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 Polonius wrote:
Isn't this just the same debate over high vs. low culture, fine art vs. kitsch, and craft vs. art that has been at the heart of mass pop culture for 100 years?

Fine art can be commercially appealing, and products with mass appeal can have artistic meaning, but on the whole, I can't begin to argue that the Marvel moves are anything other than highly competent craft.

I dunno.

Viewed collectively, they’re a significant artistic achievement, and have changed the face of the industry. All the more so that other studios have tried, and so far failed, to replicate the success.

I don’t think we’ve seen such since A New Hope, which revolutionised an entire genre, and brought us genuinely ground breaking special effects. I mean, possibly LotR?

Easy E wrote:

 Polonius wrote:
Isn't this just the same debate over high vs. low culture, fine art vs. kitsch, and craft vs. art that has been at the heart of mass pop culture for 100 years?

Yes..... that's what makes it interesting, especially in this snapshot in time.

Is there value in Art or are we all swamped by the Vulgar. Where is the line.... today..... between the two?

Scorsese thinks he has one......I am not sure I agree with it.

I don't think it's impossible to at least scratch out a few guidelines. I think all but the crankiest of artists would agree that making art you hope to sell does not doom you to commercial hell. I think that there are some aspects that are based in intent, and also in the feedback loop. off the top of my head:

Art: has a creative vision first, followed by a commercial vision. There's a story that wants to be told, or a message to be given. Trusts the audience to accept strange or new media, technique, themes, or other choices.
Commerce: fueled by a commercial vision. If Movie 2 did well, greenlight Movie 3! Makes choices in media, themes, and technique to reach the broadest possible audience.

Perfect example: look at the LOTR movies vs. the Hobbit movies. LOTR took risks, it was driven by the need to tell a story. the Hobbit was split into three simply to increase money, and kept it's choices as safe as possible, to the point of pandering. "Hey, you guys liked legolas, right? Well, he's here! and is that his girlfriend???"

H wrote:

 Polonius wrote:
Isn't this just the same debate over high vs. low culture, fine art vs. kitsch, and craft vs. art that has been at the heart of mass pop culture for 100 years?

Fine art can be commercially appealing, and products with mass appeal can have artistic meaning, but on the whole, I can't begin to argue that the Marvel moves are anything other than highly competent craft.

There has to be some "other aim" in there. Maybe there is, even in the lowest of "low-brow" movies. But if the direction we are headed, again, is toward big data, dataism, and the like, then the future could be fraught with products aimed ever the more solely at leveraging tendances that lead to addictive, non-thinking behaviors. I think video games, for example, are already headed down that road, unfortunately. Along with news and social media, as further examples.

Perhaps that is a bit doom-and-gloom and hopefully I am wrong and somehow, someway, we pull up out of a spiral of heading toward making things for the sake of just making money.

I don't even think there's a problem with just trying to make money. the gross out comedies of the 90s weren't exactly high art, but still were aimed at a specific audience. The movies Scorses is really taking aim at are movies aimed at the broadest possible audience. You can't afford to make a $50 million dollar move trying to find an audience. Instead you have to make $150 movies designed for maximum appeal. 25 Years ago, movies did that by being either really good, or include amazing spectacle. With CGI, spectacle is cheap, while moves are too expensive to make five hoping three break even and one hits big.

Bran Dawri wrote:Voss actually makes a better point than any other. Of past cultures and/or cultural greats, which works are best (or at all) remembered?
Is it the thoughtful, philosophical, artsy ones, or the ones with gods, demons, larger-than-life heroes, kings murdering each other, etc?

In that context, it seems to me Scorcese is more afraid that his work will be by-and-large forgotten, while the over-the-top, larger-than-life superhero movies will be what future generations remember as our cultural heritage to them. And TBH, it could be worse. Superheroes, for the most part, encourage people to try to do the right thing, and be the best person they can be by example.
It's a simple message, to be sure, but one that cannot be repeated enough.

Eh...if you look at the very earliest literature from any given culture, it will be heavy on mythology, monsters, etc. but virtually all cultures move to more complex themes very quickly. the odyssey and the Illiad are among the only works of literature from the bronze dark ages, and to this day they have incredible power and meaning.

Easy E wrote:Is there value in Art or are we all swamped by the Vulgar. Where is the line.... today..... between the two?

Scorsese thinks he has one......I am not sure I agree with it.

