The Distinction of an Artist and a Writer

[DevilishlyHandsome49]

I brought this up briefly during a convo but wanted to discuss it and hear from more people about it

Why is it that "writers" arent also called "artists" most of the time? Its almost like there's a clear seperation even though they both resolve around making a work of art. Written, drawn, its still art. Is it just easier to do it that way or is there another reason behind it?

[Hewge]

It's just easier, I guess. Can you imagine needing to refer to something as "illustrator" or an "illustration" every single time you talk about it?! Nope. Annoying. Four whole syllables, man! FOUR!
Also - everyone knows there's a difference between writing, illustration, and other arts. But when someone mentions art; chances are drawings and paintings will be the first thing to pop into your head.

"This illustrator's illustrations and illustrating styles are quite right, ey wot? Quite the skills of illustration, If I do say so, myself."

"Dis artist's art makes me horny, man. Check it out!"

See the difference?

[DevilishlyHandsome49]

It's just easier, I guess. Can you imagine needing to refer to something as "illustrator" or an "illustration" every single time you talk about it?! Nope. Annoying. Four whole syllables, man! FOUR!
Also - everyone knows there's a difference between writing, illustration, and other arts. But when someone mentions art; chances are drawings and paintings will be the first thing to pop into your head.

"This illustrator's illustrations and illustrating styles are quite right, ey wot? Quite the skills of illustration, If I do say so, myself."

"Dis artist's art makes me horny, man. Check it out!"

See the difference?

Yeah, Im seeing what you mean now. I just get this weird feeling a small minority of people use it as some kind of a putdown

[Hewge]

Yeah, Im seeing what you mean now. I just get this weird feeling a small minority of people use it as some kind of a putdown

If so, then they're losers and I don't know why you acknowledge that they exist :v

[DevilishlyHandsome49]

If so, then they're losers and I don't know why you acknowledge that they exist :v

Heh, cant help it. i think of all possibilities

[Vae]

It's just an easier way to refer to different practices, that's understood by a large majority of people.

I mean, people aren't going to get all pissy if you refer to a musician or a performer or a cinematographer or a photographer as those things, instead of "artist," either.
Despite those being artistic fields.

It's less about nitpicky specific definitions, and more about using the terms people understand, instead of making shit overly complicated.

And I don't understand how "writer" is an attacking term.
Writing seems to receive less attention than visual art on the whole, but that's not a fault of the terminology. It's just the medium. Reading is a time investment.
And that's just how people are going to feel, regardless of what words you use.

[Vallium]

Because art can be such a generalized term that involves many, many, many creative endeavors under the sun. Performing arts, interior design, writing, illustration, sculpting, building...if you look at your wall or your lamp or your refrigerator it could be considered art. Everyone who has created something with the purpose of sense appeal made art.

Its so much easier to make distinctions with words.

[DevilishlyHandsome49]

I dont think the word "writer" could be an attacking term. I guess I can just imagine being said with an attitude, nose pointed high ..idk. I think about these things :V

Edited November 30, 2015 by DevilishlyHandsome49

[Vallium]

I dont think the word "writer" could be an attacking term. I guess I can just imagine being said with an attitude, nose pointed high ..idk. I think about these things :V

Ugh...look at that...writer. He WRITES things, who uses their imagination anymore to see images using words, ugh, pish posh!

 

[Naesaki]

Some random guy noted once me telling me to stop writing fantasy stories saying FA writing should only be about sex and nsfw content and how dare I make him click on my submission and push away the writing he wants to see.

And I'm like well I didn't tell you to do anything >__>

[DevilishlyHandsome49]

Some random guy noted once me telling me to stop writing fantasy stories saying FA writing should only be about sex and nsfw content and how dare I make him click on my submission and push away the writing he wants to see.

And I'm like well I didn't tell you to do anything >__>

no way he was serious...what a dick

[Naesaki]

no way he was serious...what a dick

Unfortunately some right weirdo's in the fandom, that was months ago at any rate, never heard from him since.

[DevilishlyHandsome49]

Unfortunately some right weirdo's in the fandom, that was months ago at any rate, never heard from him since.

Good. Probably means people like him are a very small group

[Chrysocyon]

Hmm, I never really thought about writers as artists, although I do respect the medium.  Working in comics, I notice there's definitely a separation of artist and writer. But if songwriters get to be called artists, I don't see why story writers can't.

