Diderot+and+d’Alembert+Article+on+Art

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When I think of art the first thing that comes to my mind is a painting, or a statue, or even a play; but in this article of the encyclopedia they are saying that art is way more than that. Art is also science, and mathematics; and it depends more in the machines that you use than of the object that is created. The article says that there are two types of art, liberal and mechanical. I guess that the art that we call right now, its liberal art because we don’t think right now that mathematics or science are “arts”. They are explaining more about the machines and the techniques that they use to create something, than the art itself. Art for us is more about the painting and the meaning of it; but from this article they are saying that art is more about the machines that are used. “The only remedy for the second problem is to familiarize oneself with the objects: they are well worth the trouble whether we think of the advantages they bring us or of the fact that they do honor to the human mind.” They say that machines bring honor to the human kind and that the use of instruments is very important to the arts. The article also talks about the “geometry of the arts” when I think of art, I never think of geometry, science, or mathematics. “Hence a man who knows only theoretical geometry is usually not skillful, and an artist who knows only experimental geometry is very limited as a worker.” It is easier to become an artist right now than to become one during that time; because in that period of time, to be an artist you not only needed to know how to draw, or act but you had to know how to use a machine and know mathematics and science. I think that the idea of “art” of that time was more complicated and with more aspects of life than right now.