Aristotle

Reading through the beginning with rhetoric, I felt as if I had been magically transported back into my AP English class and was learning about the parts of speech all over again. I found reading this that a lot of information I had learned my senior year except in a much fancier and hard to understand tone. There were some interesting points, such as how one can become a good persuader and what defined one, but most of what I read I felt I had knowledge about previously. And learned, previously, in a simpler way.

As for the Poetic portion of the reading, I found it interesting. I feel, again, as if I were learning the same ideas I was taught in high school, however, I feel as if there's a new spin to this section. I especially enjoyed the idea of humans having this natural inclination to imitate (which sets us apart from the rest of the world) and the breaking down of the key elements of tragedy. I enjoy the examples he uses in order to obtain his point, most notably the comparison or two poets Poly and Zeuxis. I enjoyed the small, minuet detail about them.

Plato. Book X

So, like always, it took me awhile to get this reading. I had to ask a friend to explain it to me a little. But once she did, I got it right away. I must say, I actually liked this reading. It wasn't hard, and I understood it after awhile. Which is really good. And I actually disagree with what Plato says. And it's not just because I'm in art school to become an artist. Well maybe. But anyways. He made some valid points. But as soon as he gets to the artist, and not knowing what they paint, or that they have no real knowledge. That's where I disagree. Artists not only create beautiful works (sometimes), but just because they don't know what they paint, does not know that they don't know many other things. Of course a flute maker is going to ask a flutist how to improve the flute. But an artist, could learn to play the flute. There are many faces behind an artists that many people don't understand. And well that's what I say. But other than that, good reading. (:

I don't think all artists are imitators, though a lot of them are. Art, when Plato was writing this, mostly had to do with representing the natural world – artists were seen as craftspeople up until quite recently. I think that has a lot to do with Plato's conception of “art as imitation”. As Michael Kimmelman says “all art is a lie” - hence “this is not a pipe”, however there are certain artists who create things that have never been seen before - purely out of their imagination (Kandinsky, etc). Sure, you can argue that he used shapes, etc and those things already existed, hence an “imitation”. However, it's impossible to create something that cannot be perceived (otherwise it couldn't be experienced, and then it wouldn't be art anyway) and anything that can be perceived exists only in relation to other perceivable things because we only “know” anything by comparison. Art, as it exists today, is more of an idea – all art really exists that way, it remains in your head as a memory (the better the work the more heads it stays in). If you say that it's all imitation then you say that there are no new ideas (again, since all ideas exist only in relation to past ideas).
I think that's a rather thin way of viewing originality.

2/9/11

Artists as imitators in my eyes is a very truthful concept that Plato portrays in his text. Artists draw inspiration from things around them and visually try to communicate that moment to the viewer. It's like one of my professors said last semester when we were doing graphite drawings of shoes, drawings are lies. The more skilled you are at drawing the better of a liar you become. I don't think artists want to come to terms with this because they put so much effort and time into their projects that it is real to them not an imitation.

im still having a little problem understanding some things, but slowly i am beginning to understand more and more. Book x was to me very weird Artist i think to myself are in some way imitators but at the same time they are not. artist are not imitadors because they are making something that if another person tries to do it they wont do it the same simply because people have their own style of making art. =)

Book Ten

There are many things I agree with Plato on. For example, I agree with his view that Poets (and really all artists) influence people to be irrational, and to have a more dramatic response to situations and emotions that they typically wouldn't have if they think clearly and behave rationally. However, in this book there are quiet a few things I strongly disagree with.

For one, he says that artists have no real knowledge to give. They paint a cobbler, but don't know a thing about cobbling and therefore do not teach anyone about cobbling even though they spent so much effort painting the cobbler. He says that Homer wrote of courage and virtue, imitating through his writing how they are in life, but that he had no true understanding of it. Let me just start off by saying that no matter who you are, artist or not, philosopher or not, you have something to teach because no two people view the world in the same way, and no two people share the exact same life experiences. You can always teach and enlighten people on what you have experienced and how you experienced it. Even the most ignorant person can teach you something if you are willing to listen and learn, instead automatically demeaning them. Also, perhaps not so much in Plato's time, but in our modern times, art is almost always informative, including abundant facts, or a commentary on polotics, society, or all of these things at the same time. I almost feel that art is viewed as "bad" if it does not address those topics. Some artists in all fields of art, are working hard in various ways to find solutions to life's questions and problems. Do philosophers not act in the same way?

Two: When an artist is depicting something they don't completely understand or know many facts about, they are typically expressing an appreciation for it. Homer writes about courage and virtue because he clearly appreciates those characteristics based on the way he wrote about them. What evidence did Plato provide to prove that Homer did not understand them? What, because Homer didn't write a book defining and explaining courage and virtue, he doesn't really know what they are? Plainly if he was able to use them so effectively in his epic, he knew more than enough about the subjects.

Three: Plato limits the artist. He never even stops to think that maybe, just maybe, an artist can be more than just an artist. Who's to say that the artist is not a philosopher who just uses their skill with a brush, instead of words, to speak of what they think and know. I mean just look at Michelangelo, he was an inventor, a scientist, and an artist. I know crazy right?!

Maybe in the case of the artist, Plato is stuck in the cave of his time period.

Art And Imitation

I was highly amused and intrigued by Plato's perspective of art and how it's merely an imitation. I enjoyed the extended example between the painter and the carpenter, even the slight acknowledgment of a higher being creating the single 'couch' and that being the true one. I didn't feel truly offended as I read it, just amused at how he viewed everyone in the art. I was a tad bit taken back when he denounced the poets and wanted to remove them all from the city because artists allow the vices to flourish in the soul and that shouldn't be allowed in a good, lawful city. But, as I continued reading, and Plato allowed us back in with a condition, I felt a little bit annoyed, but only for a moment.

I do not deny that we are imitators in some respects, e.g. painting a portrait or sketching a landscape, but are we not creators? In some respect, can't we be on the level of the higher being sometimes, in Plato's respect, when we create something new and unseen? If we have created something never before thought of by anyone, we create the first and truthful 'couch', don't we raise ourselves up from being solely imitators or are we just degrading ourselves more by trying to imitate that higher being?

Short film; excerpt from Book X of The Republic

I'm in a film workshop right now and I've decided to use a couple paragraphs from Book X of Plato's Republic as the dialogue in my most recent project for class. Bear with me, it's not masterpiece...

HERE is the link to the film on my website. Enjoy.