this is one of the better things i posted on cohost and i wanted it to be more easily accessible again because i still believe it very much. i wrote it in february 2023.
I've been thinking about the things people have said about my art that have stuck with me the longest, and trying to synthesize that into a personal philosophy about how I talk about other people's art - and I think I've got it to a point where I just want to get it out into the world somehow. It does also start with a bit of a humble brag but the story is important to get to my conclusion.
One time I practiced a single piano piece for weeks on end for a once-in-a-lifetime live performance. I was playing a piece called Familiar by the German pianist Nils Frahm... in front of Nils Frahm. This was terrifying. He was sat literally on the floor about 2 metres away from the piano while I played - his eyes shut. After everybody at the performance had played their pieces, Mr Frahm came up to me and said something that justified the work I'd put in: that he really appreciated how delicate my touch on the piano keys was. It made my weeks of practice feel visible and worth it in a way that wouldn't have been quite the same if he'd simply said that he'd enjoyed the performance.
So when I am responding to art of any kind, this is what I say to myself: find a small detail in the work - something technical, some specific element of it - and talk about that. Be honest about what you appreciate about it. Be precise. You could say a piece of work is beautiful, and sincerely mean it, but if your aim is to compliment the artist in a way you want to land you could compliment the brush strokes on the shadows of the archway, or how an artist captures the slow movement of the ocean in their line work, or the contrast in the colour palette between the artificial and natural. Find something small and intentional, because the small stuff can be the part of the process of making art that consumes our effort and thought the most.
Since I've started trying to apply this rubric in my day to day life, I have found two things: the first is that I've started taking in art of all kinds on a more detailed level, and found a deeper appreciation for the technique involved in its creation; the second is that nobody (so far, and so far as I can tell) has taken this form of response poorly.
