Boston MFA lecture, Feb. 1989 (Quality in Ch. Ptg.)
The charge presented to lecturers in this series is an absorbing one, all the more so because it is so unfashionable: the questions of quality and excellence in art. Has an objectionably elitist ring for lots of people these days. CAA in NYC in two weeks has session called “Firing the Canon” (explain), with, for instance, paper on Harriet Powers’ “Bible Quilt” and Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel Ceiling. well. One of several disclosures and disclaimers I want to make at beginning of my talk tonight: I am confirmed canonist; believe that there are great works of art, good works, OK minor works, bad works, etc.; and that we can & should distinguish between these. Believe that there are works which can occupy our attn. longer, and have a more legitimate claim on our attn.; than others. That there are works that impress themselves lastingly on our consciousness, change our lives. (I state these as aspects of experience, rather than attributes of work, deliberately.)
Certain reluctance among writers on art today to confront what still seem to me urgent questions for people who study and write about art, if ultimately unresolvable questions: what is art; what is good or excellent art. (Excellent, as in title of this series, a useful word: it excels, i.e. is better than, something else. Not an absolute attribute of work. I’ll go with that.) To argue for the validity of the concept of quality & excellence in art isn’t to argue agst. pluralistic approach in making judgments, idea that works of art can be good or great in different ways; that I believe firmly, and will try to demonstrate in talking about Chinese paintings. But to grant that isn’t to say that they are all equally good, or great. I don’t believe that small piano pieces of Eric Satie are equals of late quartets of Beethoven, just different; or that the quilt, however fine, is likely to be the equal of the Sistine Chapel Ceiling.
Basic problem in dealing with quality or excellence in art: we can derive, from what we take to be excellent or successful works of art, thru analysis of kind we do, qualities that appear to make them excel, to produce this kind of high-level aesthetic experience in us; we can observe these qualities recurring in one after another of works we consider excellent; but can’t reverse process, tell artist: if you do this and that, you will produce an excellent work of art. Nor can we say that work lacking these qualities cannot be excellent: will always be exceptions; doesn’t work that way.
But I’m not here, thank goodness, to argue general issues of quality in art; only wanted to get a few general beliefs out of the way before going on to talk about where & how I find excellence in Chinese paintings. Good, I think, that this series is on excellence in Asian art. Doesn’t mean to imply (I assume) that excellence somehow different there; but allows for special ways of defining criteria. One of basic questions, in fact, is: should we adopt criteria of cultures themselves, in dealing with arts of foreign cultures, or apply our own? Proponents of former, adopting criteria of the culture that produced the work, often quite vociferous, bring in emotion-charged issues such as so-called “Orientalism.” Proponents of latter, making judgements by our own criteria (whatever those are) often charged with “imposing Western values on artistic traditions where they don’t properly apply,” and so forth. I used to talk that way, in younger years. Period in which I came into field, early 1950s, was period when more people w. training in Chinese language began to work on Chinese painting; we were so pleased with ourselves for being able to read Ch. texts, critical & theoretical writings, apply these to our understanding of ptgs, that we accepted what Ch. writers said w/o thinking, uncritically, as truth about paintings. If there is anything I’m sure about now it’s that this is bad mistake; I argue now that we should continue to make every effort to reach deepest, most complete understanding of Ch. criteria of judgement that we can; and doing so will of course affect our judgements, open our eyes to qualities we were blind to before. But in the end we have to distance ourselves from Ch. criteria and Ch. judgements, recognizing that they, too, were time-bound and culture-bound, not to be regarded as having universal validity; that there will be wide differences between judgements made by Chinese writers of dif. periods, dif. levels of society, etc. within China; that they had their blind spots too; and that in the end we have to make our own criteria and our own judgements.
When faced w. preparing lecture these days, on any large subject, find myself drawn to typologies and taxonomies: classifying, categorizing. Would that work here? types of excellence? Possible; as I said, I believe firmly in pluralistic approaches to art, even in trying to define what art is and how it works. All good Ch ptgs aren’t good in same way, nor are they good in same way typical Eur. ptg is good. One encounters people who have firm faith in sharpness of their eye, in their ability to discern quality in art wherever and whenever. I think that’s an unrealistic claim, and that people can be, must be, sensitized to special qualities in certain kinds of art; that discrimination comes w. familiarity. One of things we do, as teachers and writers, is “program in” such familiarity, open paths of responses that allow people to appreciate nuances as well as broader distinctions in material we teach.
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