I'm an art historian so I find the discussion interesting. My advisor once pointed out that it's not only a question of art or not-art. There's also good art and bad art. So maybe all skating is art but only some of it is good art.
gkelly said:Can skating with no music be art?
Does the presence of music demand evaluation as art even if the skater does a bad job of reflecting the music or uses it only for counting?
Is show skating all about art and not a sport at all? Do cheesy shows count as art or only hoity-toity ones?
What about professional competitions, or the "interpretive" programs in pro-am or "open" competitions of the late 1990s?
I'm an art historian so I find the discussion interesting. My advisor once pointed out that it's not only a question of art or not-art. There's also good art and bad art. So maybe all skating is art but only some of it is good art.
I don't consider television commercials art. Don't see why I should consider figure skating so. Both are subject to the same limitations in form, content and goal(s).
Doesn't mean I don't love it though. Figure skating, not television commercials.
I think I see what you're getting at. For what it's worth, I'm actually in agreement with you that the majority of figure skating programs will not, artistically anyway, stand the test of time and are forgettable, for the most part (although, as they say, youtube is forever).That's not what I meant. Firstly, I'm not making a hierarchical comment. I think there are great television commercials that I can watch repeatedly (movie trailers are a good example)
Art exists as it is for its own sake. That's not to say that commerical considerations, etc, aren't involved, important or preclude the definition. That's not to say that said considerations don't influence the creation/path the creator takes. To me what that means is can I imagine the piece existing on it's own (in a vacuum, though I know - art isn't created in a vacuum), with the same choices etc. With Shakespeare's plays (the ones I've read anyway), the sonnets of John Donne, the songs of Led Zeppelin, the television work of David Simon, the films of Alfred Hitchcock, that answer is yes.
For a figure skating program, that answer is almost always no. I can't imagine a COP program existing without COP rules (even though the language of figure skating remains the same). I can't imagine a 6.0 program existing on it's own. Etc etc. Just like I can't imagine a television commercial existing in it's form without the impetus to sell something.
I completely agree with your thoughts on this for the most part, Tonichelle. The only thing I would venture to add is that artistic "worthiness" is, in my view, a legitimate concept, just not as simplistic as the textbooks of that time would have had schoolboys believe.considering the amount of time and energy some commercials take to produce (and being a former student of media) I'd say they can be works of art.
I seem to recall reading that Walt Disney, in his day, had to prove time and again that his medium (hand drawn animation) was in fact an art. Most "art critics" who suffer from having a large stick up their bum had issue and swore up and down it wasn't art... and yet it's inspired so many INTO creative arts... I can't help but disagree. Some of the scenes in Snow White are stunning so many decades later. Pixar is also, IMO, art with their computer generated animation...
Are films not works of art? They're moving pictures, Ansel Adams is consider a master photographer and artist, and yet you can take either of those mediums and create snapshots that "aren't worth beans" to anyone and yet evoke more emotion... so who gets to decide what art is? Isn't that the art of, well, art?
(Whenever this subject comes up all I can think of is Robin Williams as Mr. Keating in Dead Poets Society having the boys in his class rip out the part in the textbook that graphs the "worthiness" of a poem)
Art exists as it is for its own sake....To me what that means is can I imagine the piece existing on it's own (in a vacuum,...)
free of those rules, can you imagine a sonnet/blank verse/etc existing in that form? For the expression the poet was aiming for, did they reach it? Another way of putting it: if Alfred Hitchcock was liberated from commercial considerations, can you imagine his films remaining as they are? Could you imagine him in Pyscho (spoilers for the movie, but if you don't know this, then go watch the movies)killing of Janet Leigh's character early into the movie.
My issue is that I haven't seen a figure skating program that I can imagine existing as it is without those restrictions in place.
Here I think you are making the wrong comparison. Kwan should not be compared to Shakespeare but to a Shakespearean actor. It's Lori Nichols who draws the Shakespeare comparison. (Good luck with that one, Lori!) At any rate, Shakespeare is a stretch because the genres are so utterly different, IMO.Also, if I have to group figure skating as an art, it looks small, feeble and empty headed in comparison - Kwan's analysis of the human experience doesn't touch Shakespeare's and Sondheim beats the Duchesnay's any day. If I compare it to a sport, it looks sleek, magnificent and rich.
Hernando, do you disagree with all my arguments? I would've hoped for more of a riposte. But truthfully, I see more attempted artistry in Yagudin ("attempted murder. Do they give the Nobel Prize for attempted chemistry?"). I see no art in either. A twist!
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