Reader comments.

[RobboAKAscooby]

There isn't even such singular characteristics as talent. You can't say that Satrapi has the same thing that enables her to do her art as, say, Brian Bolland; one is capable of drawing intricate photorealistic drawings, the other creates crude but very vibrant drawings. They are both good artists in their own rights, yet fans of each would call the other one talentless hack.
At best talent is a huge set of characteristics that makes one more able to do something than the other, and those characteristics differ from one artist to the other, and in the end it doesn't matter whether those characteristics are applicable to art, it matters how good you channel them into art. Like, to be an artist you have to have a rich imagination, but if you don't, you can focus on autobiography and became Harvey Pekar. To write Hamlet, you had to had both intuitive knowledge of psychology and observation, and skill for manipulating words and many other things, and if you want to call all those things appearing in one person a talent, then so be it, but it's a fact that many people who possesed completely different set of abilities achieved the same level of greatness.

So in short "talent" is just an arbitrary qualifier applied to the successful by fans and/or critics (usually in comparison to others in their field) when they are merely utilising their perceptions/knowledge to enhance their works?

[Bustertheclown]

There isn't even such singular characteristics as talent. You can't say that Satrapi has the same thing that enables her to do her art as, say, Brian Bolland; one is capable of drawing intricate photorealistic drawings, the other creates crude but very vibrant drawings. They are both good artists in their own rights, yet fans of each would call the other one talentless hack.
At best talent is a huge set of characteristics that makes one more able to do something than the other, and those characteristics differ from one artist to the other, and in the end it doesn't matter whether those characteristics are applicable to art, it matters how good you channel them into art. Like, to be an artist you have to have a rich imagination, but if you don't, you can focus on autobiography and became Harvey Pekar. To write Hamlet, you had to had both intuitive knowledge of psychology and observation, and skill for manipulating words and many other things, and if you want to call all those things appearing in one person a talent, then so be it, but it's a fact that many people who possesed completely different set of abilities achieved the same level of greatness.

So in short "talent" is just an arbitrary qualifier applied to the successful by fans and/or critics (usually in comparison to others in their field) when they are merely utilising their perceptions/knowledge to enhance their works?

[RobboAKAscooby]

There isn't even such singular characteristics as talent. You can't say that Satrapi has the same thing that enables her to do her art as, say, Brian Bolland; one is capable of drawing intricate photorealistic drawings, the other creates crude but very vibrant drawings. They are both good artists in their own rights, yet fans of each would call the other one talentless hack.
At best talent is a huge set of characteristics that makes one more able to do something than the other, and those characteristics differ from one artist to the other, and in the end it doesn't matter whether those characteristics are applicable to art, it matters how good you channel them into art. Like, to be an artist you have to have a rich imagination, but if you don't, you can focus on autobiography and became Harvey Pekar. To write Hamlet, you had to had both intuitive knowledge of psychology and observation, and skill for manipulating words and many other things, and if you want to call all those things appearing in one person a talent, then so be it, but it's a fact that many people who possesed completely different set of abilities achieved the same level of greatness.

So in short "talent" is just an arbitrary qualifier applied to the successful by fans and/or critics (usually in comparison to others in their field) when they are merely utilising their perceptions/knowledge to enhance their works?

Sorry. Just trying to simplify a wordy paragraph.

[Bustertheclown]

Sorry. Just trying to simplify a wordy paragraph.

Fine by me. Of course, you've essentially restated the very definition of talent, which brought a smile to my face, because your summary kinda points out that McDuffies has pretty much stated that he doesn't believe in talent because talent is talent.

[McDuffies]

That is a very liberal paraphrase, Buster. Talk about seeing what you want to see.
If there's anything obvious from Robbo's recap, it is that talent is a qualifier that is always applied in hindsight. Which is ok by me because I don't believe in your "either you got it or you don't" philosophy - you've only got it if you've done something useful with it.

I certainly don't believe in talent as it's usual perception is: some sort of magical characteristics that you're born with that allows you to be good at art with minimal effort.
Let's say I believe that, what with art being as wide and varied as it is today, everyone has natural abilities to be good at some kind of art, or even some kind of visual art. Except that to channel those abilities you need a lot of work. Therefore, talent means very little, because everyone's got it. Work means everything because people very rarely invest it.

Sorry. Just trying to simplify a wordy paragraph.

Wordy paragraphs are my trademark.

[RobboAKAscooby]

I certainly don't believe in talent as it's usual perception is: some sort of magical characteristics that you're born with that allows you to be good at art with minimal effort.

I find that most of the time that "natural born talent" breeds laziness and an unwillingness to learn.
Everyone's known that guy (in school or wherever) who is just a "natural" when it comes to art, they get all the compliments from their peers outside the art world but soon as they're put in an art class (or even just a room with other artists) their flaws are pointed out and more often than not they'll become defensive insisting that everyone else is wrong and they've "been doing it like that forever".
In short their stuff looks good but it lacks the basic foundations - I've seen so many artists who can do these flashy character portraits but can't draw a person standing properly.
However the flipside is these people are often good at selling themselves to people who don't know any better and selling yourself is often more important when it comes to building popularity.

I'm never going to be a great artist, my "talent" lays in storytelling (sadly not so much in writing) but I'll work hard at drawing and writing because I enjoy it and it's what I want to do and just maybe I'll succeed with it.

Wordy paragraphs are my trademark.

I may have infringed your trademark there.

[Yeahduff]

There isn't even such singular characteristics as talent. You can't say that Satrapi has the same thing that enables her to do her art as, say, Brian Bolland; one is capable of drawing intricate photorealistic drawings, the other creates crude but very vibrant drawings. They are both good artists in their own rights, yet fans of each would call the other one talentless hack.
At best talent is a huge set of characteristics that makes one more able to do something than the other, and those characteristics differ from one artist to the other, and in the end it doesn't matter whether those characteristics are applicable to art, it matters how good you channel them into art. Like, to be an artist you have to have a rich imagination, but if you don't, you can focus on autobiography and became Harvey Pekar. To write Hamlet, you had to had both intuitive knowledge of psychology and observation, and skill for manipulating words and many other things, and if you want to call all those things appearing in one person a talent, then so be it, but it's a fact that many people who possesed completely different set of abilities achieved the same level of greatness.

you've only got it if you've done something useful with it.

I have no intention of disputing any of this.

Therefore, talent means very little, because everyone's got it.

C'mon, you know this isn't true.

Satrapi is successful because her crude drawings are crude in the right way. They work: whether it's from a trained eye or from instinct is of no concern to me. The key is she recognized it when she had it, and knew what to do with it. We can call it talent or we can call it something else, but no amount of hard work was gonna pay off if she didn't come to settle where she is now, into what we can now call her unique vision.

[McDuffies]

I will take your words into further consideration.