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From: wfi@unc.UUCP (William F. Ingogly)
Newsgroups: net.music,net.music.classical
Subject: Re: Progress, the Arts, Razor Blades and Bull
Message-ID: <164@unc.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 5-Mar-85 12:43:37 EST
Article-I.D.: unc.164
Posted: Tue Mar  5 12:43:37 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 8-Mar-85 03:51:43 EST
References: <8347@brl-tgr.ARPA> <109@spar.UUCP> 
Reply-To: wfi@unc.UUCP (William F. Ingogly)
Organization: CS Dept., U. of N. Carolina at Chapel Hill
Lines: 30
Xref: watmath net.music:6391 net.music.classical:965
Summary: 


>                                  ... Arts are made by people
> using tools and the tools improve. What if Leonardo had available
> the paints we have today. That doesn't make our painters Leonardos,
> but given equal talent (almost never happens - or hasn't happened yet)
> more can be done by the artist with the better tools. 

What exactly does this mean? Do you mean that today's paints would
have made DaVinci a 'better' artist, a more prolific artist, or what?
Does this mean Shakespeare, Pope, Shelley, Wordsworth, Pound, Eliot,
etc. would have been 'better' writers if they'd had word processors?

> What if a Leonardo or a Titian could work in the present audio-visual arts?

Then we'd have a Leonardo or a Titian working in the present
audio-visual arts. So?

> Furthermore, I assert that the works of Leonardo (practically a 
> modern) are in every way superior to those of "Ugh, the Nut" well
> known neanderthal artist of the middle period... 

Why? Because 'Ugh' used charcoal and clays, and Leonardo had the
benefit of advanced tools? Check out the accomplishments of the
Neolithic artists at Lascaux (sp?) if you want to see what can be
accomplished with 'primitive' tools. Art is a product of the human
*brain* (or 'mind', if you will); if a great artist has only unshaped
rocks to work with, s/he'll produce great art with unshaped rocks.

                                       W. F. Ingogly
                                       University of North Carolina