Ok well I put the qualifier in that, at least I wasn't saying we should all be depressed over it. I kind of half agree with the post, and I half disagree. I would like to see the U.S. do more culturally move towards a more arts oriented culture. I disagree with the fact that because we haven't means we should all be unhappy. It is possible to still be happy search for the areas where America is more arts-friendly, and do what you can to make a difference. Almost all great cultures leave behind an arts heritage and cultural tradition. Certainly the ancient Greeks and Romans did. Throughout Italian Renaissance or as it spread through Europe great artistic developments were made. These artistic developments were usually supported by the government, the church, or both. Currently our government has the NEA, and some other grants, but is not involved extensively in developing and supporting the arts. The Church is by no means monolithic but is at times antagnoistic towards the arts.
FB -- most churches i'm involved with encourage the arts. there's a dramatic representation in church services...there's new sorts of music being played...there's metaphor with movies, music, etc. that are applied. much more sensitive to that, because they know it's how it reaches people best in our culture. particular the post-modern generations. this is certainly the direction of the newer churches i see being planted. but i don't think that's where the problem is. i agree with the part of his statement that says we do value money and achievement way too much...as if it says who we are. i think that is the ultimate fault of America. and i hate that our culture has made that such a definitive. the Pope recently said something about this. here's an interesting fact you may not know...know what the number one missionary destination is for missionaries around the world? the United States!! i know a Brazilian pastor who gave up his life in Brazil to come here because he thinks we're so lost, spiritually..thinks the church has abandoned the Bible and its call to evangelism. interesting.
Hmmm, this is terrible. We don't have these things? Well I disagree. These are, of course, not all inclusive. Regional Foods: Cajun/Lousiana Crab Cakes/MD Chowder/Boston Cheesesteaks (mmmmm)/Philly BBQ/TX Fried Chicken/South Lobster rolls/Maine Writers: Mark Twain EA Poe Hemingway Alice Walker Stephen King Ken Kesey Robert Heinlein William Faulkner John Steinbeck Philosophers: Noam Chomsky John Dewey Thomas Kuhn Thomas Paine Ben Franklin Thomas Jefferson John Rawls Carl Sagan BF Skinner Artists: Coltrane Miles Davis Robert Johnson Jimmy Rodgers Pollack Warhol
Interesting read. I think some of you in this thread are making good points, but from one extreme or another. Take American film, for example. There have been many, many superb flicks like Lost in Translation, Pulp Fiction, Garden State, LA Confidential, and Sideways, off the top of my head, that would be considered "small films," were American, and which I would stack up against any of the excellent films to come out of Britain or France. As for our "culture of work?" Ender may state his case too strongly, with a broad brush, in my opinion, but as someone who's spent time in Europe, I can tell you that Americans do work too much, and take too little time off compared to Europeans. It wasn't always like that here. Anyone old enough to have grown up in the '50's and '60's, when the one wage earner was the norm, and the mother typically stayed home (and I'm talking about the middle class) grew up in a far different environment. Yes, Dad worked a lot, but Mom ran the house. That took a tremendous strain off the family, and that strain exists now, all around us. Yes, we have an amazing collection of "goodies" in the typical American middle class home, with two working parents... 2 or 3 automobiles, 3 or more televisions, a couple of computers, washers and dryers, central air and heat, an array of sound systems, home security systems... one could go on and on, but how much time do we have now to relax and enjoy it all? Really? Not anywhere near enough. I remember not having all those things, certainly not in the quantities we typically see today, and I can flatly state that I believe I had a better quality of life growing up than my children do, with all these "toys." Some of you don't know what you're missing. The Europeans don't have perfect societies, far from it, but we don't either, and in many ways our standard of living is being degraded. Most of us are so caught up in it that we can't even see it happening. My two cents. Keep D&D Civil!!
