Art as Form

There are two ways to understand. First the plain understanding, What determines whether or not a work is art is its possession of significant form. That is, a painting is art if and only if it has a salient design/form. Secondly, in more formalistic manner, an art must possesses a form that is of its own, not seen before. Art must not imitate anything else. Art is celebration of forms, new forms. A painting is "a coloured surface, in which the various tones and various degrees of light are placed with a certain choice; that is its intimate being.” - Hippolyte Taine, The Philosophy of Art (1865).

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L’art pour l’art, meaning, Art for art’s sake. The intrinsic value of art, and the only 'true' art, is divorced from any didactic, moral, political, or utilitarian function. Art is autotelic (complete in itself). Art is "inner-directed" or "self-motivated”. Victor Cousin (used this phrase first, 1800s), Theophile Gautier used it to defend his novel (1835), and a number of visual artists promoted the idea that art existed solely for its own sake, and should not serve any social or moral purpose.

Don’t look through Art, instead look at Art. Formalism proposes that everything necessary to comprehending a work of art is contained within the work of art.

What is not there is not important to that particular work of art. The context of the work, the reason for its creation, the historical background, and the life of the artist, are considered to be external to the artistic medium itself, and therefore of secondary importance.

Formalism gravitates toward abstraction. Their aim is not to capture the perceptual appearances of the world, but often to make images noteworthy for their visual organization, form, and arresting design.

Art is devoid of any meaning. It is meaningless. Formalist artist rejected the premise that art must make sense. Art is an autonomous sphere of human creation.

Defamiliarisation: Looking at familiar things and seeing unfamiliar forms. Seeing an object in a totally different light. It is seeing something completely new.

It was a quest for pure art. They rejected obvious subject matter in art. The formalists were freeing art from the narrowness of topics.

Art as Form, Art theories, Formalism, What is art?

Art as formalism

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