Writing Life

The love for writing can be traced back to 1844 when Tolstoy started his law and oriental language classes at Kazan University. Strangely, teachers considered him to have been ‘born unable and unwilling to learn.’ How he turned out to be one of the most prolific writers of his time remains a mystery.

Tolstoy did not complete his university education. He left Kazan University and lived in Tula, St. Petersburg, and Moscow. He loved and lived the life of luxury.

Tolstoy began writing after dropping out of university. He penned his first novel “Childhood” which was published in 1852. In 1851, he had run out of money from gambling. He returned to the Caucasus where his brother lived. He joined the army and had an incredible experience in a disciplined environment. He was a diligent officer, rising to the rank of a Lieutenant. However, the many deaths during the war took a toll on him. He left the arm immediately after the Crimean War.

The war changed his perception of life. From a family of privilege, he became a spiritual anarchist and non-violent writer. His ideas were also shaped by witnessing public execution in France. He developed a distaste for government, terming it as ‘…a conspiracy designed to exploit and corrupt the citizens. His philosophy of non-violence was adopted by Mahatma Gandhi. His writing on non-violence was also shaped by the German version of Tirukkural.

What is Art? Leo Tolstoy

The book was completed in 1897 in Russian. However, it was not published in Russia or the Russian language. Intense censorship in the country meant that it could not be distributed to the masses. It had to be published in English.

Tolstoy opens the discussion by looking at the effort, time, public funds, and respect that go into creating a work of art. In his words, expressing an opinion towards art would diminish all these sacrifices. It amounts to questioning the offerings placed at the altar and forgetting the bigger picture.

Because of the effort and intentions that go into preparing a work of art, it is impossible to term it as useful or useless. Art exists for its sake and cannot be quantified, just like sacrifices in shrines. He does not support the idea that art should be measured in terms of beauty.  There is more to art than looking at how beautiful a painting is. After all, beauty is subjective.

Tolstoy looks at art beyond painting and sculpture. He places jokes, home decorations, and church services in the same category. For him, art encapsulates feelings, and your inability to decode these feelings should not make art unattractive. The purpose of art is to pass these feelings. How well the feelings of the artist are passed will depend on how sincere the artist is in the process of creation.

Artificiality of art

Tolstoy is very serious about the sincerity of the artist. The minute an artist ceases to be sincere, art stops conveying the intended message. The resulting piece lacks honor. Here are reasons why art becomes insincere according to Tolstoy:

• Borrowing – recycling or copying elements from other works. You cannot copy thunder, worriers, maidens, and such known features.
• Imitation – a painting that becomes a photograph is not a work of art.
• Effectifulness – the work is strikingly a contrast of reality. It encapsulates the divide between beauty and ugliness, dark and light, and such contrasts. It would be painful to the person watching.
• Diversion – the work needs to be explained or altered to hide the meaning.

According to Tolstoy, Without Art Mankind Could Not Exist. Art provides the balance and expression that grounds a human being. These principles of art can be seen in all his works.

Perception in art is how a person understands art based on his background or bias. It is theoretical and defines the influence of personal experiences in the determination of an artistic piece as beautiful or otherwise. It is the reason one person will call an object beautiful while the other holds a contrary opinion.

What is perception?

A deeper look at perception will help you understand how it influences our view. Perception is a checklist that each person uses to judge situations. For instance, you can say that all catholic nuns are good or all footballers are strong.

The perception is built over time due to personal interactions and stories you have heard about other people. It feels like a commonsense understanding of a situation. For instance, you can claim that all parents are good on their kids. While it is true in most cases, children who have not had a good experience with their parents will disagree with you.

In a nutshell, perception develops over time and will result in a bias when looking at a piece of art. It results in a dynamic evaluation of artistic styles and classification as good, excellent, or bad. Because perception is subjective, the same art piece classified as bad in one context becomes the winner in another.

How does perception change our view of art?

It is possible to change your judgment of a piece of art. New information or looking at the piece of art from a different angle will change your understanding. Here are ways in which our view of art changes our perception.

Personal history and exposure

Every person comes to the judgment table with personal history. If you have interacted with art more, you have a better appreciation of artistic expression. It will also depend on how you interact with the art and the shape that art takes. By the time you are looking at new artistic forms, you have formed a perception of the art form and people. You have a preferred taste and preference.

The exposure shapes your appreciation and judgment of the art in front of you. People who have seen more art are lenient in their judgment. They give more room for personal expression, thus accepting what is placed in front of their eyes. If you have not interacted with much art, your perception is narrow. You will be more biased, resulting in extremely high ratings or low ratings.

Ignorance of details

Each art form has a story. For instance, music may be performed for an occasion. A sculptor could be imitating a person or an abstract idea. In other cases, each society has a different way of expressing its art. All these facts inform the artist but are not necessarily available to the consumer.

Without the appreciation of facts, you create a diminished perception that will be unfair to the art you are judging. Studies of perception in art history indicate that once you have full details, you get a eureka moment where the beauty of a presentation dawns on you. You can be more objective in your judgment in the process.

Art is not methodical

The biggest challenge with art is the lack of formula. Each person judges art based on personal preferences and history. If art had a template, it would have been easier to award marks uniformly. In the absence of a method, art has to be judged using perceptions.

