Musings on Bell

I think it is completely unnecessary to study Clive Bell and that other members from to Bloomsbury group should be studied, other philosophers from there perhaps. He does not propose a momentous idea, in fact, the most interesting thing about Clive Bell is his pretentiousness and pompousness. He is very full of himself and that gets in the way of any ideas getting past him.
   I think the only worthwhile idea presented in his essay Art is in the last paragraph of the whole essay when he states that "ideas of men go buzz." I think this idea is interestingly phrased, but has already been said countless times before and thus, Bell does not present anything new to the realm of philosophy or art.
   Additionally, Bell is also scraping along the lines of Plato and using this kind of otherworldly idea to present his ideas. Like Plato, Bell is closed-minded and is missing, almost avoiding, other subjects in the realm of art and philosophy. Clive Bell's philosophy and critiques, I think, are not valid and not essential to understanding art and philosophy.

Second Bell Question

   Do you think Clive Bell’s bad relationship with his wife had any effect on him? Did it affect the way he wrote and how pretentious he was?

Clive Bell and his wife Vanessa Stephan had quite the stormy marriage and were often with other men and women throughout their marriage until it ended shortly after it began. I am under the presumption that this heavily affected the way he philosophized, thought, and acted toward his general audience. Although there is no direct evidence in Art about his relationship to his wife, we can see how his biases could have possibly formed from his tumultuous marriage. Bell, without reason, says that The Doctor and Paddington Station are not pieces of art--he is a larger appreciator of abstract art but he should still be able to see the lines and colors in these paintings. However, I believe that he despises or envies the relationships, the particularly human relationships, in the paintings, even though they are very base: a doctor and his patient and the people in a train station. It is evident that Clive Bell did not have many close friendships or relationships.

   Adding on to this, Clive Bell was not able to see eye to eye with anyone, partly wont of the fact that he could not empathize with anyone or look from a different perspective than his own. It would not be surprising if we discovered that Clive Bell was also racist and extremely closed-minded to anything apart from what he likes. As an art critic, the critic is supposed to take all art into account and not just the art that one enjoys. Clive Bell sees any other art than the kind that he likes as bad art and un-aesthetic.

First Bell Question

   Would Bell’s essay even be functional if he was not so anti-representational and snobby as it is? Would his audience appreciate him more? Would his ideas have any foundation?

I do not think Bell's essay would even function without his anti-representationalism because that is how Bell gets his sharpness and his cunning throughout the essay. I am not complimenting him on this; I think it weakens the points he tries to make but he still executes it in a very intelligent way. Bell's aggression and spite to his readers does not aid his points in any way; on the contrary, it makes them less believable because they are more subjective. If Bell took away this subjective tone and actually supplied the reader with some tangible evidence as to what he is suggesting, then it would be more believable.

   I do not feel Bell's audience would not appreciate him any more even with his cynicism gone; his ideas would have no foundation and be without any power at all. Also, Bell is not artistic in any fashion as Tolstoy was or Dewey was with his use of metaphor, so his points about what art is, how it should be viewed, and its relation to mathematics are complete without basis. Bell write under the delusion that he completely understands art and the truth is: he does not and cannot write about that which he does not understand.

Paintings Bell Refers to

http://artandaesthetics.wordpress.com/2007/11/08/paddington-station-art-or-not/

http://www.google.com/imgres?um=1&hl=en&safe=off&sa=N&rlz=1C1PRFB_enUS444US445&biw=1366&bih=643&tbm=isch&tbnid=5pPMn9SgUIWvKM:&imgrefurl=http://artandaesthetics.wordpress.com/2007/11/08/paddington-station-art-or-not/&docid=Zo2oRaVTeDgSoM&imgurl=http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2143/1919208076_15ab3706e6_o.jpg&w=1062&h=522&ei=93NBT96IOYnV0QG2u6TIDw&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=147&vpy=198&dur=490&hovh=157&hovw=320&tx=197&ty=91&sig=116678653288414116324&page=1&tbnh=86&tbnw=174&start=0&ndsp=19&ved=0CEgQrQMwAA

