The Expressive Theory of Art | AmorSciendi

[@beverlykandraceffinger3764]

Thanks so much for this wonderful instalment in a thought-provoking series...I've forwarded the link to some of my colleagues in painting, along with the comment that I've discovered a philosopher who can actually speak about art as though he has spent some time earning his understandings, and articulating his responses. Well done, and more please.

[@AmorSciendi]

Thank you!

[@RomansEye]

As you walk past a piece of art so does your fleeting senses of emotion. Devoid of empathy is devoid of understanding that art has meaning.

[@kaczynski2333]

Good essay. Now I'm going to have to watch several times to understand it all. Thank you.

[@GabrielKnightz]

What's fascinating to me is the application of these principles/patterns to all forms of art, not just the plastic ones, the rhyme vs rhythm of a song, the measured syllables in a verse vs sentences that gives new life to words you knew your whole life, (line vs colour), and then at times their perfect union that raises those who can create, and appreciate it, to a realm where we're brought closest to another entity as we'll ever be in our inherently lonely human existence, in all it's unique nuance, whatever it is, whoever it is, whenever it is. I always thought that mastering the spoken word is one of the most fundamental liberties a person can achieve, to be free of ourselves, who can say how or what language one should use to express their walk in the woods.

[@tunaberkcelik8910]

very good explanation and referances👍🏻

[@AmorSciendi]

Thanks Tuna

[@AMcAFaves]

I believe emotion (no matter what that emotion is) is central to art. In fact, that is how I define art: a production by a concious being intended or resulting in an emotional response from the viewer/participant. Art can also have narrative, intellectual, and social elements, etc, but they are secondary.

[@mikesamovarov4054]

Yes, I agree! ❤

[@haneul4164]

So useful video!!!! Forever grateful

[@margosulek]

Such a comprehensive take, subscribed:))

[@angelicaclavano]

this is a really great video! inspired me to continue working on my paper :^)

[@AmorSciendi]

Cool. That's great to hear

[@thirdrockjul2224]

Inspiring! ❤

[@iridescentsquids]

Interesting. I wouldn’t say it’s an efficiency issue so much an expression issue. Something evocative is not just expressing emotion however. It can express relationships, importance, meanings, and “feelings”. Even abstraction includes a lot of presumptions for framing meanings. It’s quite open ended. One of the challenges here is that we are trying to put into words the expression that isn’t in words.

[@KayWhyz]

The argument in the front of the video that visual art (painting) is better at expression that non-visual art (literature)-"Art can be much better than language at communicating emotion"-is interesting to me, considering you then quoted Tolstoy. I wonder what "better" means here? The dichotomy between Bacon's three paintings and what it would take a writer "pages" to do (0:55) feels like a false one? How do you compare the two mediums in such a way that a painting is worth X number of pages or vice versa? Literature has had a lot of the same theoretical arguments flow in and out of it in slightly different ways, from the narrative-heavy to the expressive quality to even the "formalism" of Clive Bell (often a lot at the same time, considering the pairing of, like, Sir Walter Scott's historical narratives and Jane Austen's emotional rollercoasters), and I think the narrative of those movements would be more interesting with an inclusion of how literature has expressed them rather than casting literature out of the narrative altogether as Not As Good As Painting. I think your real argument (because I don't think you're actually saying "Paintings > Books") is that visual art has a more immediate experience, but why is that immediate experience more valued, and is it even always true? There are plenty of very, very short poems out there that could provide the same immediacy of expressive communication, and even a lot of very, very short short stories. Hemingway's famous "For Sale Baby Shoes Never Worn." And if the immediate isn't inherently a value, we can consider gargantuan works like Tolstoy's own for their capabilities to do, well, all of it: express, narrate, instruct, play with form, etc. I thought a lot about Wittgenstein's Mistress by David Markson while writing this comment but couldn't figure out where to put it. I think it's an interesting work to consider in the narrative of expressive theory because it's main mode is anti-expression: it's a series of fragments, most of which are like historical trivia facts that have no bearing on the narrator's story, which is that she is the last human alive on earth. It's one of the most upsetting and impactful things I've ever read, and that expressive impact is done by purposefully evading expressive form. It's like if Warhol's repetitions actually made you more upset and distraught by the tragedies depicted rather than numbed. Anyway, great video as always, but I studied Lit, so I'll defend its honor.

