I’m noticing a big divide in opinion about art thanks to NPR. It seems like there are people who have a sense of humor and whimsy about art, and people who don’t.
A few weeks ago, I posted about a giant traffic barrel statue that a college student made. In the story’s comments, there’s a sharp divide between people who think that the barrel monster is awesome and people who think that the artist should be prosecuted for stealing the barrels (and, previously, a boat).
Today, there was a story about real people filling in for a missing statue in Trafalgar Square around the clock for 100 days. While the people are up on the pedestal, they can do whatever they please. To me, this sounds like a really awesome, creative and democratic way to get people involved in art. I wish we had some empty statue bases around here.
But, not everyone agrees – a visiting Canadian quoted in the story thinks it’s a bit of a joke, not at all art. The two comments on the story are divided – one person thinks it’s a cool idea (even if there’s no clear “artist”) and the other wants to know why this is even newsworthy.
How do you define art? Can you define art? Do you think all public radio listeners (or hell, all people) fall into one of two camps when it comes to art?
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