http://www.google.com/imgres?um=1&hl=en&safe=off&sa=X&rlz=1C1PRFB_enUS444US445&biw=1366&bih=643&tbm=isch&tbnid=8tqGW4oiHWPiwM:&imgrefurl=http://www.paintinghere.com/painting/The_Doctor_19997.html&docid=tT3ZL4pSn0Z4BM&imgurl=http://www.paintinghere.com/Uploadpic/Luke%252520Fildes/big/The%252520Doctor.jpg&w=720&h=490&ei=fHRBT4_eCK-70AGZ9vyyBw&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=167&vpy=185&dur=423&hovh=185&hovw=272&tx=134&ty=104&sig=116678653288414116324&page=1&tbnh=125&tbnw=166&start=0&ndsp=21&ved=0CEYQrQMwAA

Answer to Nicole's Question

How does Clive Bell establish that the aesthetic world is a "world with emotions of its own" in which "the emotions of life find no place" (267)? Do you think he explains this fully? Can you think of reasons or examples as to why he is right/wrong?


   Bell states in the previous paragraph that "to appreciate a work of art we need bring with us nothing from life, no knowledge of its ideas and affairs, no familiarity with its emotions. Art transports us from the world of man's activity to a world of aesthetic exaltation." Clive Bell certainly does not explain this fully. He is very vague about what this world is and what composes it--just as Plato is extremely vague about what constitutes the Realm of Forms. He is wrong in saying that emotion is not correlated to aesthetic experience when he says: "For a moment, we are shut off from human interests; our anticipations and memories are arrested; we are lifted above the stream of life."
   I do not feel I could have aesthetic experience without my own experience, specifically, my memories and how my experience has shaped my way of viewing art. Also, Bell asserts: "I wonder, sometimes, whether the appreciators of art and of mathematical solutions are not even more closely allied. Before we feel an aesthetic emotion for a combination of forms, do we not perceive intellectually the rightness and necessity of the combination?" He introduces this notion that art is like mathematics which I find completely unfounded. He calls mathematics an abstract science, which it most certainly is not. (Physics is more close abstract). Art is the abstract science and Bell is very incorrect in saying that mathematics is abstract.
   He mentions the combination of forms in art later in the paragraph, half-contradicting what he previously said about art being its own world. The combinations provoke us to see a work of art and immediately say if it is good or not. But, then to reach this conclusion, we would have to use our emotions and experience. The flaw in Bell's logic is that he does not explain how we can judge art without having emotions, memories, and experience paired with our viewing of the art.

Thoughts on Dewey

   I find that Dewey presents interesting, still contemporary ideas. The one I find most interesting is that art is innate and prefigured in our very nature and that animals do not create "art" in the same way that we humans do. I still think animals create in their own fashion but it is not for pure aesthetic purpose. Although I would say that all nature is a kind of art. Plato says it is kind of a divine art, coming from God or some supreme being.
   Although, I feel that since he is speaking from a critic's perspective, he loses some of the emotional gunpowder of the artistic community. He does not present the case of art being prefigured in human beings' nature as quite so desperate as he makes his metaphors of, for example, the lightning or the mountain.
   However, I do feel that John Dewey could have talked about an experience and experiencing something by using a different word or, perhaps, an analogy for the continuum of experiencing something. As I understand it, an experience happens and is complete but the continued experience of that experience can be like a memory or the invocation of such feelings associated with that experience.

Dewey: Second Question

How would your life be different if art was more censored (like in Plato’s “utopian society”) or if it was vastly limited and dry? Almost like how the Puritans viewed art? Would this change your life entirely? Would you still be alive?

Simply put: I would not be alive without art. Art is my life. I am a writer, composer, artist, actor, and slew of sub-artistic fields. Art is what allows me to understand the humanly insane world around us and how humans act the way they do. I would not want to stray away from this form of the truth, as I see it. I think it is truly a crime for art to be censored, especially in the 2000 year era. I do not think censoring art makes a population any better--it just makes the government worse and more under the assumption that what they are doing is good for the people.

