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/lit/ - Literature

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5274076 No.5274076[DELETED]  [Reply] [Original]

Do you think Plato was right when he said all Art is a distraction from truth?

>> No.5274079

No. Art is truth.

>> No.5274082

Did he say that?

>> No.5274087

I can't read him. Holy fuck

>> No.5274088

>>5274076
Yes
>>5274079
Art is a representation of a secondhand truth.

>> No.5274089

>>5274076
No but entertainment is.>>5274079 I concur!

>> No.5274090

>>5274082
“The art of representation is...a long way removed from truth, and it is able to reproduce everything because it has little grasp of anything, and that little is of a mere phenomenal appearance. ..a painter can paint a portrait of a shoemaker or a carpenter ...without understanding any of their crafts; yet, if he is skilful enough, his portrait of a carpenter may, at a distance, deceive children or simple people into thinking it is a real carpenter”

>> No.5274093

>>5274082
For Plato, the Idea is the most true; the object is a copy of the Idea; the object has many appearances that we can perceive; the artist then creates an image (representation/imitation) based upon the mere appearance of the object.
So: Idea—object/appearance—image of object (“thrice removed from truth”). The artist fashions mere images (appearances of appearances) that are far removed from the truth (the Idea).

>> No.5274094

>>5274088
Art is the recording of a firsthand truth transforming it into a secondhand truth.

But you can experience a firsthand truth of your own while beholding art.

>> No.5274097

>>5274094
see>>5274093

>> No.5274098

>>5274097
Yeah, I disagree with Plato. I think his forms are stupid.

>> No.5274102

>>5274098
why

>> No.5274103
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5274103

>>5274088

He said art is just imitation, mimesis. He regards art as being caused by authentic objects of beauty and lacking in sense because of that. This is made especially bad for him because art doesn't necessarily direct further inquiry into the origin of the form (in this he pretty much laid the foundations for Baudrillard's Simulacra and Simulation, but this is a digression).

>> No.5274104

>>5274076
damn i was thinking this the other day. i think this is quite true for me

>> No.5274109

It is true.

But it is up to the individual to decide whether that is good or not.

Because what is truth? Do we benefit from truth?

>> No.5274111

>>5274093
>>5274103

I think we're in agreement and I think you expressed the idea more clearly.

>> No.5274123

>>5274102
Because there is no transcendent truth.

>> No.5274131

>>5274123

How do you learn then? Is it all inference?

>> No.5274133

>>5274109
>Do we benefit from truth?

are you serious?
living in a lie is never good, no matter how pleasant it may be.

>> No.5274137

Of course it is. Truth is that nothing has any meaning and there is no reason to keep living. After choosing to live anyway art is something we can use to distract ourselves until we die

>> No.5274148

>>5274133
Then why consume Art?

>> No.5274159

>>5274131
How else would you learn? Recalling things from a magical truth realm like Plato supposes? I read the Meno. It was stupid.

>> No.5274177

>>5274076
Art is a stylistic expression, usually with the desire for communication of some sort (not always, sometimes it's more cathartic). More importantly, though, to what truth was Plato referring? An objective truth outside of perception? Many would argue that that would be impossible to know, and some might argue that it does not exist, and others might argue that the only truth that matters is that which you are able to perceive.

>> No.5274213

>>5274159


If we only make inferences about objects and events in the world, how do we define those objects and events?

>> No.5274236

>implying anyone on this board has actually read Plato

>> No.5274460

yarp

>> No.5274469

>>5274076
Yes, but good luck getting the pseudo-intellectual posers here to admit it. Most of them build their whole identity around consuming more and "better" art than the people they know.

>> No.5274473

How is this not obvious to everyone? Art only appeals to the senses.

>> No.5274479

You know, I haven't read any Plato in my entire life (or any 'proper' writing), but I have recently started to suspect this all on my own accord.

All this stuff around me just seems like garbage and each day is worse than the other. Does anyone else just feel constantly annoyed and disappointed?

>> No.5274489

>>5274479
>constantly annoyed and disappointed?
by Art?

>> No.5274490

Yes. Just look at "literary people". Have you ever met one that wasn't vain? It's clear that literature is not the dispenser of wisdom that some claim it is.

Most literature is the vanity/fashion of the time it was written, with a bit of journalistic insight into the spirit of the time, a little story that makes you "feel" (this isn't enlightenment), and perhaps a few platitudes chucked in but most literary writers are far from being philosophers/sages.

