Showing posts with label Originality. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Originality. Show all posts

Thursday, October 4, 2018

The Guilty Pleasure of Lowbrow Art

People often like to differentiate between highbrow art and lowbrow art and look down on the latter. But is it really that low? Doesn't it have an important function in our lives? Do we really have to feel ashamed for enjoying it?

Many highbrow individuals enjoy lowbrow art as some kind of "guilty pleasure".

Having a master's degree in literature, I often feel obliged to adore highbrow art. Which I often do. Yet what I sometimes also adore is lowbrow art, even though I agree with all those critics saying it's garbage.

And I know I'm not alone. There are many fans of Fifty Shades of Grey who are intelligent, highly educated people, perfectly aware of all its flaws. But they enjoy the series nonetheless. As some kind of guilty pleasure.

So if lowbrow art does find fans among people who typically aren't supposed to like it - Is it still lowbrow art?

Thursday, April 5, 2018

Clichés and Stereotypes in Art

Usually clichés and stereotypes are considered bad. They can even deprive an artwork of its artistic value. But what are they actually and are they really as bad as many people think?

Both clichés and stereotypes put our world in order, categorizing everything and everyone.

When I first started writing I unknowingly used many clichés and stereotypes. That's actually part of what defines a beginner: Someone who is yet inexperienced doesn't know what has already been there and may fall for some false beliefs.

The next stage of my development was avoiding clichés and stereotype at all cost and praising works by others that did it as well, regardless of their actual artistic value.

Now I believe that clichés and stereotypes are neither good nor bad. They're merely tools and it's up to the artist to decide how to use them (no matter if it's about writing, painting, music or even game design).

So ... What are they and how to use them? Here are my two cents on the topic.

Thursday, February 1, 2018

Good and Evil in Stories

Interesting, complex characters aren't "grey", since grey is still only a mixture of black and white. Good characters have colour. And for that storytellers need to shift more towards an alternative worldview ...

The very idea that there is only one true god expresses that
there is only one right way to think and to live and everything else is bad and linked to evil forces.

One advice storytellers often hear is not to make their characters black or white but grey. Everybody seems to be fed up with shiny, good, pretty heroes fighting evil queens, overlords and their ugly henchmen. So the advice is to put both good and evil into one's own characters, to blend black and white into various shades of grey. This, people say, turns two-dimensional characters into complex three-dimensional characters.

However, what people often forget is that grey is, still, a mixture of black and white. It technically isn't even a colour. "Grey" is still a symptom of a two-dimensional, even deeply religious worldview.

Good, Evil and Religion


I'm not quite sure when this binary perception of the world first was created, but there's no denying that monotheistic religions eagerly make use of it. The very idea that there is only one true god expresses that there is only one right way to think and to live and everything else is bad and linked to evil forces.

Thursday, November 9, 2017

Should Artists Create for Financial Success?

Modern technology makes it possible to calculate what you have to do if you want to be financially successful as an artist. But wouldn't following those calculations kill art and turn it into faceless, commercial crap?

Selling well and quality aren't opposites, but it's good that not every artwork is a bestseller.

A book doesn't become a bestseller by coincidence. This is result of Jodie Archer and Matthew L. Jockers' research, summarized in their book The Bestseller Code: Anatomy of the Blockbuster Novel. The software they developed for analyzing novels has read about 5000 books, both bestsellers as well as non-bestsellers. It took a closer look at things like topic, sentiment, writing style, characters and so on and noticed some specific patterns that are found in bestsellers.

Thursday, October 12, 2017

Why Contests Are Crap

Awards don't say much about the artworks they were given for. Contests promise to determine the best, but they rarely actually do it. Here's why ...

Contests say very little about quality. An artwork approved by other people often is good,
yet it doesn't mean it's better than a non-award-winning artwork.

I hate contests. I did participate a couple times, a few times I even won, and I hate them. Because, in my honest opinion, they often don't deliver the quality they promise. At least, personally I rarely agree with the results and see them as highly subjective.

The problem here is how the winner is determined ...

Thursday, August 31, 2017

Art and Intuition - How Trustworthy Is an Artist's Inner Voice?

Artists are expected to follow their intuition. But does it always lead to great results? What if your intuition is playing a trick on you?

Intuition is important when creating art.

The stereotypical artist uses some kind of sixth sense instead of his mind. His ideas seem like a divine vision that he only has to bring in a physical form in order to create a timeless masterpiece ...

