Required Reading: But Is It Art

Karolina Sotomayor
10 sept 2017
2 Min. de lectura

“Why is it art?”

It’s a question that people in the art world ere asked often, specially when it comes to contemporary art. It’s easy to say that a painting by Raphael or Michelangelo is art. We have been told that throughout all our lives.

What happens when you look at a vase from a pre-Columbian culture or a performance piece by Joseph Beuys? Do you question whether either of them, no matter what period they’re from, are art? The question of what art is has not yet been answered because it’s as subjective as a question can get.

So if we cannot define what art is, how do we reach an agreement? Will there ever be one? The answer is most likely not, there have and always will be disagreements about what should be considered art.

“But is it art” by Cynthia Freeland is an important read when trying to understand how to look at art when the answers are unclear and the discussions are contradictory. Freeland explores the different approaches that have and can be taken when looking at art. Context, for one, is always an important element, it can be political, social, or historical but it can also be personal to the artist.

Artifacts we see in museums like the MET can depend deeply on the context in which they were used; nonetheless, the manufacturing of these artifacts and what it meant in the evolution of human kind should also help us understand its importance. That’s the easy part. It is when we are confronted with artworks that challenge our perceptions of gender, sexuality, money, privacy, that we become skeptical of what we are looking at. The latter are elements that make up our day to day but that we often take for granted out of commodity. Contemporary art challenges those notions, it makes us think outside the box by not by giving us an obvious account of what these concepts mean. Freeland’s book reflects partially on how we analyze what contemporary art means to its viewers, to the artist, and to the society that was and is exposed to it.

In order to carry on this difficult task, Freeland provides approaches that can be taken depending on what we’re looking at. Even though it’s often about a wider social context, like feminism and artists’ responses to gender inequality, it can also be about personal struggles and coming to terms with one’s own demons, as in Tracey Emin’s work.

“But is it art” may not answer the final question. Nonetheless, it gives its readers the theoretical tools to tackle these concepts when thinking about art.