Photography Art that Monkeys Could Make?

Dierk Haasis · Nov 9, 2006

Asher Kelman said:
f we had a million monkeys taking pictures ...., not one would be anything like or as great as Charles' picture.

Actually many would. The experiment has been done with a another technology and a slightly different emphasis. The used paint, brushes and canvas; the emphasis was on perception of the works created, not on the production side. If you have never heard about that, almost everybody thought the works to be great art until it was disclosed chimpanzees did them.*

The greatness of a work of art does not necessarily lie in the intent of the artist [although I believe in intentional art], perception plays a large role - or Performance Art wouldn't work. Eventually nothing more is needed than declaring something art to let it be art.

Very often I hear "the uninitiated" utter, 'That's art but why, I have such a plate in my kitchen.' [for 'plate in my kitchen' put in any other everyday artefact]. My answer is always: 'But you did not put it into a museum or gallery.' Lot's of current art is singling out the banal, exalting it thereby.

Is Charles's photo art? Surely. Is it Art? Perhaps. Was the intent technical ('Let's learn about lighting.'), was it documentary ('Could you shoot my instrument for my insurance company?'), was it self-containing ('Art for art's sake.')? There's other possibilities, which only the artist itself can know. And he may tell us - but it is not necessary. The chimps have the great advantage of not being able to convey their intent by any other means than the work itself, they are [at least for now and due to our conepts and technology] unable to tell the viewers what they should see.

Unfortunately many critics and viewers nowadays ask the artist what their intent was. Even more unfortunate, many artists readily answer this.

*Before anybody starts on that, I know quite well the difference between monkeys and apes, and that Chimps are the latter not the former.

Dierk Haasis · Nov 11, 2006

Asher Kelman said:
[Well, one billion monkeys could not write one sonnet

Wrong. As should be clear from the original application of the image of monkeys typing away on typewriters for an indefinite time. The point was about probabilities and how the invariantly reach 1 when the numbers going in are high enough - like billions of monkey on billions of typewriters for a looooooooooooong time.

You put intention into your argument - which actually hurts it. The difference between a probabilistically achieved photo of a mandolin looking like a boat and the one done by Charles is his intention to allude to a boat with his mandolin, the monkeys' achievement [most likely] does not have a deeper meaning. Thus Charles' photo is a work of art - regardless of every single one of us acknowledging it.

Did I ever mention the difference between art and perception of art?

Asher Kelman · Nov 11, 2006

One billion monkeys could not write a sonnet even if they were infinitely typing intergalactic apes! Each monkey is an isolated unit. Each monkey will fail each and every minute. The probability of each and any monkey typing a sonnet is always zero.

This is no different than the probability of one man jumping ten miles. Even a billion men cannot do it. Why, because it is not in their nature.

Asher

Dierk Haasis · Nov 11, 2006

Asher, you are comparing apples and oranges [not that this is wrong in itself]. It is physically possible for a monkey to hit the keys on a typewriter in a random manner; it is physically impossible for a human being to jump 10 mile. Instead of 'monkey' set 'randomiser' if you are uncomfortable with any animal but Homo sapiens in place.

Your 'not in their nature' leads me to conclude that you still limit your thought [and worldview]; I am not talking about intention as I made clear before. It is physically and logically possible to create the exact wording of Shakespeare's Sonnet 11 ('As fast as thou shalt wane') by randomly putting together letters and words - it takes a lot of man-years but it is possible.

The question 'What is art?' only becomes interesting when we assume that some of those artefacts we consider Art have been created by such a random process. Can we still say that the cited sonnet, now created by letting loads of baboons type away for a long time, is great Art? Does, as I have claimed before, the intention of the creator of such an artefact make a difference? Or is Art really only in the eye of the beholder?

My answer to the latter is an almost unequivocal no.

PS: This has relatively little to do with the specific discussion at hand but a lot with scientific concepts turning our worldviews into some multidimensional phenomenon - if you've never read the very small catalogue of Douglas Adams' books, do it.

PPS: Personally I am not too sure apes and monkeys, perhaps other animal groups too, aren't capable of creating sonnets. Or at least potry.

Ben Lifson · Nov 11, 2006

Dierk Hassis says:

"The question 'What is art?' only becomes interesting when we assume that some of those artefacts we consider Art have been created by such a random process"

I'm stumped.

Why "only becomes"?

Why not "becomes more"?

I suspect I'd understand -- and probably wouldn't have had to ask these questions -- if you could (please) name some of those artifacts? It would help the discussion, and would help even more, I believe, if one could find online reproductions of some of the artifacts you remembered (or perhaps were even looking at reproductions of?) when you wrote the post. Surely Google Image Search, Mark Hayden's Artchive, the Artcyclopedia, the Web Gallery of Art, etc. have reproductions of some of those artifacts you either know or believe to have been created by a random process.

Thank you.

yrs,

ben

www.benlifson.com

Dierk Haasis · Nov 11, 2006

Ben, it was a real question upon a hypothetical situation - a thought experiment. It's in my sentence, 'when we assume', the follow-up sentence explains the thought experiment.

Let's assume, to get back from literature to visual arts, that the Sistine Chapel was not painted by an individual human being called Michelangelo [for our expriment it does not matter that he wasn't alone on the task] but was created by a random process or by an animal not being Homo sapiens. Is the Sistine Chapel still Art?

This thought experiment is neither far-fetched nor ivory tower. It is of utmost importance for finding delimiting factors for consciousness, helping us to understand other animals and hominins before historic times [roughly 8000 years before now]. For a long time, and many people still haven't revised their prejudice, Neanderthals were thought to be stupid cave men devoid of consciousness, complex thought processes and a sense of art. Any artefact that was found was designated either to be designed by Homo sapiens living at [roughly] the same time and place as Neanderthals found, or they were interpreted as purely coincidental non-designed artefacts.

What about the chimp paintings I cited earlier, are they Art?* Here's an article from the BBC showing some (other) chimp paintings (these are not from the experiment I cited, which I couldn't find quickly).

Here's photos I know for a fact have been created by a random process:

Let me add that I am convinced - and have written so on various accounts - that the actual content of an image [or other works of the visual arts] is not the qualifying criterion to deem something Art or not. If it were so we'd introduce personal taste again, we'd again blur the line between Art and Perception. Don't forget that I do not consider another level at the moment, that of quality, I am not writing about good or bad Art here.

