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

[seawasp]

Which is again a major difference; to me the term "first draft" was clearly an invention of English teachers who couldn't figure out how to fill up time in their classes otherwise. I never did anything BUT one draft of any work for most of my life. So the idea of having that kind of refining, polishing, etc., wasn't ... *real* to me.

These days I may, on occasion, do a second draft, but it's only and solely in response to either (A) huge amounts of time passing between the first and second, so that the universe in my head's changed, or (B) because someone outside of me, and in a position to demand changes or to at least strongly suggest them, has pointed out things they think are problems with the text, and after looking at what they've pointed out I agree with them.

So maybe for you it IS a craft but for me it isn't...?

[nounsandverbs]

Yep, absolutely. It's different for everyone and every way is equally valid.