The Rise Of The Artist • Hacker News Board

Re: The Rise Of The Artist

#101

Post by vacri » Sat, Mar 02, 2013, 10:33 AM UTC

qzxt wrote: post #93

rdouble wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have more people who graduate with degrees in dance than we do people who graduate with degrees in mathematics. This is not true. Dance programs are extremely small and one can join by audition only. The U of MN only has about 10 dance majors per year. In contrast they graduate about 100 math majors per year. I know this because I'm from MN and majored in math, and my girlfriend majored in dance. You can verify ac…

my bad man. been up too late, I meant theater and performance. From the link http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2011/11/col... "In 2009 the U.S. graduated 89,140 students in the visual and performing arts, more than in computer science, math and chemical engineering combined and more than double the number of visual and performing arts graduates in 1985." As for the museums, unfortunately kid science ce…

unfortunately kid science centers... aren't science museums

What rubbish. Just because they're not tailored for tertiary-educated engineers doesn't mean they're not science museums.

The comparison of 'art' vs 'science' museums is a load of horseshit anyway - museums are one of the places you go to art is formally presented. They're not where you go to formally present science or engineering.

Re: The Rise Of The Artist

#102

Post by happypeter » Sat, Mar 02, 2013, 10:41 AM UTC

As they say，beauty is the exercise for our heart, it keeps us healthy. I will try to learn drawing this year, I want to understand/enjoy beauty more.

Throughout the whole process of my education, to create beautiful things is of least importance in people's eyes, I think that was sad.

Re: The Rise Of The Artist

#103

Post by rplacd » Sat, Mar 02, 2013, 10:43 AM UTC

The argument's fine, given the usual caveats about the validity of its assumptions - I'm more concerned that the author's writing off mathematics as a "conventional skill" by conflating it with mechanization, and it's certainly not his fault. (I'm very aware of this - just about to be passed through the GI tract of high school, and there's nothing like poring through boiled down revision guides to make you feel miserable about what you're doing with your life.) In fact, I'm convinced the problem of attempting to convey a high-level appreciation of the sciences and mathematics is intractable, given the pressure we already put on the education system. And it's a pity - we'd all like to say that we're far better off investing in giving a kid a grand unified appreciation of what a mind can do (the arts bleed into rhetoric bleed into mathematical formalism and so on and so forth). (Un)fortunately, self-motivation seems to be a prerequisite.

But the argument works both ways: I've seen, for that matter, just as many people going through my school's art program end up still inarticulate about what their art means (you can make a cogent argument that art doesn't have to mean anything, but I haven't seen anyone take that tasty intellectual biscuit) or even what they appreciate in the subject.

So I find it annoying to claim that art is inherently special because it is something inherently better to occupy the mind with - it's true by observation, but there was nothing much to observe in the first place.

Re: The Rise Of The Artist

#104

Post by rdouble » Sat, Mar 02, 2013, 10:49 AM UTC

zanny wrote: post #99

rdouble wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If ever a time comes when one could sustainably make money selling art Now is that time. Poetry is another thing altogether, but more visual artists are making more money right now than they ever have at any other point in history.

I think the time was probably in 1970. While you have a much larger audience today, and computers have kicked the artistic potential of individuals into overdrive, I think the main factor in a healthy arts economy is a wealthy society. The America of the 70s hit around its peak wealth per person - it has been going down ever since. I don't think the advances in artist productivity trump the fact people make significa…

Although I didn't cite any stats (google "art market booming" if interested) it's not an opinion. There has been an art boom over the past decades, and there are more artists making a lot more money than ever before. Certainly more than in the 1970s.

Re: The Rise Of The Artist

#105

Post by qzxt » Sat, Mar 02, 2013, 10:55 AM UTC

vacri wrote: post #101

qzxt wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

my bad man. been up too late, I meant theater and performance. From the link http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2011/11/col... "In 2009 the U.S. graduated 89,140 students in the visual and performing arts, more than in computer science, math and chemical engineering combined and more than double the number of visual and performing arts graduates in 1985." As for the museums, unfortunately kid science ce…

unfortunately kid science centers... aren't science museums What rubbish. Just because they're not tailored for tertiary-educated engineers doesn't mean they're not science museums. The comparison of 'art' vs 'science' museums is a load of horseshit anyway - museums are one of the places you go to art is formally presented. They're not where you go to formally present science or engineering.

a science center is different from a science museum. i didn't say this difference was dependent on the formality of presentation.

