Compromise is the mother of art

DecafSilicon · Post by **DecafSilicon** » Wed Mar 03, 2004 7:38 pm

Scott, I like the quote on your blog, but I don't agree. As Cat and Girl say, "Great stuff is usually made within very set boundaries." Read the comic; it argues against your concept of art better than I can.

Doc MacDougal · Post by **Doc MacDougal** » Wed Mar 03, 2004 8:33 pm

Is there a difference between structuring a work to fit within the limitations of a medium or form and compromising personal vision? I don't really think they're comparable, let alone opposite sides of some binary.

Ben.

DecafSilicon · Post by **DecafSilicon** » Thu Mar 04, 2004 1:11 am

Songs fit within 3 minutes so they can be played on the radio. Movies follow traditions because it makes them more palatable to buyers. Great art can come from artists just making a buck.

Scott denies this by claiming that art is free expression that springs from no survival or reproductive purpose. I argue that much of our great art sprung from just that.

kaos_de_moria · Post by **kaos_de_moria** » Thu Mar 04, 2004 8:28 am

i don't think life has no limitations. have you ever seen a walrus turning up at an office or a kitten throwing a rock? life has only no limitation in the way that it is basically unlimited in length. but if you think of books like musils 'The Man Without Qualities', which was never finished, because, some scientist argue, it could not be finished - because the quality of being not finished is a central part of the book - you have limitless art. and even though i am not a great musil fan, musil is seen as a great german writer and 'The Man Without Qualities' is seen as his master piece. the classical operas are so long because they were not concepted to be seen as a whole. you were supposed to go out and come back in as much as you like. the opera was in this way concpted like watching someone elses life, where you as well do not see everything. besides, i don't think being limitless or limited is connected to compromise or not.

kaos

edit: nevertheless, i really like the cartoon. thanks for the link

Tim Mallos · Post by **Tim Mallos** » Thu Mar 04, 2004 10:27 am

Scott denies this by claiming that art is free expression that springs from no survival or reproductive purpose. I argue that much of our great art sprung from just that.

Wall murals / grafitti art created in some of the most depressing, hopeless places comes to mind. Art as a means of preserving sanity, venting anger in a positive way etc. Seems like a survival tool to me.

Tim

Veleno · Post by **Veleno** » Thu Mar 04, 2004 3:32 pm

Survival tool?

I must agree...my sketchbook certianly helps me sit through boring classes.

Well, that and it seems like if I stopped drawing for too long my hand would fall off. O_o

William G · Post by **William G** » Thu Mar 04, 2004 4:28 pm

I would put art in the same place I put intelligence- A by product of having evolved a huge heat-radiator on the top of our heads.

All of those extra synapses had to do something, and so we have my webcomic- The end result of millions of years of evolution.

DecafSilicon · Post by **DecafSilicon** » Thu Mar 04, 2004 4:55 pm

Heh heh. Reminds me of that Calvin & Hobbes where Calvin decides he's the result, and thus the purpose, of all evolution.

EDIT: This is the Calvin & Hobbes.

losttoy · Post by **losttoy** » Thu Mar 04, 2004 7:59 pm

Hmm Casablanca. It was great movie, no doubt. However my favorite movie is Citizen Kane. It is a wonderful story filled with stark images and strong angles. One of the reason that Citizen Kane is studied so much is because it broke all the rules movie making of its time. It starts at the end, which is really the middle, goes to the begining then the middle and ends at the begining, but yet does the story ever get told? The lenses they used to have three layers of focus were not made, they had to be invented.

"Great" movies can made within limits, by breaking those limits, or creating new ones. Then it goes to the personal taste of the end consumer. Personally I do not like music on the radio and I think it is untalented crap, but yet Recoil's album Hydrology which has a song over 20 minutes is a masterpiece in my opinion, but will never get any radio play. Then it does not lack "greatness", but lacks recognition.

DecafSilicon · Post by **DecafSilicon** » Fri Mar 05, 2004 3:35 pm

Yeah, you're getting at the fundamental tension between popular success and artistic excellence.

The wish for posterity, to be remembered for a truly great work, is a survival urge. It's the hope for immortality through your work. And I'd argue that it drove many writers and artists who created our canon. Thus their work, under the McCloud definition (as I understand it; feel free to break in and pull the veil from my eyes, Scott), is not pure art.

GlenSS · Post by **GlenSS** » Fri Mar 05, 2004 3:56 pm

At this point, I can't help but singing Marillion:

"And they call you a genius
Cause you're easier to sell "
- "King"

kaos_de_moria · Post by **kaos_de_moria** » Sun Mar 07, 2004 8:05 am

DecafSilicon wrote:Yeah, you're getting at the fundamental tension between popular success and artistic excellence.

The wish for posterity, to be remembered for a truly great work, is a survival urge. It's the hope for immortality through your work. And I'd argue that it drove many writers and artists who created our canon. Thus their work, under the McCloud definition (as I understand it; feel free to break in and pull the veil from my eyes, Scott), is not pure art.

whereas just financial success is not seen as pure art either by scott. and i would surely agree on that. (see art chapter of UC)

kaos

Zwol.org

Compromise is the mother of art

Compromise is the mother of art

hmm...

hmmm