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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Elder-Basilisk" data-source="post: 1319333" data-attributes="member: 3146">It's worth pointing out that this reflects a very modern idea of art that only emerged in the last few centuries. Most of what we now think of as "fine art"--Michelangelo's sculptures or paintings, Cranach and Duerer's woodcuts, the illumination of the book of Kells, Rembrandt's portraits, Shakespeare's plays, Sophocles' plays, etc--were actually not created for the purpose of disinterested aesthetic contemplation. They were created as commissioned portraits or sculptures, or as standard, mass market genre plays, etc. As far as I know, being "unique" was not even a concept in many of their authors' minds. It certainly wasn't evident as a desire in the construction of the great Cathedrals--many of which are now thought of as high examples of "art." Every reqium mass (and I don't think anyone here would want to say that Motzart's Reqium Mass is not fine art) is to some degree, a standard piece of music that has to fit a defined purpose and include certain standard elements. Even some more modern "fine art" fits this category. Berthold Brecht, for instance, intended for his plays to aid the socialist revolution rather than to be objects for borgeouis contemplation. Similarly, it is rather difficult to argue that Jackson Pollock, for instance, was not a commercial artist. He made his living through art, after all, just as much as Thomas Kincaid does. That his audience, reputation, and skill are arguably different does not rest upon any concrete and definable difference in what he does.This commercial/fine art distinction is entirely artificial and is often imposed upon the works of previous centuries by moderns intent on understanding everything through the narrow, myopic lens they insist on viewing art through. (For that matter, the concept of "art" itself is a relatively modern one--in past ages, music, for instance was thought to have much more in common with mathematics than with painting).I think it makes a lot of sense to categorize what are traditionally considered non-performance arts (sculpture, painting, composition, etc) as craft skills. Sure, artists aren't necessarily smart people and a lot of them are dumb as posts. (Although many artists were actually quite brilliant in general--Leonardo Da Vinci comes to mind). But when any character wants to create works that are more than simply passable, the number of ranks will matter far more than the int bonus. A 10th level expert with an int of ten and Skill Focus: Painting is far more likely to create a DC 30 masterpiece than a wizard with a 20 int and two ranks. (And, if you really need to come up with an explanation for the fact that the 31 int 20th level wizard is capable of coming up with masterpieces with only minimal training (interpreting artistic crafts as semi-trained only skills in the same manner as appraise--something not entirely supported by the rules but that the precedent of rank requirements for prestige classes supports), all you need to do is forget the "wizard as scientist" image and replace it with a less clinical one in which magic itself is an art form (and wizards often call it "the art" in literature, don't they). When wizards talked about the "beauty" of a magic missile spell (considered a perfect masterpiece in its balance of simplicity and power--the meanest apprentice can conjure an effective one up but only a master can unlock its true potential), the rest of the world wouldn't know what they're talking about, but it would make as much sense to them as discussing the "beauty" or "elegance" of a formula or proof does to mathematicians).</blockquote>

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