Angelina Might Need to Rethink That

The world's most famous mommy, Angelina Jolie, has stepped on a few maternal toes, including mine, with her remarks in Vanity Fair about why the children of actors often become actors. It's not about nepotism, she claimed:

Artists raise their kids differently...We communicate to the point where we probably annoy our children. We have art around the house, we have books, we go to plays, we talk. Our focus is art and painting and dress-up and singing. It's what we love. So I think you can see how artists in some way raise other artists.

Whatever. I'm not here to join the indignant mob of non-acting parents who resent the sugggestion that they are not cultured enough to surround their children with books and music and art, and who are not artistically-minded enough to actually talk to their children. Nor do I care whether she wants to own up to Hollywood nepotism.

But what does intrigue me is that Angelina considers what she does for a living to be Art--and that, of course, makes me wonder: Is acting an art? or is it a craft? Does it depend on the production? What is Art? Is it different from Craft? Is blogging an art? Am I an artist?

This definition of art from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is comprehensive and academic; the further I read in this article, the more I realized my own ignorance of philosophy and philosophical argument. For example, this little bit made me giggle:

Grasped perceptually, artworks present only an appearance of an appearance of what is really real.

I don't think Plato was aiming for housewife humor when he discussed the definition of art in his Republic.

This Wikipedia article discussing the philosophical concept of art is closer to my intellectual grasp. It covers various attempts to define art, as the Stanford article does, but with fewer syllables. It also covers the relationship between utility and art, and classification disputes--which is exactly where Angelina's comments bring us.

I don't know whether acting is art or not. I suspect that sometimes it is, and sometimes it isn't. This crafty blogger articulately suggests that art and craft cannot be separated, but that they are "specific aspects of all creative work." Craft, she suggests, has more to do with learned technique, whereas the emphasis of art is personal expression.

I'll give AJ credit for a certain amount of artistry in her field. But I submit that there is a continuum of artsiness, and all of us fall on the continuum somewhere. I don't buy the snobbish dichotomy that Angie posits between artists and non-artists. And I think its supremely arrogant to claim parenting superiority based on what you do for a living--especially when your success is due in large part to genetics.

It's acting, darling. Acting is somewhere on the artistic continuum, for sure--but let's be real. It's not writing Moby Dick. It's not painting the Sistine chapel, or sculpting The Thinker. So it's a stretch to presume that because you're an actor, you raise your kids differently than the rest of us.

OK, I guess I am joining the mob after all. Huh. I didn't see that coming.