EDITORIAL

What is art?

The word “ART” is almost everywhere in our modern culture but its definition is not really simple. One of the most difficult things when discussing art is finding a line between what is art and what is not. A basic definition of art refers to it as a product of Human creativity. It can be considered as the creation of beautiful or significant things. Art can also be a process of deliberately arranging in a way to affect senses and emotions. It encompasses a diverse range of human activities, creations and modes of expression, including music, literature, film, sculpture and paintings. Art is very important in our life. It starts from our every day life and artists try to focus on our human nature or on our thinking. From paintings to music passing by literature art comes from our experience and our thoughts and it represents a path to follow in the exploration of the culture and way of living of a society. However art is very subjective and personal.

Considering the basic definition of art, we can try to analyze some very well known authors like William Faulkner and his short story “A ROSE for Emily ” to try to present a piece of literature as art. In this short story Faulkner presented a small town and the way that some people behave in this area. Is it art? If we try to consider the way that the author presented the story, the characters of the story, we can agree that you need imagination and creativity to complete such extraordinary short story, however journalists who are writing news everyday also use imagination and creativity. They use it everyday in their work, so can we consider what they are doing as art? Who can decide what is art and what is not art? Is it the common sense? If it’s the common sense, is it really a fair judgment?

We usually consider music and paintings as most significant art whether as art itself because we see people who are doing these activities not very similar to us. We usually believe that everyone does not have the skills for being a painter or a musician. This consideration is true, but is it a fair way to ascribe what they are doing the name of “art”. Is it just because everyone cannot do it that makes it become art? In this case we would say that art is not for everyone. These artists would have some special skills that make them become kind of sacred characters. This argument is very important to consider because it attributes art to a small group of people. If this argument is so strong, what about students who are learning music and painting in our colleges? What can we say about projects we did in our Cross-cultural class?

I’m very pleased to mention our works that we have done in our cross-cultural class because some of them recur skills and imaginations to be able to interpret and to present what we feel through mosaics, photomontages or collages. Can we consider them as art? My answer is yes. I believe that they are art because the creativity is obvious in these works. However the problem of exclusivity of art is very important in this case and we realize it’s not really true because it’s a matter of choice. Everyone can be an artist if they want to, but you may need more than the will.

This possibility for everyone to be able to become an artist is sends us to another kind of art named folk art. Folk art encompasses art produced from an indigenous culture or by peasants or other laboring trades people. This kind of art is utilitarian and decorative rather than purely aesthetic. Folk art is very important. Folk art is very popular. It is the expression of our every day life with all of its objects.

ERIC ROLEX JOSEPH