[Arthur Brain]

Originally Posted by PureX

But we recognize the discord, nevertheless.

Well, I see it as another facet of harmony. Consonance/dissonance, tonality, atonality etc are all part and parcel of the musical universe.

Why does a minor chord often evoke melancholy? It's the way the sound waves physically effect our bodies and our minds.

I can't say that it does with me to be honest, certainly not in general.

Some may like to feel melancholy, and some may not. Yet somehow, we all seem to recognize the emotion that is being represented to us by the sounds. This is the "language of music".

Again, I'd have to disagree. People often react to the same piece of music in entirely different ways.

[PureX]

Originally Posted by Arthur Brain

Well, I see it as another facet of harmony. Consonance/dissonance, tonality, atonality etc are all part and parcel of the musical universe.

Exactly. It's a language where sounds create an emotional effect in us via their physical effect, their references to cultural traditions, their organizational implications, and lots of other things. Sounds imply feelings the way words imply ideas.

Originally Posted by Arthur Brain

I can't say that it does with me to be honest, certainly not in general.

It may be subconscious. But it's happening.

Originally Posted by Arthur Brain

Again, I'd have to disagree. People often react to the same piece of music in entirely different ways.

Yeah, sometimes, but mostly not. Most of the time people have a very similar reaction to a specific piece of music. The same is true of most works of art. In fact, it's surprising just how similar our reactions are. I think we're more alike than we realize.

Even children know dance music when they hear it. Or woeful music, or silly music. And the older we get, the more complex and refined our ears become.

[Arthur Brain]

Originally Posted by PureX

Exactly. It's a language where sounds create an emotional effect in us via their physical effect, their references to cultural traditions, their organizational implications, and lots of other things. Sounds imply feelings the way words imply ideas.

Well music can certainly have a physical effect. Sometimes certain chords/progressions can feel as though they're running through the skin in my experience. Other pieces bring an emotional response besides simply the enjoyment of the sound. Dissonance can bring about one or the other or both depending. It's not a set 'language' which elicits a broad or set response overall.

It may be subconscious. But it's happening.

Why? There's several pieces I love which are rooted in the minor/dissonance/atonal which several others find ugly or depressing. I don't feel such at all when listening.

Yeah, sometimes, but mostly not. Most of the time people have a very similar reaction to a specific piece of music. The same is true of most works of art. In fact, it's surprising just how similar our reactions are. I think we're more alike than we realize.

Hmm, I'd still have to disagree on that as otherwise we'd all generally like the same stuff and there's too much diversity for that to be the case.

Even children know dance music when they hear it. Or woeful music, or silly music. And the older we get, the more complex and refined our ears become.

Yes, but what may be 'woeful' or 'ugly' to a child can often become the opposite once development and the refinement of the senses takes shape. There's pieces that I didn't enjoy at all when I was a kid but absolutely adore these days.

[zoo22]

Originally Posted by PureX

Relax. It's just art (- the single most important thing for any artist to remember).

Credentials don't mean much in this case. I know lots of people with M.F.A.s that don't know a blessed thing about art. Some of them are even teaching art in colleges. I only mentioned my own "credentials" by way of an example of having spent a lot of time engaged in the endeavor, myself, and having known a lot of other artists over the years.

Yeah, I was just feeling grumpy.

[Town Heretic]

Originally Posted by PureX

That's a really great question.

I have attended many group critiques of student artworks, and have read many critiques of art shows over the years, and I can surely attest to the fact that often the artist's intention is not evident to his/her audience. And yet I'm stunned by how similarly the audience members will perceive the intent of the artwork, sans the artist's direct input.

All I can say about this is that the artist's intent is to make art. How clearly he/she understands the outcome of that intent, though, varies. As does how clearly the audience recognizes the artist's proposed intent. All that seems to matter is that the audience approach the artwork with the presumption that the artist intended the artwork to be exactly as it is. And that the audience is then free to interpret it any way that makes sense to them. And somehow, when both sides approach the experience in earnest, the art happens. The spirit of the artist IS communicated to the audience, willingly and knowingly, or not. And the audience will do with that as it sees fit, regardless of the artist's intentions.

I'm biased, of course, but I think art is an amazing human phenomenon. It can be wildly frustrating and challenging both as the artist or as the audience, and it can also be incredibly uplifting and fulfilling, both as the artist or as the audience. We human beings are indeed "wonderfully and frightfully made" (as the Bible says) and few human endeavors exemplify this better than art.

Here is one of my all time favorite artists:


Horace Clifford (Cliff) Westerman


"A Human Condition"


"Memorial to the Idea of Man If He Was An Idea"


"Dance of Death"

Thanks for the response and the art...I've often wondered if our natural genius for pattern recognition didn't give us something of an inherent language when came to the visual arts just as the rhythms of our bodies and nature fashion a familiar backdrop for music. Perhaps those figure into the communication between artist and observer through the particular medium.

[zoo22]

Originally Posted by Arthur Brain

Ironically enough 'The Scream' is an art work I see value in but wouldn't have on my wall as personally I don't find it that pleasant to look at, but I can't deny the power of the piece. Funnily enough a friend from a college course absolutely loved the piece and had it in her bedroom. She saw it as dark but vibrant so there we go....

She had it in her bedroom?? Was she involved in one of the Scream heists?

[Arthur Brain]

Originally Posted by zoo22

She had it in her bedroom?? Was she involved in one of the Scream heists?

Well of course she wasn't.

It was THE 'The Scream' heist!

(And I helped)







......








(By not being there at the time....)