Fisher, Chap. 8: Art and Entertainment
- •Some believe that art is just another kind of entertainment
- •Entertainment's reason for being lies in the enjoyment
or pleasure of audience
- •As entertainment, its value lies in how much it pleases
the audience
- •Circuses please children
- •Drive in movies please teenagers
- •Art is entertainment for elite in society
Problems
- •No justification for special support for art
- •No justification for artist to create works that society largely
disapproves of (but that perhaps criticizes and enlightens society)
- •No deep meaning to art
- •Beethoven's symphony is just entertainment for certain people
- •No more or better than heavy metal rock music
- •Might be less valuable as entertains less
- •Why would artists sacrifice so much to just entertain?
- •Importance of distinction
- •If there is such a dist art/entertainment, then audience will be confused
if it is just expecting entertainment
- •Works of genuine art can be difficult and unpleasant
- •If there is such a dist, then artists will not accept the audiences'
attitudes, values and desires as constraints on their expression
- •But to entertain, they must take these into consideration
- •Perhaps artists shouldn't ignore the attitudes of their audiences,
but main aim of artists is not to offer emotional titillation
- •Mozart example: String Quintet in G minor, k. 516
- •Some of the most tragic music ever written and then at end
breaks into a lighthearted final movement (to conclude with the
conventional happy ending)
- •Done to please his audience?
- •Incompatible with aims of artwork
- •If dist art and entertainment, commit one to distinction high art and
pop culture?
- •Artifacts of pop culture aim to be commercially successful and
must please the audience
- •Therefore not real art?
- •But many traditional works of high art had a commercial
motivation at least partially
- •Art could both entertain and do more
- •Mozart tired to make operas both entertain audience and also
make them deep and ground-breaking musical works
- •"Attempt to appeal to a broad and unsophisticated audience need
not prevent artists (e.g., film makers of 20th century) from
exploring dimensions that make them important as art.