AESTHETIC DEATH. DEATH!!!

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A Freudian slip is when you say one thing but mean your mother.

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Deep underground, there was a boy who was dead

Can something succeed in all this was and still communicate an idea which is objectively wrong?

Imagine a white supremacist making a piece which promotes racism. It turns out exactly as he envisioned, is wildly successful financially and communicates his ideas effectively and spreads racism. While successful by all of these measures it is still an objectively wrong view. Does this effect the measure of it's success at all?

Hmmm... GOOD QUESTION!
I'm going to say a lot about it, and would like to hear your feedback, of course.

My answer would be "yes and no."
Veeery complicated response.

I'd say It's a thoroughly successful piece of art/communication. But it is also essentially evil.
And while the art is successful, the artIST is failsome.
Because he is essentially using art to tell a lie.

If we think of art in terms of communication again, we think...

If a person spins a really eloquent, well-composed, poetic, rich, LIE. Does the sentence that he used become less linguistically effective just because what he stated was untrue? I'd say that in terms of communication, it was still effective.

But really... IMO a lie isn't art at all.

One important thing, that many philosophers and artists agree on, is that art should always express truth... whether it's the physical (IMO very boring and only temporary) kind of truth or the psychological (IMO interesting and everlasting) kind of truth.

If a piece isn't a product of honesty, if it doesn't express a concept you actually think/feel/believe to be true, then it can't be successful as art... because it isn't art.

It's just deception and soulless pictures... It's not made to be self-expression, but instead it's all about manipulating the audience. It's propaganda and pornography.

But... what if the factual lie is considered to be a personal, psychological truth by the artist? That raises a huge gray area and a couple questions.

Can a personal truth be offensive lies in the real world? OR can something even fairly be considered a personal truth if it involves external things in the real world?

The way I see it, one can't have self-expression that makes statements about other people. That isn't SELF expression, it's gossip and slander.

Fictional characters are fine (as long as they are your original creations, of course. IMO fan-fiction is rape), because they represent original ideas within the artist's imagination, and therefore represent HIM and not anybody else.

Caricatures are fine if they represent "the ideas that this person represents to ME" in exaggerated, symbolic form (like political cartoons). The kind of bland, theme-park style caricatures are worthless as self-expression because they simply exaggerate physical imperfections in OTHERS.

In the modern age of photography it would be hard to slander somebody with anything less than a doctored photo or a false news report... but still.

If you try to depict someone realistically and with an air of sincerity/credibility, that depiction needs to be based on objective facts, it needs to be truthful in a concrete way. (the mistake would be like adding personal bias to a news article in the paper)

And if you'd prefer to focus only on the ideas behind someone/something, you need to make sure that the ideas that you depict are ones you really believe, your conclusions make logical sense, and that you don't dare attach it to the "reality" of a person/thing (the mistake would be like taking a metaphor in the bible literally).

Objective Facts are to stay facts, Abstract Ideas are to stay ideas, you can blur the lines, but don't misrepresent one as being the other.

When we think of art as self-expression. Even if a person believes something that is wrong, if they express it very well... it's still successful self-expression.

We mustn't forget that Freedom of self-expression is important. Whatever the cost of it may be.

And in a world where "right" and "wrong" are treated so subjectively (if only people listened to common sense more often)... we need people to voice differing hypotheses every now and then. Remember that there was a time when the Copernican system was considered "factually wrong."

Out of all the ideas depicted in art, some concepts are wrong (like the white supremacy thing) others are right (like the solar system thing) while others are still in debate.

And when somebody expresses an incorrect opinion through art, the irony is that ART itself will be the main cause of its destruction.

What I mean is, art is so necessary for communication that whatever counter-argument to an incorrect opinion there is, will need to be delivered through art.

An example would be a documentary series or a novel that shows how whites aren't superior to anybody, in response to the original racist artwork.

And a concept that is truthful can be expressed so much more eloquently, and in so many more ways, than a concept that is false or fallacious. Because a true concept can actually be observed and reasoned (being objective, and all) whereas a lie, being constructed, will always be hazy, abstract, and dubious (without foundation or logical proof).

And concepts that are true resonate more powerfully. (just like the sympathetic strings on a sitar... the phrase is a metaphor!)

If there are more ways to perceive something, it's going to be perceived much more effectively.

Essentially, a piece that is objectively wrong will always be less critically successful than one that is true, because it lacks believability/credibility needed to communicate in more than one way.

ANYWAY, THIS IS ALL MY IMMEDIATE RESPONSE, SUBJECT TO CHANGE. (after all it's very late at night)
PLEASE TELL ME WHAT YOU THINK! WHAT IS YOUR IDEA?

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Deep underground, there was a boy who was dead

Spot on, I was hoping to stir up a discussion but you and I are too similar. Most of what you said was similar to what I thought. The idea that true things can be expressed better than false things hadn't occurred to me, but now that you mention it I agree.

The only point that I disagree with is tangential to my original question, but related to the success of art. You said "It's just deception and soulless pictures... It's not made to be self-expression, but instead it's all about manipulating the audience. It's propaganda and pornography." I think your choice of words was wrong. I think that, though it's rarely the case, pornography and propaganda can be art and self expression.

Propaganda isn't always bad. You can make propaganda for a truthful cause. If you feel strongly about a cause and it is a good cause, (An example no one can argue against, preventing shaken baby syndrome) then that propaganda can be art and self expression.

Porn has so much opportunity to be art. It bugs me that porn makers don't realize all of the opportunity before them, but they have blinders made of dollar bills (A metaphor!). Themes easily available to them are duality, balance, love, humanity, nature and so much more! If the stars have influence in the piece or if it is self shot than it can definitely be considered self expression. I have at many times wanted to go into porn just to make quality artistic porn. I don't mean artistic nudes either. I want to make videos and photographs which are at once inspiring, artistic, and erotic.

What say you, sir?

I agree, and have thought all the same ideas.

Did you know that Lars Von Trier has made porn movies?

I see. The semantics of that paragraph depends entirely on how you define pornography or propaganda. Truly, there has occasionally been artistry or self-expression in both. I was operating from the concept of propaganda as commercial — propagating an idea whether or not you actually believe in it using purely gut-grabbing emotional means and to advance the party that commissioned you; and I was operating from the concept of pornography as cheap and prostitute-y, in that it gets the audience's attention using both shock and sex appeal, grabbing them by their gut and by their privates, seldom carrying a message whether it's rationalized or subliminal/atmospheric (Most pornographers care mostly about what setup allows the most full-frame views of genitals colliding, and it all eventually blends together into nothingness).

So, it all comes down to where you draw the line. Does a personal piece of propaganda cease to be propaganda? Does a thoughtfully constructed porno cease to be a porno? Or do they still remain in their genres, despite being a "better class" of propaganda/pornography?

It's like in The Dark Knight.
Is The Joker really just "a better class of criminal," or does he amount to something else entirely?

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Deep underground, there was a boy who was dead

To that question I say they remain their genres. Mostly because I view genres in very broad terms.

true. really, "genre" is a way of categorizing the Aristotelian Form that the ARTIST had in mind from the get-go.
That is, even if he makes a lot of decisions that go against the genre, as long as the artist is trying to create a genre piece, it counts.

What I mean is, even a veeery sexually explicit art film does not qualify as a porno unless its creator intended it to be as such.

A very silly horror movie doesn't really count as a comedy unless its creator intended it to be comedic.

Perhaps it's that kind of thing.

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Deep underground, there was a boy who was dead