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Carter Cleveland Says Art in the Future Will Be for Everyone

42 points by alexis 12y ago

Retric 12y ago
This is factually wrong. Historically, a huge swath of the population preformed music. And listening to professional musicians was about as 'elite' as going to the movies is today.
josephschmoe 12y ago
Art already is already as ubiquitous as music. I would even say art became ubiquitous before music. The very first photographs and easily reproduced paintings prove this. Kids these days cover their walls in prints and posters. Your computer has a rolling background of various art or photography of your choosing. The shirt you're wearing probably has a logo or a decal or maybe even a full piece of artwork on it. I have had days where I don't encounter music. Not encountering art? I pretty much have to go out into the middle of the woods or spend all day at the office off the internet. Most people don't spend thousands of dollars on music per year. They won't spend that kind of money on art either. But they're already consuming art - tons of it.
pestilence123 12y ago
It's already for everyone.. everyone who cares.
egypturnash 12y ago
Has this person not actually been on the Internet? There is a huge, sprawling market of art online. And I don't mean stuff with the cultural approval of the gallery system. I mean, say, people making a living by drawing mind-control commissions on Deviantart. Paying the bills by cranking out custom art of folk's furry characters on Furaffinity. Selling commissions of weird stuff via Tumblr. Folks doing web comics and selling ads/books/t-shirts. Custom clothes/jewelry/chainmail/whatever on Etsy. Patreon is helping too - lotsa people are starting to say "hey I just wanna draw some COOL STUFF and if you like my themes then help support me doing it" in various ways on that site. This economy has been booming ever since Paypal made it easy to give someone money online. None of it is "Fine Art". No small amount of it is pornography. It is not glamorous. It is not pretentious. A hell of a lot of it is amateurs still learning. But there is a lot of it, and some of it is amazing. Seriously: I have a friend who put his wife through nursing school, and is still helping to support her and their child, by drawing outrageous furry latex bondage commissions.
- AJ007 12y ago
  The original article didn't make a lot of sense, comparing a compact and now electronic media with physical art. It is one thing to listen to and purchase 10,000 songs, it is another to accumulate even 100 paintings/sculptures/original works of art. One thing I have been fascinated with is the impact of China's artists. There are a lot of them. A painter can work for weeks on a high quality reproduction of a large classical painting with a market price in the hundreds of dollars. Unnerving for an artist living in the developed world.
- carterac 12y ago
  Carter, the author, here. Yes I've been on the Internet. In fact, I love and grew up on the Internet, wrote my first lines of code in middle school, and procrastinated my way through high school on sites like Deviant Art. I've been reading Hacker News daily for over 5 years. This essay was written with the WSJ audience (average age over 50) in mind. That audience is more familiar with the established art world and its $66B market. For an audience that grew up on the Internet like me, I would have used more nuanced language and talked more about the importance of merging the existing art market and the established art world with the more organic art communities already online. But here's the tl;dr version of what I would have written for HN: The Internet will grow the art market and broaden it to include artists outside of the existing establishment–the result is that more artists will be able to make a living without having to appeal to the existing system. But achieving this requires working with the established art world, e.g. major galleries and museums, to publish more of their art online for easy and free access–making art and art education accessible to everyone, not just those with the time and money to go visit in person. By moving the existing art world online, you're bringing its market of buyers and sellers with it, and exposing them to a more vibrant, diverse, and organic ecosystem that many readers on Hacker News are already familiar with. In summary, by increasing awareness and education about art history, the Internet will drive greater passion and market demand for art, which ultimately means more artists from all over the world will get discovered organically and be able to pursue their passions more sustainably. Likewise, music has been around forever, but the chances of someone like Lorde, a 16 year old from New Zealand, seeing such success was much less likely before the Internet democratized music for listeners and creators alike. Today, it's still very rare for a visual artist to experience that kind of success if they are not part of the existing establishment. But the Internet is going to change that, and this will be a great thing for all of us.
qwerta 12y ago
> Pre-20th century, the music world in the West resembled the art world today. If you listened to professional music, were informed about the genre and attended performances, you were part of an elite class. Bullshit. There were massive outdoor concerts for public with no charge. Every tiny village had church with some sort of musical instruments. My ancestors (rural farmers) had (and still have) 300 years old music band... > Pessimists would say that fundamentally there is a finite universe of people interested in art, or that you must experience art in person to acquire a passion for it. Another bullshit. There is a huge number of street artists, from juggler to spray painters. Every kid wants to go to circus to see acrobats. And finally there is infinitive stream of movies, ads and others forms of art.
chrischen 12y ago
I thought visual arts are already popular. They're called movies!
nobody_nowhere 12y ago
So, sure, lots of flawed examples/reasoning here, but let's look at the overall premise: can art become further democratized, accessible, expansive in media and impactful? First off, it's a nice idea. The world can use more pleasant, hopeful, upbeat thinking in my mind. Second, on the substantive points, that changes in technology will drive changes in what is considered "art" and who can access it, particularly from a market perspective: that's hard to dispute. This is a continuation of changes that have been evolving for 100 years, from the dadaists, through the invention of lithography, to warhol (or murakami today), and seem likely to continue. So an easy article to pick apart, but hard to dispute the point that (i think) he's intending to make.
jedunnigan 12y ago
Tolstoy, we're almost halfway there.
kazinator 12y ago
If, today, you want to be a visual artist analog of a pop musician, you can create comics, or perhaps grafiti. Or album covers, artwork on clothing, sporting equipment, motorbikes, and cars, etc. (Just shooting off the top of my head.) This seems to strike at the fundamental premise of the article; pardon me if I'm wrong.

