[vladms]

Sometimes rules/ideas are useful for specific stages or projects, but people tend to forget to be critical and decide for each project in particular the set of rules they want, and not to make out of them "axioms".

Related to artistic stuff, I think some modern art can be understood much better if you at least are aware (have seen / thought about / discussed) the older art. It's not like 19th century art is invalid or irrelevant - the relevance is also in the process and defining what came before and after, plus personal preferences.

Maybe the rules of thirds gets out of fashion, but might be still be useful for some projects, for understanding the evolution, or just because some people love it (like it's perfectly fine to like 19th century art compared to modern).