Can someone do art with Playmobil? & What is art?

[Gustavo]

Art traditionally is craftsmanship or a honed ability.  Special intuition or instinct on the part of the artist can lift his/her art above its peers.

In the latin meaning, you're right ... Ars is the word for craft, and that's all!

But, art as a sort of mysticism I think is rubbish.

That nonsense is what has condoned the proliferation of salesmen with a gimmick, or hacks who have no skill, just a lot of attitude.

Right ... Even so, would I like to have a Da Vinci's picture on my walls, in the dining room? ... (Maybe not the Mona Lisa ...) What makes a Da Vinci a piece of art? Is it? My judgement on it makes any difference?

So, in light of the traditional definition, customizing is an art.  Painting, molding, and re-arranging parts is a skill that improves with experience, and those with a special eye for innovations rise above the crowd.  Like Cheng and MacGayver.  They have a real skill that they picked up from practice and their unique insights.

 

Customizing is art as craft, I think. Therefore, customizing is more craft than art, is it? (Maybe not, but I'm making experiments here ...)

[Gustavo]

I'd LOVE to have THIS:

in my dining room!

G.

[Timotheos]

Right ... Even so, would I like to have a Da Vinci's picture on my walls, in the dining room? ... (Maybe not the Mona Lisa ...) What makes a Da Vinci a piece of art? Is it? My judgement on it makes any difference?

Because DaVinci practiced a lot and got real good at what he did.  He exhibited insights and mastery of his technique that lesser members of his trade couldn't match or hadn't thought of.  Even if somebody doesn't personally care for the Mona Lisa, they'd be stretching things to say the Mona Lisa is subjective rot that any clown with a paint brush could have done.

Customizing is art as craft, I think. Therefore, customizing is more craft than art, is it? (Maybe not, but I'm making experiments here ...)

There isn't a difference between craft and art.  You're now looking for mysticism.  RE: "Art is supposed to move me, bring me closer to god, find myself.  Craft is something you sell in the tourist quarter."

A person who is really good at making those stupid wooden indian heads that sell at American craft fairs is an artist.  He's just not extraordinary.  His fares don't stimulate you excessively.

Art is a craft, a trade, or a discipline.  Great art is a work with which the mastery of technique and the creator's insight for design evokes a powerful response from the observer.

I think pretension is the only outcome of splitting hairs and looking for "deep meaning" in the definition of art.  Many artists, like Andy Warhol, produce a steady flow of works that sell either because their technique appeals, their sales pitch appeals, or the artist's personal charisma inspires people to buy the stuff (* that may be one reason "classics" must have a few years under their belt--can the work stand on its own once the charismatic producer is no longer around to work his social magic?)

Modern notions of art, couched in mysticism, charisma, and persuasion, flatter the vanity of the small group of people that produces and consumes such work.

In a nutshell, they say:
"It's not art unless my circle did it or bought it."

A lot of successful artists today play head games with a gullible crowd that wants to be friends with an artist and are willing to eat up any pretentious, self-exalting "meta-narratives" that the artist and his/her gang of friends can dream up....

Yet, that's not to say that even the most perplexing modern art can't show technical expertise.  It's those works with more than just a sales pitch behind them that will probably endure.

-Tim

[Timotheos]

Right ... Even so, would I like to have a Da Vinci's picture on my walls, in the dining room? ... (Maybe not the Mona Lisa ...) What makes a Da Vinci a piece of art? Is it? My judgement on it makes any difference?

I think another mistake made in this sort of a debate is that we, as laymen, are judging specialist trades.  Painting, writing, etc. are professions with their own techniques and challenges.  A non-painter isn't going to necessarily appreciate that Painter X used an obscure brush stroke that is very difficult to execute properly, but Painter X used it like a master.  This is a detail that impresses specialists of that trade, but not an inexperienced layman.

The problem is that laymen compose the bulk of the potential consumers, and to succeed you must satisfy their tastes.

In my writer's circle, we valued a lot of stuff, which we knew was difficult to accomplish, but which didn't necessarily appeal to a reader at all.  And, we writers could judge something as a technical masterwork that a lay-reader wouldn't like at all.

A lot of the "quest for mysticism" I think is the struggle of highly specialized trades to win appeal among non-expert consumers.

That's where the hoodwinking comes in.  How to convince Joe Sixpack that Painter X's obscure master-stroke ought to be relevant to Joe's daily life enough that Joe will pay money for it.

Edit:
This is where are own experiences, say, in having classics thrust on us in high school literature class come to play.  The literature professor, who has studied the craft of writing deeply, must try to convince a non-specialist audience that a specialist work is relevant to their interests.

Some people like it.  Some people don't.  If your evaluation of art is simply based on emotional response, then yes, all art is subjective. 

[Gustavo]

A lot of successful artists today play head games with a gullible crowd that wants to be friends with an artist and are willing to eat up any pretentious, self-exalting "meta-narratives" that the artist and his/her gang of friends can dream up....