[Edit]
I forgot to point you to a very interesting and entertaining book by Nicholas Humphrey, The Mind Made Flesh, which contains one essay, "Cave Art, Autism, and the Evolution of the Human Mind", bearing on our discussion.

*And I do not speak about the experiment as such, which - in my view - turns out to be a rather brilliant piece of performance art.

Dierk Haasis · Nov 11, 2006

Ben Lifson said:
Why "only becomes"?

Why not "becomes more"?

I decided to answer the semantic question in a separate post:

In my view any artefact [including non-permanent pieces of art, like performance art or Christo's works of the past 25 years] someone calls 'Art' is Art, that is, I find only the prescriptive definition valid outside of the specific discussion of my other reply to you.

Asher Kelman · Nov 11, 2006

Dierk Haasis said:
The question 'What is art?' only becomes interesting when we assume that some of those artefacts we consider Art have been created by such a random process. Can we still say that the cited sonnet, now created by letting loads of baboons type away for a long time, is great Art? Does, as I have claimed before, the intention of the creator of such an artefact make a difference? Or is Art really only in the eye of the beholder?

Let me deal with the assumptions of your argument first.

I don't assume that the artifacts, (I guess you refer to a picture taken by an ape), are random.

After all the ape might be playing or experiemting to see what this object is. So the position of the object, the camera is not random. If one trains a monkey to trip the shutter and point the camera, again, the pointing would not be random, after all the creature has a brain.

Then I don't assume that the product of such a shot would be art for a monkey. We cannot ask the monkey about it's intent. We can't ask another money about the reception. Perhaps you might device a probe to do these things in the future and then we could revisit the question of the monkeys production of art.

Now could we choose a picture from that camera and value the image? Of course! However, if we place a monkey in a space of our choosing then we have already created a concept. The monkey would be an instrument and the result, might or might not carry the effect and or meaning the monkey controller had in mind to convey.

Back to the Shakespeare sonnet. Since the Shakespeare sonnet is billions of times more complex than the results of the fraction 22/7, I'm certain that all the monkeys that have lived and will live would not compose a sonnet by design or by random chance.

A sonnet is not a snow flake!

This idea that a million monkeys could type Shakespeare if given typewriters is sheer nonsense, worth little more than any other debasing comment like calling people rats. Sure it's insulting, perhaps even to rats, but people are not rats.

Still, we use such metaphors to convey ideas of worth. We also use it in sneeky ways. In art, this is old hat! Faced with abstract art, there is often the escape to dismissal rather than exploration.

So some do that with photography too. It's not surprising. However, neither is it the end of the world. Luckily, photographic art and the art of photography and its derivations appreciate and are appreciated by enough people to have galleries and museums seek the work.

Asher

Ray West · Nov 11, 2006

sorry I'm late, have I missed the train?

The prompt to this thread, I think, was something I said elsewhere, the nub of which I've quoted below. It was not intended to start another thread, but it seems there is enough interest to do so, so

Play, the million monkey's tune to get the shakespeare. Once you've sketched it out, then apply the art skills, to either make it real, or surreal.

Sorry, seems like I'm telling you what to do, didn't mean that, if thats how it came over. I'm a great believer in playing, to learn, thats all.

I would like to give a background to the above lines -

Asher mentioned signposts, elsewhere. Must folk have similar ideas, safe havens, the route they know, what has stood them in good stead in the past. I and others probably refer to some of them as 'touch stones'. They are all around. A dictionary is one, not walking under ladders is another, food fads, whatever. They make us humans human, all those little bits of apparent random bits. When pressed to give a reason, it becomes, 'well I've done it that way before', 'its worked in the past', 'Fred said so and Fred is usually right,' etc.

I said, I'm a great believer in playing, to learn, thats all.

People don't play properly. They don't play the right games - only my opinion of course. The monkey thing - well, its a fact, in the same way as everyone is famous for 15 minutes (probably five with population increase, etc.) If you look carefully at apparent randomness, you can see things, patterns emerging. simple to demonstrate with random numbers. I see it as not saying that this million monkeys will definietly write this exact Shakespeare sonnet (or was it Bacon) in a million years. If it is a truely random selection, it may be in the first five minutes, or they may fairly quickly get something representing it. It is more likely, that given a simple switch, they could create some beautiful binary computer code (Honest, I'm not thinking - 'that's Adobe').

A cult book, from some years ago - 'Zen and the art of motorcycle maintanence' - the only bit I remember was the detail of getting the last nut undone on a cylinder head (why is it always the last one?? I know why, honest). Anyway, the guy says to relish the moment, when you're in the pits, you will find a way out, you have the opportunity to invent a new type of spanner, something never done before, appreciate the opportunity, not the pain, etc.

So, how can you start the creative thing going - well random thinking, what if, that simple line drawn, in my choices thread, its just one way. It doesn't matter, provided you _start_. Play - Now look what its unleashed.

concerning intent, allusion, etc.

A reply of mine got lost in the transfer, thread split, I think. It took a long time to compose. It illustrated another view I wanted to present. If I can find it, then you'll get another bit of diatribe...

Sorry for the interruption, please enjoy the rest of your journey. ;-) pass me the coffee....

Best wishes,

Ray

Ray West · Nov 11, 2006

Dierk,

you said -

Let me add that I am convinced - and have written so on various accounts - that the actual content of an image [or other works of the visual arts] is not the qualifying criterion to deem something Art or not.

Dead on, absolutely right, I can't see any argument against that, agreed.

Now what is it that you are saying that is contentious? I understand when you say it like above, but being ignorant of the books or whatever you quote, I'm afraid you will maybe have to translate. ( Iwish we could get this mono/ colur thing sorted, but later)

Are you saying these random photos are Art? I'm desparately trying to see where the boundaries are, then we know what we are all talking about.

Best wishes,

Ray

Ray West · Nov 11, 2006

Hi Ben,

Surely Google Image Search, Mark Hayden's Artchive, the Artcyclopedia, the Web Gallery of Art, etc. have reproductions of some of those artifacts you either know or believe to have been created by a random process.

I'm trying to catch up here, dunno what thread I'm on much of the time, these days.

I'm not answering on Dierk's behalf, just curious.

