>The “art world” is wildly divorced from the tastes of the majority of people in society
Is this supposed to be a bad thing? Because, if that's what you're saying, then what is your idea of "art"? Something that you can buy, have promptly delivered and hanged on a wall to decorate a space and get compliments from passers-by?
Would you like if all music was something designed to be played on the radio or in malls to decorate musically the environment?
>Because, if that's what you're saying, then what is your idea of "art"? Something that you can buy, have promptly delivered and hanged on a wall to decorate a space and get compliments from passers-by?
Let's start with making a space more beautiful, and see where it takes us from here.
Definition could also include connecting with us (difficult if "divorced" from our tastes), enriching the culture, and serving a higher purpose...
>Would you like if all music was something designed to be played on the radio or in malls to decorate musically the environment?
You got it backwards. That's what modern art is currently. Only that the environment isn't a mall but a gallery or some rich person's wall.
That's why its "wildly divorced from the tastes of the majority of people in society".
Because it's either banal or high concept wankery. So like music being either musack or some avant guarde exercize for other academics to applaud. In the art world we could use some Beatles or Animal Collective or Aphex Twin or Aurora or Tame Impala or even some Taylor Swift and Luis Fonzi.
Something designed to elicit an emotional reaction from human beings. It doesn't have to be a pleasant emotional reaction, but there should be one. On that metric the modern art world has with their art, generally speaking, failed. You can't be completely divorced from people and still elicit emotional reactions. Your swings just miss.
Hilariously enough, the art world itself, continues to elicit quite strong emotional reactions, even if the art itself does not. It's possible the entirety of the art scene is actually wildly successful performance art that went entirely over my head.
>> one could uncharitably but not inaccurately characterise the modern art world as a means to arrange for low cost materials to be purchased for vast sums in tax advantageous ways.
> Is this supposed to be a bad thing? Because, if that's what you're saying, then what is your idea of "art"? Something that you can buy, have promptly delivered and hanged on a wall to decorate a space and get compliments from passers-by?
Are you disagreeing with the comment’s view of the contemporary art world’s POSIWID? The initial question seemed to disagree but the stawman you constructed concords with the parent’s pov, albeit focused on the decoration instead of the tax benefit.
In music, there are a wide variety of genres with a wide variety of sophistication. And for the most part, there are serious artists doing serious work in all genres, including pop, c&w, hiphop, etc. The most esoteric Jazz musician will have pop artists she admires.
The art world seems to be divided into impenetrable pieces that you need 10 years of education before you can understand how they "engage with the conversation", and dross that is supposedly only suitable for motel 6 bathroom walls.
Most of the art economy is money laundering with a defensive wall of sophistication put up around it. Most people know the emperor has no body paint, but it's not worth having a bunch of sophisticates sneer at you to bother voicing an opinion.
In music, the pitch-and-harmony-related content matters---that stuff we can capture in traditional sheet music---but it isn't everything, by a long shot.
You might think some pop song is hogwash, until you hear cover after cover that cannot nail it.
But I wouldn’t describe it as gatekeeping at all. It’s just complexity that isn’t immediately obvious to the layman.
Much of contemporary art is the same way. Outsiders without any knowledge may think it’s a giant scam, but there are plenty of logical reasons, historical or ideological or otherwise, for artists making the things they do and collectors buying those things. You might not like those reasons and they might not be good ones, but I’m not seeing anyone even elucidate what they are in the first place.
I think it was explained pretty well in other comments: it's gatekeeping in the name of "protecting the business" where the main business is only one thing: money laundering. Sure, there are people still buying art to display on their walls, but that's not where the big money is. There's exactly zero painters selling millions of copies of their work the way any halfway decent singer would sell, although everybody decorates their walls with something.
Is this supposed to be a bad thing? Because, if that's what you're saying, then what is your idea of "art"? Something that you can buy, have promptly delivered and hanged on a wall to decorate a space and get compliments from passers-by?
Would you like if all music was something designed to be played on the radio or in malls to decorate musically the environment?