how do you define art?
as a total amateur, i offer what i can only state as a humble opinion. thus:
i always entertained the idea that all creations are classed into two categories - art, and not art. in order to be classed as the first, i believed that a creation must fulfil three criteria:
1. aesthetic value: when looked at, the creation must provide some amount of pleasure, based purely on a surface level attraction. but what beauty looks like, and how much pleasure is derived from the appearance of the object, is different to every individual.
2. originality: the creation must contain some elements of novelty, which may easily be done by applying the creator's personal style to it. for, though to copy a photograph stroke for stroke is a testament to one's artistic skill, the product can only be a replica, not a work of art in its own right.
3. meaning: the creation must tell a story, portray a scene, or convey a message that can speak to the hearts of the creator and/or their audiences. it may add to the ambience of a room, offer social commentary, or illustrate an event, feeling, or place that means something to the creator.
my favorite example of something that does NOT fulfil these criteria is a very renowned work, marcel duchamp's fountain. for those who do not know it, it is an upturned urinal, signed with a pseudonym and a date. submitted to an exhibition to upturn conventional artistic values, the urinal was offensive then, and iconic now. i maintain that it is a new and clever idea, a funny display of spite, and certainly a bold statement -- but it is not art. in fact i might go so far as to say, since duchamp's only contribution was to slap his name onto an object that he did not make, that the fountain is an act of plagiarism!
however, i have encountered other works that have challenged this view entirely. on one visit to a popular modern art museum, i saw (as one of the exhibits) a grainy video of a lump of grass, swelling and deflating towards the ground like a dismayingly sensual, grotesquely enlarged inchworm. on the side i saw a museum label, which was roughly the length of a postgraduate dissertation, describing the video as a statement about reconnecting with nature (or something to that effect, as it was impossible for me to understand its long and winding explanation!). how horrible, how uninspiring, yet is it possible to argue that it is not art? believe me when i say i had tried -- in a conversation with a very dear friend of mine -- but no, with only my own personal perception as my evidence, i cannot argue that it is not art. it even fulfils my own criteria: it conveys a message about our relationship with nature, it is certainly something i had never seen before, and though it is my personal opinion that it is ugly, i cannot vouch that its creator and target audience feel the same. i may believe that it is bad art, or even discover that it is unpopular art, but i cannot argue that it is not art.