I interpret your question to Dierk as wanting examples of random art. I don't yet understand what you think Art is, I get quotes from Byron, and so on, and links that I follow to drowning teenagers being ignored, but in truth it doen't help me. We won't get a firm boundary, I realise that, for heaven's sake they even keep redefining much more solid concepts, like units of measurement, so something more 'hairy fairy' such as art is bound to be trouble.

Anyway, some random examples, but then its natural occurrences, and if it goes on randomly it will start again, I suspect - lightning, anything that might happen within the next five minutes. I saw an image someone posted, the flower in the wrong position, why, probably because randomly the seed happened to fall there. If that is not random enough, then please explain some more.

The pictures Dierk has here, the second reminds me of what I seem to randomly get with camera shake at night. It is random, (not quite so squiggly, but still that way inclined) 'cos sometimes I get it pretty well nailed. The interesting bit is deciding why that one squiggles that way, and is it 'better' than the clean shot. I wouldn't call it art in my book, others may. I guess random can be pretty randomly defined, too.

<ramble>
I wonder if it should be like high voltage switching, you have to pass an exam, be certified to switch at 11kV, and another for operating at 33kV, another at 132kV, etc.

So, we pass an exam to talk about art at the point and shoot level, the colour level, the whatever. How would it be examined? In the physics side of things, you measure, how do you score art...

</rambling>

Best wishes,

Ray

Ben Lifson · Nov 12, 2006

Sistine Chapel and Randomness

Assuming for the sake of argument that Michaelangelo's Sistine Chapel ceiling could have been created by some random process, it would still be a great work of art. Look at it. Compare it with other paintings of the same era (assuming, for the sake of argument, that they were painted intentionally by painters), compare it with Giotto's Arena Chapel (assuming for the sake of argument that there was a Giotto and that he painted the Arena Chapel intentionally), examine it with respect to what Leon Battista Alberti said about paintings, generally, in Della Pittura (c./ 1436), to what Vasari said about other Renaissance Italian painters and paintings in The Lives of the Artists; look at it in relation to Robert Campin's great altarpiece (at the Metropolitan), to Grunewald's Isenheim Altarpiece (in Germany), to Brueghel's Peasant Dance,(in Vienna) to Velasquez' Las Meninas, (In Madrid) to Poussin's Rape of the Sabine Women, to Goya's The Third of May and to the cumulative artistry of his Disasters of War, to Delacroix's Women of Algiers (one of the greatest compositions of all time: so great it haunted Picasso all his life and spurred him into making around 24 variations on it), to Ingres' portraits of women, to Courbet's Funeral at Ornans, (in Paris) to Manet's Bar at the Folies Berger, (in London) to Renoir's Afternoon of the Boating Party, to Seurat's Sunday Afternoon on the Isle of the Grande Jatte, (in Chicago) to Cezanne's still lifes and views of Mt. Ste. Victoire (in many places) to Picasso's Demoiselles d'Avignon (in New York), to Picasso's Guernica (in Spain)-- all great intentional works of art -- and you will see that the Sistine Chapel ceiling painting operates as greatly as all of these do according to the very same principles, just applied differently: In other words, that it is activated and informed by very same conditions that we see in those universally acknowledged great works of art that we know to have been painted intentionally by intentional artists; that it is composed according to the same principles of composition, that it creates its virtual space by the same means, that its lines are equally alive, swelling now into forms, dwindling now into a thinnness beyond belief and thus withstanding all challenges from adjacent forms and colors, as truly strong and living lines do (look at Rembrandt's drawings...) So we'd have thank our lucky stars that some random process had created such a grand, such a majestic, such a magisterial, such a consummate work of art.

By the way, I detest that Sistine Chapel ceiling painting. Ugh!

In fact, I detest everything that Michaelangelo ever painted, sculpted and drew.

It all makes me sick to my stomach.

Every piece of work he did makes me want to destroy the whole body of his output: smash all his statues to little pieces and shred all his paintings and drawings and. if I couold, destroy all reproductions too and erase his name from every book.

The man and his art fill me with such loathing that I can hardly hear his name mentioned in public without trembling and give me such nausea that I wonder if I shouldn't run to a men's room in case I have to retch. (I never mention him or look at reproductions of his work in private. I'm not given to self-torture.)

However, he was certainly, obviously, demonstrably one of the greatest arftists who ever lived.

He was a giant.

He had a greatness that almost goes beyond greatness, that almost defines the word "greatness" itself.

Who was better? It's hard to say.

He had lots of equals, most of whom I love passionately.

But betters? I doubt it.

A great, great painter, a great great sculptor. a great architect, a great draftsman...

The only thing he did badly was write poetry but painters usually don't write good poetry. Picasso's was terrible.

Michaelangelo: One Of The Greatest.

I just can't stand the work, that's all.

yrs

ben

www.benlifson.com

Ray West · Nov 12, 2006

Hi Ben,

Thanks for your reply, I'm assuming it was addressed to me, and that I misunderstood what you were asking. Obviously, if you are talking about a random specific instance, of a specific painting, then that may take a long time to arrive, without some rules being laid down, like perspective, colour, etc., which just happen to be pleasing to us. When it arrives, it is unlikely that there will be much left of either of us to discuss its accuracy...

I gather then, if you are saying what you think, that even though you do not like the art, the artist can be great. You think he is great, based on other people's perception, or something else, not on how you judge his art, the messenger is important, not the message, wrt to M, the artist? (assuming that, as I think you said)

So, these none random lines, etc, placed just so, the work, the effort put into it, the sweat, makes the art. Is that it, the art in your book? (not all, but part of it, maybe)

I wonder if, M was a photographer, what he would have put on the ceiling. Would he be so great, if everyone could get a copy for a few dollars? I suspect if he had used aerosol spray paint, it would have been scrubbed off.

I'm thinking that this definition of art thing relies a lot on training, in a neural net sense - show loads of what is thought to be good examples, and compare with what is thought to be bad examples, bias it in some way towards the period the assessment is being made, and who said what, how much it last sold for, how long ago the artist died, and so on. If you agree with the general concensus, you've got it right, if you can disagree in one or two areas, once you've been accepted, you've got it very right. If that is broadly so, then it leaves little way for progress, or improvement. Maybe it would work better if perhaps all art should have, not a sell by date, but a destroy by date, solve a lot of our digital storage and print issues, too. More money would go to current artists, less to art investors, etc., maybe.

