"Conceptual" Art.

I found an interesting op-ed on the New York Times today. You can read it here. Incidentally, it was written by Denis Dutton, whose work you may recall from our book.

I strongly recommend you read it all. It's a fascinating read. But the point I want to draw out of it is thus: this idea of "conceptual" art.

To put it in brief, paraphrasing Dutton, "conceptual" art seems to be a new trend in art. In "conceptual" art, the artist does not do any of the actual work in creating the piece. The artist merely comes up with the idea, and commissions someone else to do it, and then sells it for obscene profits.

The example Dutton cites is a new "work" by the artist Damien Hirst. It is merely a medicine cabinet stocked with the same sort of drugs anyone may have in their medicine cabinet. It is not something he made, like Warhol's Brillo boxes. It is merely an idea he conceptualized, had someone else assemble, and is attempting to sell for over $200,000.

This seems to me to be a betrayal of what "art" really means. As Dutton says in his article, "There is no place on earth where superlative technique in music and dance is not regarded as beautiful," and yet these "artists" use no skill at all in the creation of their works besides coming up with the idea.

This all leads to my question: is "conceptual" art "true" art, or is it a corruption of art?