Once More With Feeling...

[shadowkat]

Last one, I promise. All this is probably proving is that I should leave polling to the experts. Hee.

[Poll #976784]

Comments

[embers-log.livejournal.com]

I really don't disagree with any particular point you are making, however my experience is that my most creative work comes from a different place within me than my day to day activities including crafts and illustrations. Not that that would be true of all illustrators, I feel that there is unquestioned artistic value by many who have been labeled as illustrators.

But although I enjoy accounting (it is puzzle solving, like doing a crossword puzzle) it is not creative, and I feel that my craft/illustrational work comes from that same place. It isn't hard, it is fun play.... But I'm really not trying to get to my soul. I feel that I'm doing something different in my painting than in my drawings. But I guess I can't be that disturbed that is doesn't seem any different to other people..... And I certainly shouldn't try to determine what other people are doing in their work, I can tell you when I've been touched or moved by someone's music (in a way an advertising jingle will never move me), and I've even felt that my life has been changed by someone's writing.

Maybe it it categorizing or ranking ... but I guess I was raised (in ways that are probably out-moded and considered passe now) thinking of Art in terms of Greek philosophy.

so I also have to shrug and add that I also don't know...

[arethusa2.livejournal.com]

Fascinating conversation.

I wonder if the difference is that art is what matters to you. You put a part of yourself in it. Or it transcends its purpose, becomes greater than its parts--creates something that others recognize. So a school lunch can be art, if it creates an emotion in someone else. (Creativity comes from emotion.)

Or I'm babbling.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Not babbling at all...actually you nailed it, I think.

Cooking and arranging a school lunch could well be art - some are, decorative flowers made from radishes, or nice neat sushi around in a flower shape...or a peanut butter sandwich cut to look like a star.
It's what matters most to you, that you put something of yourself into to communicate an emotion or feeling to another person.

If the thing that matters most to you is writing fanfic, if you *love* it and want to become good at it - than who's to say that's not art? I'm tempted to say its doing something without a guide or pre-made pattern or recipe...but I'm not sure that's true right now. Fanfic is writing a story with a premade pattern or recipe - but it is not the same as doing a "paint by numbers" picture or coloring in a coloring book. I think art is something that is not "mass produced" and must be a creative expression.
Also it should matter in some way to the person creating it...be more than just a job. Example - Whedon loved his characters and story - Buffy became "art" as a result. While writers on Law & Order are doing a job, it's work - so not art. Enjoyable yes, but not art? Or is that categorization subjective as well?