An artwork is a physical object that may have aesthetic and/or conceptual value. It may be a painting, sculpture, photograph, installation, drawing, collage, or any other combination of artistic media. Artworks are often described as having a unique, transcendent quality that combines beauty, intellectual challenge, and emotional impact. They are often exhibited in museums and galleries, but some works may be created and displayed outside of these settings. Artworks can also take the form of performances or actions. They can be commissioned by a person or created for an individual, but they also may emerge spontaneously as part of the everyday activities of individuals. Some works that fall outside the category of traditional art include land art that is made directly in the landscape; performance art which involves an artist’s actions in front of an audience; and readymades, where artists give ordinary objects art-status (Davies 2011).
A central issue with artworks is what criteria make them worthy of this status. One way to approach this question is through a rethinking of the classical definitions of art that connect it with certain properties. These properties are ascribed to the artworks by experts who are conferred with the power to determine their artistic status. These properties are commonly called representational, expressive, and formal properties, but there are other possible properties as well.
Another approach to the question of what makes artworks art is to look at the purpose(s) they have in mind. This is often referred to as the intentionalist approach, and it tries to capture what a particular work of art intends to communicate or convey. The purpose of a work of art may be motivated by political, spiritual, or philosophical ideas; for example, paintings that portray religious, philosophical, or religious themes are often considered to be artworks. Artworks can also serve a functional purpose, such as communication of scientific information in scientific illustration, or evoke emotions, as in Edvard Munch’s painting The Scream, which depicts a person in great pain.
Finally, a work of art may be used to communicate a social message or raise awareness about a particular cause. For example, the sculptor Andy Goldsworthy’s installation The Gates of Paradise consists of thousands of metal spheres that resemble butterflies, and it raises awareness about environmental degradation. Artworks can also be used to raise awareness about a wide range of social issues, including autism, cancer, human rights in Darfur, the overturning of Roe v. Wade, and pollution, as demonstrated by the art activity of Trashion, which involves incorporating waste materials into fashion.
In addition to being able to create new universes of discourse, experts’ conferral of the status of artwork on mere real things can give rise to the Euthyphro dilemma: if mere real things are not reclassified as art by expert judgment, why should we care about them? The answer, some suggest, is that expert judgments about what is art can provide us with reasons to care about it.