Bell feels that significant form is some mysterious combinations of lines shape and colors that produces a peculiar response in people. He cannot even describe the response beyond a “you know it if you feel it” definition. He cannot describe what significant form is and he cannot describe the emotional response it causes. This starts to sound nothing like a definition and moves in the direction that art is indefinable. People respond differently to different works of art so it would be nearly impossible to come up with a consensus on works of art. An answer for this would be to find people particularly sensitive to significant form, assuming there really is such a thing and such people, and then have them decide what art for the rest of us is. Then art becomes very elitist. Only the special people get to choose what art is. Bell considered himself one of these special people and this means he would be one of the few privileged people who got to decide what art is. His view increases his own importance and that makes it suspect as well as its complete lack of clarity. Also, if we determined that two people were sensitive and so they were judging a work of art, we would encounter a problem when they disagreed. Experts disagree regularly and one could easily find what they define as “aesthetic emotion” where another does not. Does this mean that the latter is not as sensitive? If we decided that was so, then art critics might be inclined to say there was aesthetic emotion where they did not feel any so that they do not risk their position as “sensitive.” Then the poor folks that suffer from a lack of sensitivity would be looking at things they have been told are art and are not and experts would be questioning themselves and their opinions constantly trying to figure out where they missed something.
Do you think Bell’s ideas could have real world application?
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