Best wishes,

Ray

Sean DeMerchant · Nov 12, 2006

Dierk Haasis said:
. it is physically impossible for a human being to jump 10 mile.

Wrong. Exit a jet at 31,000 feet above the ocean and a human can easily jump 11 miles. It might be cold and the water may resemble concrete at impact, but it can be done. Which makes 10 miles a non-issue.

pragmatically,

Sean <smile>

Dierk Haasis · Nov 12, 2006

Wow, I have to answer a lot her ...

Sean, I assumed jumping up under normal gravitational conditions, or a typical wide leap contest. A parabola created by jumping down from a high altitude plane at high speed doesn't count as a jump, it's more of a fall even considering that you have to make a small jump-like step out of the plane.

Ben, although I don't agree with your personal taste about Michelangelo [but have to admit that I am neither a great fan of him, I lean much more cowards Leonardo], I agree with you on what art is (in the context of your message above and the question of intention and randomness).

Asher, you may not like it and you may - as I still read from your posts on the matter - think that Art needs a specific kind of intention (which need than be defined: what kind of intention?), but that does not change anything about the logically probability of randomly generating a great work of Art [even one that already exists].

Ray, some months back we had the exact same discussion. While in the current one I noted the two different kinds of definitions available to us [descriptive and prescriptive], I then pointed out the two different meanings of the term 'art'. To make it a bit clearer I used the capitalised word for high art, the normally spelled word for everything that is man-made, not naturally occurring, but without any direct use. The last limitation is just to leave out things like hammers, coffee-makers or socks.

Any photograph, regardless of its aesthetic merits, is art. But is it Art? No, if nobody declares it such. Yes, if somebody says it is Art. Before somebody jumps at the possibility to include individual perceptive evaluation ('That cannot be Art, it's just a holiday shot.') may I remind us that this does not matter.

One of the reasons we still discuss if photography can be Art, is the original notion of some idiots [sorry: philosophers] claiming that art [they did not differentiate like we do today] is not representational but interpretative. Well, it was a reaction to other philosophers before them, claiming that good art should represent the world objectively. The latter notion was used - very crudely - much later by the NSDAP to define what is Art and what is 'entartete Kunst' (Degenerate Art).

Regardless of the political misapprehension of one of the historic definitions, we should not use either of those exclusively. Both, representational as well as interpretative works of art can be Art.

There is another notion, which has to do with the inherent worth of a work of art, but that can only be proven by time: endurance. Only if a piece holds the imagination of many people and many generations can we say it is a Great Work of Art. In his time Shakespeare was a rather successful playwright, today we know he is Great, probably the greatest ever*. Cervantes was not a succesful writer in his period, it took some time to get his work the recognition it deserves (particularly Don Quixote). The same holds for visual artists. In the best of cases contemporaries recognise a Great Artist and this judgement holds for the future.

*Consistency, number of works, quality on every level. Some plays by other writers may be in the same league as some plays by Shakespeare but nobody can claim the same consistently good works.

Ben Lifson · Nov 12, 2006

Sistene Chapel Again

Ray,

I didn't make myself clear.

You say,

You think [Michaelangelo] is great, based on other people's perception, or something else, not on how you judge his art, the messenger is important, not the message, wrt to M, the artist? (assuming that, as I think you said)

No. The work is great because of what one can see in the work -- not just me, "one", anyone: what's there. I base my judgments only on what anyone can see at any time, on what is there today and is also there tomorrow and will be there ten or N years from now (given ordinary protection against decay). Not what is perceived but what is seen. The same things can be seen in other great works. The greatness is something that one comes to see by frequently repeated, diligent looking. I stopped reading museum wall labels and most art history and criticism a long time ago and read the little art history and criticism I do read now in order to understand better what I have already seen and felt: I've discovered some writers (e.g. Meyer Schapiro, John Berger, Susanne Langer) who can put such things into words better than I and who can explain my responses to me better than I can explain them to myself. But the judgments begin and end with me and depend only on looking at only what's on the canvas or on the photograph. This judgment is the result of years of solitary looking in museums, reading nothing, simply going from work to work and looking hard and, when I thought I saw something that was true of how a small piece of a single painting achieved its effect on me -- emotional, intellectual efffect -- I'd ask: "Is this true only of this work? Or is it true of other works by the same artist? Or of other works of the same country and period? Or of other works throughout the history of the same culture (e.g. Christian Western Europe) or of other cultures (e.g. China) or of other periods (e.g. 3rdC. BC Abysinnia or Archaic Greece)? Or of only flat objects (paintings, drawings) or also of solid objects (sculpture, vases, bas reliefs)? Or of only high art or also of decorative art (furniture, plate, decorative bronzes, reliquaries, jewelry, ritual objects)? I was lucky, I had the Metropolitan Museum of Art at my disposal 15 minutes from my door and enough savings not to have to work for a few years so when I had this question about, say, some lines in a Rembrandt drawing, I'd look at every other work in the Metropolitan Museum in order to answer it. I got fast at this, of course, could streak through the museum... In the end I saw that what made a line in a Rembrandt drawing strong was the same thing that made a line in an Abysinnian bas relief tablet strong, the same things that made the surface of a Picasso painting active to the point that it seems alive (e.g. variation of motif) was what made the surface of a Chinese vase seem alife (same thing, different application) and in the course of this survey discovered that some lines, some surfaces, some compositions, etc. were stronger, more alive than others...And that what the world had concluded to be great usually contained the strongest... But I worked from individual objects and considered the world's opinion only last. Turns out my findings and the world's coincided. I did my best to stick only with original objects rather than reproductions.

You also say

So, these none random lines, etc, placed just so, the work, the effort put into it, the sweat, makes the art. Is that it, the art in your book? (not all, but part of it, maybe)

Neither the effort nor the sweat makes the art. How do we know how much effort, how much sweat, went into anything? Labor intensive art is not automatically good because of the intense labor that went into it. And we're talking about random lines only in one hypothetically randomly created work, the Sistene Chapel ceiling painting. If this ceiling painting had indeed been created by some random process, part of the wonder, the miracle of it, even, would have been that every random line, mark and brush stroke had all the characteristics of intentionally made and placed lines, marks and brush strokes in all other great works intentionally created by intentional creative artists using not a random but a well-known intentional process called painting.

