The last thread in which Derek was irritated by the reviews he’d recieved at a game site, he referred to himself/yourself as an artist. I find this to be just a little over the top. I can’t imagine in a million years game designers being called artists.
As a musician I take great exception to this. Music is an artform as is painting. I refuse to accept photography and or even filmmaking into the fold. Literature and poetry are also artforms.
Let’s be realistic here, when did game design garner the same respect in any other industry other than game design? It is not now nor will it ever be an artform. Sorry to blow your bubble but that’s how we in the industry look at it.
I’ve played games where the calibre of graphic art was just fine by me but even that’s not an artform. It’s (graphic art) a derrivative form that would just love to be a true artform. If you try to tell me Andy Warhol was an artist I’ll laugh in your face. He was a hack at best.
I truley can’t even forsee the day when game design will be considered an artform, why you may ask? Well it’s simply not art.
In the music industry I’ve seen artists throwing stones at one another claiming what is or is not art. I can see their point on some issues but please do tell me how or why game design should be considered art?
I’m not trying to enrage anybody I’m simply pointing out how the whole game industry is looked upon by other viable (artistc) industries.
I think you’ll find alot of gamers don’t want games to be considered ‘art’ any more than you do. They see ‘art’ as the epitomy of unfun and pretentious posturing - the artist as a beret wearing effete goatee poster child.
The reality is that filmmaking and photography have already been embraced as art forms. Closer to game design is architecture and the design of furniture. Functional structures as aesthetic statements. The art isn’t necessarily the in graphic design or the music of a game but the gameplay, and the code structure, that supports it. The other, more traditionally ‘artistic’ elements contribute to the gestalt but really are not the entire entity any more than a stained glass window is the sum of a cathedral’s design.
Now a fair shot is that games, at this point, don’t really have a whole lot to say - even ‘deep message’ games, the few that exist, are only deep in comparison to an episode of Star Trek. However, the quality of some popular media is improving and does contain thought provoking work of artistic merit (as well as anyone is able to judge such things). There are a few graphic novels I’d have no problems offering to someone that enjoys literature. Some story oriented games, like Torment, aim at that level of quality as well.
I’d argue, though, that linear storytelling isn’t the strength of the computer game. That form is better explored in books and films where the storyteller has more creative control over the audience’s experience. The strength of the computer game is in the dynamic worlds and experiences one can explore in them. While I’m not a huge fan of The Sims I’ve seen some very interesting discussions about what this game says about being human, especially a modern consumerist human - and what it deliberately leaves out. The average player probably isn’t interested in all that but the implications are there for those who do find themselves drawn to them.
I think in time we’ll see more games, and more knowledgable folks might be able to point them out already, that do provoke more self-examination on the part of the viewer. And if these explorations are also fun they’ll still be games.
Remember, The Bauhaus movement started out making chairs and ended up making history.
Good points, but you can throw architecture out the window in your debate. I have in fact studied architecture in university and it is not art, it is the gestation of many different fields (engineering, surveying etc.) coming together and putting a building up that resembles the archictects original intent. Most architects are of the cookie cutter variety as well.
I don’t think anyone looks at musicians as these “earth loving bohemians” as you’ve tried to poorly draw reference to. In fact musicians are quite highly regarded even those with no political pretentions although John Lennon was exactly what you drew with your paint brush of wit but is that really how you view him?
That’s funny, because I own this big thick book by someone named Janson called “History of Art” and it has multiple entries for architecture. Photography too.
So are most musicians. For every Mozart there are a thousand studio musicians, for every Paul Westerberg there are a thousand frontmen in hotel bar cover bands. Many classical painters had students that actually finished their paintings. Artists that worked on commissions often had whole crews that would help them finish mosaics or large installations. I’m still not seeing why architecture isn’t art.
Hey, I’m a former bad lyricist and worse singer (I made Jonathan Richman sound good). My brother runs a recording studio. Musicians, and drummers too, are quite alright in my book. I’m just pointing out a theme I constantly see from posters here when this subject comes up and it comes up with impressive frequency.
