Not this (or so it says :))

A painting is a picture whose predominant medium is paint. A drawing is a picture whose predominant medium is pencil, charcoal, pastel, chalk etc.. There is no hard and fast distinction...it's basically a somewhat loose distinction between wet and dry mediums.

What makes a painting a painting? Is it that it's done with paint? — Moliere

I'm going to say Yes, but the next question is, "What makes a painting art?" As you say, why isn't a "painting" that covers my walls with white paint, art? Or could it be, ever?

circumstances that are not exactly artistic — Moliere

So what are these circumstances that are artistic? Should we bring in Danto at this point? He asks a similar question: Is it some feature or quality of the art object that tells us it is art?

What is it that makes a painting appear as a painting? — Moliere

That is, as something that fall under the rubric "art" as opposed to "wallpainting". A couple of possibilities:

1) Yes, it's something about the painted thing itself that reveals it to be art.

2) No, the "circumstances" that reveal art are exactly that -- circumstances, understandings, things we ourselves have to put in place, as opposed to discover within the object itself.

The object itself has, traditionally, been seen as offering us the necessary information, making (1) seem plausible, but after the developments of the 20th century, that's no longer an option. Or so Danto, and I, would say.

The story we tell about the painting is different to the story we tell about the wall, even if the medium is the same. The Sistine Chapel ceiling might have had a couple of coats of nice duck-egg blue...

Further, not all paintings are pictures...

At the least, something being art is dependent on how we chose to talk about it.

So far, so good.

The story we tell about the painting is different to the story we tell about the wall — Banno

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

the "circumstances" that reveal art are exactly that -- circumstances, understandings, things we ourselves have to put in place, — J

We're all saying the same thing here. So the interesting question is, What are those stories? What are those circumstances? How do they vary from era to era, culture to culture?

Yep.

So have we moved from aesthetics to Art History?

And why is there not an expression for visual arts equivalent to "musicology"?

I asked ChatGPT to paint a drawing of a painting. This creates a few interesting questions.

Is a painting of a drawing of a painting a painting or a drawing? Is a painting of a house a house or a painting? Is it different to say say "nice smile" or "nice painting of a smile" when referring to the Mona Lisa?

Are these questions aesthetic questions, linguistic, or metaphysical? Is a representation art, symbol, or a phenomenonal state?

Just what is the house?

Just get the scope right. Not really a problem.

Just get the scope right. Not really a problem. — Banno

Not sure what you mean here. Need not words.

Need not words — Hanover

But I'll give them anyway.

paint a drawing of a painting — Hanover

Painting of a (drawing of a (painting of a (house)))
The outermost quantifier determine all. So

Is a painting of a drawing of a painting a painting or a drawing? — Hanover

A painting.

Is a painting of a house a house or a painting? — Hanover

A painting.

Is it different to say say "nice smile" or "nice painting of a smile" when referring to the Mona Lisa? — Hanover

"Nice smile" picks out the smile. "Nice painting of a smile" picks out the painting.

Are these questions aesthetic questions, linguistic, or metaphysical? — Hanover

Issues of scope, so perhaps logical.

Is a representation art, symbol, or a phenomenonal state? — Hanover

Just what is the house? — Hanover

That'll depend on the use to which we put each term. There's no fact of the matter until we choose.

Is there a category which painting and drawing share? — Moliere

This seems like a weird question. I feel that there is a mix up here in one term being used to mean different things.

Clearly painting a fence is a mundane and necessary action, just as painting a wall is. Art is about producing something that has no mundane function to it,although the two can cross over if one wishes to paint their fence with a certain scheme or theme in mind. Just because painting is a gerund it does not make it different from drawing, other than by way of the tools and materials used.

At a strecth one could argue that, depending on cultural traditions, the effect of drawing use often associated with writing, whereas painting is usually something more broad - as in painting a larger object. Scale and rationality may sneak in when it comes to using a tool more familiar as a writing impliment than as a means of producing art ... but then again, poetry is art too! How much this effects the user is likley quite a subjective element.

