[Radix]

I think yours will be the best comment on this article.

The trouble with this discussion is people keep attempting to define objective attributes of art. But art doesn't have objective attributes; they are all subjective. Art is a feeling we get when we look at something others call art. We see three paintings, all "art", and two of them give you a certain feeling, so you call it "art" and suppose they feel the same about the third painting. And there it is. You now have an idea called "art" to develop.

It is in this way that our idea of art overlaps with each others, appearing to be the same from a distance, but irreconcilable at proximity. This is why this concept is so fuzzy and difficult to sketch out. We really do need to experience art before we can believe it as art. So, Mr. Ebert's right. Video games aren't art - to him.

[gizmo]

Thank you. I was thinking about deleting the comment because it's so disjointed and a bit of a braindump, but now I'll leave it up.

I don't agree that art is just in the eye of the beholder, but this probably isn't the place to get into that whole argument. In short, some things must be art because they're truly timeless, other things cannot be art because they're strictly worse than something else. If you have X, and X' an uninspired derivative of X, then X' cannot be art. So I'm pretty sure there are a bunch of necessary attributes for art. I don't think you (plural you) do art justice by saying it's all subjective.

[Radix]

When you put it that way I agree with you. But I don't believe art is just in the eye of the beholder. I believe there is a web of definitions for art that all overlap. Great Art is art that mostly agreed by everyone that it is great art. People the world over converge to believe a certain symmetry and proportion makes the most beautiful face. In the same way I believe there is a shared inclination for what is Great Art [1]. But I don't know what it is, and challenge you to define it, because it's a little different for everyone, particularly subject to their perspective.

Let's consider person A and person B. Both A and B see and consider derivative art X' separately. A thinks: there's nothing original here. She's already seen art X. B thinks: wow, how interesting. B has not seen art X and so the uninspired derivation is still interesting.

Similarly, I think the Mona Lisa is a reasonably accurate painting of an unattractive woman. There is nothing beautiful or intrinsically interesting about it. It's due to POV. In fact, each of your examples in the OP is a different perspective. A different reason to consider something art. If you had a stricter definition I don't see how you could change perspective so easily.

I actually reduced all words defined on emotions to being subjective. I don't think this causes a problem. I don't see this as doing art injustice. Saying it is just subjective just gives us a spot to start from.

(Oi, now I don't know if I made sense.) [1] There was a PBS like program on the BBC one night that discussed some research about this.