Intellectual Art

It is quite interesting, even funny, to notice the evolution of modern art. In my opinion, art nowadays stands where science stood a few hundred years ago: an intellectual "island" that few can access. And proudly so.

This intentional separation of art from the mass public can be seen in painting, music, literature, architecture, etc... I guess at this point some of you might be thinking I'm far off from reality; a simple check on the number of youtube views or Itunes downloads of one of Bieber's songs seems to prove me wrong. But what would you see if you were to check the comments' section? Lots of heavy criticism, arguing that it is not so much "real" art but rather comercial crap for the mass market. Which I could agree with by the way.

If you ask a so called expert he'll tell you the same: Justin Bieber makes terrible music; Goldberg variations are the ones to look out for. And that painting you've seen at the museum (the horrible one which seemed that the painter tried to drink all of the paint and ended up throwing up on the canvas) is just too complex for you. It is interesting and beautiful, we're just too dumb to realise it. But there's no need to feel bad about it since the whole word falls under the simpletons' bind, except for a few enlightened minds.

But how then can you distinguish junk art from the real thing? Seemingly useful features, such as the number of people who actually enjoy it, do not seem to be fit taking the stated above into account. In previous times a work of art was often classified according to the skill required to perform it. This is also not the case with the modern art, since skillwise complicated art forms are considered arrogant and ostentacious and minimalism is the word of order. So where does that lead us? To highly random and unpredictable domain, I'm afraid.

I believe this behaviour is mostly related to the need of differentiation and feeling superior. It is not rare to listen to someone saying, in a snobbish manner, something like 'It's a shame they don't know how to appreciate this wonderful painting' or ' I recognise it's a type of art that is difficult to enjoy'. You can even extend its scope to other areas which might not be uncontroversially classified as art, such as wine making or cooking.


Filipe Baptista de Morais