Archaeology has shown us that there were art schools in ancient Egypt (c. 2,000 BC) and the preserved artifacts that have been excavated from them show that Egyptian art students of c. 2,000 B.C. did roughly the same things as art students throughout time and up until today, figure drawings, portraits, sculpture groups, etc etc... and in styles remarkably analagous to ours; excavations in Mesopotamia have unearthed objects that predicted Cubism in 3,000 B.C.

And so on.

Photography is just a medium developed late in the history of art and whose purpose -- to its original discoverers Talbot, Bayard and Daguerre and to most of its first practitioners, who were either painters or, like Talbot, men steeped in painting and sculpture, but in any case were fascinated by the new medium -- was as a medium for making art. (Read Talbot's account of the moment of inspiration in Italy, 1833, that led to the investigations that in turn led to his first successful photograph, 1837). It is only a specific medium used by artists for the creation of beauty using the plastic means specific to it.

The first public exhibition of a body of photographic work, Paris, July 14, 1839, was of 30 some pictures by Bayard in an auction/exhibition for the benefit of vicitms of the Martinique earth quake. Bayard's pictures hung with old master drawings by Leonardo da Vinci, Andrea del Sarto, etc. and with then contemporary French masters and were reviewed by the Paris press as being some of the most startling and powerful works of art in the whole exhibition.

It was only when applied and commercial photography emerged (c. 1844) that the boundaries between photographs made by artists, as art and photographs made by commercial photographers, as commercial commodities, became blurred.

yrs

ben

www.benlifson.com

Daniel Harrison · Nov 12, 2006

Hi Dierk,
I didn't make it through all the replies but I disagree with your conclusion. Firstly the Art argument is in my opinion useless becuase the kind of art monkeys paint is, to me, not art. And yes I know that includes the human versions - throwing paint randomly on a canvas requires no skill, hence a monkey can do it(and some artists too). Great Photography requires skill and creativity, none of which an ape has. I also agree with Asher about the sonnet, it is impossible, in any practical sense.

While it is possible for a monkey to take a good photo by accident (theoretically - once they have found the shutter button but by that stage the battery might be dead) It is mostly because it is aided by human technology setting the exposure shutter speed ISO and aperture for it, I would like to see the monkey pull a photo off without it. A monkey could not get consistently good results, if indeed it ever mangaed to get any.

By some peoples definition of art, everything is art. No matter how random or ugly or distatsteful it is, no matter if it was created or not - it is all art. But I would disagree, I find art to be the opposite.

Daniel Harrison · Nov 12, 2006

Sean DeMerchant said:
Wrong. Exit a jet at 31,000 feet above the ocean and a human can easily jump 11 miles. It might be cold and the water may resemble concrete at impact, but it can be done. Which makes 10 miles a non-issue.

pragmatically,

Sean <smile>

I think the term is falling ;-)

Dierk Haasis · Nov 12, 2006

Daniel Harrison said:
I didn't make it through all the replies but I disagree with your conclusion. Firstly the Art argument is in my opinion useless becuase the kind of art monkeys paint is, to me, not art.

Begging the question.

We are trying to establish what counts as art and what not. My take is, intention does not necessarily play a role. Surely you can use another definition for you.

And yes I know that includes the human versions - throwing paint randomly on a canvas requires no skill, hence a monkey can do it(and some artists too).

Sorry but I don't think this old notion of 'art requires skill' has any meaning. At most it tells us something about what the receiver likes or not, it is a way to get in content by the backdoor. In your view lots of artists aren't creating art, hence, aren't being artists. What about Jasper Johns or Jackson Pollock? What about many Dadaism paintings?

Art has nothing per se to do with technique or skill, especially not with skill in a specific technique as you imply. I know that many people think that, German even has a most stupid adage about it ('Kunst kommt von Können', which is untranslatable since it requires German semantics and history of language; essentially it equates art with mastery). Unfortunately this uses content and perception as criterion: what I like is art, what does not appeal to me is not art.

Art and Appeal are two different things, not everything that appeals is art - this is so obvious anybody would gladly subscribe. Curiously the other way round - art need not appeal - is much harder to grasp.

Great Photography requires skill and creativity, none of which an ape has. I also agree with Asher about the sonnet, it is impossible, in any practical sense.

I challenge the notion that apes [or monkeys] do not have creativity. They do use tools and even design them; we have no way [yet] to ask an ape what he thought when creating a picture. Bad form to declare they are not creative just because they cannot defend themselves. To answer the question if an ape or monkey can produce Art by simple stating it cannot because it cannot is not very productive, is it?

I also challenge the notion that Great Photography - of which we have only talked in asides - requires skill. I have seen brilliant photos by very young children whose only skill with the camera was to point it somewhere and push the trigger. And I do see a great number of photos that show incredible skill but are far from Great. Just because one has to get around a bit more technology compared to other forms of creating visual art does not mean you really need the sill to get great photos. My favourite example is the dying soldier in the Spanish Civil War photograph by Robert Capa - judged by skill of the photographer it is no art, let alone Art or Great.

A monkey could not get consistently good results, if indeed it ever mangaed to get any.

Consistency does not play any role in judging a piece of work Art.

By some peoples definition of art, everything is art. No matter how random or ugly or distatsteful it is, no matter if it was created or not - it is all art. But I would disagree, I find art to be the opposite.

So, Art has to be beautiful, and since you don't like stretching definitions, this 'beautiful' means just what everyday use suggests?

While I have relatively little qualms with your [personal] definition of Art being almost the opposite from mine, I have some trouble to remain calm over your last sentences. You disregard completely what I and others have written, that the content of an image cannot be the criterion by which to judge it Art or not. Do you really think content matters? Or are you agreeing that content cannot be the criterion but style can? In both cases you would be hard-pressed to come up with any sensible criterion, for if you deem certain contents or styles not Art [ever heard of a movement Naive Art?], you will quickly run into problems.

Using contents or style as a criterion does not solve the problem, it just replaces the term 'taste' with more objectively sounding terms.

