ToK Essay Titles Nov 2019 Prompt 6
ToKTutor • 19 August 2019
Pigcasso's truth in painting
Throughout the history of art, artists have sought to find ‘significant truths’ about humans and our place within the wider cosmos by searching for the ideal of aesthetic Beauty. This unchanging, permanent and almost divine quality of a work of art was considered to be the defining feature separating great Art from more mediocre works. The big question was, of course, is ‘Beauty’ actually ‘in’ the work itself, or something we project into the work of art? In short, how can anyone objectively know what is or isn’t beautiful?
German Idealist philosophers of the 19th Century theorised that the aesthetic quality of an art work, the idea of the ‘sublime’, wasn’t a ‘thing’ to be perceived, it was an experience to be felt. Well, this neatly fits in with the Romantic movement which underlined the subjectivity of art. Later, practising artists, like Tolstoy and George Bernard Shaw, argued that art derives its meaning by its didactic nature. That is, art teaches us religious or moral lessons in an attempt to make us more virtuous citizens.
There is a particularly social edge to all significant art, because raising awareness of social ills and changing society for the better is the main goal of artists. Other practitioners, like Oscar Wilde, suggested that the meaning of art was purely private. That is, artists produce art for themselves and any meaning or significance it holds for others is purely accidental or a by-product. This self-interested aspect of significant art was part of a movement which underlined that the purpose of art was to produce pleasure and entertainment for its own sake. There is no other utility in artistic production.
In one form or another, this idea stretches back to Plato, who argued that the work of an artist was only to represent the world of appearances and not reality. Plato distrusted artists and, for this reason, had no place for them in his Republic.
So what has all this to do with Pigcasso and the association with Swatch? Has Pigcasso found a ‘significant’ truth in her pursuit of artistic knowledge? Have the management of Swatch suddenly discovered a ‘significant truth’ hidden in Pigcasso’s art that we have all missed? Pigcasso’s art seems, like the best avant garde
movements, to break free from any attempts to categorise it as ‘sublime’, ‘didactic’ or even purely ‘art for art’s sake’. Whatever ‘intentions’ lie behind the art works, they will forever remain a mystery to us.
This search for meaningful intentions on Pigcasso’s part might involve us with the ‘intentional fallacy’. But surely we are right to ask ourselves whether or not accepting such art as significant in any sense suggests that we’ve really reached the limits of imagination, ours if not the pig’s! And then there’s the possibility that Swatch has simply exploited a quirky situation for commercial gain rather than sharing with the world the supposed ‘surprising’ qualities of the pig’s art.
Even if Pigcasso’s artistic estate is paid a juicy commission for every limited edition Pigcasso Swatch sells, do we now need to be morally concerned about the rights of animal artists? This might sound like a trivial pursuit of ethical knowledge. However, in the realm of art and ethics, it certainly makes distinguishing between what is significantly true or not all that much harder…
Thinking about the various challenges involved when experts transfer knowledge between contexts creates various challenges for the experts who and whether or not they underestimated these challenges. Does the analogy of growing tomatoes help understand the question?
‘Fresh’ has the connotations of ‘new’ or ‘innovative’. And when something new arrives into the world, it’s usually accompanied by change. Often it’s hard to measure the impact of change until time has passed and we can look back with the cool, detached eye of objectivity.
Human beings are at the centre of the knowledge universe. This is why in your TOK studies everyone explores the ‘Core Theme’. Figure 3 pictures ‘Me as a knower and thinker’. Anyone who pursues knowledge, whether an expert or not, will at some point have to reflect on the fact that there are various factors, both internal and external, which either promote or constrain their endeavours.
Do we truly need custodians of knowledge, those who safeguard and preserve our collective wisdom throughout time?
Let’s look at two alternative senses in which knowledge might be acquired within ‘bubbles’. One within the Natural Sciences. The other with the Arts. In the former, we explore the notion of scientific 'paradigms'. In the Arts, we look at the notion of 'storyverses' or fictional worlds into which we imaginatively immerse ourselves...
HS experts are supposed to be trained to communicate difficult knowledge about mental health conditions and yet our expectations sometimes ignore the fact that diagnosing and treating mental illnesses is a messy business and not always easy. New tech allows experts to create visualisations which in turn can be helpful in communicating the complexities of a case and potential treatments...
Artists are like magpies who copy from other artists. This form of ‘copying’ is the broad sense of the term ‘replicability’ in this Title. From one point of view, such ‘replication’ leads to the creation of original works of art which make us see the world anew. From another point of view entirely, such copying borderlines on artistic plagiarism, fraud or forgery...
Exploring how a song about apartheid turned into an anthem, voicing the strength of those who have been marginalised from society, sometimes in a violent way. To what extent does such exclusion actually help build resilience and self-knowledge? How far is it harmful?
There is a branch of knowledge, akin to pseudo-scientific knowledge like ‘flat Earth theory’, in which one can seem to have absolute certainty and full confidence, because the truth of that knowledge is somehow ‘guaranteed’ or ‘underwritten’ by a higher power. Faith-based knowledge.
Now, consider a clichéd example when we seem to have the utmost certainty and confidence in knowledge and they both seem to be moving in the same direction: 2 + 2 = 4. On the one hand, this is something you cannot doubt, isn’t it? You know this with 100% certainty.. You might actually be very confident about your knowledge...