[@poojanewa1820]

Hello, I'm a painter, I studied visual arts and I agree with you here, each medium communicates so differently, you can never say this is better at expressing, they all just express different things not exactly possible with another medium I think. For instance, a painting asks you to be still, you wait for the paint to reveal different things to you, ie. you find different things in an image over time, perhaps with sculptures you have to move around, it is a more active engagement. and with writing you engage in a chain of thought I suppose? because you following one line then next one continuously , mm Idk all these mediums are these different technologies of communication and it is so intriguing how sth possible in one cannot be exactly translated in the next I enjoyed your comment and just wanted to add to that :)

[@sarahjohnson9748]

What an interesting video! Thanks a lot:)

[@jarrodcluck]

'What role does emotion play in the perception or creation of an artwork?' Good question. What is an emotion? What is an artwork? These are too big of questions for the comment section, but important to ask. I agree that expressive theory is limited and believe this is, in part, due to our understanding of emotion. The term evokes the idea of basic feelings. This is where I lean on phenomenology, seeing the mode of art as a way of exploring and relating the full of human experience, not just feelings. THIS is emotion. Yet, the theory is still lacking. Maybe art is still lacking. If art relates human experience, then it becomes about that experience. Just because Johnny had a feeling, I don't need to here about it, let alone immortalize it on canvas. Something about this feels very masturbatory. If experience of making art has taught me anything, it is that the world is much, much larger than us. If art can help me to light up a little more of it, I have done my job. Just as you raised the question in this video. More was conveyed here than an emotion. Thank you for raising the question.

[@mikesamovarov4054]

AI can create art that we perceive as emotional on our part, but we know that AI has no emotion or feelings during the production of fine artwork.

[@jacklingharibian554]

I suggest you study Expressive Arts Therapy to see the connections between Art and Psychology. You may also want to study Environmental Art Therapy and Feminist Art Therapy. Art can be defined as an expression. The Surrealists and the Abstract Expressionists used psychology and human emotions to explain art. Free Association is a form of therapy used in psychology, and it is very much related to Free Writing and Automatic Drawing. In art, you can express your feelings, because it is not healthy to repressive your feelings. The more you learn to express your true inner feelings, the more likely it may be for you to overcome depression, anxiety, and mental illness. Hence, art can be used to heal the traumas we experience in life. Expressive Art is a form of therapy. You can also use art to study your dreams, given the role of dream analysis and dream interpretation. Dreams can play an important role in psychology. because dreams are made by your unconscious mind when you sleep. If you want to understand your unconscious mind, then you should study your dreams. You can study dreams by studying dreams as a form of art or literature. You may also want to study Hypnotic art to learn the connections between art and hypnotherapy, Stage hypnotherapy, and street hypnotherapy.

[@LorenaFernandezArts]

Great content! Thanks for sharing.

[@AmorSciendi]

Thanks for stopping by to say so

[@yusefasabiyah495]

There's a question whether Bacon intended any psychological content to the painting you're describing. Do you have a quote or other reference showing he did? (Other than someone else's interpretation assuming this.) You gave a historical context to the work: Bacon's friend/lover died. (Did you say by suicide?) It's still an assumption, in my opinion, the work expresses Bacon's anguish. This particular work is similar to many others by Bacon, from different periods of Bacon's life, so unless you assume all of these were inspired by the same event, this death doesn't explain much, in particular. Why is it a tryptych? Is a tryptych expressive of anguish over a friend's death? I would love to hear an explanation of that.

[@combatINFOcenter]

1. Regarding the Bacon painting, I keep focusing on the cursor arrow, or at least what we are now conditioned to see as a computer interface, GUI. There’s no way he meant this, but did he intend something analogous to it? 2. As for paintings that are tributes to the death of someone close to the artist, I recall other examples such as Picasso and Schnabel... each of whom I suspect had faked their emotions to some degree (yes, not a charitable interpretation, but there it is). Including Bacon, I detect a certain narcissistic coldness each had with their tribute subjects, a touch of exploitation.

