Recently, while I was browsing the Internet I came across a video on YouTube titled “Modern Art Sucks”. In the video, there is a guy talking about how modern art is stupid and that is should not be considered art. He also talks about how anything that he could recreate is not art, and how artists are famous for stupid works like splattered paint on a canvas. But this is an extremely narrow view of art. Art should be defined as anything created by a human and brought the real world.
It is understandable that one could have discontent toward an artist who creates something they find ridiculous and that the artist makes money for it. For example, someone who defines him or herself as an artist could create something simple and sell it as modern art to get money. However, that person may see that work as nothing but money, but the fact that they created it from their mind makes it art. It is unique to itself down to the slightest of details, and can never be made the same way ever again.
In the Oxford dictionary, art is defined as, “The expression or application of human creative skill and imagination.” This is more than true when relating to anything that mankind has created in the history of the world.
Any kind of creation should be defined as art, whether it be a detailed sculpture or an advertisement for a billboard. Someone took the time, as small of an amount as it may be, to create something to view or hear for any sort of reason. One could simply be bored and make a stick figure; art is created there. A piece of work does not have to appeal to an audience. It can even not be appealing to the creator themselves. But the fact that they took the time to picture the figure in their head and draw it on a piece of paper says something.
However there are those who believe nothing is art. The cultural movement Dadaism would aspire to such views. They believe in a pessimistic view in which anything achieved and created by man is useless. But when creating art, we are literally plucking ideas from our imagination and bringing them to the real world. Such an incredible achievement is what indefinitely separates us from animals. What makes us different can be defined by one sentence: “I see with eyes, think with words, then I am a human being.” But when one sees more with their eyes and thinks better with words, than they are able to use their creative abilities to their full extent and become artists.These qualities are what really make humans so different.
No single person has to consider something art, but when one does have an open mind to the idea of art being anything that is created, then one can look at the world in a different, enlightened view. There are many things we take for granted that can be looked at as art. For example, the font being used to type this document is a form of art. Someone took the time to design an appealing, concise, and clear alphabet.
One of the oldest and most looked over works of art is language. It simply was someone thinking and using different sounds to help communicate with others. Then when its use was found practical, it caught on rapidly and changed into varieties of the original.
Even if something created may be unappealing or effortlessly made, one should think about what it is in terms of art. Whatever the creation might be, it was thought of and made into reality from that thought. The next invention, portrait, sculpture, song, home appliance, and so on will have been made originally in the mind of a person. Imagination is forever and art is a gateway between our mind and reality. We will never stop creating art.
