I was asked today what art is. I gave this a great deal more thought than I think I've ever given it at any point prior in my life, and I think I've reached a definition that works for me. Art is two things simultaneously.
- Art is anything done well.
- Art is the experience of life caged.
I have seen art in the motions of a waitress serving her customers, the grace and economy of her movement. Perfect execution done without thought.
But that's not how people tend to think of art because they're not looking for it in their daily life. They're looking for it in a fixed setting, one that is ostensibly repeatable. Thus, when art is considered as something separate from life, which is not the sense I tend to mean it in when I think of it.
But if it in that sense, then that's where the cage comes in. There are paintings that I truly enjoy in as much as they move me, they themselves will never move. The frame will never shift. The image will never change. It is a fixed moment of thought and expression. There are books that I love, and I find myself discovering new things in them. But the ending of that book is never going to change. No new characters are ever going to emerge, much as I may find new facets to the ones that are already there.
Their works of art fixed in their cages that I will always love But the free-roaming art has always given me more joy.