   If art, specifically literature, was written in a Puritan, dry format, I do not think I would be an English major and a writer. I would not have the influence and the previous ideas of great writers for how to write well and emotionally. When I write, I want to show people how they feel and that I feel the same way. I would like my writing to be understood and to, at one point perhaps, help those who read it in their own lives.

   Without the free form of art I compose and create in now, I do not think my life would be the same at all. I would be a completely different person. I might turn completely cognitive and be a different type of person, maybe harsher and more stoic. Without a venting system that art provides, I might not be able to communicate well with people because I would be upset a lot of the time.

   However, this whole idea is again hypothetical and only probable if things were as such. But there have actually been times throughout history where art is suppressed and made dull and so I think we can learn from those times. My first question proposes a completely altered state of the world, this question puts forth the idea of things that have past and I am trying to put myself into that point in time. I do not think I could handle it. 

Dewey: First Question

What if we did not have art to manifest our emotions but manifested them only in the damage or interaction (physically) with other human beings? How would things be different? Would they be so much different than they are now?

   Obviously, we manifest our emotions in other people partly. This creates the interesting notion that the method in which we influence our friends, family, lovers, colleagues is a kind of art. We are changing them and creating something new inside of them, or perhaps awakening something which has stayed dormant for a very long time. But, if we only manifested our emotions through human individuals, in particular, the flesh. Instead of writing a poem about hating of a friend who betrayed oneself, one hits or attacks this friend. Or if one loves somebody and wants to express it through a song, one can only kiss or embrace that person. Is the world any different fundamentally (taking into account all the emotions)?

   We would not have art and could not transfer our destructive emotions thus and I think it is safe to say our destructive and negative emotions outnumber our bright ones. There would be many more wars and conflicts, on a smaller scale and bigger scale. We would fight so much more and have no way to channel these negative debates inside of ourselves.

   To answer the question simply, yes: things would be different. But it is how they would be different drastically and is a benefit to us? I think that it most certainly would not be. Even for the positive side of manifesting our emotions, we would only be able to show affection physically, which, in a modern perspective, could be misconstrued and thought of badly. Kisses and hugs are only so much; a personal letter though a physical object made of atoms, costing money can still mean so much to a single person, at least in a modern perspective.

   Of course, this argument is made completely invalid when we look at this state of the world as being present from the commencement of humanity. We would act how we would under very physical conditions and would just be altered in that sense without the ability to look into a new scope because we cannot imagine that which we do not have previous basis for. And if art did not exist, we could not imagine it.

Answer to Nicole's Dewey Question

  Dewey's ideology of capitalism being involved in art and humanity is deeply rooted in what we, as humans, want. We are, especially with the Industrial Revolution of Dewey's age, consumers and want extravagance. Capitalism allows us for us to not be controlled in how the economy works. Thus, when one buys a piece of art, there is no control over the selling of it or the price of it. I think Dewey is referring to how art and literature are sold in reference to the rich person buying art versus the poor person buying a piece of art. Rich people have the luxury of buying art while poor people need to focus on more "practical" objects or pursuits. Dewey argues that, though art is important for all human beings, only certain, rich individuals can afford.
  As for the human psyche, this ideology makes many people think that art is superfluous and not entirely necessary, especially the vast majority of society. Many people will say that art and literature are not important to our continued existence but imagine a world without art, music, literature, or film. What a dull world! It almost seems like a world without a way to manifest our emotions into something physical which, as physical beings we seem to do quite a bit. We do have a spiritual side (or some of us do) which we tap in to, but sometimes we forget and must revert to our own physicality and we need the manifest emotions in objects. Why do you think certain images scare us or make us happy? They are loaded with innate emotions which humans can understand upon seeing them.
   A solution is impossible. Human beings battle and quarrel with each other far too much in order for any agreement of the value of art in the world. It would not work to simply make art free to everyone--artists would be upset and would not be able to make a living, though making end's meet with art is very precarious anyway. To get everyone to agree is simply illogical.