It is common knowledge architecture is not art. It is many fields helping that architect try to attain what he originally drafted and it is many contractors ruining that very vision.
The identifying factor of an artist has nothing to do with the medium they express themselves in.
Art is what is produced by an artist engaging in their expression. It is not defined as a substance on canvas or magenetic tape. This sort of pompous post refuses to acknowledge that the validity of art is not determined by commitee, club, guild, or agency. There are no universally assigned rights to artistry.
I know the nature of the music indusrty quite well. Paul McCartney was a rip-off artist and yet he was knighted. Led Zeppelin ripped off so many bands I’m surprised they didn’t get hosed like poor old George Harrison did. Music though by it’s nature is a genre where bands or songwriters learn and take ideas from their peers and expand upon them.
Where architecture is concerned, I know all too well the stunts they pull. I also am quite aware that they aren’t artists, how on earth could they be? That means the structural engineers that tell them whether or not their concept will stand are artists as well. That means the carpenters and drywall guys are artists by extension. Are they?
‘I think in time we’ll see more games, and more knowledgable folks might be able to point them out already, that do provoke more self-examination on the part of the viewer. And if these explorations are also fun they’ll still be games.’
Balance of Power seems like a shoo-in for this sort of thing.
I’d have to agree with this assessment. As soon as anyone tries to define what art is, the conversation begins to lose meaning. Maybe everyday architecture isn’t art, but Frank Lloyd Wright was certainly an artist.
This discussion about whether games are art has been around about as long as computer games. Johnny Wilson wrote about this back in the late 80’s. Heck, I even wrote about it:
Bruce Geryk, of course, disagrees with these assessments, and believes games are in no way an art form. It’s something worth debating.
However, anyone who starts narrowing down the field too much is simply being, IMHO, arrogant and elitist. Is Greg suggesting that Citizen Kane isn’t great art because it’s film? Or that Valley of the Dolls is great art because it’s a book? Or that Ansel Adams wasn’t an artist because he used a camera?
It’s certainly worth arguing if games will ever be an art form. But this kind of narrow-minded approach creates the conclusion before the argument.
And bandmates tell the songwriter why his arrangement sucks. A producer tells them why they’re all wrong. Are producers artists? How about the soundman who adjusts levels, live or on Memorex? What about the girlfriend who insists on changing some lyrics? If these influences are invisible to the audience do they exist at all? Are plays art? What about the guy who designs lighting and sets? What about the crew that builds them?
Now, why isn’t architecture art? It’s not simply because it requires additional skill sets is it? Look, it’s already been pointed out that encyclopedic works about art include architecture as rote. What do you know that these folks don’t?
A musician can play the notes presented to them in a rote and mechanical method; many do. Just because you can blow in one end of a horn and make a noise doesn’t mean you’re an artist. I doubt Coltrane and Miles Davis would consider anyone who took music lessons an artist.
Photography is ineligible to be an art form? Huh? Why? Because it uses a camera? Reminds me of the story I heard a long time ago, names are probably wrong but it makes the point:
Ansel Adams and John Updike were at a party. Updike went up and introduced himself to Adams, and said " I LOVE your photos! You must tell me what kind of camera you have, it must be great!" Adams said “I love your books - you must have a wonderful typewriter.”
Unsurprisingly given your initial post, you have missed my point completely. Even the question you pose shows beyond any doubt you have no understanding of what matters, to the point of not even recognizing what it is I said.
You are trying to forbid entry into your exlusive club because of the medium of expression an individual chooses - regardless of the merits of their work.
But this kind of narrow-minded approach creates the conclusion before the argument.
Exactly. Forgive the repetitiveness, but I feel the need to say it again:
Art is what is produced by an artist.
Games are not automatically art, just like giving some twit a brush and a canvas doesn’t make him an artist. The mechanics of expression are irrelevant to awarding or denying the classification of artist - or art.
