When arts die, they turn into hobbies

[cmsmith]

>It might be nice to live in a world in which poets had the audiences of pundits. And maybe the making of carrot carnations should be an Olympic event.

I take the opposite message from all of this. It is nice to live in a world with such absurd levels of human productivity that people have the education and time for half a dozen "frivolous" hobbies. As a middle class person, I can learn carrot carving and wood turning and painting without expecting any financial gain, then stop at a free local art gallery on my way to hear some free live music at a bar.

Maybe the author thinks that the past was the time of greatness in the arts because the only people who could afford to participate in the arts were great.

[dgabriel]

There's never really been any money in poetry for people who were just published poets. "Great" poets were all subsidized by patrons, worked in odd jobs or other mediums, or died in penury (sometimes all three)! The same is true now as it was 200 years ago.

[puranjay]

People who could afford to create art in past ages could do it only if a) They had benefactors, such as wealthy patrons, and b) They were independently wealthy.

It wasn't until the printing press that artists could look to the public to pay for their artistic endeavors. Shakespeare wasn't wealthy, but he could get by thanks to patrons and a devoted paying audience. Chaucer, on the other hand, needed his patrons, while Lord Byron was independently wealthy.

[roneesh]

I appreciate the clarity of the difference between art and craft. Craft is when the audience is the practitioners. Clarifying that distinction alone was worth the read.

[robert_tweed]

I think that's a poor definition.

I generally consider art to be an expression of ideas. A craft is an expression of skill.

Further "These are arts that have no audience, other than practitioners of the art itself. Another word for a craft is a hobby." This is patently false. Perhaps the archetypal craft is basket-weaving. It's a hobby for some, but for others (especially in certain regions) it's a profession. The "audience" is anyone that wants a basket. Perhaps some of that audience can appreciate the difference between a good basket and a bad one. That does not require that they be a practitioner of basket-weaving themselves.

In fact, of the terms art and craft, the latter is the one that is reasonably well defined. Things only get fuzzy when you get into whether or not a craft is art. Not because of the fuzzy definition of a craft, but because of the fuzzy definition of art.

[thebooktocome]

The Aubrey-Maturin series, including "Master and Commander", is actually quite good and of significant literary merit.

[puranjay]

You can go deeper and apply the author's argument to literary fiction itself. "Master and Commander" is probably literary fiction's "major art", while something like Finnegan's Wake is the 'craft' of the literary fiction writers.

[jccooper]

Sure, but it's not "literary fiction". You can tell because it has a plot and I can find it in a bookstore. Literary fiction is the "art for art's sake" side of fiction writing.

[imjk]

Couldn't you argue art is pretty much a hobby for all participants except the 1% in each field that makes a living from it?

[carrotleads]

Isn't this the case for many sporting activities... even for Tennis... supposedly the 1% are the ones who make a living, the rest may well class it as a hobby.. ref : http://www.news.com.au/sport/tennis/gap-between-the-haves-an...

[zdw]

So, people printing stuff out of PLA plastic on an extrusion printer as a hobby means what, that product design as an art is going away? Will an army of hobbyists with the much improved descendants of Makerbots make employing someone like Jony Ive obsolete in 50 years?

It sure looks like that - it appears to me that Marx's "workers owning the means of production" argument for collective ownership of workplaces is being conquered by tool prices going down by successive orders of magnitude.

[jccooper]

Industry begins as a hobby, art dies as one.

[dgabriel]

I'm not sure I buy this argument. By his criterion, porn is more or less the major art.

[roneesh]

I'm not quite sure you can make that leap. While it certainly fits his criterion of a large non-practicing audience, you forget that it actually lacks art (99% of the time). It's as workman-like as accounting or perhaps more akin to a sport.

[zem]

that would require the audience to consist of people who make porn

[startupdoc_Reed]

An excellent article about what this culture considers art. I earned an MFA a few years back and spent a lot of time with the "literary crowd." I love both literary and genre writing, but I think most academics who favor literary writing do so because it is esoteric. I honestly don't think many of them actual "enjoy" these works; they just delve into them because they are not popular, and they, therefore, make the academic feel smart.

[golemotron]

An art that is out of favor is called a craft. Religions are called cults for the same reason.

[startupdoc_Reed]

I didn't know religions were called cults.

[mqsoh]

Arts don't die.

[kdazzle]

Ugh. Such an arrogant writer.

[Animats]

Next, music. "I'm in a band" - big deal. There were how many million Myspace bands?

[circlefavshape]

The "underground" music scene in most cities mostly consists of bands going to see other bands

[tgb]

Seems like the next logical thing to apply this trichotomy to is fields of study. Uh oh, looks like math is just a hobby now. But since I've convinced someone to pay me to do that hobby, I guess I don't care what label it's given.