art (art) n. 1. a. The activity of using imagination and skill to create beautiful things. b. Works, as paintings, that result from this creativity. 2. A field or category of artistic activity, as literature, music, or ballet. ... 4. A trade or craft and the methods employed in it. 5. A practical skill: knack. 6. The quality of being cunning: artfulness.So, basically, art is imagination, skill, beauty, creativity, multimedia, a craft/trade, a skill and cunning. It is my opinion that these words describe very few works that are passed off as modern "art." Perhaps this seems harsh. But why should it seem harsh? Consider a singer who wrote songs filled with words strung together without reason or meaning, yet because they were sung they could be called songs. Imagine a poet who wrote a poem with words chosen at random that had no rhyme or reason, but because he had written it he could call it poetry. If you can imagine these two situations then you will have idea of something resembling what a good majority of the pieces of modern art represent. I have called them "pieces" because that is what they are: fragments, bearing little or no purpose or unity within themselves.
To illustrate, imagine any "work" of modern art. Now, in your mind, cut that particular work in half in some semi-symmetrical fashion. Do you not now have two pieces of art with as much meaning and wholeness as the first? Only art that possesses some form of unity can pass this bisection test. Unity comes in two forms: functional and relational.
Functional unity refers to the self-contained unity of some forms of art that prevent them from being bisected. A chair, if bisected would cease to be a chair. I would no longer be able to function as a chair because a chair requires all of its parts. Relational unity refers to the unity that art derives from its relation to the viewer's conscious experience. A sculpture of a female figure represents an object that we can relate to. Because of this it can evoke certain emotions from a viewer and if part of the figure were missing it would demand attention because we know what a woman should look like.
Perhaps the inanity of modern art is best illustrated by a quote from a juror of an art show I attended in college. In selecting the best work in the show, the juror remarked, "I responded to the sense of chaos restrained by geometry." This was the revelation of a Master of Arts. The silliness of this remark is revealed by relating it to another artistic field: music. Could we not create a musical work consisting of a orchestra tuning up before a show and reflect, "I was struck by the chaos of the noise that was restrained by sound." This is in essence what the art show juror had declared. Every piece in the show was, by definition "restrained by geometry" just as every piece of music is restrained by sound.
It constantly amazes me how some areas of the visual arts are abused by society. If a person were to flail around on a hardwood floor for twenty minutes would we be willing to call it a dance (perhaps, "Seizure")? Yet in painting and sculpture the equivalent takes place and it is hailed as art. No longer does art require skill or cunning. We have lowered art to the level of a child's finger painting -- random splatters on the wall -- lacking unity or meaning. Is it no wonder that so many pieces of modern art are "Untitled?" There is no purpose to this "art" -- no function even within itself. It exists purely for its own sake. This is not surprising in a world filled with people existing for there own individual sakes. It is also easy to see why people now accept "art" that is meaningless. A world sprung from chance and evolution has no meaning. Since we see our world as meaningless we are willing to accept our art as meaningless. Selfish people in a meaningless world will produce selfish "pieces" of meaningless art.
By definition, art is supposed to be beautiful. The beauty of it does not have to be an objective beauty such as colors that are in harmony. It can also be a subjective beauty resting in the synthesis of shapes and images to communicate an idea, a thought or an emotion. It takes no special skill or cunning to create chaos and hang it on a wall. The "art" of a thing lies in its ability to communicate with humanity and the skill and cunning used by the artist in endowing his creation with this ability. To communicate art must have relational and functional unity. Our emotions can be activated by images that we can relate to. Images that have meaning and that function together like the words of a song, the lines of a poem or the movements of a dance.
Perhaps my objections to modern art stem from the fact that I am aware of the original Artist. If you have ever stood on a mountainside and wondered at the soft hues of a day turning into night or stopped to stare a the infinite beauty of a brightly colored flower, then you have seen his work. His work never was and is not now meaningless. Neither does it exist for its own sake. It whispers. It cries. It tries desperately to communicate to humanity that the Artist loves us. This is what the original artist intended in his creation. If this is not the case then there is no beauty, no art, in the universe, just splatters on the wall.
The heavens declare the glory of God;the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge.
There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard.
Their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.
-- Psalm 19:1-4 (NIV)
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