Random Ideas on Hume

   I personally love literature and that is why I am an English major, but I believe I have a very different opinion on literature than many other people do. For example, when we read Hamlet in my high school class, I was the only one to interpret the "To be or not to be" speech differently. I feel I understand literature very well but I comprehend it in a completely different way and this completely contradicts what Hume philosophies about. It could be that I am a product of the modern generation and my thoughts are just changed by the generations that have passed since David Hume was alive to write.
   I am similar with music and art--I get different feelings from them than anyone around me does, and though I feel estranged by this, I feel gifted because I can have my own personal opinions about art and literature. Although, I feel I critique art and literature in the same way as many other people do, particularly because I have similar ideas on poetry as one of the professors at the college here. And I agree with many of the poetic analyses that I read.
   However, some analyses of literature and art I find very absurd, like the idea that Hamlet has a sexual relationship with his mother. I do not see such a plot happening as possible and I don't think it contributes to the whole of Hamlet. But maybe my view on it will change as I get older.

During Hume’s time, there were people that were still illiterate? I feel as though he did not take those people into account and that his argument is a bit discriminate towards them. What if the standard of taste was influenced by those people? How would that thwart Hume’s philosophy?

David Hume's philosophical argument does, maybe without intention, discriminate against those who were illiterate, which was a vast number of people during his time. This number of illiterate people significantly lowers the amount of opinions that will influence the idea of a certain piece of art. Only high class individuals will be able to experience this kind of art but having a view of only high class members of society very much skews the opinion of a piece of artwork.

Today, things are different and more people are literate and can read and understand more about art (even if it is visual) and there is a variety of opinions about single works of art. Although, the method of critiquing art, maybe professionally, has not changed much. Paintings are still critiqued by their visual components and literature (if one can call post 90's writing literature) is still judged by its depth and prowess.

If the vast population was still illiterate and only a certain number of people could read, then there would not be so much change in opinion. However, I think it is, principally, the number of people having learned to read that has influenced popular and nonconformist opinions about art, literature, and music.

According to Hume, would we be able to view cinema as art, whether early or contemporary? Is cinema not refined enough for Hume’s view? Movies are something seen by everyone and everyone has a different opinion about them. I feel they completely contradict his view.

I feel that, were Hume alive today, he would view only high cinema as art, but that he would completely disregard popular culture films or television like Doctor Who or Harry Potter. Hume would focus more on classical films which would have more refined tastes. But these are films that not everybody likes (especially in the modern age when black and white is less favored to color by the majority).

I think Hume would have to reinvent his view or write an alternative essay just for film because it is very tricky and cannot be completely agreed upon as good or bad art. Film might also shatter his philosophy of human beings as having standards of taste because anyone out there can enjoy films, with or without a full education. And people with a complete education were the type Hume was looking at when he sought to find those who would agree upon a certain piece of art. Therefore, cinema has partially made Hume's philosophy obsolete but the analysis of films by film critics is still something which is agreed upon.

The critique of art by "professionals" will, in some ways, never change, but the appreciation of it and the sentiment felt by it will be every changing depending upon the human beings experiencing it.

Answer to Nicole's Hume Question

If the Iliad and the Odyssey were written during this time period, the general population would absolutely hate it and not understand it. The only exception to that would be people who enjoy that kind of literary beauty like English majors and those who are poets and are more emotional and think more deeply about literature. The Odyssey and the Iliad are, as I think we often forget, poems. They are just a little longer than most and I think that people in the society of poetry would enjoy them very much. I refrain from saying that the whole literary community would enjoy them because there are those in such a group which only enjoy more solid and concrete works.

I found the Iliad and the Odyssey very difficult to read when I read them. But that could be because I was taking excessive notes on them and it did not make it fun at all. But I also think that the books would not fully be accepted, permitting that they are understood by a vast amount of people. There is a lot of relationships and treatment toward women in the books that would be viewed as sexism which were not viewed as such during that time period.

According to Hume, we would find the beauty in these works and there would be a general consensus that they are beautiful and a worthy production of art. However, these works would eventually become less and less read except by a select group of people, like how literary classics today are only mostly read by English teachers or majors or mature individuals. However, to look at Hume as a person: he grew up in a rather wealthy household so he could not see what the lower class was thinking of art. Therefore, his view is inherently skewed.