[@garjog1]

There is verbal and non verbal meaning. When we say that modern art is about feeling I think we are trying to say that it doesn't have a linguistic meaning that can be rationally explained.

[@mylesjordan9970]

Re. the conventional interpretation of O’Keefe’s “vaginal” flowers pushed by Stieglitz, among others-it’s surprising that contemporary gender theory hasn’t made more hay with the artist’s bisexuality. It enabled her to feel more easily the functional consonances between flower as procreative organ, as ecstatic catalyst and vagina as exactly the same things-and as the ultimate lever of power.

[@AmorSciendi]

I've got an O'Keefe video that addresses this topic

[@mylesjordan9970]

@@AmorSciendi I’ll look forward to seeing it; your work is excellent. Thank you for your reply.

[@thepenguin3276]

Let me speculate something about Plato, as a philosophy major who married a philosophy major. Plato had a few options when it came to dealing with the passions in his ideal society. He could: A) Ask for a balance between reason and the appetites. This would commit him to articulating what that balance should be and how it should be implemented in a perfect society. Also, this position might require negotiations between the logical and the appetitive, which are notoriously difficult ("I want cake" "You shouldn't eat cake." "So?"). B) Reason is a slave to the passions. This would undermine his ability to argue for a perfect society with rational philosopher kings at the top. Also, it might undermine his use of logical arguments. ("Plato, you only think philosophers are in charge because you're appetites want to be king"). C) We don't listen to the passions. This is not an exhaustive list, but Plato chose C) which included censored poetry, logical sounding musical scales, and abolishing the flute, an instrument which drove people to vice. Why choose C? Because despite appearances C is a much easier position to argue from. There is little ambiguity in banning the flute. There is no is-ought negotiation, which means you don't have to listen to the desires of the irrational masses. There is no subjectivity. You preempt a lot of discussions you don't want to have by hunkering down on "thing-bad." This simplifies your overall goal, which is to win arguments and look cool in front of your philosopher friends.

[@danielschaeffer1294]

Interesting that you should bring up Plato here. Perhaps you’re familiar with Karl Popper’s devastating take on “The Republic?” His claim is essentially that Plato was the first great totalitarian theorist. He would likely have cut a lot of slack for Soviet realism, as a perfect example of The Noble Lie. And in fact Putin is still pushing a noble lie - the myth of Russki Mir.

[@S_M_McBean]

2:08 well no not really. It can, but then it can also not. and 2:20 - I can find both.

[@mr1234567899111]

Bravo🎉

[@timeenoughforart]

I'm kinda on the side of If a kid in Jr high can't understand it it isn't art. A banana duct taped to the wall might bring out a belly laugh, but not tears.

[@AmorSciendi]

I've got a video about that banana

[@conniecendon4740]

Nice content (: sometimes I feel more of a formalist, where the right use of the visual elements can have a grrat impact on the viewer regardless of the narrative. Still, the emotions one can deduce from a piece are very stimulating as well.

[@joez6235]

I agree with the idea of formalism but I don't think it can be used to declassify any painting as a work of art. When you depict anything visually, you are using visual elements to do so. There is no avoiding it. I don't see much of a distinction between suggesting an emotion through an image vs expressing emotion through the visual elements required to depict the image. A picture of a bloodstained knife will allicit a particular emotion. Is it the redness of the blood and the jaggedness of the knife that expresses this emotion or is it the implications of the image? I say it's both because emotions expressed through the colour and form are fundamentally connected to implications of depiction. If you changed the colour or form it would no longer carry the same narrative. Do we like paintings of flowers because we like the way flowers look, or do we like the way they look because we just happen to like flowers? The two forms of expression are so connected they might as well be the same. Magritte tried to make his paintings devoid of style in order to express himself purely through the ideas expressed in his paintings and I honestly think he failed, his style carries as much weight, if not more than the surrealistic ideas he tried to convey.

