Oh, you don’t actually do it. That won’t tell you any more than shutting cats in boxes with nuclear isotopes will tell you abut quantum physics. But as the author of the incisive essay preferred to tremble before the sublime mysteries rather than answering his own damn question, I thought I might have a crack at it.
How many people should sit on a jury? Is One Man One Vote the best form of election? What is Good and Evil? There are times when we have to answer poorly posed questions like this. Use makes master, sometimes.
That’s why I love the second I see any art article posted on a happy mutant style site. All the art majors come out in force and I learn so much, but also, it’s this: 
There is not good and bad art.
There is art and not art.
Also, craft does not aspire to art.
There is craft and art.
It’s not hierarchical.
The best I can come up with is that art is intent.
Some years ago, my mom brought back a massive silk scarf (5’ x 5’) from her Spain vacation. She had it framed, then mounted in her living room; a rendering of a Picasso, she said. When I finally got to see it, I had to break the news to her; it was a Miró (whose art I enjoy much, much more than Picasso’s). She looked very disappointed. (I was also disappointed… but for a completely different reason, I’m sure.)
I wonder, though, how that would fit with art that is generated or found? That gets us into the questions of what is the art–the chance, the system, the seed, the result?
I do agree with the differentiation of “craft” and “art”–and yet I’m also less and less convinced by ideas that exclude sources for art… I am more convinced that art can sometimes be something wholly emergent that arises, independently, to be recognized by the artistic thinker, and that it could have no ultimate source at all.
The only uniting element that I think is necessary for art is the human. I don’t believe other species, no matter how beautiful the creations they make, have this idea of “art”, though they may value their creations with the same intensity we value ours.
Very well stated. Those grad degrees paid off. Well, intellectually, anyway.
I’d say spiritually as well. No educational experience is wasted time. I grew as a person, going through all of that. Still a work in progress.
Apparently, you need a bunch of letters after your name to get anything these days.
Dude, your words sound pretty harsh and gratuitous towards someone who is expressing his opinion, with no claim to own an ultimate piece of truth. If you need to boast the BFA and MFA programs you went through to establish yourself, well, I think it’s pretty lame. Too bad your “education” (and aging) didn’t help you grow in manners. Anyway, along with the destructive comments you offered, it would be interesting to hear the pars costruens of your argument, and see how your BFA and MFA plays out. Just a thought. Peace bro.
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