Re: The Rise Of The Artist

#106

Post by lutusp » Sat, Mar 02, 2013, 11:03 AM UTC

vacri wrote: post #101

qzxt wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

my bad man. been up too late, I meant theater and performance. From the link http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2011/11/col... "In 2009 the U.S. graduated 89,140 students in the visual and performing arts, more than in computer science, math and chemical engineering combined and more than double the number of visual and performing arts graduates in 1985." As for the museums, unfortunately kid science ce…

unfortunately kid science centers... aren't science museums What rubbish. Just because they're not tailored for tertiary-educated engineers doesn't mean they're not science museums. The comparison of 'art' vs 'science' museums is a load of horseshit anyway - museums are one of the places you go to art is formally presented. They're not where you go to formally present science or engineering.

> museums are one of the places you go to art is formally presented. They're not where you go to formally present science or engineering.

Although generally true, there's the Exploratorium in San Francisco, and the Air & Space Museum and the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. All these examples present something other than art works.

Re: The Rise Of The Artist

#107

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Mar 02, 2013, 11:21 AM UTC

gnosis wrote: post #73

qzxt wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're talking about the economic prognosis of art, I'd like to direct you to the world of high-end sports cars. There are many people who can afford to buy and maintain them in this world. Not all of them do. Just like many people can afford to buy works of art, but not all of them do. Why? Because one doesn't really need a sports car, just like one doesn't really need an art piece. The author's essay isn't one o…

"as far as being a professional artist, well guess what; when I was a kid I wanted to be a poet." You were certainly not representative of the typical American kid. "If ever a time comes when one could sustainably make money selling art, then I'm sure many artists and even non artists will flood the market." I'm not. Not until they can make a better living at it than most other professions. The sad fact is that not o…

[deleted]

Re: The Rise Of The Artist

#108

Post by carbocation » Sat, Mar 02, 2013, 11:36 AM UTC

weareconvo wrote: post #62

carbocation wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no physical hemispheric dominance, there are just ways of thinking. Well, those right-handed people who have had strokes in their left middle cerebral artery distribution might beg to differ on this point. However, I got this far because I found your first paragraph to be quite compelling writing.

Don't be pedantic. It's clear from the context that he meant in terms of "right-brained = creative, left-brained = analytical".

The fact that there is lateralization to cortical function is not just some curio.

A stroke on the nondominant side in the same distribution leads to contra lateral hemineglect of the world. Watch these people try to draw a clock: they'll put all 12 numbers on the right side. It is interesting, to me, that the pathways are such that there is this partitioning of deficits.

It's not "left logic right creativity", but neither is it one homogenous mix.

Anyway, I think it's relevant and not simply pedantic. If you disagree, well, I suppose we can disagree politely.

Re: The Rise Of The Artist

#109

Post by sethrin » Sat, Mar 02, 2013, 11:39 AM UTC

wallflower wrote: post #7

"I don't know how to draw" -many of my friends, simultaneously dismissing drawing as out of reach and as a challenging hobby in which they fear they could not be good at - at least in the crucial initial stages (the fear of peer judgement) If you want to learn how to draw, you can learn how to draw. You start out drawing lines and blocks, move on to cylinders, than to pots and pans, shoes, chairs, simple still-lifes…

I used to doodle, which eventually made me think that I had some predilection for art. It was only partially true, and likely only in the sense that you refer to -- that anyone can do it. Drawing something that you see is a purely mechanical exercise.

The first real drawing lesson that I had was some years after I had started. The teacher placed an egg in front of each of us, and said "Draw exactly what you see." It was a revelation, an instant understanding that art was a way of looking at the world, not about collecting shapes on a piece of paper. The utter simplicity of the form and color force you to examine the play of light and shadow in exacting detail.

I am convinced that once you've learned to see gradations of light and color, you need no other lesson, only practice.

Re: The Rise Of The Artist

#110

Post by caster_cp » Sat, Mar 02, 2013, 11:44 AM UTC

"The creative application of scientific principles to design or develop structures, machines, apparatus, or manufacturing processes, or works utilizing them singly or in combination; or to construct or operate the same with full cognizance of their design; or to forecast their behavior under specific operating conditions; all as respects an intended function, economics of operation or safety to life and property."

First definition of "engineering" to pop up on a google search (Wikipedia).

The problem is that it is damn harder to be creative when your creations have to actually work, and you have to know some science to make that happen, than it is when the creations just need to be "beautiful, inspiring or thought-provoking".