The Function of Art

[Stephen Whiteside]

The function of art is to impose pattern on chaos. Is this a fair comment?

[Vic Jefferies]

No.

[Neville Briggs]

I'm not sure what you mean.
I don't think that the world is intrinsically chaos.

Maybe art is more like arranging a collection or variety of things into recognizable patterns. Art is the first three letters of the word artificial. We seem to have an incurable urge to make things.

The human mind seems to want to bring variety into a pattern, for what ? I think probably the greatest philosphers and psychologists have never really understood the creative impulse. The Bible tells us that we are made in the likeness of our maker who is a creator. But that's another debate.

[Neville Briggs]

But the mystery of creativity still remains.

[Stephen Whiteside]

Interesting, Neville, that you don't see the world as chaotic. Perhaps you are right. If I take a bucket of marbles and tip them over the floor, it is much more likely that they will come to rest in a totally random way rather than that they will form some sort of recogniseable pattern. On other hand, when I look at those amazing photos of galaxies, there does seem to be some sort of pattern evident.

I was brought up with Newton's Second Law of Thermodynamics, which implies that Man is forever trying to impose order on disorder - that the state of entropy will always naturally increase - but perhaps that is not strictly correct, either.

[Zondrae]

Oh Dear,

I'm not young anymore and I've been labouring under a false ideal all my days.

I thought Art was something we made to show beauty or some other aspect of a object or scene.
My idea is that we create art to improve out outlook on life. We write poetry to express in a slightly higher form, our observations of things and people around us and therefore call others to look more closely.
Or even to show something brutal so as to have it remembered.

I'm wrong?

[Stephen Whiteside]

I'm pretty much with you, Zondrae. I think we are saying the same thing in different ways.

[Neville Briggs]

I suppose Stephen that we can be said to be imposing a pattern on language, but the English language although very irregular in parts is not generally chaotic. It has rules of syntax and grammar and spelling, which might appear chaotic but this language enables us to communicate quite efficiently if we use it carefully.

The art of poetry, as best I can I think after trying to learn about it, is putting the language into a carefully chosen pattern in order to make the most of it's expressive and emotional characteristics ( distinct from mere passing of information) and in a way that appeals to the listener as musical and memorable.
It's like a dance, the listener to poetry is not just an observer but is invited to joint the dance.