I have come to the conclusion that forms of art are all about offering up a means of viewing the human experience through different spacio-temporal lenses. The static picture extends thorugh time, the moving picture or piece of music spreads a single item of human experience out.

Through each different medium we effectively extend or contract in opposition to how the art form is presented.

What is it that makes a painting appear as a painting? — Moliere

Doesn’t it matter why we are asking? What purpose will the answer serve?

If you are tallying the number of paintings, drawings and sculptures owned by the museum for purposes of a security audit, wouldn’t the right answer have its own criteria that might even insult one of the artists? In such case, there has to be one specific answer, boiled down to a number, or there will be no way to insure or protect the museum.

So you set the criteria and draw the lines. And that is that.

Likely, with artists being artists, the auditor will be forced to throw certain works into a fourth miscellaneous category because painting, drawing and sculpture are not going to capture all that artists can do with paints, pencils and solids. At least not to an auditor type person.

But, a painting is an art form where an artist uses paint applied to what is usually a flat surface (such as a rectangular canvas) to create a visual experience.

So now, what is art?
What is an artist?
What counts as paint?
How flat is flat?
Why “usually”?
What does “visual experience” mean?
Are colors essential, or can white paint on a white surface make a painting?
Is there anything else? What else?

I googled Moliere - he was a playwrite described as a “literary painter” because of how vividly he painted his characters.

I guess we’ll never know now. Thanks Moliere. And Moliere.

A painting is a picture... — Janus

A picture? Tell this to surrealist artists such as Salvador Dalí. :snicker:



Art is the persistence of memory -- Salvador Dalí.

The soft watches are an unconscious symbol of the relativity of space and time, a Surrealist meditation on the collapse of our notions of a fixed cosmic order.

Isn't painting the way we express our dreams and hallucinations, while drawing is a simple technique?

↪Janus The story we tell about the painting is different to the story we tell about the wall, even if the medium is the same. The Sistine Chapel ceiling might have had a couple of coats of nice duck-egg blue...

Further, not all paintings are pictures... — Banno

I'm not seeing the relevance of your comment about the painting and the wall.

All paintings and drawings are pictures on my definition (which is not to say all paintings are representational in case that was how you read it).

In any case I was answering the questions "What is a painting as opposed to a drawing?". Both are applications of some medium or other on some surface or other, and I was pointing out that generally 'painting' refers to works which use predominately wet mediums and 'drawing' refers to works which use predominately dry mediums.

A picture? Tell this to surrealist artists such as Salvador Dalí. — javi2541997

Why would you say that is not a picture?

Isn't painting the way we express our dreams and hallucinations, while drawing is a simple technique? — javi2541997

'Painting' as a verb signifies the act, and as a noun the product of the act. Same with 'drawing'.

I'm not seeing the relevance of your comment about the painting and the wall. — Janus

How does a Last Supper differer from a coat of off-white?

A painting is a picture whose predominant medium is paint. — Janus

...unless it was painted using Microsoft paint.

Point being, whatever rule is offered, someone will produce an exception. That's not saying you are mistaken.

How does a Last Supper differer from a coat of off-white? — Banno

If a coat of off-white is presented on a surface as an artwork, then the only difference is that the former is clearly a representational work. I say both are pictures in that they are both designed to depict something. I suppose you could say they are both representational in that one represents a gathering of people at a meal and the other represents an idea, but I think that would be stretching it.

...unless it was painted using Microsoft paint. — Banno

Sure but I don't think Microsoft paint is really paint, but is rather "paint", just as Microsoft pencil, charcoal or pastel is not pencil, charcoal or pastel. Digitally produced works do not count as one or the other, but as prints (if they are printed out that is).

Why would you say that is not a picture? — Janus

If I am not mistaken, I think you use the word 'picture' thinking of the way of representing real life. At least pictures and photographs are about that. Nonetheless, there are artists (such as Dalí) who painted surrealismo. His paintings were far from a picture but a good example of how our imagination and mind can work.

