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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Pax" data-source="post: 1069964" data-attributes="member: 6875">So, you have never been moved by a powerful, masterful performance by an "A-list" actor in a well-written movie, or recorded play?You have never been moved by a powerful, persuasive story, article, or other written presentation?  Poetry holds no charm for you, it cannot evoke an emotional response in you?[qote]Monet is, last I heard, dead.  So, he obviously can not affect me with his presence.  He can, affect me with his skill at a brush, and has on several occasions when I have seen his paintings.[/b]</blockquote>One need not be alive and present, to affect anotehrs' emotions.  A performance need not be live, to be performance ... the act of fixing that performance in a physical, unchanging form does not render it a mere display of passionless, purely-technical skill.And one's art reflects that process.  The quality of the end product is directly related to the quality of effort put into the process of making that end product.Speak for yourself.  I admire the passion, the emotion, and the thought-provocation of a piece of art.  You can make a perfect picture of someone with a cemera.A good photographer (an artist whose medium is photography), however, does more -- and it's not just skill.  Sure, skill helps with picking filters, angles, lighting, and so on.However, there's a certain ephemeral, human aspect that factors in.  Choosing the backgrounds, the non-focal elements of the image, talking the people who will be the subjects of the photo into he right emotive state, and CAPTURING it all at just the right moment.And photography is, IMO, one of hte most-mechanical, least-emotive forms of art there is.  Yet still, I would call a photographer an artist, and his photographs a kind of performance-in-fixed-media.I'll ask again -- does the act of recording a song, mean the singer is not giving a performance ... ?    Does it matter if you hear the recording while the singer is present, or decades after his or her death?  However, many of what WE modern-convenience-glutted people would consider "an ingredient" ... a person with craft(cooking) would have had to prepare.  We can just buy a bottle of nice, purified olive oil.  THEY would possibly have had to press the bloody olives themselves, or at the least, purify it themselves.  We can take down some spices in nice convenient little jars, and sprinkle them in.  THEY woudl have to dr the spices properly themselves.  We can use pre-packaged sauces, dressings, and so on.  THEY had tomake it all from scratch.  UTTERLY from scratch.Actually ... yes, he does.  He often comments on the process of selecting a good, quality piece of wood -- and has described that, on numerous occasions, as being a critical part of the process of making X piece of furniture.He won't just take any old hunk of wood; he'll recommend several good types, give you advice on what to look for, and usually close with a comment to the effect that most reputable lumberyards will be happy to help find you the right kind of wood for your project, if you ask.No offense, but I begin to think you've never MADE anything that wasn't half-prepared in a box, already.See above; mister Abrams would consider his work to begin not when he starts cuttiong, but in his case, when he PLANS the shape of the piece he will make ... and he would consider the process of his craft to CONTINUE through to his visit to various lumberyards and hardware stores looking for the right parts and  pieces.I strongly suggest you read up on the ACTUAL processes of making the various things I have described as craft skills.The rules on this are clear: if you make a physical end product, it's generally a craft skill.  If you don't, it's generally a profession skill.  In a preindustrial society, most jobs other than farmer would involve craft skills.Stop being stuck on wether or not you canmake a masterwork version of the product.  Not everything HAS a masterwork version.  There are, for example, no masterwork Torches.[/QUOTE]

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