Again, I too disagree with Scorse's characterization of his own work, but I think you do bring up a good point. Is, or should, art be aside the vulgar? That is hard to say. In fact, I can imagine the vulgar in art. However, vulgarity for, say, titillation's sake is not art. Not to me. But then again, with an actual purpose, aside the monetary one, of something with which to raise the consciousness from and to a different level, then maybe vulgarity could be art.

That's kind of a key thing, art isn't just one thing. It's not a schematic or formal thing. It's a highly relational thing. And that will depend on how, why, when, where, with what and with who it is related though. And again, we have yet to even consider teleological points here, on just what art's "final cause" is or should be.

Bran Dawri wrote:Superheroes, for the most part, encourage people to try to do the right thing, and be the best person they can be by example.
It's a simple message, to be sure, but one that cannot be repeated enough.

Well, I really don't have much issue with most super hero movies, but some, maybe even most, do promote an notion of manichaeism and/or of fantastic moral clarity. Although I think Endgame, for example, at least tried to explore something of an alternative, even if it ends up in the same place anyway.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

 Polonius wrote:
Isn't this just the same debate over high vs. low culture, fine art vs. kitsch, and craft vs. art that has been at the heart of mass pop culture for 100 years?

Fine art can be commercially appealing, and products with mass appeal can have artistic meaning, but on the whole, I can't begin to argue that the Marvel moves are anything other than highly competent craft.

I dunno.

Viewed collectively, they’re a significant artistic achievement, and have changed the face of the industry. All the more so that other studios have tried, and so far failed, to replicate the success.

I don’t think we’ve seen such since A New Hope, which revolutionised an entire genre, and brought us genuinely ground breaking special effects. I mean, possibly LotR?

You can make this argument. A single silkscreen of a soup can is just an image, dozens of them become art. I suppose it's interesting to think about it that way.

And by my own guidelines above, the MCU does take a very big risk: assuming audiences want to follow characters through literally dozens of movies.

I'm still not sure what the message or theme of the MCU as a whole is, other than "aren't superheroes awesome?"

And the reason other studios can't replicate the MCU is that their attempts have largely sucked. I don't think anybody is saying the MCU is hacky or poorly made. But they blend character growth with action and humor, all done well, with top notch acting and visual effects. Most attempts to compete have struggled with some or even all of those factors.


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 H wrote:

Bran Dawri wrote:Superheroes, for the most part, encourage people to try to do the right thing, and be the best person they can be by example.
It's a simple message, to be sure, but one that cannot be repeated enough.

Well, I really don't have much issue with most super hero movies, but some, maybe even most, do promote an notion of manichaeism and/or of fantastic moral clarity. Although I think Endgame, for example, at least tried to explore something of an alternative, even if it ends up in the same place anyway.

By that definition, the inspirational posters in your office are art. I'm not sure we want to go down that road.

I dunno, people with power we cannot relate to solving problems that are nothing like real life problems doesn't lend itself to a really interesting message. Compare that to say, Dark Knight, which at least played with the more interesting questions of the nature of evil, the motivations for justice, etc.

 Polonius wrote:
Isn't this just the same debate over high vs. low culture, fine art vs. kitsch, and craft vs. art that has been at the heart of mass pop culture for 100 years?

Fine art can be commercially appealing, and products with mass appeal can have artistic meaning, but on the whole, I can't begin to argue that the Marvel moves are anything other than highly competent craft.

"Fine" Art is always highly subjective - especially since modern Art Crtics tend to sneer at well crafted art in favour of abstract or similar.

Cinema is subject to the same - to some (typcially Critics) popular means "inferior" regardless of any other aspect or element.

Partly responsible for my continuing dislike for and contempt for Professional Critics of any kind.

And the reason other studios can't replicate the MCU is that their attempts have largely sucked. I don't think anybody is saying the MCU is hacky or poorly made. But they blend character growth with action and humor, all done well, with top notch acting and visual effects. Most attempts to compete have struggled with some or even all of those factors.

Agreed. Casting RDJ as Tony Stark was a stroke of genius on somebody's part, and the original Iron Man caught lightning in a bottle. Then, somebody somewhere, either Feige or other executives, had the good sense to build on that formula blended with the willingness to experiment and deviate from that formula just enough to keep audiences interested. This wasn't, at inception, any sort of grand vision, after all the only reason Iron Man was made, if the gossip is to be believed, is because Marvel had signed away all the "good" heroes to other studios.