Painting' as a verb signifies the act, and as a noun the product of the act. Same with 'drawing'. — Janus

So, you don't see differences at all.

I still think that painting is a way of expressing art. For example -- when you paint Christ or a landscape in an oil on canvas. But drawing is a technique used by the artist to work the figure. The melting clocks of Dali is also a good example. He painted his hallucination, and he drew the outline.

If I am not mistaken, I think you use the word 'picture' thinking of the way of representing real life. — javi2541997

You are mistaken and I think that should have been clear from what I've written.

So, you don't see differences at all. — javi2541997

The difference between painting and drawing, as I've said, is predominately one of mediums.

A painting captures a moment in a narrative. A painted wall is not a narrative moment. Even if there is evidence of a significant event on the surface of the wall (like a large splat of dried blood) it still isn't a painting. It's a wall with a blood stain, which no doubt has an interesting story behind it but it probably wasn't produced with narrative intent.



Hopper's Night Hawks captures a moment in an urban diner at night. Whose story is this? The guy behind the counter? The person gazing into the diner? One of the customers? The city? We don't know what the story is, exactly; it might be humdrum boredom; might be tragedy. Or maybe the diner is a welcome respite from late night work. When I look at pictures like this I hear Aaron Copland's Quiet City.

A painting doesn't have to be figurative. "Composition X" by Kandinsky displays definite but abstract shapes against a black background. It is more like a musical composition than a photograph. I do not know what Kandinsky is communicating, but his work is definitely a "painting", probably produced in a manner not altogether different than any other painter's method--taking carefully mixed colors on a brush and applying them to a surface, perhaps over a pencil sketch, perhaps not. I'm not always sure what music is trying to communicate either.



Back in the day, say, 1900, what was art and what was not art was still maybe somewhat clear. The difference between art/not art began to break down when in subsequent decades artists started presenting "ready made" art -- Duchamp's Fountain being a famous example.



Ready Made and Found Art were a provocative objection by its creators to what "ART" was supposed to look like and mean. "If I say it is art, then it is art." They said.

"Fountain" isn't a painting -- it's an object; it could be a sculpture. Indeed, manufacturers employ sculptors to design bathroom fixtures. But a hardware store urinal isn't art, and isn't attempting to be art. It's a utilitarian object, and as such may be interesting, beautiful, very functional, or drab and uninteresting. But it isn't capturing a moment in a narrative. (It's capturing something else at the moment.)

What is a painting, as opposed to a drawing? — Moliere

I think a painting is a type of drawing. The medium, paint, is the most obvious and least interesting distinction.

Paintings are always aesthetically oriented, while drawings might be doodles, diagrams, even words ( which are so specialized and so woven into the fabric of life that those drawings get their own category). A painting is art by definition, a drawing may or may not be.

Paintings are prestige, high art. Drawings, far less commonly so. Kings commission paintings, not drawings. We build temples (aka museums) to honor and worship paintings, not "drawings". If the painting on your wall is not museum worthy, it is because it is "low art", not high; but, it's still on the spectrum, whereas a mere drawing may not be on it at all.

is there a category which painting and drawing shar — Moliere

Drawings are 2d and represent something other than the literal markings themselves. Paintings are a certain kind of drawing.

A painting is art by definition, a drawing may or may not be. — hypericin

I don't think that's true. Watercolours and gouaches are generally considered to be paintings and they may be used for example in architectural design as depictions of what projected buildings or landscape gardens will look like. Are they to be considered art or not? Of course a sketch may be either a painting or a drawing depending on mediums.

Drawings are 2d and represent something other than the literal markings themselves. Paintings are a certain kind of drawing. — hypericin

This is not true either―there are abstract drawings that are all about mark-making and composition, just as there are abstract paintings.

What is a painting — Moliere

The meaning of "a painting" cannot be put into words, either as a definition or a description. The meaning of "a painting" cannot be said but can only be shown.

