After this week’s readings and viewing the artist books during our lab on Tuesday, I began to realize that nothing I was seeing or reading about was exceptionally unique. No, I am not trying to discredit the artists of these wonderful pieces. I am, however, challenging their concepts and originality. Surely, the artists were inspired by something, encouraging them to implement varying devices into their art. However, I would have to argue that diversity, more than anything, is what creates “novel” ideas.

As we have read, most of the artists “inventing” art forms such as cubism, proun, and dada didn’t come up with these movements out of nowhere. There was a context in which they were constructed, whether it be from the industrial revolution or wars or other art. For instance, when futurist painters described their purpose, they said it was to “totally invalidate all kinds of imitation.… Elevate all attempts at originality,” yet in the very same quote, they explain they will only “support and glory in our day-to-day world, a world which is going to be continually and splendidly transformed by victorious Science” (“The Influence of Modern Art”). In essence, these artists are looking toward something, supporting it and glorifying it as some sort of model. Rather than invalidating imitation entirely, it seems to me they are, in one way or another, imitating the art and beauty of science.

Art is a revolution. While we use art in our day-to-day lives to inspire more creativity, it is also a medium of political and social expression. Art is more than the visual component, and becomes more of a concept. What I am trying to say is that we have not invented art but only put a name to it. It becomes significant to us in the contexts in which it arises and succeeds. Art is all around us, in everything we do, see, and experience; it is only when we find its relevance that we truly recognize it for a “novel” idea, even though it’s always been there. Perhaps, rather than saying the art is novel, it is more accurate to say the way we think about the art is novel. That is how we begin transforming our mindsets to appreciate a version of something that has been here all along.