Criticism

            On Wednesday October 12th, in Aesthetics class, Devlin told us that we could switch TAs temporarily if we have a conflict with their office hours.

            Review: Propositional imagining is not picturing or imaging. It can involve inferring, theorizing, resisting and inconsistency.

            Professor Roberts informed us that we have ended the first section of the course, on Aesthetics, and we are now entering into the section that deals with Issues and Challenges. The theories presented now will be less broad.

            He showed us a video featuring art criticism in the form of a movie review. He told us to try to dissect what the reviewer is up to.

            It was a review of the 2014 movie, “Whiplash”, starring Miles Teller and J. K. Simmons: “One of the lowest grossing films of that year but one of the best … Simple … Chemistry between the two characters … I couldn’t take my eyes off of them … Music school … Andrew, the student wants to be a great jazz drummer … People will like the characters … The film is about the characters … Andrew will put up with anything … Ruthless mentor … would put someone in danger to improve them … Simmons deserves the Oscar … Defined facial structure … Compare him to the sergeant from Full Metal Jacket … Insults … A bit cartoony, but humanized … Great character because understandably morally ambiguous … The film is a level playing field … The characters are everything … Andrew’s girlfriend is just a subplot … The film is from the perspective of the main characters … Like witnessing an athlete in training … boy honing skills … Unique … Blood, sweat and tears … The soundtrack was so good I wanted to join a jazz troupe … Only gripe is over technical issues with drumming … Continuity errors happened too often … The editing was sharp though … It is difficult to say why I like it … These two interacting … The best way to get this is to see the movie … Constantly gripping … So basic … Just a well made, exciting drama … Nine stars out of ten.”

            There are three broad things about the review.

            A descriptive element that is straightforward in identifying and fixing relevant properties of the work. He describes the characters and the basic plot elements. Why is the descriptive element there? It works in service of the critic’s wider aims of interpretation and evaluation. He describes the characters because the movie is about the characters.

            An interpretive element. Why interpret? He raises the question: Can the greatest art emerge from struggle? But the movie does not answer. Go back to the theories. What, for example, would Actual Intentionalism say? The critic is engaging us. There is an argument going on. The critic is trying to convince you of his interpretation. Someone can describe a work in a way that you have never heard and present an undeniable argument. There is something determinate and constrained in interpretation.

            An evaluative element. We don’t talk about this outside of art criticism. The film critic gave a rating. Why? We want to know if the movie is worth our time, but there is a deeper element. There is a worry about whether evaluation should be about art criticism. Why would someone think that critics should not evaluate artworks? Think about art value theories. For the Aestheticist, for example, by describing and interpreting a work of art, the critic allows us to see the meaning, thereby causing aesthetic delight. For the Cognitivist, the critic deepens our understanding of the artwork.

There was an iclicker question that asked if evaluation aims to increase the value of the artwork. I asked if he meant that it aims to decrease value as well, but he said we were only talking about increasing value. With that I had to disagree. Most of the group somewhat agreed.

Someone argued that evaluation seems subjective and that interpretation and description seem better for determining the value of an artwork. The professor said that maybe for movies it can be up to us, but with more obscure art, the Evaluative view becomes more plausible.

Problem- What about negative criticism?

An alternative view is that the success or failure of what the critic appraises is based on a standard.

I stopped off at Freshco on the way home and bought bananas, grapes and yogourt.

When I got home, while I still had my clothes on, I decided to step out to the liquor store to buy a Creemore to have with my dinner later on. There was a skinny middle-aged man walking along Queen just ahead of me, singing in a powerful voice and another language, what sounded like an African reggae song.