[@garyrickard6189]

I can't imagine that art that doesn't raise an emotion wouldn't be thought of but for a brief moment.

[@mikesamovarov4054]

I saw a shovel nailed to the wall in the National Art Gallery in Ottawa. I felt nothing positive and wouldn't pay one cent for it. Disappointed that my tax money was partially spent on that type of garbage 😂 Too easy to create an emottion with art, just make something uggly or stuрid. It's not rocket science to create a random emotion 😂

[@TimotheeLee]

I picture says a thousand words. YT is so profound. Here's another one: ain't nothing new under the sun. or in this case LCD monitors.

[@ExiledGypsy]

Interesting video but at the end of it I was left with a question; what do you mean by contemporary art; apart from its literal meaning, i.e. what artists exhibit contemporarily? In that sense, all sorts of art were once contemporary which kind of renders the term "contemporary art" non-specific. So what is contemporary art? Surely it is not limited to the examples you provided. For example; What about hyperrealistic drawings? If anything art has exploded out of its Plato box everything can be called art depending on the personal values we invest in them be it a creation or an idea or just the process. If anything art has become more and more personal. I find some so-called contemporary art as nothing but a scam because I don't see anything worthy of emotional investment in them but if someone else thinks of them as art, I have no argument with them. Why do some intellectuals try to anticipate ends? It is like the end of history announced by one of them (Francis Fukuyama) at the end of the cold war. I bet he feels stupid now. As you said, art is a reflection of a specific time and space (like "truth"). So, art like history is contingent and nobody will know when it ends because we won't be around as a specie to know.

[@AmorSciendi]

I've got a video called "the end of art" that will answer that question

[@mikesamovarov4054]

It doesn't matter. Not sure why we argue about these minor things. Main development in art is that it's a wide spread and democratic hobby with free lessons and most westerners doing it at home. Art is an awesome hobby now, but we've failed to see that art is no longer a profession or a business. It's just a popular and cheap hobby.

[@ExiledGypsy]

​@@mikesamovarov4054 After making the comment, I realized that the Amor Sciendi knowingly or not was only referring to institutional art (as proposed by George Dickie) and not the kind we can call personal or hobby. Hence his reference to the pluralistic aspect of art. Your view of democratic art is exactly the opposite of what the video is about. The irony is that like everything else to do with institutions, that kind of art is prone to corruption and historical revisionism that kind of makes it unpleasant if not totally unreliable. Nonetheless, we still have to deal with it even though we know that most of it is probably junk. This is why I have a kind of ambivalence towards intellectuals especially when it comes to anything to do with history. For example: Contarary to the narrator's view of Guernica and according to Piccaso himself was not meant to represent a bombing scene during The Spanish Civil war. It was based on his memory of an earthquake that luckily made good metaphor and no once can claim say that Picasso was a pious and/or conciencious person. But once you know that it is impossible not to see it that way. So which one is right? How are we to look at the painting with multiple understanding of its history. Some say that it doesn't matter but I can't accept that because of its emotional consequences. Another more poinant example is the Kaffka's novel; the Trial. I like many others inclduing Christopher Hitchins used to view it more of sureal Political Satire and critique of authriterian gavernment. But once you know about Kaffka's childhood then you realise that the sence of persecution especially that of self persecution and admission to guilt comes from along with everything else about Kaffka. So, I thought; screw Christopher Hitchins. No once seems to be a reliable source or even if there is a source. However, I still think that many of the issues I pointed out still apply unless there is a more precise definition of what Art means in this specific context. That is the problem with language everything is tightly bound to context even the explanation of a given context. But one thing I think is indisputable and that is the idiotic concept of the end of art although again that depends on the context and what we mean by art. I suppose one could imagine an end to institutional art if and when civilization collapses but even then I doubt it is the kind of end Danto had in mind (context again).

