GG: creator

[cbennett@axionet.com (Catherine Bennett)]

Antoine:

Thanks for your response to my response. As I said in my inital post, I'm
looking for information. One needn't "respond to my liking" - I'm happy
with any response at all! Yours was comprehensive, but here I go again . .
.

>To my mind, an artist can only be
>recognised as such: one doesn't declares oneself an artist, one becomes an
>artist through social interaction, exactly as I recognize in someone I
>speak with an intelligent being, although I am perfectly aware their are
>millions of intelligent beings out there, but...

I agree with this in part, but only in part. Social interaction must be a
factor in becoming an artist, in that human beings generally engage with
each other to some extent. And I agree that declaring oneself an artist
doesn't *make* oneself an artist. But having others declare one an artist
doesn't make one an artist, either.

By the same token, the fact that others have not declared one an artist
needn't mean that one is not. Van Gogh, I believe, sold only two paintings
during his lifetime. Was van Gogh himself less an artist for not having
been recognized as such until well after his death? And, for instance, if
his paintings had been destroyed after his death, would van Gogh himself
have not been an artist simply because he was never recognized?

But perhaps "recognition" is more important in defining the interpretive
artist (actor, performing musician)? I suspect an audience (and therefore
response and recognition) is much more integral to the act of "recreation."

I don't claim to have a definitive answer to this, and I doubt that there
is one. But it's fun to wrestle with the concept!

Thanks again!


Catherine