Normally, good art is pleasing to some sectors of the populace. It should make people happy. However, there are many ways art goes about doing that.

1) Making a museum curator happy (proud) is different from making an art speculator happy (rich). A museum curator is content when his collection is culturally significant and interesting enough to bring in the public to see what is featured and gain continued funding.

2) A good art collector is happy when his collection moves toward perfection, and when the reputations of favored artists and styles increase. Some art collectors are like speculators in the stock market. They are only satisfied when their collection increases in value. (usually, art collectors are a little of both; speculators and the genuinely devoted).

3) A commercial artist is made happy by pleasing his boss while maintaining his soul as an artist. The boss is satisfied with the industrial output when it is supremely functional. If a commercial artist can please themselves with their designs, there is harmony. Some commercial artists gain enough notoriety to be allowed a great deal of creative freedom so that the parameters they work within are less distracting. Ideally, a commercial artist is a positive and original influence on culture and eventually a part of the overall common vernacular. 

4) An art teacher is happy when his students understand and fulfill his instructions. Occasionally, there are stand-out students in art school who have a chance to make themselves into something by pursuing art as a career. These gifted students make art teachers happy, also.

5) The general public is made happy by art when it is what they understand to be art. The more they know it, and the more it endorses their values as to what art should be, the happier they are. (No one ever failed who gave the populace what they wanted).

There are advanced public members (kind of a non-sequitur… “the public” by definition, is meant to refer to the herd; it is difficult to break the herd into retro- middle- and advanced… But I use it as an example). These advanced viewers sense quality and rich variety when they encounter it and are impressed by it.

6) The individual artist is made happy by their work when they feel it is “creation at capacity.” Although the best artists tend to hold a little back, generally speaking, they work as well as they can on each piece. Show me an artist who isn’t creating their best stuff, and I’ll show you an artist who is selling out to make a buck.

7) An Art Gallery survives when art sells, keeping the establishment profitable. An Artist’s Co-operative Art Gallery is slightly different. It’s purpose is to serve it’s members and the public interest.

Art is usually about making people happy.

In certain instances, it is not.

  • Misunderstood art: When the art misses the point, is off the mark, it is too deep, is obscure or obtuse, or (on rare occasions) is too advanced to be easily comprehended. Sometimes art is simply for a different crowd. Sometimes it is part of an elaborate (or not so elaborate) inside joke.  Yet, these things can still be art (by merely being in a museum or art gallery or by having a credible artist call it art).
  • Aggressive art: Another art failure happens when art is too violent, sexual, socially unacceptable, repellent, unappealing, ugly, intentionally simplistic, aggravatingly sloppy, poorly executed by design, or is meant for a different cultural division than one knows. All these things can leave a viewer feeling uninitiated and even wronged.
  • Overly Naïve or unintentionally simplistic art: This is art also by many measures. A child’s scribbles are still called art. A “good attempt” at realism by an art student is still art. An amateur’s experiments are still art. These fall under the broad category of art, even if their audience is small, and they fall short of making people “happy” like some of the other types of art initially mentioned here.

Creative (new) art: Usually misunderstood—at first. An educated mind might see this type of art and have a violent reaction to it (“…what is THAT doing in this gallery with the GOOD art?”) The genuinely new is unlikely to be immediately perceived as such.

However, the quality of such art is undeniable. Anything new will eventually RESOUND, although it is then copied and assimilated. Some other attributes of truly creative art are its ability to make us think, wonder, and see things differently. Even after being copied, the genuinely original challenges our notions of creativity.

It is the highest goal of art: to be memorably original. In this world, where there is “Nothing new under the sun.”

There is a passage in the Book of Ecclesiastes, where the author notes the monotony of life. The entire course reads, “The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.”

The Bible is an ancient book. There have been innumerable new things since Ecclesiastes was composed (arguably, the author speaks of human nature, which has only changed ever so much). Undoubtedly, the new shall be created and seen before humanity sparks out or attains the infinite.

Beware those who tell you that anything different is of no value. The quality of surprise, the measure of creativity that goes into almost anything, is vitally valuable. 

Beware those who say that there is no chance of anything unique being created by you. Those who say “…it’s all the same…” have very limited imaginations. I believe no one can step into the stream at the same place twice (another old saying; this one I like because it off-handedly supports creativity). Each action is a new one, and each choice occupies a different circumstance. No moment is a copy of the last, even though consciousness’s limits make it appear that way.

The great trick is to tap into this moment and create radical variety. I don’t recommend you do this with your social interactions unless you want to alienate those who care for you. No. Do it in Paint. Do it in Music. Do it in Writing or Sculpture.

At least, attempt. In art, stay away from what is safe, regular, and accepted. Time forgets the mundane. Strive to make something memorable and lasting. 

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Husband artist: “Remember back in 1970 when we had that gas mask and German helmet, and I painted you wearing them while you held those two rubber fish? I wish we still had that painting.”

Wife artist: “I remember! I have no idea what else we were doing at the time. But that was so weird; it sticks in my memory. Funny, eh?”

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The more unexpected it is, the more likely you will remember. It’s like getting stung by a hornet (an example of overly aggressive art). You will remember. Most people also remember their best Christmas/holiday season. (this is an indirect example of art exclusive to the individual but universal in joy).