I look at art and say this is not art but really, I have no basis for this. Are the relentless scratchings of an infantile less art then the creations of an established and esteemed person. No, rather it is not. “What makes it art?” has been asked. The question has been laid down in ink on white, the print is clean.
*Art is classified as art when it’s creator has identified it as such. Anything else is either nature or irrelevant to the conversation.
Next is the issue of analyzing said artworks. What distinguishes the fact of a piece from opinion? I am speaking plainly of not literal depictions but of the meaning or concept or statement or such.
We externally seek meaning not when we wish to know the truth of art, but when we seek to know what another person or group of persons think of it. Somehow the collective agreement of the meaning somehow validates a statement or idea, which seems to be solidified into the truth behind a work of art. This is fallacious. I’m surprised that we, as people still cling to the general consensus as being means for cataloging truth, in anything. It is human nature to seek simplicity in life and nothing is simpler in the entropic world of art than fact. We understand data. We can outright grasp fact in the clutch of or knowledge-seeking fists and lock it. We look for data in art. That is all anyone looks for when they look for the meaning of a piece of art. An individual will look externally in their search for meaning and they’ll cross-reference and a particular value from whoever agrees the most is most often validated by this individual. It was listed as a fact, it should have been listed as one theory.
When I look at a painting of a man on his knees and am asked what it is, I reply “a man on his knees.” The person who asked says, “That is wrong, it is a social commentary on poverty and its effect on man.” I say, “Yes, it is a man on his knees.”
The statement he gave me was an analysis, a theory, but he stated it as a fact.
Is the creator is the only one who holds the firmest grasp on the meaning of a piece? Who can validate a meaning more than any critic or bystander? Where does the institution draw a line between displaying and validating art?