The Ethics of Online Scoring Systems for Art

March 6, 2012

https://www.digitalethics.org/essays/ethics-online-scoring-systems-art

"The 123's of Art Scoring"

First Impression:

That's one of the craziest ideas I have ever heard in my life: I mean being an artist myself, and an fellow art enthusiast, a question comes to mind: is there such a thing as a perfect work of art? The answer to that is ironic: it's the imperfections that makes it perfect, and a scoring system just ruins the whole idea --- I mean, really though, it's like someone seeing the Mona Lisa and giving it a 1 out of 10, which is really disrespectful to Leonardo Da Vinci, and boy, that's going to be hurtful in his grave.

Quote: 

"You could argue that Michelangelo's “Pieta,” Orson Welles' “Citizen Kane,” Frank Gehry's Guggenheim Bilbao and Picasso's “Guernica” come close, but perfection is an abstract concept and not really something that is ever attainable."

Reflection Proper:

Art itself is a very touching subject for me, as I am a bit of an artist myself in my free time. Of course, there's the age-old question to all pursuers of art: is there such a thing as a perfect work of art? I mean, one could argue that such works like Da Vinci's Mona Lisa, or Edvard Munch's The Scream, or Michelangelo's "Pieta" can come close, but honestly, perfection in its own right is an abstract concept and not really attainable, even if we are always aiming for a perfect piece of work everytime. And speaking of "perfection", art criticism is a term that comes to mind when one hears the term "perfect work of art" and in this era, there have been millions of websites that are somewhat rating all sorts of art on a specific scale from a perfect 100 to a zero. This sort of thing, on the surface, means well and does attempt to provide consumers a valuable service via aggregating and averaging the critical appraisals of such works of art, thus giving them a clear, objective sense of whether a work of art is worth one's time and money --- as I understand from a collector's point of view. It does seem straightforward---rating systems these days---but it does have its side effects like for instance: if a restaurant has a nasty review online or a low score from a rating app, it instantly can cause huge nasty effects for both the owner and the workers. If you can imagine a rating system and art involved: think of it in this way: what would you think might happen if someone just gave a lousy rating to say, for instance, the Mona Lisa? The answers to that are mostly described as, in my own words: "horrible, nasty, and could lead to a series of unfortunate events including the followers of Da Vinci chasing after you like an angry mob from the 19th century who wants to hang you or burn at the stake for badmouthing a genius's work of art". So basically, I advise everyone to limit themselves when it comes to criticism and decide for themselves on what they feel about art: after all, everyone's entitled to their own opinions, and calculations sometimes are not accurate as you think, even ratings.

5 Things Learned From Article: 

1. I learned about online websites turning critical appraisal into mathematical precision.

2. I learned about the truth of websites and their scores in art when it comes to buyers, consumers, and collectors of art.

3. I learned about the craziness that comes with criticism and rating systems these days.

4. I learned that it's best to decide for yourself when it comes to criticizing art.

5. I learned about a lesson in avoiding the numbers of ratings of art, focusing on critics' words and deciding for myself.

5 Integrative Questions:

1. Do you ever have an experience involving art like either making a drawing or going to a museum?

2. What's your opinion on people rating art?

3. Why do you think people tend to rate things nowadays from what a person does in real life to movies and establishments?

4. What suggestions can you give to art critics and art rating websites?

5. If you were a art critic, what steps or what would you do when it comes to commenting about a certain work of art you see?