A Dance of Identity, Reading 9, AV 360

I'm going to focus on the Chapter 1 section. I remember having a "What is Art?" debate in 260 last year and it got pretty heavy. For me, at least, I don't exclude much from the "Art" category. If it came from an artistic, creative place, then it is art. Sometimes, people will go into a museum, look at a painting that has a squiggly line in the middle with nothing else and say, "What the hell? I could have done that! That's not art!" Well, that may or may not be true, but it was made by an artist, thus it is art. I guess one can decide whether or not to like it, but I don't think it shouldn't be called trash because someone thinks it lacks difficulty. The author makes a good point that can explain this. People from different cultural traditions will have their sense/ judgement of what art is. When we look at art, we look at the appearance and from then on, we interpret. Whatever judgements follow cannot be avoided. Going back to the meaning of art, the author also writes about the background of the products artists come up with. There is the geography component (Where is this supposed to take place? Where is the influence drawn from?" Then there are other things, such as style, context, etc. that give more body to the significance of the work we do. It is so easy to judge something based on its appearance, but one must not look over the influence the artist had and the background that lead to its creation. It all deserves recognition.