What Is the Value of Priceless Art? Debate Continues on $20 Admission By CAROL VOGEL When the Museum of Modern Art reopens on Saturday, admission will be free - for a day. On Sunday, the price goes up, to $20. And some art lovers are already protesting. Filip Noterdaeme, a Belgian artist who founded the Homeless Museum, an online conceptual museum, is planning a peaceful protest outside the Modern's newly expanded home on Sunday. "I'm all for celebrating MoMA's reopening,'' he said. "But I do object to the 63 percent increase.'' Before the Modern's home on 53rd Street closed for renovations in June 2002, adult admission was $12. J. P. Morgan Chase, with Target, is sponsoring the museum's free day. Dan Levenson, a 32-year-old painter from Park Slope, Brooklyn, has been standing outside the museum this week, wearing a sandwich board with a $20 bill on it, passing out leaflets about his Web site, Freemoma.org. "It's a museum's mission to keep their doors open, not to become an upscale brand like Gucci,'' Mr. Levenson said. "I understand their need to raise money. But their priorities are backwards.'' Mr. Levenson said his time outside the museum had yielded some interesting discussions. Artists have come up to support him; others have disagreed. Online bloggers have been especially vocal, both pro and con. "MoMA could calm this tempest in a fur-lined teapot very easily by offering a money-back guarantee,'' wrote Greg Allen, a filmmaker, on his site, Greg.org. "After seeing the collection reinstalled in that spectacular building, only a true philistine - or a schnook - would think it's not worth it.'' Mr. Noterdaeme said he wanted to find out for himself. So on Tuesday evening, when guests at a pre-opening party included the artists Ellsworth Kelly, Brice Marden, James Rosenquist and Rachel Whiteread, who have work on view, he managed to sneak past guards. Once inside, he distributed fliers that said, "Manhattan Is Robbed Again.'' He then talked with Glenn D. Lowry, the Modern's director, and Ronald S. Lauder, its chairman. "They were all very polite,'' he said. Despite what he called Mr. Lowry's "slick sell," he said, "it was clear we were in two very different camps.'' Mr. Lowry said he was not surprised by protests of the $20 admission and defended the fee, saying the museum receives no operating money from the government. "If you think that museums should be free, campaign for a government that will support that,'' he said in a telephone interview yesterday. "We're in a country where there is a cost for culture.'' http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/18/arts/design/18free.html
It was an extreme but apt exaggeration, and many here have agreed that for the most part, American cinema is not up to par with some of the stuff being produced internationally. Have I ignored the excellent films made by Americans? Yes. It was necessary. Would you have felt the same way about civil rights? "Well, there are obviously a few people who treat minorities with dignity and respect, so it can't be too much of a problem." Those people were the minority, and the quality films are a minority. The majority needs to be fixed. (And yes I understand there is a big difference between the civil liberties of an entire people and the flops that Hollywood produces. The same principle still applies.) I'm not saying that we should all kill ourselves, or shut down as a society. But if there is something wrong, why does no one want to fix it? We don't have to jump from extreme to extreme. I admit that we have a form of culture. I may not hold it in the highest esteem, but it exists. You don't have to absolutely agree or disagree with me. If you absolutely agreed with me, we could go ahead and scrap the whole system and adopt everything that Europe does. If you disagreed with me, you could ignore me and we could shut ourselves off from the rest of the world and never make any progress from the melting of cultures and ideas. Neither idea is good, so quit thinking in extremes. I'm using extreme examples to make a point, because otherwise no one ever feels the need to change. If the status quo isn't immediately dangerous or undesirable, then it's allowed to continue until it is too undesirable to bear, and by that time it's too late to fix easily, when you could have saved yourself a lot of trouble by acting in the beginning. Again, I'm not talking about happiness as in "Boy I feel so happy today". I'm talking about being content. "I'm not content with this system, and neither should any of you be. No sane person would want this, normally. But since this is the culture you've grown up in, you somehow think this is alright." Maybe that's a little more acceptable. I'm not suggesting that we all need to be depressed and sit around and mope and cry all day long. What I am suggesting is that it is high time that we took a good, long look at ourselves in the mirror and decide if this is really what we'd like to be, as a culture. If the answer is no, then we must change it.
ACtually I didn't say we don't have these things. We don't have them as a nation. I agree that there are regional foods that are famous in that region but not the nation. I mentioned Texas as having a culture. I think our cultures are more regionalized than national. That is probably because of our size more than through any fault or greed of our society. Some of those artists mentioned would fall into what I categories I already mentioned. Carl Sagan is another good point that the U.S. does, or did have until very recently a high tech scientific kind of culture. I think that still exists but is dwindling and being stifled by the current administration. It's not that our nation doesn't have any of these things, just that don't become or aren't always part of our culture.