[@ExiledGypsy]

@@AmorSciendi Why not send a link to it then? Although I wonder; What question? I don't remember asking one. Maybe it is a subjective issue but as I said ; the academia is either too proccupied or their view of "end" is not the same as what it meant in ordinary language. May be they are talking about end of a cycle in which case I wish they would clarify it rather than being coye and smug about it that is a sign of their vanity. They want to deliberatley confuse as a way of showing how clever they are. Humsn Art, like history is contigent and therefore it will keep going as long as there are humanity to sense it.

[@napoleonsittingonvegemite6234]

I believe that its is a bit like religions. All religions express their believe of the human connection to the divine in a different way but just because there are different types of living life "the right way", that doesn't mean that if one is right that the others are therefore automatically wrong. Maybe all of the opinions you just named are right but just in a different way. One could still argue that one way is in some way more "efficient" and therefore more accurate but if you reach your goal anyways all ways are somehow legit. Its seems to be less of a "black and white" and more of a Spectrum type of question, where there a more than one legit answers.

[@mikesamovarov4054]

Yes, art is opinion based, including its perceived quality or value. But one thing is clear, art is just a hobby now. 99.99% of university trained artists will never sell a single painting in their lifetime. Self trained even less likely to sell. There's also zero demand for art pieces, since people are barely buying china-made сrаp from ikea or walmart on rare occasion, if ever. Even teaching art is not a thing, with all the free content on KZbin. Basically, art is just a nice hobby now. Very wide spread and democratic. But art is no longer a profession or a business.

[@GabrielKnightz]

PS: would you as an expert agree if i said "Art is to society what icing is to cake" (or find it reductive and offensive?) [What i mean is most societies/cakes are made of the same basic materials in different ratios and perhaps something that makes them, them. What adds character to that cake over everything else however is the icing, whether it says "Happy 6th Divorce Grandma or Congratulations / whether the local theatre is playing "Jesus Christ Superstar or Hamlet, whether it's slathered on or delicately designed / whether the local museum is featuring "Coco the clever chimpanzee or Monet". The icing is a piece of purposeful act of self expressionism, conveying who and what and to whom. I apologise for the rant and any and all ignorance on my part in advance, i get verbose when drunk. I do enjoy your channel ]

[@vikingjanch]

I am a trained and "professional" artist/painter . For me , art is about materiality - in my case, paint. The sensation and mystery of the liquidity of paint and the resistance of dry, partially shiny, primed, textured canvas ; and how this becomes fixed with time and reaches up through form (used in the widest sense) to communicate something essential about the experisnce of being human , and what lies at the heart of the human experience - the sensation of materiality in a partiulcar and fundamental situatuion of the profound beyond the veil of familiarity, or the world as it actually is (hinted). This is not "emotion", to use your term, which as a category (except in fairly extreme and clear cut observable instances of behaviours) is not a term I really understand or feel is very useful, and I don't think it can be abstracted as a reality in tself (although obviously it often is !) .The broader and more superficial meaning of the painting, is important but not essential - it could be said in other ways, and it can change and be different, for instance. A similar process is evident in poetry with relation to what might be called the musical quality of language. Of course, much contemporary visual art is not painting, but I think similar issues can be found in such offers ( as I don't practice in that way I can only speculate). It is at the heart of what constitutes art - possibly. But the heart of art is a mystery, although it can be experienced. Of necessity, this is all very briefly and simply put.

[@mikesamovarov4054]

What do you mean by "professional artist"? Are you able to pay for your living expenses fully from selling your original art, or not? If the answer is no, you're not a professional artist. I'm always surprised to see people going to art schools, hoping they could earn, not realizing that art is just a hobby, and you can learn it on KZbin like vast majority of people today. Art is a hobby, not a profession or a business. Even becoming a pathetic art teacher is pretty hard, but then you're still not an artist, but rather an art teacher. Art is a hobby, dear.

[@beverlykandraceffinger3764]

@@mikesamovarov4054 Well, breathing is a pathetic pastime, and we seem to be earning very little from the practice, dear. But it is rather a challenge to try giving it up.