42 points by alexis 12y ago

This is factually wrong. Historically, a huge swath of the population preformed music. And listening to professional musicians was about as 'elite' as going to the movies is today.

josephschmoe 12y ago

Art already is already as ubiquitous as music. I would even say art became ubiquitous before music. The very first photographs and easily reproduced paintings prove this. Kids these days cover their walls in prints and posters. Your computer has a rolling background of various art or photography of your choosing. The shirt you're wearing probably has a logo or a decal or maybe even a full piece of artwork on it. I have had days where I don't encounter music. Not encountering art? I pretty much have to go out into the middle of the woods or spend all day at the office off the internet. Most people don't spend thousands of dollars on music per year. They won't spend that kind of money on art either. But they're already consuming art - tons of it.

pestilence123 12y ago

It's already for everyone.. everyone who cares.

egypturnash 12y ago

Has this person not actually been on the Internet? There is a huge, sprawling market of art online. And I don't mean stuff with the cultural approval of the gallery system. I mean, say, people making a living by drawing mind-control commissions on Deviantart. Paying the bills by cranking out custom art of folk's furry characters on Furaffinity. Selling commissions of weird stuff via Tumblr. Folks doing web comics and selling ads/books/t-shirts. Custom clothes/jewelry/chainmail/whatever on Etsy. Patreon is helping too - lotsa people are starting to say "hey I just wanna draw some COOL STUFF and if you like my themes then help support me doing it" in various ways on that site. This economy has been booming ever since Paypal made it easy to give someone money online. None of it is "Fine Art". No small amount of it is pornography. It is not glamorous. It is not pretentious. A hell of a lot of it is amateurs still learning. But there is a lot of it, and some of it is amazing. Seriously: I have a friend who put his wife through nursing school, and is still helping to support her and their child, by drawing outrageous furry latex bondage commissions.

AJ007 12y ago
The original article didn't make a lot of sense, comparing a compact and now electronic media with physical art. It is one thing to listen to and purchase 10,000 songs, it is another to accumulate even 100 paintings/sculptures/original works of art. One thing I have been fascinated with is the impact of China's artists. There are a lot of them. A painter can work for weeks on a high quality reproduction of a large classical painting with a market price in the hundreds of dollars. Unnerving for an artist living in the developed world.
carterac 12y ago
Carter, the author, here. Yes I've been on the Internet. In fact, I love and grew up on the Internet, wrote my first lines of code in middle school, and procrastinated my way through high school on sites like Deviant Art. I've been reading Hacker News daily for over 5 years. This essay was written with the WSJ audience (average age over 50) in mind. That audience is more familiar with the established art world and its $66B market. For an audience that grew up on the Internet like me, I would have used more nuanced language and talked more about the importance of merging the existing art market and the established art world with the more organic art communities already online. But here's the tl;dr version of what I would have written for HN: The Internet will grow the art market and broaden it to include artists outside of the existing establishment–the result is that more artists will be able to make a living without having to appeal to the existing system. But achieving this requires working with the established art world, e.g. major galleries and museums, to publish more of their art online for easy and free access–making art and art education accessible to everyone, not just those with the time and money to go visit in person. By moving the existing art world online, you're bringing its market of buyers and sellers with it, and exposing them to a more vibrant, diverse, and organic ecosystem that many readers on Hacker News are already familiar with. In summary, by increasing awareness and education about art history, the Internet will drive greater passion and market demand for art, which ultimately means more artists from all over the world will get discovered organically and be able to pursue their passions more sustainably. Likewise, music has been around forever, but the chances of someone like Lorde, a 16 year old from New Zealand, seeing such success was much less likely before the Internet democratized music for listeners and creators alike. Today, it's still very rare for a visual artist to experience that kind of success if they are not part of the existing establishment. But the Internet is going to change that, and this will be a great thing for all of us.

qwerta 12y ago

> Pre-20th century, the music world in the West resembled the art world today. If you listened to professional music, were informed about the genre and attended performances, you were part of an elite class. Bullshit. There were massive outdoor concerts for public with no charge. Every tiny village had church with some sort of musical instruments. My ancestors (rural farmers) had (and still have) 300 years old music band... > Pessimists would say that fundamentally there is a finite universe of people interested in art, or that you must experience art in person to acquire a passion for it. Another bullshit. There is a huge number of street artists, from juggler to spray painters. Every kid wants to go to circus to see acrobats. And finally there is infinitive stream of movies, ads and others forms of art.

chrischen 12y ago

I thought visual arts are already popular. They're called movies!

nobody_nowhere 12y ago

So, sure, lots of flawed examples/reasoning here, but let's look at the overall premise: can art become further democratized, accessible, expansive in media and impactful? First off, it's a nice idea. The world can use more pleasant, hopeful, upbeat thinking in my mind. Second, on the substantive points, that changes in technology will drive changes in what is considered "art" and who can access it, particularly from a market perspective: that's hard to dispute. This is a continuation of changes that have been evolving for 100 years, from the dadaists, through the invention of lithography, to warhol (or murakami today), and seem likely to continue. So an easy article to pick apart, but hard to dispute the point that (i think) he's intending to make.

jedunnigan 12y ago

Tolstoy, we're almost halfway there.

kazinator 12y ago

If, today, you want to be a visual artist analog of a pop musician, you can create comics, or perhaps grafiti. Or album covers, artwork on clothing, sporting equipment, motorbikes, and cars, etc. (Just shooting off the top of my head.) This seems to strike at the fundamental premise of the article; pardon me if I'm wrong.