Most literary writers have taken men backwards, not forwards. Shakespeare, for example.

>> No.5274498

>>5274490
forgot trip

>> No.5274499

Plato thinks that the truth is beyond our senses.

But what if he was wrong? What if truth is in our senses?

>> No.5274500

>>5274489
Somewhat, but more just life in general

I am disappointed that Art hasn't given me meaning or anything for that matter. I guess if anything, a momentary release of dopamine and then it's gone, never to come back. The same piece of Art never gives that sensation again. It's basically disposable, and knowing that, makes it meaningless and less exciting each time.

Am I making sense? I feel like I am just being an edgelord now, but it's how I truly feel. I am more impressed by people who alter the world in tangible ways I guess.

>> No.5274501

>>5274490
>literary people

Never fails to make me laugh. If you really press them these pseuds are usually reduced to pointing to "studies" that claim that reading fiction increases empathy. As if Europeans are not fucking crippled by empathy already. Top fucking kek. I have much more respect for farmers who have never read a day in their lives than I do for these effete urbanites who hop from easy novel to easy novel without rhyme or reason. Reading has become an end in itself and that is fucking sad.

>> No.5274503

>>5274500
I'm sure everyone feels that from time to time.
But I can't relate to the 'same piece of Art never gives that sensation again'. I can come back to a variety of stuff and get all the same sensations, plus sometimes new ones.

>> No.5274504
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5274504

>>5274093
but isnt art an idea? A sculpture of a person is not the actual person, but the artist's idea of the person materialized.

>> No.5274508

>>5274479
Mate, Plato said this about Homer, arguably the best poet there ever was. His argument was that even the best of poets only appeal to the SENSUAL nature of people ("muh feels"), and so to be a hearer of poetry is to become enslaved to your sensual appetites at the expense of clearness of intellect. He also said that poets don't write their works from reason but from "inspiration", i.e. they don't understand the things that they are writing about, and are always open to being deceived (for example, he thoroughly detested how Homer portrayed the gods as petty squabblers).

>> No.5274514

>>5274500
Never make art a religion. I've made a thread about this before.
Art fails as a religion completely because it is always subject to the whims of fashion and popular taste.

>>5274499
Even if the truth was in our senses it wouldn't dispel the claim of Plato's that artists "know not what they do".

I don't know how people can take art seriously enough to read from Homer to Shakespeare to Joyce as though the three didn't present 3 completely contradictory accounts of the world. If they each contradict one and other then we know that at least 2 of them are liars, if not all 3.

The only reasons I can see why one would want to take art seriously is for scholarship/history, or wanting to be an artist yourself and learning technique (but even then you are probably better off following one great author's example than trying to synthesize the scraps that you glean from a multitude of authors).

>> No.5274515

>>5274504
Art is not the idea, art is the final product, the "thrice removed from the truth", the image of object or appearance

An idea is formed in the mind (e.g. an understanding of what a basic chair looks like), and then it goes down levels of corruption
After perceiving what a chair looks like, the artist will take a physical chair (the object) and use that to create art, e.g. paint the chair

so now you have a physical chair that cannot represent the Idea of the chair because it a third party object, and now you have a painting of a chair that cannot accurately represent the Idea of the chair nor the physical chair you used.

>> No.5274519

>>5274514
>than trying to synthesize the scraps that you glean from a multitude of authors).
what about if you constuct a lineage of authors all influenced by one another?

>> No.5274520

>>5274515
but is there still not a bit of truth in art? To someone who had never seen a chair, I would bet a painting of one would enlighten them somewhat

>> No.5274526

>>5274520
its sort of a paradox

for a person who has never seen a chair before, and then sees a painting of a chair, that chair will become the Idea for the future

but then they will go down the same process of corruption upon seeing other chairs

not to mention that painting of the chair they see for the first time is already removed from the original idea of a chair (impossible to pinpoint)

basically, we are fucked

>> No.5274532

>>5274526
what if there are certain artists who are gifted with the ability to see the true Ideas and share them with the world. But the viewers cant elucidate this, and thats how we get the feeling of beauty??

>> No.5274543

>>5274532
that would assume these artists would not have been influenced by other Art, which is pretty much impossible
and it is impossible (according to Plato) to present the 'Idea', it is only possible for an artist to present a work that is not true to the Idea, due to what I already posted.

