Tzalam wrote:
The way I see it everything is art.
I think it's more important for and image to be artful rather called art.
One man's art is nothers trash or obsenity.
Cave drawings of early man are consdered art by us but to them it was a record of a hunt and way to tell and record a story.
Some call a black dot ona white canvas art. I guess if you can BS enough about it some people will buy it.
This argument is as old as whether photography is art.

everything being art, means nothing is art or the meaninglessness of art.

the question is who the fuck am i kidding calling my own work art with some capital A? where do i get off attempting to elevate what i do beyond what would otherwise be obvious (one way or the other) to one viewing the work?

galleries have their marketing to do. curators determine their criteria for including/excluding

if i shit on a canvas and you buy it, is it art? only if you think so, otherwise its called a good con.

its the assertion, for effect or impact, of 'art' that is pretense, not the reality of it. an art photographer is one who photographs works of art.

as to categories, like everything else, there is commercial work, editorial work and personal work. that applies to nudes as well.

Sita Mae Edwards wrote:

In an effort to legitimize the nude as a subject for art it certainly seems like a lot of effort has gone into pretending that there's nothing sexual about a naked body.

You make art when it is personal and you have something to say and you HAVE to do it. Sexuality and personality are a part of it but it goes deeper than that OR it's just a "Glamour Nude' in my opinion. And that NEED to express is a large part of why I feel so desperate here on MM with the NoShow rate. I need to get to know my subjects and they need to want to have the images for themselves as much as I want to create them. In this enviorement the model becomes a true muse and I make art. Other wise it's gesticulations aimed at making a nice imge to impress the model to get them back so MAYBE this Muse thing can occur. It was MUCH better for me whne friends and students modeled for me."models" often think of it as a job or at least in terms of how many hours of the day it will take to do the shoot. Preassures not all that condusive to making art.
Mike

Doug Lester wrote:
Hmmm, is this thread just an exercise from 'art 101, or is it serious. It seems to be one more question about "what is art".  If y9ou need to define "art", then forget it, it is not definable.

It's just a casual set of observations, discussions about a large number of images that appear on MM.


It's just me, I like to look at things that I've stopped noticing and notice them.

We can go back to talking about boob jobs.