But what really gets me is - and I do not blame you nor do I imply that you think alike, to the contrary - that I already brought the most blatant example in history of what can happen if you use such a subjective definition. If I were Woody Allen I might deduce that it was only the bad Art Adolf Hitler the painter produced that led to his banishing Cubism, Dadaism, Expressionism and even Impressionism from German museums as Adolf Hitler the chancellor.

In my view Art is not defined by some subjective criterion as taste [incl. contents nad style], it cannot be or any discussion will be moot. I think Art poses questions - and you do not need skill or techique or technological prowess to ask a question.

Ben Lifson · Nov 12, 2006

"...throwing paint randomly..."

Daniel Harrison writes that

the kind of art monkeys paint...[which] includes the human versions - throwing paint randomly on a canvas requires no skill...,hence a monkey can do it(and some artists too).

This is certainly true.

I should like to know if Mr Harrison believes that any of those "some artists" have been recognized and, therefore, now historical twentieth-century painters, minor or major: not only those whose works are reproduced in histories of art and/or in monographs but also those whose works are preserved in public and private collections and/or are usually part of the permanent exhibitions of public and/or private museums.

If he does, I should like to know which recognized and now historical painters he believes to have painted this way, like monkeys, throwing paint randomly at canvas, and why he believes it.

In general, it would help this discussion immensely if contributors would refer to specific works of art (paintings, photographs, drawings, etc.) and artists (painters, photographers, sculptors, filmmakers, etc.)

yrs

ben

www.benlifson.com

Ben Lifson · Nov 12, 2006

Art and Accident

There's happy accident in every branch of art.

But it takes an artist to recognize an accidental event as an interesting or good (and, sometimes, great) one.

The two or three pictures one clicks off at the beginning of a roll of film, not looking through the viewfinder or, particularly, at where the lens is pointing -- made to get the exposed leader past the lens -- are sometimes visually interesting, even strong, even moving and, sometimes, all of these and radically new either to the photographer's work or to photography itself.. But to recognize which few are requires knowledge of what an interesting, strong, moving or radically new picture is.

In the mid-1930s, when making an etching by a process that required varnishing the plate, Picasso made a mistake and the varnish buckled. Picasso thought the image ruined and started scraping the varnish off. Half-way through, the remaining lines and forms suddenly reminded him of the features of the painter Rembrandt in his many self-portraits.

"It's Rembrandt!" Picasso exclaimed. And kept scraping, this time to bring the Rembrandt portrait out of the disfigured lines and the partially buckled varnish.

It was a success and led to Picasso making three more Rembrandt portraait etchings.

Coleridge'began his poem "Kubla Kahn" while high on opium When he'd reached the end of the third stanza someone knocked on the door -- something about money, an unpaid bill, I think.

When Coleridge went back to the poem his opium trance was broken and he couldn't continue writing in order to finish the poem he'd envisioned. But he knew the fragment of it that he'd written was a great poem in its own right and published it.

On the set of "To Have and Have Not" in the scene where Humphry Bogart and Lauren Bacall meet and the sparks begin, when Bacall delivered her exit line, something like 'If you have anything else to say, just whistle," she added the unscripted "You do know how to whistle, don't you?" The look on Bogart's face was so great that the director (John Houston?) kept both her unscripted line and his unscripted reaction in the final version.

These accidents, when incorporated into a work of art by the artist, who makes them relate to what else is already there and where they, in turn, determine what comes afterwards, do not annul the artistic status of the work.

yrs,

ben

www.benlifson.com

Ben Lifson · Nov 12, 2006

Jackson Pollock, Jasper Johns and skill

Dierk Haasis writes:

Sorry but I don't think this old notion of 'art requires skill' has any meaning. At most it tells us something about what the receiver likes or not, it is a way to get in content by the backdoor. In your view lots of artists aren't creating art, hence, aren't being artists. What about Jasper Johns or Jackson Pollock? What about many Dadaism paintings?

Do I read this correctly? That Dierk considers Jasper Johns and Jackson Pollock as having lacked skill? This is difficult to believe. Johns and Pollock were two of the most highly skilled artists of their generation. Surely either I am not reading this correctly or something got unclear in the writing.

yrs,

ben

www.benlifson.com

Dierk Haasis · Nov 12, 2006

Ben Lifson said:
Do I read this correctly? That Dierk considers Jasper Johns and Jackson Pollock as having lacked skill?

Nope, only in the context of what Mr Harrison wrote about throwing paint randomly at canvas - which is what both cited artists did do [for a time]. There's a second point to this, which is why I included Cubism, Expressionism, Impressionism and Dadaism in my post: many non-initiates still critique many of the works from these schools (and many works of Johns and Pollock) as 'I could have done it.' My answer to this is invariably: 'Yes, but he did.'

My criticism of Daniel's proposed view was exactly that with personal taste as a criterion we get into endless debates of who has the skills and who not. BTW, that also was the point of the chimp painting exhibition I mentioned [in this case the one I couldn't find quickly as well as Desmond Morris' test]. For personal choice taste is everything and that's alright. But it is a bad criterion for categorising.

Although I seem to be the only one putting myself out on a limb by actual examples I give you one more: Joseph Beuys. Oh man, how many people have said his works are not Art - and how often has it been said that it cannot be Art because no skill was involved? Since he's 20 years dead now, I guess, he is now canonised ...

... if not, my favourite painter van Gogh was widely accused of being a hack who does not have the skills.

Ben Lifson · Nov 12, 2006

Pollock skill and

By the time Pollock started standing on his canvases and applying paint with a mixing stick he knew so much about the behavior of paint on canvas and on paint that he was never randomly throwing paint on canvas. He was painting. You just have to stand in front of the works and look at the surface, either from close up (2 inches or so) where you see the layers and the movement and the colors beneath and on top of colors creating the feeling of very deep space and very large overlapping planes and forms, to far back where the design and composition become clear. There was never anything random about it or anything that didn't require great skill.

I take it you think Beuys had skill. You just have to look at his works to know that he did.

And so on.

new visions require new forms, said Rimbaud, or something like that

yrs

ben

www.benlifson.com

Ray West · Nov 12, 2006

Give me enough rope, and I'll hang everybody...

Hi Folks,

I think there is a broad sense of agreement here, that there are different level/types of art, within Art. (assume the art of still images, in the majority of cases.)