My Own Random Musings

This essay What Is Art? has made me think of art today, more specifically what some people call "modern" or "contemporary art" and the kind of experience I have had with that is in seeing art in MassMOCA and one other art museum. I feel that art since around the 1960's has become less sincere. Artists these days seem to be trying to give a message or make a piece of art for their generation and it does not really reflect the individual. For example, there was a piece of art in one museum I went to which had a photographed, mixed around picture which had symbols of microphones and dirt and such to show the degradation of the music industry.

In MassMOCA, there is an exhibit showing distorted and twisted birds to show certain emotions and while I feel this art is sincere and took a long time to produce, I feel the idea is cliche and borrowed from other sources. I feel many artists and writers rely upon cliches and stealing ideas and this makes the art very insincere. One needs only to look at the movies that are put out today and one can see the imitations of one film to the next. It is actually quite disgusting how little creativity actually exists in the mainstream. And to think that back in his day, Charles Dickens would have been mainstream and now the mainstream is something like Live Free or Die Hard. It is quite upsetting.

Second Musing on Tolstoy

Without any form of art, would we, as human beings, would we be able to survive? Tolstoy says art is used as a basic communication form. But is it more than that? Has art, in this day, become so crucial to our lifestyle?

I know that I would not be able to survive without art and art is very important to my continued existence. In my art course this semester, we are constantly exploring how human beings have used art both for practical purposes and for coping with the human condition. Many artists I have researched and appreciated art by have had emotional or psychological problems and have used that art to cope with whatever they dealt with. But without that art in their lives, I feel they would not have made it very far.

Why do we go to the movies (or why did we used to go to the theater)? We did it, subconsciously most of the time, to remind ourselves of what it means to be ourselves--human--and to escape and relax. And in this way, art is always practical because it helps keep us mentally and emotionally stable by giving us an unbiased entity to communicate our own feelings to. 

I feel that many people these days ignore art and it is not as important to everyone as it once was. I am on the opposite side, as I expressed before, I feel art is something that cannot be ignored and is crucial for physical and emotional life.

First Musing on Tolstoy

Is it necessarily important that a piece of art be clear to the reader or viewer? What if the artist is mad and cannot think clearly? Mad people have created beautiful work that is still understood though it is sometimes unclear. Is clearness in art truly important?

I do not think art necessarily needs to be clear in the eyes of a viewer because when I was younger and did not fully understand Shakespeare's words to the full extent that I do now (or maybe do not), I still felt emotion from  the lovers in A Midsummer Night's Dream. And sometimes the writers of magic realism tend to write rather realistically but, at the same time, enigmatically and pensively. Clearness is necessary so that the reader or viewer can understand the most basic premise of a piece of art but art can also be very complicated. Tolstoy would be contradicted himself if he would not agree with this himself because War and Peace is a very confusing, long conflict with about fifty characters.

Some writers have been mad (some people would argue the best ones are) but have produced great work that can be understood by all. The Sufi poet Rumi, for example, was considered to be mad because he simple just cited verses of poetry out and sometimes did and does sound mad in his poetry. Vincent van Gogh was considered mad during his time period and was, in fact, extremely depressed and sorrowful but his art is expressed very clearly. Edgar Allan Poe had many psychological problems and his work is very precise, some of his stories almost have a formula like some equation.

Clearness is important but a definition and clear understanding of what is clear in art is more important.

Answer to Nicole's Tolstoy Question

With Tolstoy's entire philosophy, one must take into account that Tolstoy believes that the artist must be sincere and that is the most important in creating art. If you look at it in a certain perspective, a mother giving birth to a child is art if she is truly sincere about the child. Nature is, in a way art, because it is creating and it does so with such care. But art is not so easy as to create, say, this blog post, according to Tolstoy, we must be extremely sincere about it. However, debatably, conveying the emotional fear of the boy in the story about the boy and the wolf is also art and is difficult. In my experience, some pieces of art, principally literature, do not convey emotions as well as they should to be considered real art.

Newspapers are not art. They are merely reporting information with very little emotional content. It is up to the readers to put emotion into the newspaper articles. From what Tolstoy says (or, more specifically, does not say) about the reader's perspective, there should be emotion felt from the art and emotion should be not applied to the art.