What is Art?

[jennythereader]

(Post inspired by a back episode of the Overthinking It Podcast)

How do you define art? Where do you draw the line between art and craft?

Personally, I define art as any creative work that lasts. That is, anything that people are still talking about and responding to years, decades, or even centuries after it was originally created.

A craft, on the other hand, is any work of creation that the person did with their full effort and skill.

Someone can be a craftsman* without being an artist, but it's rare for an artist to not also be a craftsman. In fact, I would suspect that many of the people that we now think of the great artists thought of themselves more as craftsmen.

What do you guys think?

(*Gender assigned because "craftsperson" looked clunky.)

Comments

[jennythe-reader.livejournal.com]

So movies and music can't be art?

[seawasp]

As I said, I don't have a definition for "art" in the sense you're using it; I don't really know what it MEANS. Thus the reversion to childhood definitions.

I think movies and music can do more than paintings and sculptures, personally, because neither of those generally do too much for me at all. But whether that's "art" versus "craft"? Way out of my intellectual ballpark. I write stuff, but I don't think it's "art", nor would I call it "craft"...