By Kevin Lee Associate Editor

The same difference

Initially, I seemed the ideal man for the job. You want something instigated, look no further.

The occasion was a class in the University of South Alabama’s Odyssey program of continuing education, a series seemingly geared toward area elders seeking to keep their minds stimulated and vital.

The focus of this particular session, per its organizer, was to be a discussion of the differences, real or imagined, between “art” and “entertainment.” My scant directions were to spur things along toward that end.

The other participants were an entertainment reporter and the arts editor from the local daily paper. How adversarial their positions or opinions would be was up to them.

Well, other than some friendly cajoling, the delineation never emerged in full form. When asked to define the general terms “art” and “entertainment,” my colleagues went straight to the point that there is little difference between them and much shares both titles.

The entertainment reporter got in a short jab at his friend, saying he covered popular entertainment while his compatriot covered the other kind. He went on to explain he saw an amorphous line between the two subjects, recognizing community theater as existing in a grey area between both classifications.

Mr. Entertainment also broached the fact that what we know as fine arts grew out of the “lower” art forms, that it all had fairly pedestrian roots.

Mr. Arts was pretty much on the same page. He acknowledged that in some respects, we have “dumbed down” the culture and the live experience has suffered. As he said, going to see the opera or the symphony is still important, with any live experience significantly overwhelming the isolation technology can afford us.

Mr. Entertainment chimed in that he felt a distinction between arts and entertainment is damaging. He seemed to nod toward a difference between the two when he noted the static aspect of classical music and the innovation essential to popular art.

He later told of an experience while living in Berlin and attending the opera. He pointed out the “self-imposed stigma” opera has in America, where it is perceived as an indulgence of the enlightened elite. In Berlin, he told how everyone attended as if it were just another universal facet of cultural life, where the hoi polloi rubbed elbows with the gentry and a variety of garb greeted the eye.

Mr. Arts then warned the audience to be careful of definitions, that they are traps. He used an illustration of a former colleague with a passion for both opera and ice hockey, someone who explained the intense drama of both as being the draw.

He said we often ignore the fact art surrounds us at all times, that everything from the design of the desks in the room to the skill used in writing textbooks was the product of inspiration.

Mr. Entertainment referenced a photographer portrayed by Joe Pesci who, when asked the difference between art and pornography stated, “If it’s in focus, it’s pornography.”

Mr. Arts also pointed to the community created by events such as the LoDa Artwalks and Arts Alive festivals, that the bond is essential to empowerment and coalition.

His reiteration that “arts is enlightenment, it ennobles us” was a wonderful encapsulation and a sign of hope on his part that a higher purpose lies in those pursuits.

As to their conclusions, I both agree and disagree.

At one point I asked if they felt the highly subjective nature of arts and entertainment was not an innate pitfall and they didn’t bite. In retrospect, it would seem I wasn’t being clear.

The very subjectivity I mentioned is what creates the countless distinctions between art and entertainment simply because those classifications shift with every participant or observer. One man’s serious art is another’s triviality and there’s no way to get around that.

Why is Ingmar Bergman’s “The Seventh Seal” classified as fine art while the Coen Brothers’ “No Country for Old Men” is pushed onto the entertainment shelf? There are certainly similarities between the two, themes and characters they share. I dare say there are some out there who hold the more contemporary film more resonant, but does that make them wrong?

Some would never think of classifying abstract expressionist Mark Rothko with the folk art of Mose T, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t those who would disagree with the assessment. For them, the wizened Alabamian connects with them in ways the modern master doesn’t.

The essence of the question is in something Mr. Arts said: “Art enables us, makes us better as a person.”

As I’ve stressed before, I believe art is ultimately a form of communication, of relaying components of the human condition from one to another.

Plenty of things can entertain us, but does that make it art? Some find tractor pulls entertaining, but does that make it art? Is that canvas a masterpiece, design element or accoutrement?

Entertainment is often used merely to waste time – particularly in the form of television programming – but engagement with art is never a waste.

Evocative or provocative, art should stir us. Entertainment doesn’t have to even when fulfilling its central purpose.

Kevin Lee is Lagniappe associate editor. Contact him at klee@lagniappemobile.com.

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