>> No.5274544

>>5274543
>by other Art
by other Art, objects/appearances or Ideas*

>> No.5274555
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5274555

>>5274543
yeah, thats where I disagree with Plato then. I believe art can connect us to the divine, or at least let us feel traces of it

>> No.5274560

>>5274555
well, that's where Plato does actually agree with you

he would have allowed hymns that spoke to the Gods into his city

>> No.5274561

>>5274555
> I believe art can connect us to the divine

Plato believed that too, to an extent. It's just that it often doesn't because artists are lawless.

>> No.5274567

>>5274555
>>5274560
“the only poetry that should be allowed in a state is hymns to the gods and praise of good men”

>> No.5274574

But what about architecture and building design? Even if it is not intended in any way to be artistic, isn't it still Art? Surely the Parthenon would be considered a work fo Art?

>> No.5274580

>>5274574
Plato wasn't against art, he was against bad art; it's just that Plato had a much more strict definition of good art than anybody as ever had; to him Homer was bad art, as were all the famous tragedians and comedians from Athens that we praise today.

>> No.5274585

>>5274076
No, since it would be believing the truth can only be expressed by the original form of something and not by any representation of it.

For example if you write the story of a trial, the ideas of justice etc will still be present in the piece of fiction yet nothing of it is happening in reality.

>> No.5274590

>>5274580
But what to Plato was good art? Doesn't a building still fall under the 'failure to construct the Idea correctly'? Doesn't a nice looking building appeal to the senses and distract us from truth?

>> No.5274597

>>5274574
No, it's design.

>> No.5274600

>>5274469
got me in the feels

>> No.5274603

>>5274600
It shouldn't since its a gross misinterpretation.

>> No.5274607

>>5274597
How is design not art?

>> No.5274628

>>5274574
Architecture is not art, because somewhere along the lines, the artistry had to stop in exchange for practicality.

It's art if it's a building which can't be lived in, and the architect is creating a building which could be inhabited by beings perfect in his own mind. Then it's both art and architecture, but not design, because it's impractical.

>> No.5274630

>>5274607
Design in its purest form is primarily utilitarian; it's engineering. In practice, however, they're inseparable because aesthetics (and associated philosophy) is automatically brought into question when giving form to something. Add to this that an observer or user will impose even more meaning/philosophy to the object.

>> No.5274633

>>5274603
I spend a lot of my day reading. But for every minute I'm expanding my mind, I spend two attempting to acquire some profound sort of "taste" so that people will "like me" and I can become a "well-adjusted member of society."

I must be a pseudo-intelelctual, right?

>> No.5274638

>>5274630
I disagree. Framework design on computers is utilitarian and is a practice of creating code that other humans can use (design), but it has no aesthetic to it, it's all in the head

>> No.5274644
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5274644

>>5274628
Art can definitely coexist with practicality dude

>> No.5274646

>>5274580
I can see how though. Brecht, for instance, heavily dislike how people glorify notions such as Catharsis and the Sublime, a tradition of artistic appreciation which goes way back from Aristotle.

>> No.5274654

>>5274638
I didn't intend to say anything to the contrary. I had things like architecture, industrial design, clothing, etc., in mind.

>> No.5274658

>tfw it took until I was 18 for this to fully sink in
I fucked up. I fucked up. I fucked up. I fucked up. I fucked up. I fucked up. I fucked up. I'm so sorry. I'm trash.

>> No.5274661

>>5274628
go to bed ayn rand

>> No.5274667

>>5274644
Why don't you give any arguments to support your position, instead of cherry-picking picture?

>> No.5274671

>>5274667
whats wrong with cherrypicking? if it clearly shows artistry in practicality?

>> No.5274672

>>5274658
Tell us about it anon.

>> No.5274679

>>5274628
>art can't be practical
Hahahah what?
I hear this from people but no one ever presents a reason for it. Why did you make this distinction between what is useful and what is creative?

>> No.5274685

>>5274671
No, it doesn't. Why? I won't tell you, because you won't tell me otherwise either.

>> No.5274686

>>5274685
Hold on, what? It's a functional theatre with clear artistic endeavours. Tell me why it isn't Art.

