I'd say it may be said to be one possible representation of a black square, a picture of a black square, and that it also may be said to be just a black square because squares are abstract objects. — Janus

Well, if you must. The idea that a black square only represents a black square looks a tad too platonic for my taste... it smells of perfect forms and such nonsense.

It does have to be recognizably art in some sense — Moliere

What could that mean, if not that it must participate in some game in which we call it art?

There is a community who claim continuity with the Murujuga artists...

What could that mean, if not that it must participate in some game in which we call it art? — Banno

I agree with that, but then the question turns to -- what are the rules of this game? For whom and when? What does this tell us about what we think art is?

There is a community who claim continuity with the Murujuga artists... — Banno

Cool -- that would add to the evidence against any skeptic, insofar that they took the institutional theory of art seriously, about its categorical placement -- "is art".

Though even if there weren't I'd still be inclined to call that art even if I was disconnected from that history -- I'd want to know more to understand, but "on its face" that looks like art to me in a fairly unproblematic manner.

And we can further insist that "seeing" retain its metaphorical meaning, that it doesn't have to be retinal, but can instead be the kind of seeing we mean when we say, "Ah, now I see!" — J

Yes, definitely.

Another way to put -- or at least a different way to get to a similar idea -- the notion of aesthetic attitudes are ways of seeing-as. So we are looking at the painting as a painting: or, to not use the visual metaphor, we have judged something a painting which is different from the wall it hangs upon. We see the wall and the painting but I don't see the wall as a painting.

OK, let's call that special way of seeing an act of judgment. And let's agree that there's no "innocent eye," no "brain-off" way of looking at paintings. Still, we need to explain the important difference Duchamp is pointing to. If I understand him, he's saying that the Warhol exists in order to stimulate thought, whereas the Monet is an object of contemplation in its own right -- or something like that. Now we need a lot of conceptual apparatus to see either of these paintings in the right way; that's not in dispute. But conceptual art uses the image in a way that traditional painting does not. The soup cans have to function as a bridge to the concept, otherwise the artwork fails. Whereas the water lilies don't insist on this kind of move. — J

OK this helps me to wrap my brain around the idea of conceptual art better, then. It's always something I've struggled to understand -- Surrealism, Dada, Pop Art I could make sense of but whenever someone would say their a conceptual artist it simply eluded me what that could possibly mean.

What's of particular help is the contrast class -- the conceptual art is somehow supposed to be different from this "older" way of looking at the function of paintings.

My skepticism arises because of a general skepticism of concepts being separate from our ability to experience as enlanguaged beings at all. There was never an escape from the concepts to begin with, it's all conceptual art.

But then this sounds something like an overgeneralization in the face of your description here -- the classic function of painting vs. the conceptual function of painting.

Well, if you must. The idea that a black square only represents a black square looks a tad too platonic for my taste... it smells of perfect forms and such nonsense. — Banno

Platonism not needed; it is just the idea of a black square that is being represented, an idea which can be re-presented in countless ways, just as the form of a tree or a human face can be re-presented in countless ways.

I'd still be inclined to call that art — Moliere

Trouble is, the custodians would not call it art.

Art is an aesthetic judgement, an object detachable from it's surrounds, to be moved, sold or exhibited, whilst this is created as an obligation to the land, inseparable from it's location, the very connection between people and land.

Platonism not needed; it is just the idea of a black square that is being represented, an idea which can be re-presented in countless ways, just as the form of a tree or a human face can be re-presented in countless ways. — Janus

You say Platonism is not needed, then launch immediately into an explication of platonism.

Trouble is, the custodians would not call it art. — Banno

What would they call it?

Not at all. We can all form an idea of a black square. We don't need a separate realm where the idea lives.

Are these paintings to be considered pictures? Are they representational?
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Buggered if I know.

See, perhaps, Encoding the Dreaming - A theoretical framework for the analysis ofrepresentational processes in Australian Aboriginal art

The argument there is for ongoing interpretation.

What might Davidson make of this?

Without an interpretation, how could the question have an answer?

Exactly...now you are making my case for me.

...now you are making my case for me. — Janus

It might help if you were to explain what your case is...

Here's mine:

...something being art is dependent on how we chose to talk about it. — Banno

How does yours differ?

It doesn't really differ. That's why I said from the start that all paintings can be thought of as pictures...or not...depending on the definition of the terms (interpretation).That's also why I offered the Ship of Theseus and Sorites examples as analogies.

