What is the difference between “high art” and “low art”?

Compiled by Jo A-ra, Kim So-hyun, Kim Yoo-joong and Park Eun-young

Nam Ha-Kyeong, student majoring in design art

I think it is meaningless to separate art as “high” or “low”. I think it is the people of the upper class who separate art as high and low to make their own high-level culture stand out from others’. It might wander off the point, but for example, the poems written by Korean poet Sang Wook Ha are highly valued by the people that are not majoring in literature with the encomium that he broke into a fresh genre of literature. However, there are conflicting opinions among the literature majors about whether it is literature or not. However I think not only the meaning of art is important but also the point of view of the acceptance.

Isyana Paramitha, university student, Indonesia

Okay, for me high art is a kind of artwork from an artist who makes a breakthrough against the popular style. This artist is usually very popular and often made a huge impact on art history. Low art comes from an artist that paints casually, where the artwork is not as sophisticated as high art. But of course there are differences in price and access to get the artworks too.gwangju talks 1

Kwan Lee Swiger, student at the University of Texas in San Antonio, Texas, United States

When looking at art, typically the most valuable art at the most unique or high level is usually the most useless thing you can find around. In my opinion, people make art, and what they see as art is what art should be. What defines art shouldn’t be determined by its value but rather by the effort and passion that goes into creating what is the final product.

Yoon Se-bin, graduate student at Hongik University

What is the criterion for classifying high art or low art? This curiosity was propounded by Marcel Dochamp’s famous artwork “Fountain”. He wanted to break stereotypes by bringing a urinal into an art gallery that was full of high art. I want to quote the sentence from a video artist, Paik Nam-jun, to answer this question: “Art is fake.” Art is high and also is low. Art is just art.

Bob Lee, student at North Seattle College, Washington, United States

Have you ever seen some unaffordable work even if there was just a dot or simple line in it? We don’t understand why such simple works are so expensive. There are painters’ philosophies and ideas in famous works. People can see valuable ideas through the work. If we should divide an art into low art and high art, the main difference should be whether valuable ideas are present or not.

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