Writing is an Art Form

cgwriter said:

There will always be someone out there who will enjoy your work.

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Not if it's terrible.

I don't know. I think that Dan Brown writes utter drivel, but he's made eleventy zillion dollars. So even the "not if you write badly" bit is a bit subjective.

But even so, it's not an excuse to say "I'll write however I feel like it, 'cuz someone's bound to like it." You'd better be writing the single best thing you can manage every time, or else it's like paying darts in a dark room. You may hit the board now and again, but you don't deserve to.

PeeDee said:

I don't know. I think that Dan Brown writes utter drivel, but he's made eleventy zillion dollars. So even the "not if you write badly" bit is a bit subjective.

But even so, it's not an excuse to say "I'll write however I feel like it, 'cuz someone's bound to like it." You'd better be writing the single best thing you can manage every time, or else it's like paying darts in a dark room. You may hit the board now and again, but you don't deserve to.

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Brown may write utter drivel, but he told a story people wanted to hear, and he flled it with characters quite a few people seem to like. That's what it's all about.

True 'nuff.

cgwriter said:

I've always looked at writing as an art form. writing to me is a way of expressing feeling, thoughts, etc. No matter what you write there is always someone out there that will love your stories. I've taken up writing as a hobby only because I have a busy life with family. My suggestion to any aspiring writer is to keep on writing. No matter who your critics are. Like I said: There will always be someone out there who will enjoy your work.

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There are people who like eating worms, too. Writing may be art, but just because something is art doesn't mean it's any good. There's more horrible, tasteless, untalented, disgusting, stupid art in the world than there is good art.

There seems to be the notion these days that calling something "art" means it's automatically good, and it just ain't so. I once saw an "art" display that was a chocolate pie made of dog poop. Art or not, it was still dog poop.

And there's plenty of writing in this world that would make a dog poop pie taste like gourmet cooking. Bad is bad, and calling it art doesn't make it any better.

There was a room at the Minneapolis School of Art with a sign in front of it that said "CHAIRS"

You go into the room. It's got wood floors, blue walls, and about fifteen chairs of various sorts sitting around.

This was the "art:" a room full of chairs.

Call it art, call it a craft, call it a business-like-any-other. Just whatever you do, make it matter, and make it important, please.

When you've walked your azz off for six hours in a store filled with idiot Christmas shoppers a room filled with chairs will be very important!

Art is subjective. Puke in the snow will be art to one person. Writing is art, but it is an art that has levels of quality like any other art. Sometimes you do not attain a level that makes it worthy. Sometimes you do.

cgwriter said:

I've always looked at writing as an art form. writing to me is a way of expressing feeling, thoughts, etc. No matter what you write there is always someone out there that will love your stories. I've taken up writing as a hobby only because I have a busy life with family. My suggestion to any aspiring writer is to keep on writing. No matter who your critics are. Like I said: There will always be someone out there who will enjoy your work.

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Writing IS an art. At the same time, it's also a craft. Anyone can write and call it art. But it's in honing your craft which differentiates it from being readable and non-readable. Between enjoyable and "drivel".
Writing for me is therapeutic. But so is writing a journal. Not a lot of journals are readable.

And, you know what? You're right on target with your suggestion on writing: just keep on writing! And it's always good to hear when someone else takes on this mantra.

Lastly, there may be someone out there who'll enjoy your work no matter what you write. However, it doesn't mean it's marketable. I wrote a few stories in my youth that my family said were really good but in retrospect really were horrible and not publishable. But, if that's what you mean, then you're right. Someone out there will enjoy your work no matter what.

PeeDee said:

There was a room at the Minneapolis School of Art with a sign in front of it that said "CHAIRS"

You go into the room. It's got wood floors, blue walls, and about fifteen chairs of various sorts sitting around.

This was the "art:" a room full of chairs.

Call it art, call it a craft, call it a business-like-any-other. Just whatever you do, make it matter, and make it important, please.

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And some just close their eyes and listen to the sound of the "artist" laughing his rear off all the way to the bank. Calling something art doesn't improve quality, and claiming importance doesn't add importance. Bad is bad, stupid is stupid, and crap is crap, no matter what anyone calls it.

KTC said:

Art is subjective. Puke in the snow will be art to one person.

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I've had this debate before. And, of course, enthusiasm over things labeled art is subjective.

Once in the Hirshorn Museum, a friend said to me, "See that's expression. Expression is art." I gagged and replied, "No, expression is a therapy session. Art requires talent."

The arts provide a stage for the fable, The Emperor's New Clothes over and over again. I think this is one of the sad Achilles' heels of mankind.