Aesthetics, Respect and Days Gone By...

Music | Porecelain by Moby

Remember as a kid, going thru family photos, either thru albums or boxes of loose prints? Remember going to museums and looking at actual art pieces, sculptures, paintings and photographs? Having seen images thru magazines or books, then seeing the actual work was just so much better! I realize the tides are changing and viewing art electronically has become the default.

In these times, I wonder if the painter is painting with the end result being on the screen as their main intention. I guess if so, they could paint with the computer, lose the feeling of dabbing brush into paint, then onto canvas. Command Z for mistakes and just as easily change colour with the press of a button. Of course I know the answer to my question. Painters are painters and they do what they do because they have to. What true painter would forgo the subtleties of pressure, feathering and all the techniques they have learned over the years?

With photography, I realize the end result is not always the print. Not that tangible object that you can hold in your hand and feel, study, look and think upon as an object of desire in itself. The camera phone, android, iphone has made things where we no longer even think about the photographic print.  I'm just as bad as the next, shooting photos with instagram and posting for the world to see. I get my pats on the back and hope my number of comments and likes increase...

The electronic and digital age we live in has managed to devalue many aspects of our lives. It has also stripped away man's view of aesthetics. Now, we have access to everything, in overt abundance where more people are capable of doing more bad things and compare themselves to those who have worked hard and paid their dues to reach where they are. But since we live in a "Good Enough" society, only those that have been able to keep a smidgen of aesthetics can see a difference.