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Polonius wrote:
Isn't this just the same debate over high vs. low culture, fine art vs. kitsch, and craft vs. art that has been at the heart of mass pop culture for 100 years?

Fine art can be commercially appealing, and products with mass appeal can have artistic meaning, but on the whole, I can't begin to argue that the Marvel moves are anything other than highly competent craft.

"Fine" Art is always highly subjective - especially since modern Art Crtics tend to sneer at well crafted art in favour of abstract or similar.

Cinema is subject to the same - to some (typcially Critics) popular means "inferior" regardless of any other aspect or element.

Partly responsible for my continuing dislike for and contempt for Professional Critics of any kind.

It's sort of subjective. I think it appears subjective, but in practice there are some real patterns that emerge. For starters, the preference for the abstract over the "well crafted" already tips the scales in the "art vs. craft" discussion. If I were to paint an exact copy of the Mona Lisa, is that art? Even if the technique is perfect? No, right? Because art requires something new, something creative, something unexpected. Most importantly art should make you feel something.

A lot of people don't feel anything from abstract art, but if you give it time, it will effect you. Colors and shapes can stir emotions just as much as recognizable images.

And popular does not mean inferior inherently. virtually all film critics, even the snooty ones, love movies like the Godfather, Pulp Fiction, Silence of the Lambs, etc.

You also cannot wallpaper over the difference between commercial craft and "bad art." The MCU are good movies, they're just not art. A movie like the Boondock Saints might not be a good movie (although I enjoyed it) but I'd argue that it's art. It has a message and a theme and it's occasionally even surprising. It might be crude and poorly executed at times, but I think it raises the question of if vigilantism in the face of evil is justified. It makes you feel something, even if it is some weird combination of bloodthirsty vengeance and repulsion.

I think the main appeal of the MCU is that their characters, while fairly standardised, each have their own driving force, which whilst none are diametrically opposed does cause internal conflict,

So as well as seeing some most excellent action, there is interpersonal drama and actual teamwork.

I mean, breaking it down in Endgame to just Iron Man, Captain America and Thor against Thanos was a really, really good touch. We see them fight together, properly for the first time since Age of Ultron. That’s a good pay off themeatically.

That it takes everyone, big and small, major and minor characters, to actually defeat Thanos? Golden.

And people can watch just Infinity War and Endgame without needing to see the others. Yes the experience is probably improved by watching them all in order (which is what I did) only more impressive.

I’ll use a familiar comparison. Terry Pratchett’s Discworld. It spans 41 novels, and you can start with any of them. Each is a self contained story which doesn’t require the others. But read in release order, the world becomes all the richer.

And like the MCU, many literary bigwigs remain incredibly snooty about it, despite them being objectively good books.

That doesn’t mean one is guaranteed to like them. But I can’t imagine all but the disingenuous saying they’re poor efforts.

Polonius wrote:I don't even think there's a problem with just trying to make money. the gross out comedies of the 90s weren't exactly high art, but still were aimed at a specific audience. The movies Scorses is really taking aim at are movies aimed at the broadest possible audience. You can't afford to make a $50 million dollar move trying to find an audience. Instead you have to make $150 movies designed for maximum appeal. 25 Years ago, movies did that by being either really good, or include amazing spectacle. With CGI, spectacle is cheap, while moves are too expensive to make five hoping three break even and one hits big.

The issue is not "making money" at all. No one, realistically, is upset, for example, that Perdue Pharma makes money. What they would be concerned with is that they leveraged "bad science" with pushed marketing and ended up harming people, where our notion of pharmaceuticals is to help people, not harm them. That is a clear teleological aim we have for that industry. The thing is, what is the teleological aim of the entertainment industry? If it is only entertainment at any cost, then why not just screen XXX rated movies in every theater? Dramatic example, but I frame the edge-case to show the issue inherent to the paradigm. Again, if making money is the only end of, say, the food industry, why not place addictive chemicals or drugs into your brand of food so that you can sell more?

I think, also, here we have what Scorsese critiques in his notion of not taking "risk." Spectacle is not risky today. Isn't that what the notion of the "summer blockbuster" is predicated on. I'd consider something like Arrival as more risky. It does have some elements of "spectacle" in there, but more subdued in scope. It has non-linear time and is more nuanced in the sense of it's narrative structure. Does it mean that Arrival is a "better movie" than Transformers? I don't know. But I know which I like more, which I'd rather watch and which I think has more "value" in what it is "saying" or trying to "say."