>> No.5274691

>>5274679
this is what the entire discussion is about.
this is the distinction many philosophers have made.
As soon as utility enters the mind of the creator he forfeits the state which allows him to create, like if we told Yo Yo Ma he couldn't play certain notes because they didn't resonate well enough in the theater.

>> No.5274695

>>5274691
Would you call a film that can't use all of its footage due to running time not a piece of art? Sometimes this cutting can produce something even better.

>> No.5274700

>>5274695
see A bout de souffle

>> No.5274702

>>5274695
I wouldn't call it art.
"randomness can be beautiful" is not a good argument either. Then we should just say "everything is art!" and suddenly, nothing is.

>> No.5274703

>>5274686
>It's a functional theatre with clear artistic endeavours.
Why should you include the architecture within your criteria? That's the same as saying cathedral's ornaments as included within the religious ritual. The contrary argument of utility != art of course don't apply for your position, because you're arguing in the sense of artistic process, right?

So, how exactly you can say architecture is, like, the same as other visual art or installation?

>> No.5274704

>>5274702
you wouldnt call A bout de souffle, constantly referred to as one of the greatest films in cinema not art? The editing techniques are art in themselves

>> No.5274705

>>5274691
Technically there are always constraints to take into account when creating a piece of art.
Music, painting, etc all have their own constraints.

>> No.5274713
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5274713

>>5274702
Get a load of this guy

Every single piece of Art ever created has some form of compromise

see:

PLATO's theory as one example!

stupid cunts...

>> No.5274714

>>5274704
I don't know the specifics of A bout de souffle's creation or the director's intentions with the film.

Some film is certainly art, I know Man With A Movie Camera is, since he's just playing with footage. No studio came to him and said "americans won't sit through this whole thing!" and made him cut it.

What I hear you saying is that all things are art. But it's not black and white, it's a spectrum.

I like the way Hannah Arendt defines it. Art is betwen everything else aside from work, and directionless play. It's isn't pragmatic like work is, but it isn't without focus like play is. Art is the rest. Something are more artistic than others.

>> No.5274715

>>5274713
I didn't say that

>> No.5274717

I'd go for institutionalist position: That an object can be artistic object if it gets the recognition as art, from the community it belongs. The problem that emerges is, of course, from intrinsic qualities. Is there anything that can intrinsically constitute as artistic object?

>> No.5274718

>>5274715
>creations that have compromises are not art

you said that

all art has compromises

>> No.5274721

>>5274718
it's not as black & white as I made it sound, I suppose. As I said in previous comment: it's a spectrum.

>> No.5274724

>>5274721
explain this spectrum in detail

>> No.5274728

>>5274724
ahhhh but I'm tired
bring me coffee

>> No.5274730

Holy shit. For those who're debating architecture: you really lack any knowledge whatsoever about aesthetics or philosophy of art. Go learn them before discussing, at least when you can adequately identify what position is this or that guy is advancing. For instance, neither of you have any intention to divide 'art as x', e.g. 'art as object' or 'art as process', when you need it within the discussion. From my experience it signifies a thorough lack of knowledge about the subject, when someone cannot put in details what he's arguing for, how he can't be more specific while staying within the subject, and how he can identify the consequence of each positions that have been repeated or even anticipated by earlier thinkers.

Start with the Greeks.

>> No.5274731

>>5274728
go on, im intrigued

>> No.5274732

>>5274730
What if the greeks didn't exist?

>> No.5274734

>>5274730
>how he can identify the consequence of each
*how he can't

>> No.5274739

>>5274213
Socially agreed upon symbols.

>> No.5274754

>>5274731
Arendt breaks down life into a variety of realms in "The Human Condition."

She doesn't include art, but talks about it breifly in her section on "action" (she considers it a form of action for simplicities sake in an already complicated book)

She describes art as being where work and play end. Imagine a triangle with each of the three concepts at each point, the three oppose each other: they each begins where the other ones end.

She describes this in detail, but to be short: fabrication is a sort of action, but it can be done with a variety of intentions. Playfulness can't create art because playfulness is without direction, random. Work cannot be art because it is not self-fulfilling (we have to keep farming/eating, it's never "done"). But there is overlap, and therein lies the spectrum.

>> No.5274946

>>5274732
Then there would be no such thing as Western civilization.

>> No.5275013

>>5274079
this
art is the final purpose of humanity, whether it be literature, music, film or visual art

>> No.5275028
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5275028

>>5274079
More specifically, photography is truth. It is the purest form of art.

