Art is has entered the post-epistemology stage. Transversing from the so labeled name of Art History and moving to a future of Visual Studies. Pondering questions such as: how might visual studies rethink what we thought we already knew? The keywords to note, and one we just discussed; globalization, visual studies, practices of teaching and research, historiography, cosmopolitanism, aesthetic communities. MC, says that, yes art history is broad, but still limited, and definable. The visual arts/visual culture challenges the traditional modes of assessing the aesthetics. The comment he made about the nature of the 'decision' and how one comes to one's research, made me think about the validity of some of these authors we've been reading. I think it's our programmed Art Historical voice in all of us. Though we should have an open approach to such ideas, abstract writing, calls for abstract thinking/assessing.
MAH, arises the question, do we take the art out of history, or the history out of the art? Why, remove anything, can't they be happily married? I mean, if art could be/is sometimes, called timeless, should we not just appreciate it for the pure aesthetics, and does knowing the 'history' of a work completely change our perspective on the art? From a more contemporary standpoint, we think of some of the famous artists who we have became so enamored with their life profile; they should be in PEOPLE magazine. That could be an example of 'taking the art out of history.'
This one little liners get me, such as 'history must depend on the nature of the interpreting subject.' This makes me think that if art were timeless, every person would view a piece of art in a completely different time, in the context of their contemporary times. Ok, yes this seems obvious, but I want to know what happens when you x-out the interpreting, another impossible notion, is it the same as the saying goes, "If a tree falls in the forest, an no one's around, does it make a sound?" Well, is art, Art if there are no interpreters?
The 'value of value.' Who places the high status on something to enforce the idea of value? Responsible, are they not the historians we have came to praise for their defining of aesthetic value. When MAH, digressed about the past interfering with the present, this makes me think of how we are constantly comparing to what is the art of the moment to the art that has been done. This may be the reason we feel the need to change the title 'Art History' to 'Visual Arts', one is a field of study, the other an intellectual attitude. Saying that we need to move on, forward, and not just dwell in the past, with this past artist, and their artworks. I think we're trying to re-glamoritize art history, be a little avant-garde, it's good.
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