There are two merits that I look for in art.
The first criterion is beauty. Beauty comprises content and form.
Content is the subject of the art. Anything can be content. In the past, fewer things were suitable for content—at first only history, then religion, nature, love, sex, and even the mundane became acceptable subjects for art. Content can be a story, a place, a person, an emotion, or anything at all—though some things lend themselves better to art.
Form is how you express content. At its highest level form is the whole field of art as expression; then, music, writing, visual art, etc; then, symphony or waltz, and short story or novel, and ballad or shape poem, and painting or sculpture; finally, melody, harmony, instrumentation, diction, rhyme, meter, transition, brush, composition, and so forth.
Form is not content, though historically they have been conflated. Certain forms are seen as suited to certain content. Operas are for love, ballads for epic stories, portraits for preserving faces; you could hardly paint the Iliad, and writing about music is notoriously insufficient. However, innovations like modern poetry, pop songs with lyrics, and graphic novels are breaking new ground.
Form can be well or poorly executed. Good execution is the degree to which an artist correctly uses a form or creates a new, lasting one. Thus, beauty is choosing the right content, choosing the right form for the content, and then executing the form well so as to best show to the public eye the content.
The second criterion is more elusive: artisticness, or the intention to be artistic, or one of many names.
Too much intention ruins artisticness. Especially in regards to content, and especially according to the avant-garde movements, accidents make better art—or at least humility does. If the maker of the Mona Lisa had been trying to paint one of the greatest figures in art, he might not have chosen her as a model. It’s hard to say exactly why “trying too hard” ruins even well-chosen content and well-executed form. Perhaps it stems from the common belief that art in its purest form is not work, but something one is and does. As mountains, sunsets, and oceans don’t move us on purpose, artists are supposed to be both the victim and the master of what they express; it’s supposed to be their nature. Otherwise, even if it’s well done, it doesn’t ring true, or strike the audience, or resonate. This applies to all art. If the audience sees the intention, or reads the request “Now I want you to…”, they resent it. Good art doesn’t need the audience to be in a specific frame of mind to understand it. Good art is made when the artist feels a certain way, not when they want the audience to feel a certain way. This is the popular idea of art.
I was asked for examples of good art without beauty, so I’ll turn to the ones I know. Daniel Johnston is a very poor singer, a cliché songwriter, and a comically bad lyricist. But there’s something compelling about him: purity and innocence, which one ought to seek alongside beauty. His songs are very poor, but he feels them with all his heart, and that comes through. Good critics throw him out, but millions of people like him understand what he’s trying to say, and even that he’s not a genius at exoressing it—and they identify with him, and it strikes them so much more than do the popular, the good musicians. The Shaggs, a family of musically inept girls whose father forced them to record a rock album, are in a similar position. Their expressions are the peak of naivety in almost any musician, and it resonates with some people. They certainly don’t think it’s good music (after all, The Shaggs themselves didn’t); but there’s something in it other than the traditionally beautiful side of art: the second half of art.
Sometimes I call these people my favourite artists, and sometimes Beethoven or the Beatles. I realized that they’re not running the same race. When I say that these artists are my favourite, I don’t mean to offend anyone’s sense of beauty; that’s not the criterion by which I’m judging them. Nor should anyone emulate their style—such an attempt, even if successful, would fail both beauty and artisticness. The only thing one should emulate is their attitude toward art: its subject, not its master.
Perhaps the artistic side of art doesn’t mean much to people—not enough to be taken seriously, or not enough to exceed the importance of beauty. But for no one is it totally without value.
