Pragmatism and Art

Art is anything the artist intends to be Art.

I have just stated what John Dewey may have been trying to say in 10 pages of flowery prose. Reminds me a bit of H. D. Thoreau and his work of several hundred pages expounding on the idea of simplicity, beating it to a blood pulp in an disgustingly elaborate series of analogies of varying degrees of complexity...

Swipes at "Walden" aside, what value might there be in this thought? Can Art really be anything that the "artist" makes with the intention of being "Art?"

At present... I'm suspicious of the idea. Just because the "artist" intends for a work to be "Art" does not necessarily make it "Art."

I could draw a picture with the intention of being an artistic representation of the struggles of man. If the picture amounts to nothing more than a few stick figures and I declare my "Artistic" work complete, does that make it "Art?" Or does "Art" need something more, some additional element to transform the INTENTION into ART?

Wait... isn't that the whole point of this course? Thanks a lot, Mr. Dewey. You've lead me back to the same question we started this course with, and successfully did so without adding anything to it. Unless I just haven't discovered it yet. I'll withhold judgment for the time being. There are too many questions yet to explore.

As a small aside, Freud. Perhaps his views aren't COMPLETELY worthless, but after reading "Civilization and Its Discontents," I do not find much that DOES have value. And I insist that Freud contributes nothing to the discussion of "What is Art?"