Polonius wrote:And by my own guidelines above, the MCU does take a very big risk: assuming audiences want to follow characters through literally dozens of movies.

I'm still not sure what the message or theme of the MCU as a whole is, other than "aren't superheroes awesome?"

And the reason other studios can't replicate the MCU is that their attempts have largely sucked. I don't think anybody is saying the MCU is hacky or poorly made. But they blend character growth with action and humor, all done well, with top notch acting and visual effects. Most attempts to compete have struggled with some or even all of those factors.

Well, again, I don't think this is really "risky" at all now. The data is in and the water is safe. Again, if you go up and read some of the quotes I had, you can imagine why it is not risky at all to follow characters, because people build identities with and through these sorts of narratives.

I am not here to say "Scorsese good, Marvel bad." Rather, I think his point, even in being misguided in part, does have some merit, even if he misapplies it to his own self-serving end.

A huge factor of the MCUs success is simply that its movies aren't really dependent on one another. There's no huge overriding story that drives them and they're mostly free to be about whatever they want. In many ways Infinity War and in particularly Endgame are more about the movies that came before it than those movies are about telling the story of Endgame.

Asking what the MCU as a whole is about kind of misses the point. While I think most of the movies are about ideas they don't really explore in depth and too many of them are about putting aside hubris to use your gifts for others, the best of them have more to say. Of them, I think Black Panther does the best job sneaking its message into the template with its hero and villain acting as literal avatars for their respective cultures. It's the movie most about something, even if I lot of people seemed to have lost the point by focusing on the physical, color coded action at the end.

 Azreal13 wrote:

And the reason other studios can't replicate the MCU is that their attempts have largely sucked. I don't think anybody is saying the MCU is hacky or poorly made. But they blend character growth with action and humor, all done well, with top notch acting and visual effects. Most attempts to compete have struggled with some or even all of those factors.

Agreed. Casting RDJ as Tony Stark was a stroke of genius on somebody's part, and the original Iron Man caught lightning in a bottle. Then, somebody somewhere, either Feige or other executives, had the good sense to build on that formula blended with the willingness to experiment and deviate from that formula just enough to keep audiences interested. This wasn't, at inception, any sort of grand vision, after all the only reason Iron Man was made, if the gossip is to be believed, is because Marvel had signed away all the "good" heroes to other studios.

they also struck gold with the relative unknowns. Evans, Hemsworth, and Pratt all went from promising young actors to major stars. The MCU got incredibly lucky with it's stars rising to the occasion, and then brining in some ringers like RDJ, Sam Jackson, etc. Compare the MCU batting average with the new Star Wars movies: their new stars have ranges from "fine" to "okay." Solo would have gone from pretty good to really good if somebody with Chris Pratt's talent had the role.

I like reading the epidermic reaction that some people will have to denigration of the Marvel movies they love .
I find Marvel movies quite annoying. It's like all already told stories about already overused heroes. I mean basically all characters have been repeated over for 30 years at least.
Also hate corporate ownership of the characters/universe. And fans do, even if they won't admit it, every time the corporate gives the characters to an artist they don't like lol.

 H wrote:
Well, again, I don't think this is really "risky" at all now. The data is in and the water is safe. Again, if you go up and read some of the quotes I had, you can imagine why it is not risky at all to follow characters, because people build identities with and through these sorts of narratives.

I am not here to say "Scorsese good, Marvel bad." Rather, I think his point, even in being misguided in part, does have some merit, even if he misapplies it to his own self-serving end.

I think by Infinity Wars/Endagme, the only risk was if the movie was well built enough to satisfy the demand. I think the first Avengers was a bit of a risk, in that it didn't really introduce all of it's characters. And while they're not hard to figure out, they're also not as completely archtypical as batman/superman.

 H wrote:

 Polonius wrote:
Isn't this just the same debate over high vs. low culture, fine art vs. kitsch, and craft vs. art that has been at the heart of mass pop culture for 100 years?

Fine art can be commercially appealing, and products with mass appeal can have artistic meaning, but on the whole, I can't begin to argue that the Marvel moves are anything other than highly competent craft.

In a sense, yes, it is. Given that we could spend 100 years talking about it would seem to give credence to the notion that it isn't simple, belies the idea that it doesn't matter, or that we shouldn't care about a possible distinction though.

