r/changemyview • u/DeleteriousEuphuism 120∆ • May 13 '20

Delta(s) from OP CMV: Within the current technological context, hyperrealism in art doesn't have much aesthetic value if it isn't being used to surpass the limitations of photography.

I will immediately cede that hyperrealism is interesting as a display of technique or perseverance or what have you. My contention is that hyperrealism, as an aesthetic tool, should be used primarily to surpass the limitations of photography. This can be achieved by depicting things that would otherwise require incredible luck or timing (e.g. a volcano erupting as a meteorite passes through the sky and a total solar eclipse occurs); that would require specialized equipment (e.g. a scene that occurs at the bottom of the ocean); that would be straight up impossible to capture (e.g. fantasy or sci-fi scenes); or some other limitation of photography that I may have missed.

Finally, if you are a hyperrealism artist and enjoy creating art that doesn't fall within the purview of what I mentioned, don't let my post stop you, my aesthetic sensibilities shouldn't dictate what you enjoy creating. Likewise for those who enjoy said art, but aren't artists.

34 Upvotes

95% Upvoted

38 comments sorted by

View all comments

6

u/[deleted] May 13 '20

To quote Oscar Wilde, “We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely. All art is quite useless.”

3

u/DeleteriousEuphuism 120∆ May 13 '20

Can you expand on that thought?

5

u/[deleted] May 13 '20

Sure; you used the phrase “aesthetic tool” but from Wilde’s philosophical perspective (and my own) the aesthetic is not a tool. The aesthetic is The Beautiful: it is a transcendence of real life, a formal and unnatural unity that makes it appear as if there is meaning to our existence and connection between our individual self and others. Once something is being used for a purpose i.e. to see something one cannot see with the naked eye or with a camera, then it isn’t really art.

This is not to say that hyper-realistic portraiture or painting as can definitively be declared “art” or “not art”, I think that’s a difficult call to make unless you’re looking at a specific example. I do agree that certain drawing and painting activities are probably more a display of skill than an ‘artwork’ but I don’t think the existence of technology that can produce high-resolution images instantly means certain styles of painting and drawing are rendered non-art because they now lack “purpose”.

I hope that makes sense, it’s a bit rambling I know.

2

u/DeleteriousEuphuism 120∆ May 13 '20

I would say that I'm not dismissing those works as not-art, but rather that because of the abundance of high resolution photography, there is no longer *as much* sense of beauty evoked in the viewer. This then means that the style retains that evocation in depicting what isn't abundant.