Only it doesn't work like this. Well, following one's intuition mindlessly does work sometimes. Paul McCartney is said to have composed the ingenious melody of Yesterday in a dream. But in most cases, especially in the cases of average-talented and yet inexperienced artists, this results in stepping into every cliché trap possible.

Thursday, May 4, 2017

Does Specialization Kill Creativity?

Sometimes artists we admire don't seem to move forward. They're good at what they do, but they don't seem to evolve. May they be trapped in their respective field? And is it bad for creativity?

The multipotentialite Leonardo da Vinci would have had quite some trouble in our era.

I've followed quite a few artists so far. I enjoyed their books, their music, their paintings, their movies, their jewellery designs ... And even though their art still amazes me, with time, I stopped following some of them. - Why? Because their art bored me.

Thursday, April 20, 2017

The Art of Imitation - Lack of Originality?

There are many different kinds of imitation in art. At the same time, we expect artworks to be original. But is it really a contradiction?

What makes realism and photography artistic is the original input by the artist.

Most people in the art community agree that tracing other people's drawings isn't the ideal form of art. Many people feel it's okay for learning purposes and I, too, have learned a lot by tracing and copying drawings and photos. Yet the problem with copying is that it lacks originality and thus isn't real art.

... Really?

Thursday, April 6, 2017

Creating Art with Software - Is It Cheating?

Computers ease many processes - the process of art creation included. Working on a creative project requires less and less skill. All you need is a little basic knowledge and a good idea. Art isn't what it used to be. - Or is it?

We can't stop technological progress. We can only embrace it and make the best of it.

Computers ease many processes - the process of art creation included. Using traditional brush and canvas, you have to paint every single grass stalk when painting a landscape. If you use Photoshop, however, you can adjust the brush settings in a way that you only have to go over the areas where you want the grass to be - et voilà, you have a quite realistic grassy landscape within a few seconds.

With other art genres it's no different. You play only keyboard, but you need a guitar for your piece? No problem, there's software for that. You want to create a video game, but you have no programming skills? There's easy editing software for that as well. You need a professional-looking website, but you don't want to waste your time on PHP, JavaScript, HTML and CSS? There's professional software for that, and it's free.

Thursday, March 9, 2017

Is Performing an Art Form?

Are actors, singers and musicians performing other people's creations actually artists? What do they create? This week I dive into the specifics of performing arts.

When performers enjoy themselves they pass this joy on to the audience.

Nowadays we have quite a culture of idolizing actors, musicians and singers. But being a writer, I kept wondering:
Art is about creating. Writers create stories. Composers create music. Artists create drawings and paintings. Architects create buildings. Sculptors create sculptures. Game developers create games. But what do actors, musicians and singers do other than perform what other people have created?

Thursday, December 8, 2016

Can Art Unite the World? - Creating and Perceiving Art from Different Perspectives

Our world is home to a sheer endless number of different cultures with
a vastly different understanding of moral values and aesthetics.

I often come across cliché phrases like: "That event united people from all over the world by their love for music/books/whatever." This is a nice image. The world united by art. But is it really possible?

Let's remember that we are all limited in our perception which is shaped by our surroundings. These surroundings also determine how we react to different pieces of art and they influence our own artworks. Let's ponder on this.

Relevance of Background


Art is often used for political statements. And just as often it merely reflects what people think. A few years ago I've read a novel about the everyday life of German teenagers in the 90's. It was an interesting read for the sake of studying German culture and I got an idea of what teenage life was like back then (very pampered and silly compared to that of Russian teens of that time), but there was one particular line that struck me: There was a moment in an inner monologue when the protagonist mentioned something like even Russians having Bubble Gum and Coca Cola nowadays. I was well aware that it was only natural for a West German teenager to believe that, but having experienced part of Russia's 90's myself, I actually felt like strangulating someone. Because no, back then we did not have Bubble Gum and Coca Cola, all we had was spaghetti and vegetables from my grandparents' garden, sometimes we even had nothing to eat but potatoes every day, and the ones who did have Bubble Gum and Coca Cola (or rather: people who could afford wasting their money on them) were the nouveau riche ******** who stopped at nothing for the sake of making money. (Even the Italian mafia was shocked about the unscrupulousness of their Russian "colleagues" who had taken over once the Soviet Union went down like the Titanic with 293,047,571 people on board drowning in despair.)

Thursday, October 13, 2016

Art and Academic Education - Why Artists Should Study

Education is one of the best sources for inspiration and innovation.