I don't agree. Numbers don't indicate quality - isn't that one of the core arguments deployed(more accurately misappropriated) by the "art is art" crowd? - nor change the nature of the thing, and the thing is the same as it always has been; snobbery. It's about taking works that fit your(general, nonspecific) personal taste and elevating them(and thus, yourself) above those things enjoyed by the common masses of the out-group created by your subjective and arbitrary distinction. The fact there are a lot of snobs and the idea of arbitrarily defining some things as "art" and thus rarefied & valuable, and other things as "mere craft" and thus perhaps worthy of grudging technical respect at most refuses to just die off as it so plainly should, doesn't lend any kind of authority to the idea, because the reason it continues has nothing to do with its quality or validity and everything to do with primitive primate social dynamics.

Indeed the fact that the core assertion has remained while all of the things the assertion is made about have changed over the years is itself fine evidence of how nonsense it is; once, technical skill was required for something to be considered "art", then it wasn't, and now technical skill is practically derided - someone painting in the style of an old master will receive at best a patronising head-pat from the "art community", while someone creating an "installation" of, I don't know, red ping-pong balls floating in different sized jars of piss arranged haphazardly around a room painted in stark white will be lauded as a genius. The same is true of every other quality of what is now considered to be "true art" - it's fashion, and nothing more.

Which is fine. But when people are snooty and snobbish, banging on about say, Citizen Kane instead, or worse, French Art House nonsense, it becomes less about whether or not the MCU are good films, and more about their own ego.

People can dislike the MCU, and not be in the slightest bit snobby or up themselves.

People can like the MCU and still prefer French Art House.

It’s just when some corners make it a binary thing that it irks.

 Polonius wrote:
By that definition, the inspirational posters in your office are art. I'm not sure we want to go down that road.

I dunno, people with power we cannot relate to solving problems that are nothing like real life problems doesn't lend itself to a really interesting message. Compare that to say, Dark Knight, which at least played with the more interesting questions of the nature of evil, the motivations for justice, etc.

Well, just being art doesn't make it good art. In fact, art no one is interested in or cares about really fails the entire point of the art itself. So, while the "inspirational posters" are trying to fill the role of art, they are necessary failures, being too explicit and commoditized, likely trivializing and commercializing to some degrees the thing they want to promote. Likely a whole-cloth failure at every level. But that doesn't preclude them actually being art, or rather, maybe we should say being objects attempting to fill the role of art.

I mean, I like both Endgame and Dark Knight as entertainment. But each one definitely has "issues," no doubt. I think the questions there are really a whole other can of worms though and my posts are already long, nonsensical and meandering enough as it is.

There’s also what makes the MCU crowd heroes.

It’s not their super powers or skills. It’s that they’re all somewhat flawed beings trying to make our world a better place. That helps make them relatable.

Compare to Justice League (I know it has its fans, I’m not seeking to be personal here). They’re all pretty two dimensional. And worst, it all just falls to Superman to do everything everyone else was trying to do, on his own, when he finally shows up.

That is not an indictment of them as D.C. characters - just the execution of that particular movie. I genuinely couldn’t tell you more about that film, because there are two things I actually remember. Supes turning up at the end and saving the day, and Gal Gadot’s ‘Kal El’, a line I felt was delivered incredibly poorly. (Other opinions are of course available and no more or less valid)

Yodhrin wrote:Indeed the fact that the core assertion has remained while all of the things the assertion is made about have changed over the years is itself fine evidence of how nonsense it is; once, technical skill was required for something to be considered "art", then it wasn't, and now technical skill is practically derided - someone painting in the style of an old master will receive at best a patronising head-pat from the "art community", while someone creating an "installation" of, I don't know, red ping-pong balls floating in different sized jars of piss arranged haphazardly around a room painted in stark white will be lauded as a genius. The same is true of every other quality of what is now considered to be "true art" - it's fashion, and nothing more.

Well, here you have one aspect of "modern" art, is it's self-serving nature. Art about art. Also, notions of technical skill fall away as technical skill become more of commodities. In 1400, almost no one had the technological, economic ability to paint technical works. So to do so was "art." Now, I can likely go to school and come out a reasonable representational, technical painter, and I am an no-talent idiot.

So, art must take on new forms, because society, technology, process, all have new forms. I mean, you might not like abstraction and that's fine, but it doesn't make it "not art" in the same way the modern artists don't like representational art, to your very point, does not make it "not art."