Can we get a more concise definition of Art? Can we say that for our purposes for this definition, we are talking about the result, not the means of getting there? Keeping it broad, not restricting, understandable by any person, I'm unsure about this, (since I thought it was true that Zulus, for example, who did not normally see straight lines in their surroundings, did not initially understand perspective drawings,) so therefore I guess we have to make some assumptions here, too, about our definition of 'any person'.

If 'Art' can't be defined, at any fundamental level, then all that follows from that situation will be personal opinion.

I think it may be a fuzzy boundary, but at the moment, it is still like trying to carry a jelly in a hair net.

I am deliberately wishing to get away from the method of creating the 'Art', as contributing to the definition, since I see that as contributing at a subset, an 'art' say.

I'm putting forward, as a rough first stab, that 'Art is....'. I was going to ask for someone else to complete it, but maybe that as far as we can go - 'Art exists'.

I would like to be included something like test of time, number of folk in agreement (uniqueness?????), but how to get in the concept of beauty, interest, and so on.

Or, maybe a possible solution is to define the parts first, the various bits of 'art', then the whole 'Art' is defined as the sum of the parts.

The definition I was using, based on the Oxford English dictionary refers to human creative skill or its application, and excludes scientific, technical or vocational skills.

I think the random thing, more or less exactly as Dierk says is correct, but the human creative skill is in the selection. If I am the selector, am I then the artist? I am also a gallery owner, selecting paintings by a local artist, am I the artist now?

Best wishes,

Ray

Daniel Harrison · Nov 12, 2006

Ben Lifson said:
Daniel Harrison writes that

the kind of art monkeys paint...[which] includes the human versions - throwing paint randomly on a canvas requires no skill...,hence a monkey can do it(and some artists too).

This is certainly true.

I should like to know if Mr Harrison believes that any of those "some artists" have been recognized and, therefore, now historical twentieth-century painters, minor or major: not only those whose works are reproduced in histories of art and/or in monographs but also those whose works are preserved in public and private collections and/or are usually part of the permanent exhibitions of public and/or private museums.

If he does, I should like to know which recognized and now historical painters he believes to have painted this way, like monkeys, throwing paint randomly at canvas, and why he believes it.

In general, it would help this discussion immensely if contributors would refer to specific works of art (paintings, photographs, drawings, etc.) and artists (painters, photographers, sculptors, filmmakers, etc.)

yrs

ben

www.benlifson.com

hi Ben,
While I agree that this is art, I do question why we hail it as good art. The Australian Governemnt spent 2 million on this in the seventies. http://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/pollock/

That is alot of money for someone to pour paint on a canvas. While I think that this man did have some purpose in his art (evident from the repititious poles) there are others with less purpose, just not as famous as yet.

I guess there is a reason I am a photographer and not a modern artsit.

Daniel Harrison · Nov 12, 2006

Dierk Haasis said:
Begging the question.

We are trying to establish what counts as art and what not. My take is, intention does not necessarily play a role. Surely you can use another definition for you.

Sorry but I don't think this old notion of 'art requires skill' has any meaning. At most it tells us something about what the receiver likes or not, it is a way to get in content by the backdoor. In your view lots of artists aren't creating art, hence, aren't being artists. What about Jasper Johns or Jackson Pollock? What about many Dadaism paintings?

Art has nothing per se to do with technique or skill, especially not with skill in a specific technique as you imply. I know that many people think that, German even has a most stupid adage about it ('Kunst kommt von Können', which is untranslatable since it requires German semantics and history of language; essentially it equates art with mastery). Unfortunately this uses content and perception as criterion: what I like is art, what does not appeal to me is not art.

Art and Appeal are two different things, not everything that appeals is art - this is so obvious anybody would gladly subscribe. Curiously the other way round - art need not appeal - is much harder to grasp.

I challenge the notion that apes [or monkeys] do not have creativity. They do use tools and even design them; we have no way [yet] to ask an ape what he thought when creating a picture. Bad form to declare they are not creative just because they cannot defend themselves. To answer the question if an ape or monkey can produce Art by simple stating it cannot because it cannot is not very productive, is it?

I also challenge the notion that Great Photography - of which we have only talked in asides - requires skill. I have seen brilliant photos by very young children whose only skill with the camera was to point it somewhere and push the trigger. And I do see a great number of photos that show incredible skill but are far from Great. Just because one has to get around a bit more technology compared to other forms of creating visual art does not mean you really need the sill to get great photos. My favourite example is the dying soldier in the Spanish Civil War photograph by Robert Capa - judged by skill of the photographer it is no art, let alone Art or Great.

Consistency does not play any role in judging a piece of work Art.

So, Art has to be beautiful, and since you don't like stretching definitions, this 'beautiful' means just what everyday use suggests?

While I have relatively little qualms with your [personal] definition of Art being almost the opposite from mine, I have some trouble to remain calm over your last sentences. You disregard completely what I and others have written, that the content of an image cannot be the criterion by which to judge it Art or not. Do you really think content matters? Or are you agreeing that content cannot be the criterion but style can? In both cases you would be hard-pressed to come up with any sensible criterion, for if you deem certain contents or styles not Art [ever heard of a movement Naive Art?], you will quickly run into problems.

Using contents or style as a criterion does not solve the problem, it just replaces the term 'taste' with more objectively sounding terms.

But what really gets me is - and I do not blame you nor do I imply that you think alike, to the contrary - that I already brought the most blatant example in history of what can happen if you use such a subjective definition. If I were Woody Allen I might deduce that it was only the bad Art Adolf Hitler the painter produced that led to his banishing Cubism, Dadaism, Expressionism and even Impressionism from German museums as Adolf Hitler the chancellor.

In my view Art is not defined by some subjective criterion as taste [incl. contents nad style], it cannot be or any discussion will be moot. I think Art poses questions - and you do not need skill or techique or technological prowess to ask a question.

Hi Dierk,
I guess almost anyting could be classified as art, so defining what is art and what isn't could be quite easy - if you made it, it is art. My personal definition comes in when talking about what I would consider good or great art. I do think that content matters, and while I do not say that art without much content is necessarily bad, infact some of it is pleasing, it often does not show great craftmanship. (some does)

Getting back to photography, which is different from painting, a soft OOF blurry picture would be considered by most to be bad. A mistake - not reaching it's intended design. Photographs are different from paintings in that it is designed to capture a moment, or moments in time. As opposed to painting which is more about what the person perceives it to be. While photography can be used for abstract art, the examples you provided are IMHO lacking, a photo of a blurry person is just that to me, can't see anyone spending money blowing it up to put on their wall.

