Yes.
Source: me
Is there such a thing as good taste?
471–479 of 479 posts
Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?
#472Wrote professionally about taste in a previous life. It is related more closely than we expect to techne or competence from physical knowledge. When we think of poor taste, we tend to think of symbols that are separated from their function and meaning, where instead of representing that, "I do this thing," something gaudy says, "I have this thing!" That's what crassness is, and it comes down to our relative apprehens…
I write art reviews as a hobby and have published my theory in a work called Critique of the Last Man in Film. I view taste to be more biologically predicated in that, quality can ultimately be measured according to a gradient of "healthy" and "sick". Immediately we can perceive "sacred" and "vulgar" and its connotations as it pertains to the subject of the representation. Nevertheless, it is the representation itself which can be understood as a biological expression of life and its experience in the minds of others which we can judge to be good or not. Thus, good art is that which positively resonates with as universal a mind as possible. That claim infers an everlasting beauty is the best art. (Notice I am necessarily relating positive resonances with beauty, not as a metaphor but as an actual electromechanical experience of the brain upon receiving neural stimulation from the body's senses)
Now with respect to originality...that's a separate topic altogether :P
Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?
#473Earlier quoted context omitted.
>I never demanded "copius evidence" I asked a clarifying question. If you are going to make specific claims, people might ask for evidence of those claims. It's not confirmation bias to ask for supporting details, quite the opposite. It is when you don't ask for the same evidence of the opposite, original assertion, and when the test you demand/clarify-the-existence-of is a strangely narrow test that no one would hav…
The assertion is that the knowledge of Michelangelo and his association with that work is artificially raising the viewer's appreciation of it. My contrary claim was that it's appreciated as good work, Both of these statements can be true at the same time. As an extreme example, take the Mona Lisa. No matter how much you think it's a good painting, there is no way that people would travel from around the world in the…
Okay I can better see where you're coming from, I just cringe at your unironic endorsement of the status game. To the extent that these people are flocking to the paintings just to get its (South Park-style) status "goo", that is something not to be lauded or encouraged, and an indication of the non-seriousness of the artistic appreciation.
The "acid test" of Renaissance art being more praiseworthy than the exhibits in modern art museums is that people can know nothing about the "goo" of the artists and still go away thinking "damn, that's awesome". The fact that some of the artists have "name currency" is noise in this dynamic, not signal.
If the best you can say about the super edgy, more modern art is that "oh yeah, people flock to see it because they think other people like it who think other people like it" -- well, you either aren't familiar with "The Emperor's New Clothes", or you sorely missed its point.
Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?
#474Earlier quoted context omitted.
>I never demanded "copius evidence" I asked a clarifying question. If you are going to make specific claims, people might ask for evidence of those claims. It's not confirmation bias to ask for supporting details, quite the opposite. It is when you don't ask for the same evidence of the opposite, original assertion, and when the test you demand/clarify-the-existence-of is a strangely narrow test that no one would hav…
> So yes, when you come in and single out my response as needing a very specific test before you'll consider it plausible, aren't being epistemically fair. It seems you felt attacked by my comment, which was not the intent. Apologies if it came off confrontationally. I never asked you to supply “a specific test”, I asked if there was one. Not sure why you took it as a personal attack on your point. I was genuinely in…
Then why the bit about "This seems like a big assumption", if you weren't also asserting that it seemed implausible to you that anyone could like any Renaissance art without having someone tell them "this is good, this high status, this is what you like now".
Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?
#475Earlier quoted context omitted.
3 examples of still life: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bd/Jan_Brue... https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/437317 https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/490581 As you can see, the three artists didn't value the same things in their composition. All three are recognized enough to have their place in a museum. And I seriously doubt you can find a consensus about a general theory…
Yes, which means all of whom have recognized mastery of their art. So in a way they all are at the top. But can we "rank art" at all? I think we can but we need to look not at the masters, but at the multitude of nameless students, most of which will never get their works displayed. Let's take an thought experiment - an art class of local hobbyists is given the task of copying only one of them, let's say the Pissarro…
Relevant quotes from my first message:
> Within the group, the extent of your knowledge will help you distinguish from others.
> the way this taste (but also the artist's skill) is acquired is highly correlated with social belonging: your appreciation of a specific piece of work is informed by your past experience within your social environment.
