comsauandiaufdihudshiuhaoonaon:p

couple of hundred years ago we'd have seen a meteorite streaking across the sky as some sort of mystical event. It would represent something, the light would be a god, there would be a reason, maybe a punishment, maybe a prophecy. No doubt this weighting of meteorites with ideas was because we really didn't know much about them. We didn't know that they were just pieces of rock and ice, floating through space and happening to cross our paths.



The reason i mention it is because it reminds me of art. There are no absolutes in art, not yet anyway, science hasn't been able to explain why some art is better than others, causing many people who suggest, absolutely, that one work is better than another to be met with claims that they are pretentious or 'up-their-own-arses', etc. Science can't help us decide whether Sunrise is better than Transformers, even though the majority of people familiar and in love with film (including myself) will generally agree that the former is great, while the latter is shite.

But i don't want to defend either side, because, to be honest, there are a lot of pretentious, 'up-their-own-arses' type people, who describe certain artworks, say the The Last Judgement, or Ugetsu Monogatari, along the same spiritual lines as people described meteorites hundreds of years ago. And, in my opinion, it trivialises those great works by weighting them with near religious idolatry. The fact is they were made by people, for people, and the general consensus amongst those who are familiar with and in love with art, is that they are great. Nothing more nothing less. If you don't see it it doesn't make you a worse person, and if you do see it it doesn't make you a better person. In fact, i'd like to consider the word 'art' as redundant, there isn't a comfortable definition for it, so why use it? words are supposed to help us explain things, but the word 'art' is so heavy with past ideas that it just causes more confusion than it clears.

The great possibility is that paintings, film, music, dance, theatre, is like the beauty of cars. That not everyone will, or should, 'get it'. I like cars, i like that they get me from one place to another quickly, they make me feel independent too. But i don't know enough about them to be able to say, convincingly, that one is more beautiful than another, i can only say, with my limited knowledge of them, what i like and don't like. I think art should be viewed the same way.