I don't understand. You point to France and their REGIONAL FOOD as a standard of their NATIONAL culture, and then say its not the same here because our regional food isn't national. Regional is by definition not national, right?
The church does get involved in arts type activities, but not in the manner that was true when all the Greek Plays were written to be part of religious festivals, or when they were commissioning the painting on the sistene chapel. I am glad that many churches encourage an involvement in the arts. But some churches discourage secular music, movies, and very few churches invest large scale, top quality art projects.
What a load. Why isn't Last Action Hero art? The writer and the director probably feel like it is art. How is that less worthy than Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, or Michaelangelo's David, or Beethoven's 9th. I think the problem doesn't lie in the inferiority of American culture, but rather with the snobbery of old Europe and people like Ender. Guess what, art is subjective. Art cannot be objectively good or bad, either you like something or you don't. Personally, going to an art museum bores me, I would rather watch Bad Boys II. Somebody else may want to go to a Britney Spears concert. Maybe somebody would like to go to an opera, or a ballet, or a basketball game. None of those things are better or worse than any of the others. The fact is that not only does America have a culture, but it dominates the world. I don't see dozens of French restaurants in small town America, but I bet I could find quite a few McDonald's in Nice. This whole discussion reminds me of that "How to be a music snob" topic we had on here a month or two ago. So Ender, you can go spend time looking at dusty old sculptures, but I have a feeling that Star Wars Episode III will have a bigger opening than the Museum of Modern Art.
That's what I was trying to say when I mentioned our size probably keeps our regional food from become part of our national culture. The foods from France that are famous and regional can still be had in plentiful supply in other parts of France. But it's very hard to find a chicken fried steak or Texas BBQ in NYC.
I would be willing to bet that the director and writer of Last Action Hero don't consider it art and definitely don't consider it in the same league as Beethoven's 9th etc. That movie isn't as good, complex, complicated, or expressive. It may be a well made action movie, that was technically crafted in a competent, and even creative manner. It may have brought people enjoyment, and been satisfying to make for those involved. I don't think to be a well made movie it has to be art. I don't think Last Action Hero aspires to be art at all, just a well made action movie that pleases a certain audience, makes some money, and fills a niche for the movie going public. That doesn't mean it's bad, but it isn't art. Whether Star Wars III has more people attend it than a modern art exhibit doesn't have anything to do with the quality of the product being put out.
I already addressed this earlier: And I didn't know that we were calling names now, but why is it that I'm a snob instead of you being uncultured or shallow? It's nice that you would rather watch Bad Boys II than go to a museum; I also talked about how people these days have short attention spans. But if you are going to say that that movie is more artistic than the masterpieces produced in the fields of music, literature, and art, you are sorely mistaken. Just about every example you provided was an example of entertainment, not art. Is a Britney Spears concert more entertaining than looking at the statue of David? Yeah, probably. But there is no expression in her music, and that is what I suggested art should be earlier- an expression. If you want to look at art as "what's most entertaining" then fine. We'll never be able to come to an agreement on the matter. However, I don't think I'm in the minority here when I say that I feel art should be an expression, whether it be of emotion or certain basic truths of human nature, and I doubt that this thinking makes me a snob.
