(Originally Written Feb. 28, 2008 in the Journal)
What is Art?
Chapter 2
Tolstoy is angered about the money that the government gives to the arts by taking money from the poor who never get to experience what their money goes to.
We must decide if art is so good and so important as to redeem the evil that art causes.
Art lies between the practically useful and all unsuccessful attempts at art.
The common answer to what is art? Is that which creates beauty. The problem with this answer is that it assumes the concept of beauty is fully known. But, it is obscure and cloudy.
In Russian, the word Krasotá (beauty) means only that which pleases the sight.
Could beauty be defined as "that which pleases the senses" so long as we include an ethical, moral and religious sense to the other five senses?
The concept of good (in Russian) entails the concept of beauty, but the concept of beauty (in Russian) does not entail the concept of good. In every other European language beauty and good are conceptually synonymous. But, these other languages now have no suitable word to express beauty of form.
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