Oddbean new post about login | logout In art school it was said that “art is whatever the artist says it’s art”. Only recently remembering this and realizing how much of a fiat statement this is. Of course the statist scholars of these educational institutions love this because they are the ones who get to decide who is and is not an artist.
It’s a question I used to ask my students: what is art? The amount of times the discussion became violent is surprisingly high.
I had a strange realization while painting once, The art is what I intended, What the person interpreted, And it’s physical existence. Beyond the peer review system is a world of people authentically expressing their interpretation and perception of reality.
Basically "art" ends up being a subtle form of ideological propaganda and sometimes an outright cult.