What is art? Over time our concepts of what art is has changed as quickly as the movements could shape them. I will admit that while in MOCA I hated almost everything I saw. The pieces were part of a movement that had passed and for me had no inherent beauty. Although for art in general I have a deep affection. Art has to be liberating, controversial, and thought provoking. It must be so because it is often representative of our history, geography, politics, religion, and numerous other humanistic studies. It creates and abolishes war. It is suppressed and elevated, loved and hated, mocked and embraced.
No doubt much of art is beauty. Although sometimes it is used as beauty's antithesis. It can be an ideal or simply something pleasing to the eye. Often art is based loosely on our representations of ourselves and to my delight that of a beautiful woman. Art in the beginning of art even contained women along with rituals and architecture. Our ancestors eventually realized that art was a necessity.
But why do we need art? Basically because we have very large brains and demand stimulation. We are constantly exploring and bending the world around us. We speculate on what beauty really is and the nature of life not to mention simply as a way to communicate with each other.
On my recent travels I went to The Getty, MOCA, MOMA, The Guggenheim, and The Metropolitan museum. All presented varying degrees of art and all stimulated me in different ways. My personal tastes enjoyed the Getty and the MET, but did not like MOCA or the Guggenheim. Like life and art everyone is stimulated by different things.
1 comment:
when did they rename MOMA to MOCA? and 'çause how am i supposed to know which acronym to use for NYTimes crosswords? :)
interestingly, i preferred Gugenheim to all others, but that might depend on the exhibitions as they change there more often than say, at the MET..
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