Polonius wrote:I think by Infinity Wars/Endagme, the only risk was if the movie was well built enough to satisfy the demand. I think the first Avengers was a bit of a risk, in that it didn't really introduce all of it's characters. And while they're not hard to figure out, they're also not as completely archtypical as batman/superman.

Sure, I'll buy that. But there was, I think we can admit, an ever closing air of risk at all as it goes on.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:It’s just when some corners make it a binary thing that it irks.

Right, well, if your definition of art includes a valuation in the label, yeah, that is a nonsense position as far as I am concerned. Art is only "better" than a craft, if we consider what art's teleological aim is, as opposed to craft. Consider a dramatic example: art made to have you think about sexuality vs. the craft of simply showing sex acts. But, consider the opposite, art made to think about the nature of a table, vs the craft of actually making a table. Vastly different end points to all of those. And no one is inherently "better" it depends on what you want/need out of it. It makes little sense to denigrate art to craft, or craft to art.

I’m.....im talking about movies?

Scorses against the MCU.

Snobbish Critics against Hollywood fare.

And how one is free to enjoy both without compromise, and the only problem being enforced binary views?


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For example, me and Horror movies.

I massively enjoy my gorefests, slasher flicks and monster movies, with a particularly fondness for low budget Italian Zombie movies.

Yet I also very much appreciate well made psychological horror films.

Psychological horror films are probably better made. You can shock and scare with copious amounts of blood and gut churning eviscerations. But to build atmosphere, and to play the audiences nerves and paranoia like a fiddle is a far harder achievement.

Now, I can tell when something is genuinely superior (original Ring compared to the remake The Ring etc), but can still enjoy both.

Indeed, the only horror I’m not keen on would be found footage. Probably because I saw Blair Witch and thought it was pants.

Doesn’t mean I’m right about any of it, just that I’m able to enjoy different sub genres equally.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I’m.....im talking about movies?

Scorses against the MCU.

Snobbish Critics against Hollywood fare.

And how one is free to enjoy both without compromise, and the only problem being enforced binary views?

Nobody is saying you can't. Nobody is even saying that the MCU are bad, and shouldn't be made. the concern is only that as movies have better and better technical crafting, there is less and less space in the theaters for more niche, artistic fare that challenges the audience or makes it think.


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let's look at a notorious example: The Room. This is generally considered to be one of the worst movies ever made, but it's undeniably an attempt at art. It's bad art, but it's art. Nobody told the makers how to make it more commercial. It was, good or bad, clearly the vision of the creator.

Gun to my head, i'd rather watch it than, say, the Lone Ranger reboot.

For clarity, wasn’t referring to any person in this thread.

Just the snobbish critics out there, who’ll rubbish certain movies just because they’re made by big Hollywood studios.

 Polonius wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Polonius wrote:
Isn't this just the same debate over high vs. low culture, fine art vs. kitsch, and craft vs. art that has been at the heart of mass pop culture for 100 years?

Fine art can be commercially appealing, and products with mass appeal can have artistic meaning, but on the whole, I can't begin to argue that the Marvel moves are anything other than highly competent craft.

"Fine" Art is always highly subjective - especially since modern Art Crtics tend to sneer at well crafted art in favour of abstract or similar.

Cinema is subject to the same - to some (typcially Critics) popular means "inferior" regardless of any other aspect or element.

Partly responsible for my continuing dislike for and contempt for Professional Critics of any kind.

It's sort of subjective. I think it appears subjective, but in practice there are some real patterns that emerge. For starters, the preference for the abstract over the "well crafted" already tips the scales in the "art vs. craft" discussion. If I were to paint an exact copy of the Mona Lisa, is that art? Even if the technique is perfect? No, right? Because art requires something new, something creative, something unexpected. Most importantly art should make you feel something.

A lot of people don't feel anything from abstract art, but if you give it time, it will effect you. Colors and shapes can stir emotions just as much as recognizable images.

And popular does not mean inferior inherently. virtually all film critics, even the snooty ones, love movies like the Godfather, Pulp Fiction, Silence of the Lambs, etc.

