[MD] ART versus NONART

[MarshaV]

Greetings,

Re:  Art versus Nonart: Art out of Mind (Contemporary Artists and 
their Critics) (Hardcover)
by Tsion Avital, John G. Harries (Translator)

Thanks for the recommendation Ham!

I am only through the first chapter, but I'm finding this an 
extremely interesting and challenging book: Art is as dead as that 
small teal (duck) in ZMM.  I've included a quote below, chosen only 
because it uses a water analogy.  But I'm really upset that this book 
should cost $90.  It seems to me this book should be published in 
monthly installments in People magazine or as a comic book.  How can 
anyone blame society when they're fed crap and the elites restrict 
access to the good stuff?

The Interlibrary Loan system is great, but I might need to have this 
book as a reference with marginalia and it's too expensive.  Damn!!!

m



Quote:

    "The problem of demarcation created for the first time a 
situation in which everything, including nothing, may be accepted as 
a work of art.  But then there is not differentiation between the 
class of entities that belong to the category of art and those that 
do not belong to that category.  The significance of this fact is 
that in these conditions there is no art, nor can there be 
any.  Similarly, if everything is water, and there is nothing that is 
not water, then there is no meaning to water, for there is no way of 
distinguishing a duality or difference between water and 
nonwater.  That is to say, if any thing can be art, than there is no art.
    This conclusion follows from a basic and most important attribute 
of symbols of every kind.  Every symbol, whether verbal or pictorial, 
connects all entities that have a certain common denominator and at 
the same time separates them from all others entities in the 
world.  This attribute is what makes symbols of all kinds a means of 
classification and ordering.  (ART versus NONART,pp56-57)