[Pignog]

Joyce's autobiographical novel is called Portrait of the ARTIST as a Young Man, case closed.

I have more of a problem with people not distinguishing between musician and artist, and the only reason is that I've shown up to "art crawls" before that are musicians only when I just wanted to find local comic artists :@

[MalletFace]

Art used to be the word for any kind of skill like in martial arts and liberal arts. An artist was somebody proficient in that art. Write, however, is essentially as old as Anglo-Saxon itself and then some. The word is so old that nearly every European and western Asian word for it is related. Writer had been used to describe one who writes for a very long time.

Being a writer was having a skill in the written art, but writer was a more descriptive term than artist.

And then the High Middle Ages and Renaissance happened. People were actually making creative works that were not totally focused on representing divinity, and the word art began to be applied in the creative sense.

Artist as applied to those with skill in the visual arts was Elizabethan and after. If you remember anything from school, you would recall that that period was also a revival in English literature and poetry like had not been seen since Chaucer. This is only a guess based on the rest of that, but I would say the popularity of writers and poets like Shakespeare among common folk made the term writer exist independent of artist.

I'm going to look further into it, though. This has me interested.

[Pignog]

That's actually super interesting to me, do you have anything you'd recommend reading on the evolution of the terms (or is this more stuff you've figured out from reading general history)?

[Troj]

I think most people think of the visual arts when they hear the word "artist"---so, someone who makes paintings, drawings, murals, or even sculptures, or otherwise creates things that are exhibited in galleries. Writers are artists, but that's not where people's minds go when they hear "artist."

Either way, I tend to find people who describe themselves as Artists in That Tone of Voice absolutely insufferable. All of the cool creative people I know are very casual about referring to themselves as small-a artists, or simply describe their art as something they do because they're inspired to do it. 

I'm reminded of some snobs I met in my hometown once who had a lot of highfalutin' modern art for sale--some of it certainly nice or intriguing, to be sure--in addition to various standard garage sale items and little tchotchkes. When I noted that they could even turn some of the smaller items they were selling into art, the woman sniffed that that "wasn't their preferred meeeeedium" and indicated that doing any art piece smaller than, say, a painting or a piece of furniture was beneath her artistic sensibilities. Oh well; her loss.

 

Edited December 2, 2015 by Troj

[MalletFace]

That's actually super interesting to me, do you have anything you'd recommend reading on the evolution of the terms (or is this more stuff you've figured out from reading general history)?

I have never read anything written specifically on the terms; I'm almost certain nothing exists specifically on them.

I have looked at the etymology and read works from around the time these words were changing, though.

For example, just as much as Chaucer described the art of writing with write he described the art of sketching with portrait (Which is an archaic use now):

"He koulde songes make and wel endite,/ Juste and eek dance, and weel purtreye and write."

Any of the times Chaucer used artist, he was usually describing a skill in something, and I can remember at least once he used it to describe speaking of all things.

The first thing I have found after then, which was quite a number of centuries, which uses artist in the sense of "skilled in the visual arts" was most of the creative works of Lord Byron. He used that several times in Don Juan, if I remember correctly.

[Pignog]

I think most people think of the visual arts when they hear the word "artist"---so, someone who makes paintings, drawings, murals, or even sculptures, or otherwise creates things that are exhibited in galleries. Writers are artists, but that's not where people's minds go when they hear "artist."

Either way, I tend to find people who describe themselves as Artists in That Tone of Voice absolutely insufferable. All of the cool creative people I know are very casual about referring to themselves as small-a artists, or simply describe their art as something they do because they're inspired to do it. 

I'm reminded of some snobs I met in my hometown once who had a lot of highfalutin' modern art for sale--some of it certainly nice or intriguing, to be sure--in addition to various standard garage sale items and little tchotchkes. When I noted that they could even turn some of the smaller items they were selling into art, the woman sniffed that that "wasn't their preferred meeeeedium" and indicated that doing any art piece smaller than, say, a painting or a piece of furniture was beneath her artistic sensibilities. Oh well; her loss.

 

ya i don't know any visual artists who call themselves Artists in That Voice personally (thank christ). Formally I call myself an "amateur cartoonist," but informally I prefer the term "absolute fucker."

Edited December 3, 2015 by Pignog