[@albertusmagnus5829]

A painter of the Umbrian school designed upon a gesso ground / The nimbus of the baptised God / The wilderness is cracked and browned

[@sock2828]

Personally I'd say the Andy Warhol example is still portraying an emotion. Numbness and anxiety are emotions, and even a lack of emotion for something makes you feel other emotions. With Warhol It's just that the context of our modern world is absolutely key to feeling those emotions with the majority of his art I also think the transfer of a belief is still the portrayal of an emotion. You must have faith and trust in an idea to believe it, and the whole point of art designed to teach you a lesson is belief in that idea. If it was actually just about the lesson itself, instead of mostly about believing in the lesson or feeling something towards it, then it would be a graph or a rational intellectual argument of its reality. Not a painting full of striking colors and symbolism, or even a book full of poetic prose.

[@poojanewa1820]

Hello, I always feel a bit uneasy about Warhol's work, he communicates the numbness, the reduction of artistic value to market value-he communicates it effectively but wonder and what else? I feel an artist should have an empathetic core in their work, whatever they make. Make some thing that is non-conforming, angry, confused, ugly anything but it should attempt to move the viewer towards making the situation better. And with Andy's work I just find this shallow mocking smile, yes he makes an accurate observation, but then what does he do with it? I think it is because of the way he lived his life also, he capitalized his fame and glamour, I think it also affects how I judge his work. What do you think about it? I read your comment and wanted to know how you view his work. Thanks. :) and I love the last paragraph, ya I agree...

[@tiesthijsthejs]

Hej. I've always been uncomfortable with the frictions between perceived categories like wordsmiths versus visual artists. Within literature communities there's vain glorification of poetry as the ultimate art form. And as you referred to in this video, within visual art (and dance and music) communities there's paradigms of grandeur when it comes to not needing words. It all seems pointless to me. It all seems like just different strands of art. And taste in aesthetics directing preference to which forms speak to perceivers to convey emotions or whatever it is they frame. Certain poetry for instance plays with form and suggestions of imageries. There's the narrative paintings you mentioned that further blur the lines. I can't deny there's much literature that's more like crafts, but there's plenty of examples of writers who use words to create exhibitions of experiences, via suggestions of narratives. Anyway, I wonder what your take is on the claims on "art" especially when distanced from literature. I love how dance can communicate emotions or analytical visions in ways that musicians can't, but how musicians can do so what painters can't and so forth. Maybe these individual artists can't convey what they wish to express in other ways, and thus assume their medium is therefore better or more suited than others. But I don't see how words somehow don't make the cut when it comes to defining which means art has. Or any of those distinctions. In general, it makes me weary of wanting to share whatever I express myself, as humans come up with all these separations and hierarchies. When expressing something through whatever, I love to learn from for instance art history, but detest the mine field of tribalist obstacles of inclusion/exclusion, peer and group pressure etc. I might make a collage or an installation, but can't also mention I'm working on a short story, cause you're no longer taken seriously by a the "art world". Or i might perform a poem but won't dare to share photography or a novella because of the same reasoning within the literature community. It's a game of inconsistent logics I can't seem to navigate. It's all a kaleidoscope of angles of meaning; I can appreciate these different takes on the role on emotions in your video. But it makes no sense to me how at the same time there's all the contentious frictions between claims on aesthetics. It seems it's all just ephemeral cave paintings.

[@Dino_Medici]

Bro ur channel looks sweet about I’m to run it

[@crustykells27]

Feelings emotions talent why not.

[@mikesamovarov4054]

AI can create to make us feel. Does it count?

[@robertalenrichter]

Is it also sexist to refer to work by male artists as "phallic"?

[@AmorSciendi]

No

[@robertalenrichter]

@@AmorSciendi I had a naive conception that we wanted equality, but at least it's clear. Sexism can only be committed by males, so women don't have to worry about stereotyping and degrading men.

[@AmorSciendi]

@@robertalenrichter anyone can make phallic art. You're not making any sense.

[@mikesamovarov4054]

Art is a hobby. If a man us broke trying to sell art, I'll definitely consider him stuрid. But calling all male-made art fallic is ridiculous 😂