Interesting reads and some pretty fascinating economic stuff regarding oil, dollars and euros. Its interesting that most of this debate has come down to culture when the biggest things we (Americans) should be worried about are economics and geo-political influence. One of the reasons why American pop and consumer culture has been so successful is that its been able to absorb disparate other cultures and distill them down to common denominators. Take Taco Bell for example. that is both a great strength of our culture but also why so much of it seems bland and uninspired like condensed soup. As far as the economics there certainly are things to worry about but there's also a twist. While our trade imbalance and debt are potential grave risks at the same time the size and power of our market means its in Europe's and the rest of the world's interest to see us going. As long as that remains the case its doubtful that there will be any serious economic moves against us in a global economic cold war. So while there are many reasons for OPEC to shift to euros the resultant damage to the economy of the World's leading oil consumer would have grave repercussions for OPEC. The other thing that I think was glossed over too much in the article is the importance of military power. Europeans would like to think that they've reached a point where military might is a quaint anachronism but we're far from that. The Balkans showed that the Europeans couldn't even handle a crisis in their own backyards and had to count on the US to provide the muscle and leadership to get something done. Since then the Europeans have proved fairly feeble dealing with a host of other problems where military might is required. The French have faired poorly trying to keep the peace in their former colonies and Europe still had to lean heavily on the US to police the Athens Olympics. While Europe might succeed culturally and economically soon the PRC will be considered more of a superpower than them if they can't come up with a credible unified military.
Yeah it pretty much does make you a snob. Not liking it doesn't make you a snob, but claiming its not art because you don't like it does. A concert doesn't have expression? That's just silly. FB, I think you're just making up delineations as you go. Food in Normandie is not like food in Alsace. Food in Alsace is not like food in Nice. Unless you want to say wine and cheese generically. And then you'd be showing a glaring ignorance of the differences in wine and cheese from the different regions. It would be like saying we eat meat and vegetables as part of our national culture.
This whole argument comes down to definitions. I define art as an expression. I define all the other examples given as entertainment. If we can't agree on the same definitions, then we won't agree period. And because we can't agree, we won't see this from the other's eyes. From your side, my position looks snobbish. From my side, your position looks uncultured and shallow. I don't believe that there is an absolute "Truth", only that there are varying degrees of truth, and I think the same applies here. So is a Britney Spears concert art? Sure, if you want it to be. But a van Gogh painting is much more nearly art than the concert.
That's the point, a Van Gough is no more art than a Britney concert. It is snobbery to think so. From dictionary.com A five year old's finger painting, rediculous feces based performance art, and the poppiest of pop music are art just as much as a Monet or a Bach. Different people will value them differently, which is why I said art is subjective. There is no unit in which art can be measured, because it is an abstract.
i know a Brazilian pastor who gave up his life in Brazil to come here because he thinks we're so lost, spiritually..thinks the church has abandoned the Bible and its call to evangelism. interesting. I agree it is interesting. However, there aren't enough Brazilians who need help both spiritually and in terms of basic human needs? In Brazil they haven't abandoned the Bible and its call for evangelism, too? It is a nice line. I just don't buy it. Probably can make more in the preacher biz here than back in old Brazil. I know I don't know him, he seem sincere etc. Still seems fishy and self aggrandizing to me.
The way you define art is so subjective that its untenable, especially as a tool to critique others. Its 'expression.' Please explain how a song is not 'expression.' Again I say that you try to say what YOU don't like is not art, and that is just silly. Your whole premise that you can decide what is, or is not 'cultured' smacks of arrogance without substance. As Aristotle said, 'art is what man creates.'
I feel the need to jump in because I think ome things are being confused in the art/culture discussion. Beofr doing so, though, I must note that such an attemp at discussion is very difficult because it is an attempt to define and restrict a word, "art," that is so problematic that aesthetic philosophers and art historians cannot come to a consensus. With regards to culture, though, it can easily be noted that there has been some confusion between "culture" and "mass culture." The US dominates the world with its mass culture, but is lower down the list with regards to culture. Mass culture can simply be understood as that which is created for mass consumption - fashion, film, advertising...anything where the ultimate measure of success is money. It is interesting to note (and neither country would want to admit it) but the mass culture for which the US is so famous (and for which it is often villified) originated in France. They started it, we took over and dominated. Now, with regards to art... Britney Spears concerts and Last Action hero-type movies are done to be mass consumed as entertainment for profit. They are in no way the same as a painting, for example. One could say that they are better (to them) than a painting, but they have very different intent, production, audience, and delivery. So I think it is silly to say they are the same thing and the same art. This, again, is without making a value judgement in either direction. There is much more that can be said, but I will end it with that simple difference - money. A Britney Spears concert (or CD) would not exist if it could not create profit for somebody. A Van Gogh painting (or the cave paintings at Lascaux) would (and does). That alone makes them completely different.
