'Mind Of The Beholder'

' "Saying that cultural objects have value", Brian Eno once wrote, "is like saying that telephones have conversations."

Nearly all the cultural objects we consume arrive wrapped in inherited opinion; our preferences are always, to some extent, someone else's.

... once a thing becomes popular, it will tend to become more popular still ...

Paintings, poems and pop songs are buoyed or sunk by random events or preferences that turn into waves of influence, rippling down the generations.

...

Shamus Khan, a sociologist at Columbia University, thinks the way we define "great" has as much to do with status anxiety as artistic worth. 

But ... a work needs a certain quality to be eligible to be swept to the top of the pile ... some stuff is simply better than other stuff ...

Over time, exposure favours the greater artist ...

Great art and mediocrity can get confused, even by experts. But that's why we need to see, and read, as much as we can. The more we're exposed to the good and the bad, the better we are at telling the difference.'

Ian Leslie
2014 The Economist Newspaper Limited