Criticizing Art: First Summary

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Manet, Dejeuner Sur L'Herbe. This painting was a scandalous horror to art critics of the time period. Now it is considered one of Manet's finest masterpieces.

Being a former Art History major, I thought I had all this stuff covered already. But really, Criticizing Art seems like a somewhat interesting read. At first I was wary of it since Art Criticism to me seems a bit fuzzy and relative, but I like how Terry Barrett approaches it. He quotes many different sources and comes clean about the unreliability of many critics. He also discusses how critics coming from different backgrounds can impose their political/moral/philosophical/whatever beliefs on the art and that there are many different publications that are politically specific or will only hire people with certain beliefs. Audiences should be taken into consideration also, and many critics will slant how they write based on they publication they are writing for, and who reads it. I think we should all be diligent about keeping our heads clear when we read about art and not automatically accept what the critic says, because we never know what kind of background he or she comes from--let's do our own research and think for ourselves!