I say there is no ontological fact that determines what it is correct to say. You said I am doing ontology in saying that...and I respond again that it depends on your interpretation of the term 'ontology'.

Oh, ok. You were just saying that the meaning of words is not fixed.

I guess you could say that is the upshot. So we are left with the possibility of looking at things in many different (and hopefully interesting) ways.

The Davidsonian point that we all agree about most things is true when it comes to everyday stuff. Not so much when it comes to aesthetics.

The Davidsonian point that we all agree about most things is true when it comes to everyday stuff. Not so much when it comes to aesthetics. — Janus

Not so sure. But a discussion worth having.

What might a Davidsonian aesthetic look like?

@Banno @Moliere @Janus How do you feel about 'conceptual art'? Personally i do nto see it as Art at all, but more of a philosophical sortie into the world of Art.

Not all paintings, then, are pictures. — Banno

An interesting statement. I am bent to think every painting is a picture, as ever 'image' is a picture. Of what, is an interesting thought.

An interesting statement. — AmadeusD

Conclusion.

If "A picture captures a moment in a narrative", and some paintings do not capture moments in a narrative, then not all paintings are pictures.

What might a Davidsonian aesthetic look like? — Banno

I imagine that you would probably be in a far better position than I to give an account of that.

Again I think it (obviously) depends on how you define the term 'art'. I am predisposed to think that examples of good visual art have colour and tonal and textural relationships that form strong, resolved and unified, compositions. Many works of visual conceptual art are not much or even at all concerned with aesthetics, but rather with conveying some idea or other.

If they have nothing to do with aesthetics I do not think we can call this Art at all.

The reason I state this is partially due to what was mentioned previous regarding the Noun and Verb of the term 'paint'. The problem I see is that literally anyone can view anything with an 'artistic' eye, yet that does not make the item under inspection a 'piece of art'.

Let me explain further. A mountain can be beautiful, yet it would be bizarre to call it a 'piece of art'. A building, architecural design, may possess some unintentional beauty beyond its primary function, just like a painted fence. A fence painted a particular shade and tone may in-iteself not be at all artistic, yet along side the composition of the surrounding area may highlight aspect that draw the eye more readily to it.

As you can see there are nuances here, but neverthless I state that Art must contain aesthetic quality or it is not art. Even a mathematician can refer to the 'beauty' of a formula, but this is quite abstracted from a more pure sensory experience. With conceptual art the aesthetic is stripped clean away and what we are left with is something more akin to a rational metaphor. Again, here I can see how it can be argued that there is 'aesthetics' within this, in terms of the cleverness and juxtapositional placing of the work in question to express an idea, but the primary focus is on a rational idea, a philosophical stance, and the aesthetic of the work is deemed utterly irrelevant.

Example: Someone stole a plant from France, brought it back to the UK and emailed the gardens telling them what she had done. She then displayed the plant and the email exchange in a gallery.

My interpretation of this: It is a political action that gets people to think about ownership but there is absolute nothing aesthetic about this. It is certainly an interesting way of drawing attention to something, but what is being focused on is intellectual ideas not aesthetics qualities. That said, I am not at all suggesting that Artwork cannot possess intellectual content (far from it!), my point is that Artwork is not primarilt focused on the intellect, so I would describe what people call 'conceptual art' as more in line with a philosophical endeavor - which is why people here may disagree.

There is a differenece between an artistic eye and an artistic work. Both deal with aesthestics and emotion above raw intelect and rationality.

To paraphrase Oscar Wilde for the millioneth time, Art is useless.

I am sure a case could be made that I am not looking at things properly. And a case could be made that there is no such thing as looking at these things properly. And a case could be made that I was looking at things properly, (no matter what I said I saw, or because of what I said I saw, namely, a sculpture with a blue wall). — Fire Ologist

On the other hand, perhaps artworks need to looked at "properly" if they are to make sense.

Today, as a simplification, we can say that there are two main approaches to painting, Modern and Postmodern. The Modern is drawing attention to the aesthetic within the modern world, such as Georges Braque, and the Postmodern is drawing attention to the social situation within a postmodern world, such as Damien Hurst.

These are two very different approaches to the artwork.

Problems arise if Modern artworks are looked at from the perspective of a Postmodernist viewpoint, or Postmodern artworks are looked at from the perspective of a Modernist viewpoint.