Last week I've published a video explaining the Typological Model of Narrative Situations by Franz Karl Stanzel, one of the most important theories in narratology and part of the basics in literary studies. At least, this is the case for Germany.

Well, in that video I mentioned something my senseis at university would have hated me for: I said that knowing this model is important for both readers and authors, since it helps us to understand literature better as well as to write our own prose. The "problem" with this statement is that literary studies are about analyzing texts and not about giving guidance how to write them. And yet ... One of the reasons why I've studied literature is that I wanted to learn the depths of this art genre in order to improve my own writing.

As far as I'm concerned, in the US you can actually study creative writing. In Germany you can't. Over here you can "only" become a highly educated scholar who has spent years researching great masterpieces of literature and their historical and cultural contexts. Yet I don't believe I've missed anything. In fact, I believe that studying literature helped me more that studying creative writing would have.

Learning by Analyzing


When learning any art the best thing you can possibly do is to learn from the masters. And the best way to learn from the masters is to analyze their artworks: How did they achieve a certain effect? What do they do to convey emotions? How do they structure their artworks? And so on ...

Thursday, June 23, 2016

Art vs. Mere Skill - Do Commissions Destroy Art?

Some of the greatest pieces of art are commissioned works.

In 1835 the writer Nikolai Gogol published a short story entitled The Portrait in which a poor, young artist gives in to the temptation of money and starts a mass production of commissioned portraits which leads to him losing his talent as well as his sanity. His sin against art isn't taking commissions per se, but giving in to the demands of his commissioners who understand very little about art and only care about being portrayed as Greek gods.

In 1833 Vladimir Odoevsky told a very similar story: In his Improvisator a poet is granted the power to make up poems on the spot and has a huge success as an improvisator who makes up verses according to his audience's wishes. He, too, loses the ability to create art along with his mind.

Both stories are fruits of the Romantic era which introduced the idea of art as something divine seen and expressed through the artist. Today there is the idea about art being a way of self-expression. From both standpoints the artist is seen as having a crucial role in the process of creating art.

When it comes to commissions, however ... At first glance, the artist doesn't seem very important: The idea comes from the commissioner, the artist serves only with his bare skill. Yet is this first impression true?

Thursday, June 9, 2016

Trash - When an Artwork Is So Bad That It's Good

"Good" trash wouldn't let go of you and it will haunt you in your dreams and everyday life.

The internet ... A place where you can find everything from the greatest crap to the most wonderful masterpiece ... A place where I found stuff that both amazed and traumatized me, that made me a better artist and that turned me into a little devil at the same time. I've been "living" online for 12 years now and I slowly but surely ended up developing a strange liking for trash.

Don't get me wrong, though. There's a big difference between creative products (I struggle to call them artworks) that are just bad and masterpieces that are so bad that they're actually good. While pieces that are "just bad" are simply plain boring trash has something fascinating about it. "Good" trash wouldn't let go of you until you finish reading or watching it, and afterwards it will haunt you in your dreams and everyday life.

Thursday, May 26, 2016

The Fascinating World of Fan Art - Why Creative Fans Do What They Do

The internet is a free space, and there are people with very diverse ideas and interests.

If you ever came across Harry Potter having SM sex with Draco Malfoy in tight leather underwear and your only reaction was to roll your eyes and say you've seen worse then you truly know what creative fans are capable of. I love fan art, I've been a fanfiction writer for over 10 years, and as an operator on Fanfiktion.de, a German fanfiction community, it's actually part of my job to struggle through really disturbing texts. And considering some rather traumatizing experiences I really understand why Anne Rice, the author of The Vampire Chronicles, used to forbid her fans to write fanfiction:
"I do not allow fan fiction. The characters are copyrighted. It upsets me terribly to even think about fan fiction with my characters. I advise my readers to write your own original stories with your own characters. It is absolutely essential that you respect my wishes."
There are also copyright holders who generally don't mind fan art as long as it respects moral values. For instance, the example above isn't something Joanne K. Rowling, the author of the Harry Potter series, and Warner Bros. like to see, since the series is targeted at a younger audience that should be protected from adult content.

Thursday, May 12, 2016

Chemistry of Romance - 4 Rules for a Good Love Story

Which rule is most important to you?

