How does it feel to be an Artist? If this is the right question, then the answer will be as vague as it is when you ask a woman how she feels when being dumped by her boyfriend. Lot of tears if the woman was so passionate about the relationship and it might be only laughs if she was waiting for this relationship to end or similar to the answer you will get from a man who was just fired from his job.
Actually, both answers will vary in the depth of reaction. But being an Artist doesn’t always have to do with emotions. We can meet lot of Artists who have no feelings toward their paintings or designs while we can meet amateurs with two or three paintings in all their life span with deep and centrifugal emotional state of mind. And in between, you can meet those Artists who don’t really care for feelings as long as they’re selling pieces which in return creates a good business and a living.
I think the right question would be: Do you consider yourself an Artist? Funny and ironically that Art has come to an edge nowadays. We meet people who painted couple of paintings with only a self-rationale who had the opportunity to exhibit their works in a fancy place and people started to call them Artists- Maybe they are. But who is the responsible people of giving the tile of an Artist to someone? I myself ran into a similar discussion over and over with lot of people and I always got the answer that no one can tell if you are an Artist or not. Is that really true? Well, apparently, it seems to be true. Every couple of days I meet people who do Artworks and consider themselves as Artists while some other days I meet I meet people who do hundreds or Artworks and they still don’t consider themselves as Artists. I still have that question in mind. Who gives the title?
I think the problem is not with the title itself. Art has become so unlikely to be defined anymore, thus if we have no definition to a term, then everyone can adapt the title of it. For example, God has no specific definition and every religion claims to have the righteous god who has all the definitions. Similar to Art which has no solid definition, at least anymore. If I am a fan of cubism who consider realism to be other forms of not being Art, I would definitely defend cubism and claim that it has the higher righteous definitions at all while considering other art schools to be obsolete and silly, if I may say so. Of course, not all fans of cubism defend against realism but in a way or another modernity has created a solid ground for evaluating artworks and artists. How about Designers? Graphic Designers for example are still divided into lot of debatable sectors. Some of them consider design to be a high form of Art since they do come up with creative design which in return, as they claim, to be a form of Art. But then again, the question still rises in front. Does creativity make you an Artist? Other Designers would say that Design is a reaction to a problem which requires having a purpose and a problem to solve. Those people differentiate between Fine Arts and Design.
Whatever the question is. We can agree that no single criteria can tell if this is an Artwork or not. But the combination of the social, political, cultural, educational and psychological criterion together can build a rationale behind and work. If you believe what you do is Art, then you are an Artist who just need to be recognized from others to make money and reputation, otherwise, you also can be an Artist if you say so! Who cares but you anyway?