“The photograph is literally an emanation of the referent. From a real body, which was there, proceed radiations which ultimately touch me, who am here; the duration of the transmission is insignificant; the photograph of the missing being, as Sontag says, will touch me like the delayed rays of a star.”

>> No.5275038

>>5275028
photography is dishonest because of its limitations
we've all seen the cartoons of a photograph being taken in the middle east of say bombed israeli houses and just outside of frame a pile of dead palestinians. politics aside, photography is incapable of capturing truth because it's inherently restrictive as a medium

>> No.5275039
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5275039

>>5275013
It is the creative act that is the driving purpose of humanity, of life itself.

After all, it was a creative act that lead to the formation of the physical universe..

>> No.5275045

>>5275039
>god
intothetrash.jpg

>> No.5275047

>>5275038
“For the photograph's immobility is somehow the result of a perverse confusion between two concepts: the Real and the Live: by attesting that the object has been real, the photograph surreptitiously induces belief that it is alive, because of that delusion which makes us attribute to Reality an absolute superior, somehow eternal value; but by shifting this reality to the past ('this-has-been'), the photograph suggests that it is already dead.”

You're a moron.

>> No.5275053

>>5275045
>implying consciousness isn't god

>> No.5275057

>>5275053
>implying god as a concept has no meaning or coherent definition in the 21st century
you can be the godhead too anon1!!!

>> No.5276934

If men used as much care in uprooting vices and implanting virtues as they do in discussing problems, there would not be so much evil and scandal in the world, or such laxity in religious organizations. On the day of judgment, surely, we shall not be asked what we have read but what we have done; not how well we have spoken but how well we have lived.

Tell me, where now are all the masters and teachers whom you knew so well in life and who were famous for their learning? Others have already taken their places and I know not whether they ever think of their predecessors. During life they seemed to be something; now they are seldom remembered. How quickly the glory of the world passes away! If only their lives had kept pace with their learning, then their study and reading would have been worth while.

How many there are who perish because of vain worldly knowledge and too little care for serving God. They became vain in their own conceits because they chose to be great rather than humble.

He is truly great who has great charity. He is truly great who is little in his own eyes and makes nothing of the highest honor. He is truly wise who looks upon all earthly things as folly that he may gain Christ. He who does God's will and renounces his own is truly very learned.

--The Imitation Christ

Society today is so wrapped up in entertainment, and vain ideas that there is some hidden knowledge to find and to perfectly express, or perhaps worse, people who live only with the surface and wrapped their personalities and lives around an aesthetic ideal they took from television. There is goodness in knowledge and art, but knowledge and art are not good in and of themselves.

>> No.5277243

>>5276934
>Society today is so wrapped up in entertainment, and vain ideas that there is some hidden knowledge to find and to perfectly express, or perhaps worse, people who live only with the surface and wrapped their personalities and lives around an aesthetic ideal they took from television.

Hit the nail on the head.

>> No.5277570

>>5276934
>>5276934
Put your trip back, Jude. You can't fool anyone.

>> No.5278550
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5278550

>>5274133
i rather live in lie than in war

>> No.5278731

>>5278550
dude that's megacool

>> No.5279473

>>5278550

She got a big booty.

>> No.5279543

>>5278550
>man has a sledgehammer and woman has a little girly hammer

kek

>> No.5279551

>>5279543
>that
>sledgehammer
how soft are your hands?

>> No.5279557

>>5274076
Nope.
I love Plato's system but I think art reveals an unseen truth.

>> No.5279562
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5279562

>>5279543
It's a fucking chisel. For fine detailing.

>> No.5279610

>>5279557
Maybe not an 'unseen truth,' but I believe that art communicates truth to a greater extent than Plato believed.

Consider parables and fables. These communicate truth, and often they communicate it better to their unsophisticated audiences than a straightforward and detailed explanation. Yet surely Plato would call them 'art.' What would he make of Jesus' parables? Are they 'art,' and therefore fundamentally untrue?

>> No.5279665

>>5279562
>buttercuck gets angry because someone points out that women are the weaker sex

kek

People don't chisel with the kind of hammer you find in a typical garage you voodoo feminist. Women are not strong enough to carve marble well or efficiently.

>> No.5280393
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5280393

>>5279665
How could you not understand what I wrote? How is...

>Boys who cannot into logical thinking