I haven't read that piece by Lewis - but you've also reminded me that I must finally read Gadamer, who, as I understand it, pays attention to the dialogue between author and reader, especially to what's within the reader's "horizon" of meaning.
I think drawing's useful in many ways - it's certainly basic to how I think, but I'm not prescriptive about it. Although I don't know anything about their particular methods, it seems credible to me that, for instance, Rachel Whiteread, Cindy Sherman, Dan Flavin, Richard Wilson or Damien Hirst might be able to produce many of their famous works without drawing.
Paying attention to hand skills and their importance for various artworks I think would be really useful - it would at least help to sharpen up discussion of what constitutes "skilled hand work" and what does not - whether the hand might really be considered the "cutting edge of the mind" and so on, but there are pretty severe battle lines drawn at the moment between Art and Crafts/craftsmanship, which I think impedes such a discussion.
...but I've generally shied away from any consideration of art as art over the past decade; I'm really only concerned with art, or cultural production in general, as social communication these days. It gets me out of having to worry about whether a particular work is "any good."
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zvi and
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Date: 2009-06-20 03:59 pm (UTC)I think drawing's useful in many ways - it's certainly basic to how I think, but I'm not prescriptive about it. Although I don't know anything about their particular methods, it seems credible to me that, for instance, Rachel Whiteread, Cindy Sherman, Dan Flavin, Richard Wilson or Damien Hirst might be able to produce many of their famous works without drawing.
Paying attention to hand skills and their importance for various artworks I think would be really useful - it would at least help to sharpen up discussion of what constitutes "skilled hand work" and what does not - whether the hand might really be considered the "cutting edge of the mind" and so on, but there are pretty severe battle lines drawn at the moment between Art and Crafts/craftsmanship, which I think impedes such a discussion.
...but I've generally shied away from any consideration of art as art over the past decade; I'm really only concerned with art, or cultural production in general, as social communication these days. It gets me out of having to worry about whether a particular work is "any good."