I've been contemplating a question: what is art? I've had a number of conversations and read articles on the topic. I'm interested in how often the discussion comes back to the method someone uses. As an artist working with modern technology alongside traditional artistic principles, I want to understand how other people see it. I am also challenging my own thought process. I have my preferences, but I want to remain open to a work that reaches me in a way I didn't expect.
I asked my best friend, John, what he considered art and listened to his perspective. Then I played devil's advocate with a bride who knows exactly how she wants her wedding dress to look. She has chosen the fabric, the color, where the beads belong, and how high she wants the slit. She cannot sketch it or sew it, so she takes her idea to someone who can. We call that person the designer. But the woman came with the vision, and I consider that a creative contribution before the first stitch is made.
The bride has the vision. She deserves as much credit as the designer and the person creating the pattern and sewing it. That's how I see it. The dress may change as they work together. The fabric may behave differently than expected, or a detail may need adjusting. Those decisions deserve recognition too. I don't think we have to take credit away from one person to acknowledge what another brought to the work.
Watching Joseph McRae's bridal look on Project Runway gave me another way to think about that dress. He used lavender instead of white. As I understood his explanation, he was designing for the Joseph McRae bride. I understood what he meant. We can have an idea of what a bride should wear, but the woman wearing it may want something different. A color I wouldn't choose might be exactly what makes her feel like herself. That reminds me to consider who a design is for before judging it against my own expectations.
I also brought up photography with John. Suppose a photographer walking down the street notices two people laughing together. One is giddy and expressive, and the photographer takes a series of pictures as the interaction unfolds. Later, one frame stands out. The photographer didn't create that moment; the two people did. But someone recognized something in it that was worth keeping and sharing.
Perhaps it was dusk, or the weather made the light less than ideal. The photographer might edit the selected image. Darkening part of it could draw attention to an expression. The finished photograph comes from that combination of an unplanned moment and deliberate choices. I see art in the selection and interpretation, even though the photographer didn't control everything that happened.
Editing can go further. A photographer might remove a blemish or retouch other details after a photo shoot. The finished image differs from what the camera recorded. Those changes matter when we describe what we are looking at, but an altered image can still have artistic intention. Capturing, retouching, and generating imagery are different processes. I am interested in the decisions behind each image and how we experience the result.
I feel the same curiosity when I look at a painting. I have seen so many paintings of scenery, but I still want to know what another artist saw in a particular place. Why those colors? What did they want to express? Watercolor, acrylic, or glass will each allow something different, and the material may be part of the reason the work affects me. It doesn't have to be a method I use myself for me to appreciate what someone has done with it.
With abstract work, I might look at poured or splattered paint and wonder what the artist was feeling as they made it. What did they see as the paint moved? What made them stop there? I don't need every mark explained, but I enjoy learning the story behind a work. Sometimes the image gives me enough on its own. Sometimes hearing the intention makes me return to it and notice something I had passed over.
Even a chair can make me pause because I find it beautiful. Knowing that machinery helped produce it would not take away my response to its shape or the thought behind its design. These examples involve different skills and forms of expression. They make me reluctant to decide what counts as art by method alone. I would rather give the work my attention and see what it offers.
When I say art is subjective, I mean we bring our own experiences and feelings to it. For me, that is a reason to stay curious. Another person may see something I haven't seen, or feel a connection that I don't share. I don't have to love every work to make room for that possibility. I want to appreciate the different ways people express themselves without asking them all to arrive at the same result.
A gallery will have its own program, and a collector will choose what they want to live with. I respect that. My hope is that we can make those choices without discrediting one another as artists because our methods differ. There is room to talk about the process honestly, ask questions, and disagree about the result. I want those conversations to help us understand the work rather than close us off to it.
I am proud of the images I create for Milton Wes Art. When I look at them in my home, I see beauty and feel a warmth that matters to me. Perhaps I am biased toward my work; I know the emotion and thought I put into it. But that feeling also helps me understand why someone else might care deeply about a piece that doesn't speak to me at all.
That is what I want to carry into this conversation. Art can give us beauty, bring people together, or leave us with a thought we want to talk about. I want to encourage people who have something to express. I'm interested in the ways they find to express it. When a work makes me feel something, I want to spend time with that feeling. I don't want its method to become a reason I talk myself out of appreciating it.
Related reading: Why I Created Unapologetic Faces.
Photo credit: Bence Szemerey / Pexels.