In this sense, looking at an artwork "properly" means looking at an artwork as it was intended by the artist. If intended by the artist as a Modernist artwork it should be looked at within the domain of Modernism, and if intended by the artist as a Postmodernist artwork it should be looked at within the domain of Postmodernism.

I went to the BBC's website and it seems that the lectures weren't being hosted anymore. — Moliere

They are here. There are also transcripts for each episode. (I find it's often best to search from outside the BBC website.)

I was beginning to wonder if part of what makes paintings and drawings paintings or drawings is that they are in 2-dimensional space. — Moliere

The question why is a painting not a sculpture is the same kind of question as asking why is a play not a film or why is a cat not a dog.

If something is a domesticated mammal and a subspecies of the gray wolf then it it is a dog and if something is a small, domesticated carnivorous mammal that is commonly kept as a pet then it is a cat.

If something is performed by live actors then it is a play and if something is a recording of live actors then it is a film.

If something is an artwork in 2D then it is a painting and if something is an artwork in 3D then it is a sculpture.

There is a human need to divide the observed world into smaller parts using language. This helps the human make better sense of their observed world. As Derrida pointed out, part of the meaning of a word derives from what it is not.
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but even the painter wouldn't say it's art — Moliere

The man paints a wall red. How do you know what is in his mind?
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On the multiplicity of artworlds — Moliere

As of 1 January 2025, there were about 8,250,423,613 different artworlds, in that it seems true that no two people have identical minds. As they say, the world exists in the head.
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Also, a general caution for family resemblance -- I like that concept a lot for tamping down the desire for universal and necessary conditions as a foolhardy quest.........................................There's still the work of specifying that family resemblance — Moliere

Yes, even if we agree that there is a family resemblance between André Derain's "Henri Matisse" (1905) and Georges Braque's "The Harbour" 1906, this doesn't explain why there is a family resemblance.

As a first step, the "why" can be put into words. The Tate writes:

Fauvism is the name applied to the work produced by a group of artists (which included Henri Matisse and André Derain) from around 1905 to 1910, which is characterised by strong colours and fierce brushwork. The paintings Derain and Matisse exhibited were the result of a summer spent working together in Collioure in the South of France and were made using bold, non-naturalistic colours (often applied directly from the tube), and wild loose dabs of paint. The forms of the subjects were also simplified making their work appear quite abstract.

There is much that can be said.

But sooner or later, some words cannot be described using other words, such as "Wild loose dabs" or "fierce brushwork". The meaning of words such as "wild" and "fierce" cannot be said but can only be shown.

And they can only be shown as family resemblances.

It is the intrinsic nature of the brain to be able to discover family resemblances in what it is shown, and this ability is beyond any philosophical explanation

There are also transcripts for each episode — GrahamJ

The problem is that Grayson Perry does not seem to give his opinion as to what art is, other than saying what art could be.

Now there’s no easy answer for this one, I’m sorry to say. I’m not going to live up to sort of like the Reith Lecturers’ code of honour which is to have definite strong opinions and be a kind of certainty freak because many of the methods of judging are of course very problematic and many of the criteria that you use to assess art are conflicting. I mean we have financial value, popularity, art historical significance, or aesthetic sophistication. You know all these things could be at odds with each other.

https://downloads.bbc.co.uk/radio4/transcripts/lecture-1-transcript.pdf

What might a Davidsonian aesthetic look like? — Banno

"The painting on the wall, named, can be described in the following ways... (10 pages later)" is True IFF The painting....




That's been one of the questions I've been trying to answer in talking with @J; there's the sense in which I know there's something there, because it's been there for a long time. It's art so even if we say people were "bamboozled", it's still this phenomena that, like it or not, one must contend with when doing philosophy of art.

If we exclude it then what does that say about other works of art? On what basis are we including?

For my part I take the stance that there's something I'm missing. I've gone to plenty of modern art museums out of curiosity, and some of the installations/videos/etc. really just left me mystified. I was willing to look just to see, but sometimes I sort of just shrugged.

Which usually means I'm missing something -- what is it about this that so many other people like that I'm not seeing?

looking at an artwork "properly" means looking at an artwork as it was intended by the artist — RussellA

I think that is right in the sense that, in order to see what the artist is showing, it often helps to know what the artist intended to show.