The setting you describe is a perfect example of this: a group with agreed upon acquired taste, which uses knowledge of that taste as criteria to rank art pieces. In that setting, the judgement is bidirectional: not only do people judge art pieces' worth, but they are judged for their good taste by their ability to separate the pieces according to the group's criteria.
> Our daughter likes to draw a lot in her own style. Now she is revisiting her old drawings and redrawing them few years later. While her earlier work has some naive charm, she tends to prefer her later pieces, and indeed I do find her current work "better" in the sense that the characters are "more" there - they are more skilfully renderered and have "more character".
I don't want to judge your daughter's art, but it is perhaps unsurprising that she uses her latest opinion to judge her own work. As she acquires a sense of aesthetics, her new artwork will tend to confirm to that new taste.
Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?
#476Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, which means all of whom have recognized mastery of their art. So in a way they all are at the top. But can we "rank art" at all? I think we can but we need to look not at the masters, but at the multitude of nameless students, most of which will never get their works displayed. Let's take an thought experiment - an art class of local hobbyists is given the task of copying only one of them, let's say the Pissarro…
Relevant quotes from my first message: > Within the group, the extent of your knowledge will help you distinguish from others. > the way this taste (but also the artist's skill) is acquired is highly correlated with social belonging: your appreciation of a specific piece of work is informed by your past experience within your social environment. The setting you describe is a perfect example of this: a group with agre…
"... but they are judged for their good taste by their ability to separate the pieces according to the group's criteria."
On this we disagree. I think the students can do the sorting without peer pressure, driven only by their innate perception and love of the specific genre.
If we enforce this by making the selection process completely anonymous? Do you still feel the students will still feel judged for their taste?
Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?
#477Earlier quoted context omitted.
Relevant quotes from my first message: > Within the group, the extent of your knowledge will help you distinguish from others. > the way this taste (but also the artist's skill) is acquired is highly correlated with social belonging: your appreciation of a specific piece of work is informed by your past experience within your social environment. The setting you describe is a perfect example of this: a group with agre…
"... but they are judged for their good taste by their ability to separate the pieces according to the group's criteria." On this we disagree. I think the students can do the sorting without peer pressure, driven only by their innate perception and love of the specific genre. If we enforce this by making the selection process completely anonymous? Do you still feel the students will still feel judged for their taste?
There is no specific peer pressure mechanism in what I discussed. The system is internalized by the people doing the rating; it is learned as a part of being in the group, discussing whith others about what you like and how you create, and by following the courses in your example.
It is also not only values, but also knowledge. If you know classical music theory, you will be able to appreciate and distinguish baroque music, while people with other educations may seek different things in the music they listen to.
> Do you still feel the students will still feel judged for their taste?
The main point here isn't about judgement. It's a personal gratification for the viewer to be able to see subtleties in the author's art. It's very similar to people personally enjoying learning about technology, while also being able to acknowledge peers in a technical discussion and also seeing social benefits from being able to program.
Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?
#478Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Maybe a simple set of questions would help: You don’t feel some art is better or special? Or you don’t feel a person can discern between art that is better or worse, even in the most extreme cases? Or is it something else? Yes, but that is the point I think, subjectivity. You also feel that way for different reasons, and who's to judge which of us is objectively right?
“who's to judge which of us is objectively right?” History, hiring committees, the general public, artists assessment of their own work, artists assessments of other peoples work, common sense, to name a few. Obviously I have come to my own conclusion on the matter. My interest is in why others can’t see what to me seems self evident. I too used to not understand, to think it’s all subjective, that there is no there…
I appreciate this effort. Not sure where the initial confusion came from, but you don't take it lightly, and that matters.
Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?
#479Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not OP but > That one must judge art, to enjoy art, appears fundamentally exclusionary, Well, yes. You must make a judgement in order to have a reaction. In order to have a positive reaction to something (enjoy) it, somewhere along the line, you must have decided if had positive attributes. If it had bad attributes, you would not enjoy it. But a decision/judement/evaluation IS made.
With respect, to me that stance seems both incomplete and absolute, and falsifiable in about nine ways, so surely, while you are entitled to hold that opinion and are not alone in that judgement, you are both wrong. But so am I. EDIT: another comment may help explain why I find "judgement" so completely orthogonal to this topic: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29229946
Or this one: