Art Deco Scrap Art Expo

[Yumyumcrow]

ZELDA

"You speak true. Form and function are linked. One cannot ignore the other, no?" Zelda remained quiet as she watched the conversation flow. "A perfect kata is a thing of beauty. So is a luxury sports car. Or a painting, framed and in the right place."

Turning slightly toward Faye, she added: "Ah. Thank you. I would never be able to get it right myself, but I have friends who love experimenting on me. What shades you prefer?"

This is a SHADE. Allocating 3 dots to PRES 4 and Academics 2

[Wayland]

Wayland raised an eybrow at his fellow Talon, and wondered how deep her knowledge of martial arts went. Was she testing him? He himself wasnt that great a fighter, at least not yet, but he certainly considered himself a student of war, and knew a lot of history in that regard. "Yeah I don't know about that with the kata thing. At least when you're talkin' about the Japanese martial arts. Ya know that when World War two hit Japan, a whole crap ton of martial art masters died, and they like, totally lost a whole bunch of their secrets, and you can imagine how tight-assed they would be with their secret moves an' stuff." War can be brutal, but there is no better theatre to find conflict.

"But also, at the time, the main dude who was teaching Karate all through Japan was teaching it as Phys Ed in school, and had to dumb it down for all those little kids. Then all the awesome dudes get killed in the war, and the students start teaching their watered down crap, and American soldiers start learning it and bringing it back here." He turns to look at Zelda. "So those kata they're doin', is like some half remembered thing, cause they dont actually know what the meaning of half the moves are any more, ya know?"

"If you want the real stuff that has all the form and fuction, then you gotta look more at the stuff from China. You know, where the Karate guys first learned their stuff from." Thankfully, all that knowledge was still retained by his Order. There were esoteric meanings in the various martial arts that spoke of higher Truths.

"But hey, thats just me talkin' about stuff on Discovery Channel, not sure how we went from scrap art to Karate." Form and function, thats right.

[Aurora]

Grinning, “I lean towards purples, sometimes pinks. I vary between just doing my roots, or just the ends. And sometimes I mix yellows and oranges to get a flame inspired look.” She had the process down to a science, “Ah, I do my own. Years on the road and tons of practice have me doing it pretty well now.” And being a natural blonde made it easy too.


She then looks to the others, talking about…swords and foreign places. She’d never left the US, well, unless you counted her time in Montreal going to school.


They had defiantly lost her, and when Wayland mentions the convo shift, she shrugs.

[Rory]

Rory listened with patient interest and nodded as each spoke -- not even batting an eye when some misconstrued his statements.

"But aren't all of these opinions on form and function based on one thing?" His hands appeared from behind his back and spread to encompass the group. "The idea that it is the creator or audience that judge the value?"

A hand gestured to Faye.

"I don't think anyone would argue that Madison is beautiful, and she says she's also a performer. So who would judge her value? Her parents, who 'created' her? An audience? Or herself?"

[Fisher]

Fisher thought for a moment about Wayland's comments about lost moves and secret knowledge lost to time and death. That was the case with many things that have been around for a long time. No one person can know everything and she'd wager her next week's worth of food that the Chinese have lost just as much if not more over the course of time.

"Well, you'd have to look earlier than WWII in order to find the decline in modern martial arts. Japan had a decline in combat with the peace of the Tokugawa era beginning in the 17th century. Once people aren't using combat arts in live combat they always decline during peace. You see it even with the the people that get out of the military modern day. They have to find a way to be relevant in the civilian world and that is easier for some than others. All martial arts are watered down at this point and little more than used for sport and competition. So when a society has been at peace for any length of time the true art is always watered down, because the true art is about killing."

She wasn't trying to belittle his point, and she didn't want to get into differences in style, that could be saved for later. She knew a bit about martial arts history, but wasn't a huge scholar of it, nor of Chinese Martial arts, heck she read that Bruce Lee book so that had to count for something right? Maybe. Then Rory raised some excellent philosophical or moral points regarding their topic.

"That's a good point, I would argue that all people are intrinsically of value as human beings. It is easy to fall into the moral gray area and start seeing people's value in how they benefit a person. Then you start falling into well my group is better than their group, and mentally challenged, elderly, gravely sick, are all of no value and should be purged because they are a drain on society. That's some scary stuff man." She said looking at Rory with the convention that she honestly meant how she felt. "How would you argue value? Does it only matter when it is of use or is there an objective standard of it? If there is no objective standard than all is permitted and it is all relative."

[Yumyumcrow]

ZELDA

"Poo! That is a problem, oui? Personally I find value to be a multifaceted thing. Uh... It is not about the intrinsic value of a person or a thing - value is layered, yes? It is a construct of multiple layers. Ah each layer has a meaning to a person, a group or an audience and it depends on the context. Different context, different value. It has nothing to do with the question of relativism - that is just a confusion of ignorance. Before one can ascribe value one must know the current context a person or an object is in."

She gestured around her.

"Take these. To the creators of these beautiful pieces, they had value. To us, they have value because we are here to enjoy them as Art. Our own contexts will weight these objects differently to the value of the artist and each other. To a person who does not love Art - a different context again - these objects will have a different, lesser value. Context ascribes value. But context alone is not the whole truth."

She shrugged.

This is a SHADE. Allocating 3 dots to PRES 4 and Academics 2

[Strix]

"Flow of conversation," Strix commented as possible explanation to Wayland's observation, giving a shrug about it. It happened often enough while talking: Starting with one thing, and suddenly talking about something completely different. Same thing when google searching, look up one subject and suddenly find yourself looking at kittens being cute.

Or maybe he was just easily distracted when looking up things online and it wasn't really anything important.

Strix listened to the others speak, his hands moving to slip into the pockets of his jeans as he did so. It certainly was more interesting than the art around them, at least. "Well, value is really just another thing that lies in the eye of the beholder. Madison's parents probably think about her differently than an audience does," he said as he picked up on Rory's example, then he nodded into Fisher's direction, "the question what defines value falls into this, as well. It's an individual value we put onto things, though it might also be influenced by upbringing or what social group they might belong to. Two people putting a similar value on something could still have different reasons for it."

Another shrug. "Like Zelda said, there are layers to value."

[Aurora]

An eyebrow raises in surprise as the conversation shifts again, and this time her looks are used. He raised some interesting points.

“I personally find value in everyone unless I’m proved otherwise. Assuming someone has no value because of a mental handicap, are elderly, or some other preconceived default shows a lack of character in my opinion. Zelda makes an excellent point, valued is layered, and each layer is important to someone." it all fell to opinions.

“Well, I feel people are unfairly judged based off their looks. I’ll admit, I use mine to my advantage when performing. But I hate people assuming I’m unintelligent or have no real value aside from being attractive.” She shrugs, “Beauty, as well as value differs from person to person, each having their own opinion on it.”

[Wayland]

Wayland nods along with Fisher's thoughts on the decline of martial arts in general. "Yeah, I guess you're probs right 'bout that. Skills go out the window in peace time. Guess that's why the army's still over in the Middle East, keepin' their skills sharp an that. Though killin' just for practice is a bit harsh." Why the military was still involved in the 'war' was above his pay grade, no doubt it was being lead by Awakened with an agenda.

He considered Rory's question and listens to the others before voicing his thoughts, "Value's like, a matter of context yo. I mean, does Madison's apearance got value for performing? Well yeah, but does it have value when you're talkin' context for somethin' like, diggin' a hole? I think people like, assume form has value too often in the wrong context." Its hard to seperate form from function from a lot of things. Especially when form is the first thing you see.

[Rory]

"Oh, I'm sorry. I wasn't just talking about your looks -- I tried to also include your performing," Rory offered to Madison, looking genuinely apologetic. "I didn't mean to give that impression, but that it could also relate to just performing."

His eyes returned to the chess pieces, and he ran a thick finger over on.

"Intrinsic value, contextual value. Sure. But isn't contextual value the same as the Bear Defecating In The Woods? Without an audience, that doesn't exist. But we could also assume that any intrinsic value arrived at by the subject themselves is going to be biased." Rory looked up and smiled at each, clearly enjoying the conversation.

"So the question is, do we each have a constant, unbiased value? We must, or we would be, by definition, meaningless in a vacuum."