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StaceyPowers

Are art and entertainment mutually contradictory?

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The goal of entertainment is to serve an audience (usually to make money). The goal of art could be a variety of purposes (i.e. service to communicating an idea, espousing an ideal, creating something beautiful, etc.).

With respect to video games (and other media), do you see these goals as inherently contradictory, or potentially mutual? Why or why not?

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They really don't have any difference at all. Art is entertainment. Entertainment is art. The Louvre houses some of the greatest art in the world, and it entertains thousands if not millions every year. Entertainment is everything from movies, to plays, to games, to books. It's all an art form from the creator. My art, as you all know, is the written word. They are one and the same.

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I don't think entertainment always has to be art. Talk shows have no art at all to it. Most on the radio are political nonsense. But maybe hate, lies, and manipulation is an art. After all, there is a book titled The Art of War. Is strategy art? What about martial arts? 

With respect to video games, it started off as entertainment. But now it is becoming more recognized as an art and awards being offered for story and picture etc. And I think games really should be artistically recognized just as much as a movie would. 

I don't think they contradict each other yet in video games. If the game has a specific purpose granted by the government for education or simulation, then the entertainment aspect would contradict the art because then the government banks off of it which is a conflict of interest. 

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Entertainment is art. Even for talk shows there is such a thing as the art of speech or debate. Or martial arts, is not called art by accident. So I think everything that is not serving an utilitarian purpose is some type of art.

But as soon as you try to give it a specific purpose beyond entetaining, it stops being art, it becomes propaganda.

Edited by m76
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3 hours ago, m76 said:

But as soon as you try to give it a specific purpose beyond entetaining, it stops being art, it becomes propaganda.

Nicely put. But maybe art itself can be used for propaganda. Art is used for advertising, which would be for entertainment. But propaganda is the advertising of a philosophical belief. In their minds, art is a tool that is torn away from its entertainment purposes. Advertising itself needs a closer look. It is definitely an art by its design, but there are also hidden messages in advertising. The color schemes can make you hungry. It could instill fear that if you don't buy, then something bad can happen like in insurance commercials. Or financial security in credit cards. Advertising could also demonize characteristics such as fat, old, or bald. Is there really a difference in advertising and propaganda? Is advertising on tv the same art as advertising on the radio? The tv physically displays a message by design. The radio has to use emphasis on the demonization or use a whole bunch of adjectives to get its point across to sell something. I want to agree that art that isn't used for entertainment is propaganda. But who is to say what art is? Is a serial killer displaying bodies art? We see it as murder. The killer sees art. 

Maybe entertainment is art, but art isn't always entertainment. Martial arts is used in so many ways without entertainment value, but at the end of the day we watch it for entertainment. 

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And I think art and entertainment can change in society. Are we really that far away from the gladiator days where they would have to fight to the death? Just change some laws depending on who is the leader and boxing or martial arts can easily be a fight to the death. Sculptures in one culture could have foot long schlongs and another culture could find it a warrant for arrest. A porn movie could be a work of art for some and an abomination for another. Our cultures determine what is art, entertainment, or propaganda. I don't think it's really set in stone at all. 

But when you watch a Super Bowl, with all the commercials advertising, then throw in a political advertisement that is propaganda, then how exactly are we supposed to distinguish between the two, entertainment/art vs propaganda? So whatever it is we believe is only societal and can always change. That is something to be cautious of. 

 

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I can't quite put it as nearly as succinctly as others here have done, but I'll offer my usual dose of pedantry all the same: if art can be, quote, "a variety of things", can it not also be entertainment by that virtue? And you say entertainment exists to serve an audience, usually to make money.... what about the other times there's no monetary incentive?

I'm not ragging on your point, it's a question well worth asking! I just sort of think you've answered the question yourself, the answer being yes with the arguments you provide.

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