You also cannot wallpaper over the difference between commercial craft and "bad art." The MCU are good movies, they're just not art. A movie like the Boondock Saints might not be a good movie (although I enjoyed it) but I'd argue that it's art. It has a message and a theme and it's occasionally even surprising. It might be crude and poorly executed at times, but I think it raises the question of if vigilantism in the face of evil is justified. It makes you feel something, even if it is some weird combination of bloodthirsty vengeance and repulsion.

by that reasoning if you create a perfect copy and it "effects me" then it is art? No matter if its a copy or not? Sorry I work with original artworks (of many and varied forms from tapestries to paintings, porcelain to weapons from the 15th- 18 century - some I like, some I don't - some effect some don't but i can usually see the effort, craft and ideas behind it regardless of whether i like or they effect me. I cna appreciate its well done etc..

Often in abstract work there is - at least to me, nothing more than the ability to talk it up - no skill, no meaning and no effort - other than self promotion - thats just my opinion and woorth nothing more than anyone else but if it does not effect me - there is nothing else , no skill or technique other than ability to communciate and self promote effectively.

I can't agree that MCU filsm are not art - all movie making is art - some are percieved by us as individuals as "good" or bad" - its all subjective. Some people can claim (often dubiously or with zero grounding with regards to Film Critics) that they know better and they should be bale to tell you and me waht is and is not art - thats arrogant and IMO false.

MCU movies to me can be surprising, make me feel and have messages - maybe you don't feel or see them in that way - so they are somehow not art to you but I am unclear how that makes them not art to everyone else unless you feel that what you determine is or is not art is somehow better than others - if so - why do you feel that?

 H wrote:

Yodhrin wrote:Indeed the fact that the core assertion has remained while all of the things the assertion is made about have changed over the years is itself fine evidence of how nonsense it is; once, technical skill was required for something to be considered "art", then it wasn't, and now technical skill is practically derided - someone painting in the style of an old master will receive at best a patronising head-pat from the "art community", while someone creating an "installation" of, I don't know, red ping-pong balls floating in different sized jars of piss arranged haphazardly around a room painted in stark white will be lauded as a genius. The same is true of every other quality of what is now considered to be "true art" - it's fashion, and nothing more.

Well, here you have one aspect of "modern" art, is it's self-serving nature. Art about art. Also, notions of technical skill fall away as technical skill become more of commodities. In 1400, almost no one had the technological, economic ability to paint technical works. So to do so was "art." Now, I can likely go to school and come out a reasonable representational, technical painter, and I am an no-talent idiot.

So, art must take on new forms, because society, technology, process, all have new forms. I mean, you might not like abstraction and that's fine, but it doesn't make it "not art" in the same way the modern artists don't like representational art, to your very point, does not make it "not art."

You've entirely missed my point.

Either a definition of art exists which can encompass both the rampantly abstract installation I think is garbage and the great works of renowned historical painters, in which case that definition must necessarily also be broad enough to encompass all of film, even the trashy stuff, even the nakedly commercial stuff.

Or art is defined in a very narrow way and that definition is necessarily either wholly subjective in an individual sense, or else does exist beyond individual subjectivity but also changes over time based on nothing more substantial than mere trends and fashions.

So the term is either so broad as to be meaningless as any kind of judgement of quality or value, or very specific but so loaded down in subjective individual and cultural and class biases as to be worthless except as an indication that any given person who invokes it as a judgement of quality or value is a pretentious twonk.

So to summarise, my point is that Scorsese is a pretentious twonk.

 Yodhrin wrote:
You've entirely missed my point.

Either a definition of art exists which can encompass both the rampantly abstract installation I think is garbage and the great works of renowned historical painters, in which case that definition must necessarily also be broad enough to encompass all of film, even the trashy stuff, even the nakedly commercial stuff.

Or art is defined in a very narrow way and that definition is necessarily either wholly subjective in an individual sense, or else does exist beyond individual subjectivity but also changes over time based on nothing more substantial than mere trends and fashions.

So the term is either so broad as to be meaningless as any kind of judgement of quality or value, or very specific but so loaded down in subjective individual and cultural and class biases as to be worthless except as an indication that any given person who invokes it as a judgement of quality or value is a pretentious twonk.

So to summarise, my point is that Scorsese is a pretentious twonk.

Well, I do pretty much agree with your final point.

However, I don't agree that art needs a very narrow, or overly broad "definition" to be. Consider, art as a manner of relation between an artist, something created, and a viewer. In other words, art is not the thing created, art is the process of conveyance of concept through something like aesthetics. But note, that the negation is always on the table. Subversion is always an option as well.

