Art or Craft?

[LatakiaLover]

DO NOT limit yourself by being so closed minded, young one.

For Scottie to be able to refer to a pipe maker as "young" is mind-blowing, innit?

How the PipeWorld is changing...

[socrates]

A product of art

Sent from my HTC0P3P7 using Tapatalk

[The Smoking Yeti]

HA!

Scottie, I'm not saying a billiard isn't beautiful, I'm not saying a billiard isn't difficult, I'm not saying there isn't a transcendent quality to an expertly cut billiard. I'm just saying it's not art.

[scotties22]

But why?

[The Smoking Yeti]

I see classical shapes as grounded by a set standard/ well defined rules. When working within these predetermined boundaries/ thoroughly trodden ground, what is being made is not art, it's craft. A well crafted billiard is made and perfected to a known standard. It isn't inspired the way art is. It's like prints of the Mona Lisa- the original is art, the rest are copies- albeit there is some variety within the copies.

[d.huber]

I'm gonna be a cop-out and just agree with almost everything that Yeti and Jeremiah said. Though I will add this: To deny that we are fiercely intertwined with that which is "greater and outside" ourselves is to deny our own creativity. We create from within that which inspires us from without. We are a conduit for creativity. It's important to pay attention to and learn from this interaction.

I think I should follow up my previous comments. I believe that most pipes made are firmly rooted in the realm of craft. You can say they are artfully crafted if you like- although I'm still not sure I agree with the phrasing. Maybe beautifully crafted works better. (OOH! There's another question, is beauty the same as art? Or, is art necessarily beautiful?)

I would argue that art is not necessarily beautiful, but moving. Great art elicits deep emotional responses that do not pertain to judgement of the piece being experienced.

For example: "I liked it," or "That wasn't very good," don't equate to deep emotional responses.

"Time froze when I saw it," or "That makes me uncomfortable," are closer.

My best two examples in pipes are Ollie Sylvester and Kei Gotoh. Opposite extremes.

Ollie's work makes me uncomfortable. That isn't to say I don't like it, it just makes me uncomfortable. It hits me somewhere deep inside that makes me want a night light.

Kei Gotoh's work makes time stop for me. The two times I've held his work in my hands, I literally felt as if I were floating. His work is transcendent in that ethereal unexplanatory way. It's like shaking hands with God. Gotoh is a highly functional conduit.

The argument could be made that a billiard isn't art because it doesn't require creativity to create. Aka: what Yeti said.

[The Smoking Yeti]

I would argue that feeling alone is not enough to define art. Rather, it is an attribute of art.

[mredmond]

To say that a copy of a piece of art is not actually art and that only original ideas or works can be art is very closely approaching contradiction of some of your previous points, Micah and David. If the original is art, a copy of that must also be art. The method of creation doesn't matter when discussing if it's art or not. It affects value, but not it's inherent purpose/intent. By that logic the world's finest billiard is not art, but a lumpy turd of a pipe which has had life breathed into it is, because nobody else ever made a pipe that looked so much like a severed toe, and by golly, the dude who made it really felt inspired. If a really well made billiard isn't art because of it follows established rules of execution then a photorealistic drawing or painting must also not be art. Logically, offering up some metaphysical, transcendental, "but I feel it in my soul, and I think it's art, and it connects me to God" explanation and then claiming something isn't art based on it having been made before is a contradiction/fallacy, because you're assuming that a copy can't have the same emotional, transcendental intent that the original did and you can't possibly know that's true.

[scotties22]

Yup

[LatakiaLover]

If the original is art, a copy of that must also be art.

Indeed, in the so-called "fine art" collecting world, experts with extensive laboratory testing capabilities are often brought in to verify authenticity, the forgeries can be so good.

When the only clue is the presence or absence of certain ion-beam-detectable trace elements in the paint, the casual viewer's ability to discern the difference is long past.

In short, no unaided human on the planet can tell the difference between a good Mona Lisa copy and the real thing, therefore both create an identical emotional response.

[sandahlpipe]

I don't think art needs to be original to be artistic, but I think originality is something that contributes greatly to the quality of art. You wouldn't call a person who copies art of others an artist. You'd call them forgers or plagiarizers.

I also do think that subtle variations on a billiard can be art. There is enough going on with the lines that you can look at and admire a good billiard for hours. But a billiard may not give you as great a glimpse into the transcendent as a more artistic shape like Grechukin's chopper.

