Most current dialogues concerning current-day art upset me.
Artists, being as they are inclined towards more human matters of feelings, are consistently hot-headed and devoted to their opinions in conversations and dissections of craft of any type. Of course, typically when people hear the word "art" they conjure images of museums with traditional master works such as the Mona Lisa and the Statue of David, and for the sake of keeping this from being too exhaustive those will the be the art forms (painting, statues, museum/curated exhibition pieces) that I'll be reffering to when referencing "art"... for this moment at least.
There's become this almost (dare I say?) elitist bubble around art. It is not enough to invoke emotion and theme, you must be technically competent in the matters that are traditional and are thought therefore, by personal measure, "better." But of course, art does as it does and artists do as they do, and they break cultural and personal preconceptions of what art is thought to be by the individual. And then a lot of people get very mad, very fast.
It's just upsetting to see so many write off works of contemporary art (because modern art is a time period pre-1970's, and whether someone knows that is a good way to see if they really care about discussing art, or are just looking to hate on contemporary displays) because they don't meet their own ideas of what art is. Art is not always in the brush strokes or the chisel marks or the blending, but rather in the story and emotions behind it. One of my favorite works of contemporary art is the work "Electric Fan (Feel It Motherfuckers)" from John S. Boskovich. It is literally just an electric fan, commercially purchased, fully functional. But what makes it so meaningful was that it was the only unclaimed item from Boskovich's, and his at the time recently deceased partner Earabino's, estate after Earabino's family had stripped the property of nearly every item- save for the fan. It's a piece that expresses the grief of the AID's epidemic in a very real, viceral way, and it does that through a fan set in a plexiglas container.
But then goes the consideration "Well yes, it's not traditional but it was installed with intent. What about-" and now I ressurect the banana duct-taped on the wall situation, and I am just as tired of bringing it up as you may be of hearing it. To this, it's not that hard to find the merit in a piece as absurd as a banana duct-taped to a wall, because it's meaning is in the conversation around it. The outrage, the confusion, the conversation. It posed a direct question, "What is art?" and it got it's audience to consider it, and feel something from that consideration. Although it begrudges me to admit it, the banana duct-taped to a wall is a piece of art... and if I be so brave as to venture, it's one of the most important and impactful displays of the current era.
Those former examples were all of pieces that held some value to culture or society at large. They had something about them that was important or introspective or technically outstanding or revolutionary so on and on and on. Is that what art is? The goal of it? To make feelings, to inspire thought? Yes! ...And no.
The meaning of art is whatever the artist decides it will be when they make something. And that meaning can be nothing at all. That doesn't make it any less "art", it just has a different objective. It's upsetting to see so many try and define art (and by extension classify pieces) by giving it restraints and qualifiers and all of these things that don't make sense, and don't need to be there. Art is just the shit you make. It's not based in some abstract meaning, or technical skill, or the conversations around it, or any other measure, merit, or anything. Art is not a monolith to be subject to definition. It's as free and flexible and broad as the human mind can conceive of, even the stuff that may seem stupid. A doodle on scrap paper is art, a pratice sketchbook filled to the brim is art, the Mona Lisa is art, a box fan in plexiglas is art, a banana taped on a wall is art, a canvas painted a shade of blue is art, and a single line on a blank piece of computer paper is art, because the worthiness of its belonging in a museum is not what makes it art, but that a human being made it with their hands and mind is what makes it art.
Art is just the shit we, as humans, make. Have fun making it, however you may do so.