Maybe so ... However, I can say that I think I don't know most of these. And that most of these, maybe, will be completely forgotten in the future.

If you have many groups of few people who wish to rise one or another of their most creative friends whom they consider an artist, this won't make of their friend an artist, if his art doesn't last ... And in this I'm talking about art, not craft.

There isn't a difference between craft and art.  You're now looking for mysticism.  RE: "Art is supposed to move me, bring me closer to god, find myself.  Craft is something you sell in the tourist quarter."

...

Art is a craft, a trade, or a discipline.  Great art is a work with which the mastery of technique and the creator's insight for design evokes a powerful response from the observer.

I think there is difference between art and craft, all right. And I'm not a "mystical" or religious person.

Da Vinci was an artist AND a craftsman. He thought about making things to be used, he was an architect (appearently, not the best of them, in his time ...), and a painter. I think he succeded more as a painter, and observer of nature around him, and how to portray it. (He had notions that made him imagine some odd things for his time, but not enough technique in science to actually try them ... His idea of a helicopter makes sense, but wouldn't work out in the shape he draw it.) As an architect, he came out to be the best painter ever! ...

Yet, that's not to say that even the most perplexing modern art can't show technical expertise.  It's those works with more than just a sales pitch behind them that will probably endure.

-Tim

Some of the thoughts I had about this subject came out because of the thought that "Playmobil draws the failed artists" ...

What's a successful artist?

I don't know if we have many failed artists here ... I'm reasonably sure there's a lot of people here who find in Playmobil many things that artists too like to pay attention at. The fact that most of us here are no artists doesn't mean that most of us here are in failure. To be an artist isn't every (sensible to the beauty of humanity) man's target, is it? If it is, I think it should not. What I mean is that all the people I find here are very happy in general!: we have the best hobby & plaything ever! It's even better than art!

G.
 

[Richard]

Is Hans Beck an artist?

see attachment ("borowed" from Tricorne Jack)

[Martin Milner]

Because DaVinci practiced a lot and got real good at what he did.  He exhibited insights and mastery of his technique that lesser members of his trade couldn't match or hadn't thought of.  Even if somebody doesn't personally care for the Mona Lisa, they'd be stretching things to say the Mona Lisa is subjective rot that any clown with a paint brush could have done.

Agreed, but the people who spend their lives re-painting the Mona Lisa - to me that's just good craftsmanship. They've done nothing new or original.

Hans Beck was an artist I think (though he probably considered himself a designer) becaue he created something new - and it's stood the test of time so we can be confident we weren't just hoodwinked!

When I'm playing a tune on my fiddle, I may display great craftsmanship, but if I'm just re-playing a piece someone else wrote it's just craft. If I compose a new tune nobody else ever heard, then I'm verging on art. If that tune catches on and is still being played 50-100 years later, then I was successful.

[CountBogro]

I guess the line between craftmanship and artist is rather blurred. I think that even in the Eyes of the Da Vinci himself; most of his drawing were just studies. Attempts to put down what he saw. People now a days would use a camera. I rather go that a artist tries to express himself through whatever it is he makes or creates. How well he succeeds in that makes someone a great or lesser artist.

I believe that most of these "professions" are more in the mind as to the works someone creates. Someone can be a poet without ever writing a word. It is in the way they are in the world or the way they work with words. A Philosopher is born that way. He'll thinks about the world and it's content and tries to work it out.
How successfull someone is, merely is a measure of how well someone is. But on the first place someone is a artist/philosopher/ poet / ...

But that's just my own 0.02 ...

Bogro

[Timotheos]

Hi Martin, Bogro,

I like both your well-thought definitions.

They avoid that mystical rubbish so many self-absorbed young artists goose-step around with.  In America, a lot of "art" nowadays is either political propaganda or a navel-gazing 20-something ranting poetry that expresses his/her grievances.

====================
As for the my failed artist comment:

By "Lego draws the blunt-speaking, misfit engineers; Playmobil draws the failed artists", I was trying to be funny.   

Self-abasement has the potential to be funny.
Self-congratulation has the potential to be drole.

-Tim

[Richard]

You ARE funny, Timmy ...

... I was trying to be funny.   

And, if I didn't think that you could easily laugh at yourself, I would never poke fun at you.

As you have no doubt seen, we have some exceptionally gifted members here at Playmofriends.

It seems that many don't often have a chance to express their thoughts with others who understand them. So, when the opportunity presents itself, they're quite willing to share their opinions and ideas with the other members.

Because there are a couple of us who are natural clowns, jesters and jokesters, who seldom if ever take anything seriously, it can be somewhat frustrating for those members who want to have a learned discussion ...

I know that are some (including me) who are probably always in danger of getting into trouble for "yanking the chains" of others ... 

However ... You, my friend, seem to be a much better "dancer" than most.  Which in itself is a real "ART" ... And, that, Timmy ... Makes you an ARTIST!
(Were you kinda wondering where I was going with this?) ...

All the best,
Richard (always the fool ...)