I've wrestled with this for years. I sometimes am a speaker at gatherings of art curators and or artists and I watch my words. But In Canada, a country that values art, I can not believe some of the lame "Artists" who write brilliant grant requests to support really lame (and to my mind phoney) "Artistic" projects. Like web pages an untrained Ape could create. They garner tens of thousands of dollars every year, sometimes hundreds of thousands over five years, to support what is little more than a sham effort. But one dare not criticize their work. "They are Artists."

My question is this: Should we not have standards for what is art and what is not? By having no standards do we not devalue the entire concept of Art? Art must have SOME definition in general terms no? Is it just a silly meaningless word that applies to anything made by man or machine? Is studying Art and design at university a silly thing to do because none of it matters in the Art world? I don't know the answer.

I see here at Caedes that Good art rises above the rest because it is widely recongnized, commented upon and ends up in the perm collection. Perhaps by examining the "Good" and popular art we could come up with some idea...some principles of definition. I know art is in the eye of the beholder, but what is it exactly? What makes it good or bad? Help me please.