[LatakiaLover]

But a billiard may not give you as great a glimpse into the transcendent as a more artistic shape like Grechukin's chopper.

We are talking about pipes, not horror movies. Pay attention.

[sandahlpipe]

But a billiard may not give you as great a glimpse into the transcendent as a more artistic shape like Grechukin's chopper.

We are talking about pipes, not horror movies. Pay attention.

I'm talking about pipes too. But my source is the internet, so take it with a spoon of salt.

http://tobaccodays.com/interviews/vladi ... cs-master/

[Sasquatch]

Art: Balvenie Doublewood

Craft: Famous Grouse

[LatakiaLover]

But a billiard may not give you as great a glimpse into the transcendent as a more artistic shape like Grechukin's chopper.

We are talking about pipes, not horror movies. Pay attention.

I'm talking about pipes too. But my source is the internet, so take it with a spoon of salt.

http://tobaccodays.com/interviews/vladi ... cs-master/

Just making a play on "Grechukin's Chopper". Sounds like Freddy Krueger v2.0 movie title.

[scotties22]

I don't think art needs to be original to be artistic, but I think originality is something that contributes greatly to the quality of art. You wouldn't call a person who copies art of others an artist. You'd call them forgers or plagiarizers.

I disagree. What George is talking about takes just as much talent to accomplish as the original artist had.

And be careful with the "forgers or plagiarizers" because we all have copied a pipe made by another maker. Are we not just as bad given this school of thought?

[kamkiel]

I think you are all right. Art is whatever you call it and "good" art is whatever future generations decide.

I honestly think that the pipemakers/hobbyists on this forum are in pursuit of making mechanically sound good smoking pipes that also look nice. I like to think of the contributing members of the forum as craftsmen who do a good job promoting the craft and sharing information.

I am also part of a Chinese pipe forum and a Chinese social network pipe group. Over here many people are making more "artsy" kinds of pipes. They see a market for the art. I have also read that many of their pipes don't smoke well at all. These makers weren't concerned with concerned with the smoking qualities because they just want to sell "art". The people who bought their beautiful pipes were, in the end, disappointed. I have offered them some advice (and sited the original author) that I got off this forum, but it wasn't received well. It felt like they weren't too interested in making a solid pipe.

So I guess what I am trying to say is, if you take the craft out, you get a pretty piece of wood. Is it craft of art? That is probably up to the person who is buying it and not the maker. I believe David when he held the Gotoh and time stood still, but I also believe he could smoke the shit out of that pipe too!

[NathanA]

I think I should follow up my previous comments. I believe that most pipes made are firmly rooted in the realm of craft. You can say they are artfully crafted if you like- although I'm still not sure I agree with the phrasing. Maybe beautifully crafted works better. (OOH! There's another question, is beauty the same as art? Or, is art necessarily beautiful?)

I would also say there are some pipes which are wholly art, and wholly pipe. To have a "pipe" that is "arty" yet not really that pipe-ish, is really a double failure to me.

As to many of Gotoh's best works George, I think they're art.

Edit:

I don't think a billiard is art.

Ridiculousness. No shape is art. Ask Gotoh if he makes pipes or art. If he intends his creations to be art he therefore isn't a pipemaker.

Pipes can have artistic value and they can be artistically crafted but that is far different than art.

[dogcatcher]

Some have taken the craft of pipe making and turned it into a form of art. Others, and we know who we are still working to master the craft.

[W.Pastuch]

Everytime this type of discussion comes up I have a problem understanding why this qualification (art vs. craft) is so important and so relevant. I never cared.

It's always seemed obvious to me that whatever it is you do, if you do it well enough, you can get to a level of skill where people will consider your work "art". Not because what you do fills some complex definition of ART, but simply because being super-super-good at something is a form of art in itself.

In Polish we have a compound word that pretty much solves the issue : "rzemiosło artystyczne" (you can try and pronounce it George ). All it means is "artistic craftsmanship". It's a type of craft where creativity and aesthetics play an important part - that is what we do.
Also, any pipemaker who claims to be "just a craftsman" (no artistic element) is full of shit. The only exception goes for pipe factory workers, who have almost no influence on the global aesthetic outcome of their work and only perform selected and pre-planned tasks.