Love is one of the most common subjects in all genres of narrative art. And as it is with common subjects, there are good love stories and bad ones. Furthermore, I believe that the romance genre is especially vulnerable to overdoing: If there's too much violence in an adventure story you can just roll your eyes and go on; yet if a love story is too cheesy it's really hard not to throw up.

So what can we do to spare our audience the need for vomit bags? Here are some thoughts on this question.

Clichés: Good or Bad? 


My personal love story trauma is the movie Waterloo Bridge from 1940. And I can take much, actually. I generally enjoy romance anime, I love the movie Désirée (1954) as well as the original novel by Annamarie Selinko and I love shipping fictional characters. I generally like love stories. However, watching Waterloo Bridge was a torture. I hated the story, I hated the characters, and most of all I hated their relationship. I know the movie was made at a time when people had other ideals concerning love, but I still couldn't help but think that Roy is an a****** and Myra a stupid cow without a noteworthy personality. From the very beginning of the movie I wanted them to die, and when Myra threw herself under a bus I was genuinely happy her miserable and annoying existence finally ended.

Thursday, April 28, 2016

What is Art? - My Subjectively Objective Definition

Defining art is difficult, since everyone defines it differently.

In my opening post for this blog I tried to define "art" with search suggestions by Google and I also mentioned my wary attitude towards academic definitions. Since defining "art" is the ultimate goal of this blog, however, I sooner or later have to deal with different views on this point.

Yet before I discuss what others have to say about this I believe it's a good idea to record how personally I define it right now, slightly more than half a year after starting this blog. By doing so I can analyze how my views changed later, after I've dealt with the views of others. Will other definitions change my own or will they make me stick to my definition even more?

Defining art is difficult, since everyone defines it differently. We used to discuss it in school, and ... I changed my views several times in my life. With every book I read ... with every story I wrote ... with every movie I watched and every game I played ... with every academic text I read ... My own definition changed with every new experience.

Thursday, February 4, 2016

What is a Narrator? - Why Narration Is Manipulation (or Not)

Every narrator is a liar.

Does the title sound like a stupid question to you? After all, a narrator is the one who narrates. And according to the modern "show, don't tell" fashion the narrator should be as invisible as possible. - Why? Because, as avid supporters of the "show, don't tell" philosophy seem to believe, the modern reader is too stupid to deal with the specifics of prose, since they're so different from what he's used to from movies.

Please don't get me wrong: I'm not against "show, don't tell" in general. Moreover, often this is what I wish beginners would do. In many cases the advice "show, don't tell" is appropriate. - But! A novel is not a movie. There are things it can't do while a movie can. And there are many things it can do while a movie can't.

As stated in a former post, the main difference between prose and other narrative art genres is the existence of a narrator. So what's so special about him?

Thursday, December 3, 2015

Idealism vs. Realism in Art - Why Characters in Art Usually Are Too Pretty to Be Real

Throughout all of human history we see more idealizing artworks than those showing reality.

There's a question I frequently end up asking myself: Why do people usually create young and healthy characters? Why are at least the main characters almost always good-looking? Why are scars or any other injuries more decorative rather than ... serious?

This isn't a question which is only about modern days. Throughout all of human history we see more idealizing artworks than those showing reality. There's Napoleon's nose on Bonaparte at the Pont d’Arcole that is too straight to be Napoleon's actual nose (just compare it to other portraits). There are all those Greek and Roman statues showing perfect bodies. And today we have photoshopped models and anime girls with thigh gaps that are only possible if you have an extremely dangerous combination of anorexia and a deformed pelvis.

Thursday, November 19, 2015

Case Study: How the First "Hunger Games" Movie Turned Us Into Sadists

Metalepsis - How the First Hunger Games Movie Turned Us Into Sadists

Tomorrow is the big day when Mockingjay Part 2, the last part of the Hunger Games movie series, is going to be released. It seems like a good occasion to talk about the very first part. The one that unlike all the others had a very special effect.

Maybe it's just me; maybe you noticed it too. Maybe it was done consciously; maybe it was done unconsciously. But if you ask me, the effect of a narrative metalepsis is there, and this effect is the reason why the first movie impressed me so much. It's the effect of blurring the line between the viewer and what's happening on the screen.

In narratology we speak of a metalepsis when one narrative level enters another one. This happens, for example, when a narrator starts meddling in the affairs of the characters instead of just telling the story. Or when a novel is about the reader reading it. Or when the characters decide to kill their author for all the horrible things he did to them. Or when the reader somehow turns out to be a character in the story. ... You get the idea, right?