonderful appreciation of the Arts. Often times, even moral novels are so magnificent to read that their purpose is intangible and inseparable from the story (Anna Karenina), while pure aesthetic works are so engaging that they are useful for variable meanings and reflections ( a pale pink Malavich ).
"None of these effects result from a conscious, purposeful program" is a good expression for that hefty thump we feel from those "Get with the Program !" works. The message is plain and without interpretation, by intention. Such works "mean what they say" and are as short-lived as they are blunt. This counterpoint displays what you are guiding us to perceive: the rich layers of meanings and reflections within great works.
Thanks for the circuit !
Thank you, George. "Circuit" is the right word here, because I feel that I am circling whatever it is that I want to say or to conclude, and I keep going, hoping that I'm closing in on it.
Is this Chapter One? It sounds unfinished
In a sense, all these posts are unfinished because they're all trying to approach an understanding I haven't yet achieved . . . but I'm going to keep trying