To say that art is wholly subjective, I think, fails to grasp the relational nature of it. Art does not exist solely as Subject, it is also expressly Object. Another way to consider it would be that art is the mediation of Subject [Artist] relating to Subject [Observer] via something like Object [Art itself]. Considering this, yes, anything could be art. In fact, that is part of the nature of Abstraction, the sort of revelation that art is not fixed, content and form are aesthetics, but art is meta-aesthetic. Frankly, art could even be considered as the meta-thinking of thinking abut thinking.

So, if something is overtly made in the issuance of commercial gain, it might well be art, if in that case the point is to convey, from artist to viewer via that commercialism, something outside that commercialism. Here again, we need to consider the teleology. If the final cause is the make money, we don't really, in my opinion, have art, we have what is expressly a commodity. If I give you a story, or a painting, or a movie, what's my aim? If my aim is to explicitly make money, am I am artist, or am I a worker in manufacturing? What is the difference, if not teleological?

Many things are creative and sort of quasi-artistic now-a-days, I think, but that doesn't make art, as such. But hey, what do I know, I'm not an art theorist. Or even a reasonably intelligent person. That's just my off-the-cuff notion.

Breaking News: Old man says the good old days were better. Kids today don’t know what’s good. Insists that people *clearly* on the sidewalk get off his lawn. More on this developing story at 11.

The money was always put on good bets. Scorsesee’s first films didn’t have the bankroll his later projects did. That hasn’t changed.

It’s like trying to define the difference between a tool and an implement. Or the difference between a vendor and a purveyor, or a peeping Tom and a Voyeur.

When it comes to telling people why you got arrested, being a “Voyeur” sounds more classy. Same deal with movies and cinema. They’re the same thing, but one sounds mundane and the other sounds classy.

 greatbigtree wrote:
Breaking News: Old man says the good old days were better. Kids today don’t know what’s good. Insists that people *clearly* on the sidewalk get off his lawn. More on this developing story at 11.

The money was always put on good bets. Scorsesee’s first films didn’t have the bankroll his later projects did. That hasn’t changed.

It’s like trying to define the difference between a tool and an implement. Or the difference between a vendor and a purveyor, or a peeping Tom and a Voyeur.

When it comes to telling people why you got arrested, being a “Voyeur” sounds more classy. Same deal with movies and cinema. They’re the same thing, but one sounds mundane and the other sounds classy.

I'm stealing that one; the difference between art and craft is much akin to the difference between voyeur and peeping tom - one of them makes you sound better when you do something terrible

Yup, that works.

I have always preferred this definition of art.

Anything made in any medium with the intent of evoking an emotional response.

Kid does a finger painting for it's mom?

Art. Complete crap technique and a gak medium but it's still art.

Resident Evil?

Art. It was intended to scare people. Was it successful? Could it have been better?

The Marvel movies might not always be art but some of them certainly are. Winter Soldier and Civil War ask questions the audience is supposed to think about. People who didn't know about the snap from the comics lost their gak at the end of infinity war. The build up, the music (or complete lack there of) as hero after hero is turned to dust. That evoked the emotional response the creators wanted. How is that not well crafted art?

High art doesn't exist. It's just the pretentious and the elitist staking claim to the right to deem things worthy of being art.

 Yodhrin wrote:

 greatbigtree wrote:
Breaking News: Old man says the good old days were better. Kids today don’t know what’s good. Insists that people *clearly* on the sidewalk get off his lawn. More on this developing story at 11.

The money was always put on good bets. Scorsesee’s first films didn’t have the bankroll his later projects did. That hasn’t changed.

It’s like trying to define the difference between a tool and an implement. Or the difference between a vendor and a purveyor, or a peeping Tom and a Voyeur.

When it comes to telling people why you got arrested, being a “Voyeur” sounds more classy. Same deal with movies and cinema. They’re the same thing, but one sounds mundane and the other sounds classy.

I'm stealing that one; the difference between art and craft is much akin to the difference between voyeur and peeping tom - one of them makes you sound better when you do something terrible

Like the difference between a fresh baked loaf and a fresh baked artisan loaf is about £1?

I feel that the important part is the bit about the elimination of risk. Almost everything seems to be either remakes, sequels or adaptations of best selling books. Scorsese himself is quite guilty of it too.

I mean, I get the strategy. Whan a book have seduced thousands of people, you got to be sure that you got a good story. But god, can't we have new stories ?