The meaning of "a painting" may be understood by looking at the objects that have been named in the following set: {Monet's "Landscape with Factories", Derain's "Houses of Parliament", Klimt "Pine Forest", Leonardo da Vinci "Lady with an Ermine", Giotto "The Betrayal", El Greco "View of Toledo", Albert Bierstadt "The Rocky Mountains", Jolomo "The Light of Argyll"}

Because the elements of the set share family resemblances, Russell's Paradox, resulting from unrestricted comprehension, may be avoided.

As Wittgenstein pointed out, the observer who looks at the objects named in this set will discover a family resemblance between these objects, and this family resemblance will be "a painting".

In order to understand the meaning of "a painting", the set does not need to include every painting ever painted, but only a sample.

As there is no "correct" meaning to any word or expression, there is no "correct" meaning to the expression "a painting". Person A looking at this set will discover a family resemblance that will be different to person B looking at the same set. Person A looking at a set 8 elements will discover a different family resemblance to a set that contains 16 elements. But even, so there will be a family resemblance between different family resemblances.

In answer to the question, what is a painting, a preliminary meaning of "a painting" may be understood by looking at the following 8 objects.

Paintings at one point in history a kind of primitive 'Photograph,' but now I think the photograph is more 'primitive' in what it can achieve.

A painting is a picture — Janus

Why?

Kazimir Malevich, Black Square (1915) explicitly does not represent anything.

Also, note that "picture" does not occur in the OP.

A painting captures a moment in a narrative. — BC

I like that.

Not all paintings, then, are pictures.

Not all paintings, then, are pictures. — Banno

Exactly. I like that.

What is a painting, as opposed to a drawing? Is there a category which painting and drawing share? Suppose sculpture as a point of comparison, along with glass blowing and theatre. — Moliere

A painting is made of areas. A drawing is made of edges. They both change the appearance of a surface.

Paintings at one point in history a kind of primitive 'Photograph,' but now I think the photograph is more 'primitive' in what it can achieve. — I like sushi

A photograph is a copy of what exists in the world, and therefore depicts what is necessarily true.

A painting is a copy of what could exist in the world, and therefore depicts what is possibly true.

Primitivism is a style of art used by artists in an industrial society that duplicates the style of art used by artists in pre-industrial societies.

Photography as an invention of an industrialised society can only copy the world as it exists in an industrialised society, and therefore cannot depict the primitivism of a pre-industrial society.

Only painting can copy what the world could have been like in a pre-industrial society, and therefore can depict the primitivism of a pre-industrial society. For example, Picasso's "Portrait of Max Jacob".

Ready Made and Found Art were a provocative objection by its creators to what "ART" was supposed to look like and mean. "If I say it is art, then it is art." They said. — BC

More defensible is, "If we say it is art, then it is art," which can also open up interesting conversations about who is included in "we."

"What art is supposed to look like" and "what art is supposed to mean" are separate inquiries, I think, both prompted by an object like Duchamp's urinal. D's choice of the urinal as his "ready-made" was of course not arbitrary; he offers an object that is "supposed to" look like something unbeautiful, utilitarian, with connotations of disgust -- the sort of thing our culture encourages us not to look at. So, can we declare it to be art nonetheless?

The "what does it mean" question is the more lasting, and exciting. Here, any object would do, and the question applies as much to found art as to ready-mades. What does it mean, what are we saying, when we declare something to be art? Are we discovering something within that object? Or are we declaring a way of seeing, a way of regarding? I think art should be understood as something we put a metaphorical frame around, and 20th century art has shown us that that can be literally anything. The title of Danto's famous book suggests this eloquently: The Transfiguration of the Commonplace.

Conceptual art pushes this even further, asking whether an "object" is even needed to reside within the frame.

Need not words
— Hanover

But I'll give them anyway. — Banno

That was a spellcheck error where it somehow put "not" instead of "more." You charitably read me as rational and deciphered my intent correctly. Very Davidsonian of you.

Is it different to say say "nice smile" or "nice painting of a smile" when referring to the Mona Lisa?
— Hanover
"Nice smile" picks out the smile. "Nice painting of a smile" picks out the painting. — Banno

Same referent though.



I'm a huge Hopper fan.