Great minds discuss ideas, average minds
discuss events, small minds discuss people.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Sometimes the modern tendency in society seems very strange to me. For example, many people post their own images (selfies) onto social media apps such as Instagram, Snapchat, and so on. Do they really believe that those pictures have an artistic value or others care for them a lot? Do they really believe that they are creating a masterpiece of art? I do not think so!
However, many people like to discuss stars, politics, and others famous people. According The New York Times, one year ago, Cindy Sherman said something about sharing photographs on social media: it was trivial. āIt seems so vulgar to meā. So am I! Why she is doing it right now? I do not know. Perhaps, she wants to be in the spotlight again or she decided to make money with the help of Instagram. She was a famous photographer, but her fame started to fade away and she decided remind everyone about herself in this strange way. Anyway, she achieved what she wanted. Some people are talking about her, some magazines even published a few paragraphs about her again.
Do those selfies are masterpieces? According Merriam-Webster dictionary the Masterpiece is āa work done with extraordinary skill; especially: a supreme intellectual or artistic achievementā. I cannot see in this selfie extraordinary skills or artistic achievement considering her level of professionalism. With the help of basic Photoshop many people can achieve the same results in photography. In other words what used to take years and hours of patience is just couple of clicks away in the painting programs. However, Malevich’s Black Square also easy for reproduction and many people thought that it is a masterpiece. In her Instagram, she mixed this selfies with interesting pictures of animals, flowers, natures, or objects. Therefore, every person can have his own opinion about her photos. We just need to decide what we will discuss events, ideas, or people among those pictures.
Very thoughtful post and nice start off with Eleanor Roosevelt’s quote. Your post raises the important question of aesthetics, and what values we use to judge art, or masterpieces.