But I would add that there are works of art that declare much in themselves, demanding the viewer react - music can do this. Dance can do this. A poem can do this. But any type of art can require more instruction to orient the viewer and deepen the experience with the artwork.

a philosophical sortie into the world of Art. — I like sushi

That sounds to me like a new type of art! But I know what you mean. Interestingly, Danto talked a lot in his later writings about art within a particular culture as "discovering its own identity" or meaning. He compares it to Hegel's Spirit. He blurred the line between art and philosophy. For him, a work of art can be a piece of philosophy as well, it can teach us something specifically philosophical -- so a philosophical sortie, if you like.

I've gone to plenty of modern art museums out of curiosity, and some of the installations/videos/etc. really just left me mystified. I was willing to look just to see, but sometimes I sort of just shrugged.

Which usually means I'm missing something -- what is it about this that so many other people like that I'm not seeing? — Moliere

I've had this experience too. Part of me wants to put on my Philistine hat and say, "Enough is enough! This looped video of a woman sucking her toes simply isn't art. The artworld is wrong about this." If I resist that impulse, as I believe I should, I could also say, "Yes, I'm able to engage with this work in the Space of Art, I'm willing to accept the invitation to that special sort of seeing that art requests. Having done so, I judge it to be not very good or interesting art."

At this point, the questions about "What am I missing?" become relevant. Can I honestly say that I know enough, am experienced enough, in the particular milieu or conversation in which this art-object exists, in order to be entitled to an aesthetic judgment? If my answer is yes (as it often will be in an artworld I have a lot more expertise in, such as music or literature), then so much the worse for the art object -- but again, this doesn't jeopardize its status as art. If my answer is no (as is likely with conceptual and other post-modern visual arts), then it's on me to get educated, if I care enough.

And one more factor: Do I like it? This is a dimension where I've really noticed changes over the years. Perhaps because I have tried to better understand and experience some of this unfamiliar artworld, I more and more find that there's a sort of primitive, pre-judgmental delight I feel when exposed to (some) conceptual art. It is not at all the same delight I associate with Monet. But once I get over the "hermeneutics of suspicion," and allow the object to just suggest whatever it suggests -- call it a charitable intepretation! -- it's a lot easier to get a kick out of it.

OK that helped, thanks.

Looking at Lecture 2 I like the "checks" which he provides for whether something gets to count as art or not, in the categorical sense.

Copying them succinctly from the transcript of Grayson Perry's second lecture:

1. "So the first marker post on my trawl around the boundaries is: is it in a gallery or an
art context?"
2. "My second boundary marker: is it a boring version of something else? ...one of the most insulting words you can call an artwork is ‘decorative’."
3. "Okay, next boundary marker: is it made by an artist?"
4. "Next boundary marker: photography. Problematic"
5. "Now this brings us on to an interesting other boundary post, which can be applied to
other artworks as well as photography, and that is the limited edition test."
6. "Another test that perhaps sounds facetious I have is what I call the handbag and
hipster test... you know you might say it belongs to sort of
privileged people who’ve got a good education or a lot of money, and so if those
people are kind of staring at it, there’s quite a high chance that it’s art."
7. "Right the next test I have here, the next boundary post on our trawl around the
boundary, is the rubbish dump test. (Fx: whip) Now this is one of my tutors at college.
He had this one. He said, “If you want to test a work of art,” he said, “Throw it onto a
rubbish dump. And if people walking by notice that it’s there and say “Oh what’s that
artwork doing on that rubbish dump”, it’s passed. "
8. ". But anyway this test is … let’s call this one The Computer Art Test. ... “You know it might be art rather than just an interesting website when it has the grip
of porn without the possibility of consummation or a happy ending."


And I found his concluding remark interesting -- a certain self-awareness about what people "fear" in the idea of conceptual art.

But this pluralism that you know we have in the art world, that’s a great thing because
you know you can literally do anything, and I think that is also a problem. I am
haunted by this image. After a lecture once, I had a student come up to me and she
said, almost whimpering like this “How do you decide what to do your art about?”
And I was like “Oh …” I said, “Well” - and I was sort of struggling to say something
- and I looked at her hand and she had her iPhone, and I said “Well I didn’t have one
of those.” Because she has every image, access to all information in her hand. When I
started, I had none of that and I think it’s a challenge for young people today.

Verbal nouns inevitably lead to ambiguity. But in this case the answer is relatively easy. A painting is “that which is painted”, the combination of paint applied to medium.