Anyway, these are probably more my personal tastes, but as I posted earlier I do not understand why people are spending 2 million dollars on what they could do themselves, and their 6 year old could do themselves. And perhaps given enough paint and canvas - an ape could do.

I think that is enough art discussion for me

Daniel

Asher Kelman · Nov 13, 2006

Sean DeMerchant said:
Wrong. Exit a jet at 31,000 feet above the ocean and a human can easily jump 11 miles. It might be cold and the water may resemble concrete at impact, but it can be done. Which makes 10 miles a non-issue.

pragmatically,

Sean <smile>

Fall! Yes man can fall*! However, my use of the word, "Jump", in context, is meant to be "up"!

So, Dierk, my statement, that man, (on earth, at least, cannot jump [upwards] 10 miles, stands unchallenged!

*That word, "fall", is issue to me anyway. The belief that man "falls" indicates he was, perhaps, in his origins, once elevated from the position he has fallen to! That obfuscates the need for man to pull himself up from brute behavior to become all that his potential offers. To my mind, it's more useful to consider man as yet another beast, socializable, who by personal and community efforts can elevate himself to be a wonderful, tender, creative and nurturing person. Without the correct "given data" on the nature of man, we blame devils and others for matters that should and could be in our own hands.

Don Lashier · Nov 13, 2006

Asher Kelman said:
Fall! Yes man can fall*! However, my use of the word, "Jump", in context, is meant to be "up"!

So, Dierk, my statement, that man, (on earth, at least, cannot jump [upwards] 10 miles, stands unchallenged!

Well in fact a good athlete can jump on flat ground a distance of approximately 90 km. Even I can probably do a third of that (and even land in the same spot!). As with so many things, it all has to do with frame of reference.

- DL

Ben Lifson · Nov 13, 2006

Jackson Pollock in Australia

Daniel Harrison refers us to a link to Jackson Pollock's Blue Poles Number 11, in Australia and for which the Australian government paid $2 million (a long time ago) and says

"That is alot of money for someone to pour paint on a canvas. "

I've never seen Blue Poles Number 11 but I do know that it's considered one of Pollock's best paintings and that Stanley Marsh, of Amarillo, Texas (who financed Robert Smithson's Amarillo Ramp and was the "idea", if you will, behind the Cadillac Ranch) sent a talented young Texan painter to Australia to copy it for his, Marsh's, "Dynamite Museum," a Museum of acknowledged forgeries of 50-some important American paintings. Blue Poles Number 11 was the Pollock that Mr. Marsh wanted even though the young painter could have copied one of the great ones in the US for a small fraction of the cost of going to Australia and staying there the several months it took to complete the work.

However, I have seen many Jackson Pollock paintings from this same great period in his career -- and saw the Museum of Modern Art 1990s retrospective of Pollock's work -- and can tell you that Jackson Pollock never poured paint on a canvas in his life, not in the way I think Daniel Harrison implies, i.e. just poured paint on canvas.

Every abstract Pollock canvas is highly intentional from edge to edge and corner to corner.

The tension between drawing and painting (in the black paintings) is about as high as tension can get in a painting and the release, in the composition, is equally strong.

With color the tension gets more complex and the release more satisfying.

For those two or three years Pollock painted like an angel, hardly earth bound and with an ease of execution that rivals some of the greatest painters in history.

In those paintings there is grace, strength, elegance, bluntness, there are flights of fancy, plunges toward the earth and soarings back up at the last minute, there is tenderness, comedy, pathos, drama, narrative, hubris, humility, rage -- all in one painting, painting after painting.

He transferred to painting the technique of the three-ring-circus finale: the great spectacle, and carried it to heights the circus has never achieved (outside of the finale of Fellini's The Clowns). His paintings are, thus, presentational in the extreme.

In some paintings his visual counterpoint equals Bach's musical counterpoint. It also creates the same effect as Bach's, an architectural one. Bach's counterpoint (e.g. The Art of the Fugue)soars like the interior of a great cathedral, Pollock's moves forward and inward in labaryinthine intricacy but both architectural spaces* are vast and complex and defy the human soul's comprehension of them. Contemplating both, one is only brushed by the wings of a soaring being whose imagination can grasp the infinite.

Even though Pollock sometimes literally poured paint directly from the can to the canvas, he never just poured paint on canvas and in effect he never poured at all, not in the fifty or sixty pictures I saw at the Museum of Modern Art, not in a single one. In effect, he painted.

That he painted with a stirring stick, with raw paint from the can, with cigarette ash and cigarette buts, with coins and other debris from his pockets, with debris from the floor of his converted-barn studio doesn't change the situation.

By 1913 Picasso and Braque had abolished the hierarchy of materials: the notion that some materials (oil on canvas, marble, bronze, etc.) were "nobler" for making art than others.

At the same time, by gluing bits of newspaper into their paintings, they changed the meaning of the verb "to paint" and the noun "painting": these no longer exclusively meant the acts and products of a person with a paint brush, oil paints and canvas. Gluing things onto the canvas became part of painting. Artists have been pushing the boundaries back ever since.

Pollock pushed back the boundaries. But his importance is not in the fact that he painted in large part without brushes but in the fact that the work he created is good. Had it been bad he would have done nothing despite the novelty of his technique.

He painted.

By the time he painted those great abstract works he knew so much about how paint behaves that he could create whatever effects he wanted with it just by letting it drip off a stirring paddle or pour from a can in thin streams, in thick, in short bursts, in long pours, from high, from low, thrown or delicately dropped: he knew his materials inside out and all his instruments including brushes. He was a great technician, a great craftsman... He had to be in order to make those paintings as good as they are.

One can only see and, more importantly, feel all this if one stands in front of the original paintings and looks at them carefully, long and with at least as much intention as Pollock put into the painting of them. One cannot judge Blue Poles Number 11 from a small scan of a photographic reproduction received by a computer from the Internet and seen on a monitor.

yrs

ben

www.benlifson.com

*Susanne K. Langer tells us that pictures create "virtual space" and argues her case convincingly.

Photography Art that Monkeys Could Make?

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