“What is art?”- the question that has plagued me for as long as I could remember. Essentially I have always known my answer, the trouble is articulating it to others. Art is a relative term. I always thought of any creative work as art, whether that be visual art, dance, music, writing et cetera. If the person doing so is expressing themselves creatively (even if solely for entertainment or for profit), I wholeheartedly believe that they are an artist.

Everyone can view musicians, dancers, and visual artists as artists, but certain art movements just perplex people. Take the Dada movement for instance. I consider this to be one of my favorite art movements simply because others do not consider Dada art worthy of the title “art.” Marcel Duchamp, a famous Dada artist, created what is known today as “readymades” or ordinary objects that are slightly modified by an artist and deemed art by the artist. For example: Duchamp’s Fountain (1917) is just a urinal Duchamp found, signed “R. Mutt” on it and declared it to be art (see picture below). Most people would look at Fountain perplexed not only as to why it is considered art or why it is so famous when it is just a urinal with “R. Mutt” written on it. I firmly believe that it takes an certain degree of creativity to see this urinal as beautiful. Duchamp’s ability to see past the crude connotations of a urinal to see it as art is what makes me see it as a true piece of artwork.

Marcel Duchamp, Fountain, 1917

Avant-garde musicians are often caught within the same perplexity that the artists of the Dada movement were. Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band’s album Trout Mask Replica (1969) is an unconventional album that often makes listeners feel uncomfortable with how odd the music sounds (For example: I attached my favorite song off the album “Hobo Chang Ba”) .Many who listen to this album might think of it as just meaningless noise, but the album actually is highly revered. Trout Mask Replica was ranked 60th on Rolling Stone‘s “500 Greatest Albums Of All Time” in 2012. This is because the album was made to sound completely ridiculous and they executed that perfectly.

Of course, institutions play a huge role in determining what the general public considers art to be. For example if Jackson Pollock’s artwork was never put into a museum, people would regard his massive splatter-painted canvases as just another piece of art that “anyone can do.” Instead Jackson Pollock is a world renowned artist whose artwork can be recognized instantly.

Ultimately, art is what you want it to be. There is no one who can tell you what art truly is.