The overriding question becomes what is perception in art and how does it affect our appreciation of the same? In the absence of a formula to judge art, we are left to use personal bias and the limited available information. The verdict is heavily influenced by personal opinion, resulting in multiple interpretations.

Artificial intelligence stepped in to allow these machines to make decisions without depending on human intervention. Self-driving vehicles are the best example. Today, the car can make a decision when to stop, switch lanes, overtake, and avoid barriers or accidents. The machine is now shedding off human intervention. It has resulted in the development of intelligent cars, machines, entry systems, and similar installations. Such developments are the foundation of this AI essay.

Computational creativity is also known as creative computation, creative computing, mechanical creativity of artificial creativity. It is a field of science bringing together philosophy, cognitive psychology, arts, and artificial intelligence. The idea is to replicate or simulate human creativity using computers.

Artificial intelligence and its influence on computational creativity

Artificial intelligence is the front runner to computational creativity. Art machines arise out of the desire to advance the use of Artificial Intelligence to develop futuristic equipment for everyday life. As you eliminate human interference, the machine uses software and algorithms to execute self-generated decisions.

Take the example of the self-drive car. It has sensors whose data is processed and used to influence the decision to speed or slow down, change lane or maintain a lane, increases interior heat or cools the car, and such other decisions that would have been made by a human being. Such automation is the best description of AI computational creativity.

Understanding humans to develop smart machines

All the machines developed in the world are meant to serve human beings. Take the example of an AC system or entertainment system in the house. They are designed to keep a person comfortable. To develop smart machines, you must understand how human being work or interact with the world around. Such understanding is captured in cognitive psychology. It is the reason AI and computational creativity rely so heavily on cognitive psychology.

Artificial intelligence concept art requires you to see beauty and efficiency from a human standpoint. How does a person feel when he wakes up in the morning? What kind of music does he want to see? Are there particular colors he would love to see? The human scientist goes back to the AI lab to develop algorithms that would help the machine to ‘think’ and behave like a person in different circumstances. The glass door opening while you enter an office is just the beginning. Finding a warm bath and your favorite music playing because you had a bad day at work in the future.

Machines and software that enhance human creativity

Human creativity and capacity have been thought to be limited. For instance, a man can only run a 100meters distance in several seconds. In this essay on artificial intelligence and art, the quest is to find a way to push human creativity and capacity beyond what it is today.

The use of AI to produce a more intelligent human being is informed by the fact that creativity can be blinded by human biases. The AI machines collect data to help you design a better product or make a decision that would not have been possible without the benefit of data. The approach raises the quality of decisions made. For instance, AI can collect personal data on your health, compare it with other people who had similar conditions around the world, and advise you on the foods to take or the lifestyle to live. You will avoid health complications that affected people with similar properties in life.

Artificial intelligence makes art is the future of human-machine or gadget interactions. Machines can judge human behavior more accurately to give the best results. The future of computational creativity is to build smart machines that can study human beings and customize the environment for them.

Art education at a basic level

The basic learning levels involve a lot of art. Children draw a lot of images, create puppets, sing the entire day, and dance. However, the idea is not to teach children how to draw or create sculptures, sing, or draw. Art in this case is used to learn mortar and coordination.

Art education helps children at a young age to learn how to learn. Without nursery rhymes, it would be difficult for children to acquire language skills. In the course of sculpturing or singing, they learn socialization and collaboration. Art in this case becomes a learning enabler.

To enhance creativity

Assuming that artists are born and not made, each student would live by his potential. The student does not need any training to express his ideas in any artistic form. The sculptor would produce the best pieces without the need to learn about sculpturing. However, it is not always natural and easy. Human creativity can be haphazard such that the resulting product does not count as creative.

By teaching art education, creators will look at their processes and products from a different perspective. They begin to see new and higher dimensions of art, helping them to be more creative in other processes.

Impart the basic principle

Each form of art is directed by particular basic principles. For instance, music comes with rules that prevent singers from discord or going off-key. The principles are not known naturally. You have to learn these principles to bring your art to another level. In the course of literature review art education, you will learn new tricks used by artists or analyzed by scholars to help you produce an amazing piece of art. By adhering to these basic principles, your art will be more acceptable.

Learn from others

Each artist has a unique learning path. It takes a while to master the skill and produce art that is acceptable to the world. However, it might take too long if you will learn through your mistakes. Art education helps you to learn the tricks, failures, and successes of other artists. The lessons help you to produce better art in the future, especially devoid of the mistakes made by previous artists and enriched by the experiences of other successful artists.

Tune the artist for a particular course

Art on its own is beautiful and rewarding. However, it becomes more valuable when used for a particular purpose. For instance, you can create plays for educational purposes. You can also use your graphic design skills for digital marketing. Once you learn the artistic principles that govern graphics design, you can twist your focus to address the needs of the industry.

Art for use beyond art

Engineers need to learn about art. Marketers also take art lessons. Actors learn about art beyond their acting. Such lessons help the persons involved to appreciate the role of beauty and artistic principles in everyday life beyond art itself.

When writing a persuasive essay on art education, you need to look beyond the fixed definition of art. Take a wider view to see the application of art in areas beyond art. You will understand why marketers, doctors, and IT professionals, among others, have to learn the basic principles of art.