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Dylan16807

> on the other hand couldn't you say the same about art in general?

I would say that mass-produced art should be pretty cheap, and these are mass-produced.

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These ones are not.

150 of the exact same model, among huge piles of other models.

I don't want to argue about word choice. In the distinction I was describing, however imperfectly worded, watches like this easily go on the bulk side of the line.

No, they don’t. And you won’t find many watch enthusiasts who agree with you either about this class of watch.

I drew a line. It goes on that side of the line I drew.

> And you won’t find many watch enthusiasts who agree with you either about this class of watch.

What specifically would they disagree with? The idea that these 150 watches are made in bulk to a single design, and that watches of this class have many closely related designs? Or something I said that wasn't watch-specific?

If they're not made in bulk that's extremely interesting to me. Would that be like old guns that didn't have interchangeable parts, each one carefully and individually refined by expert hand to fit together? More so? Less so? How much variance is there between pieces? (I'd guess many old watches are like that but I haven't heard so specifically.)

To me it seems in bad faith to use a word that draws a line in a roughly agreed upon place, and then claim you have freedom to place that line wherever you want, and thus are always correct in asserting that it is "made in bulk". Using your argument, you could claim that 1, or even 0 watches are "made in bulk", or that 30C is "cold" bc you draw the line of "cold" at 40C, etc. Throwing away all understanding of concepts that has ever existed in order to win this one point seems pointless to me

Well it's not bad faith if I'm accidentally somewhat unclear. Like, I could say something completely objective like "100 for watches" if that's better, and it would be impossible to argue about whether 150 is more or less than 100.

If I'm wrong about the production of 150 watches having some quality, argue about that quality, no need to argue about broader categories in a completely abstract way while introducing no other examples.

For your analogy, if I say a temperature is cold so we shouldn't do some activity, let's talk about that activity and how the temperature affects it, not how we categorize temperatures.

I think he's disagreeing with the arbitrariness of where you're drawing lines to make your argument sound more reasonable. And he's free to argue his way. Mass production already has a definition and I'm pretty sure significant manual work goes into each copy.

But this is beside the point. Regardless of how many copies are made, the creativity and ingenuity that went into the first one alone makes it something marvellous. Jaquet-Droz only made one handwriting automaton boy. But if he made 150 it would still be a contribution to human endeavour and I'm glad for that.

Manual work goes into each copy, manual artistry less so.

So it's true that I should classify batches of 100+ and mass production quite differently. Along with pure one-offs and batches under five. But my original point still applies. I think these different quantities should be treated quite differently in terms of how art can be very expensive.

In your other comment you said: Finally, quantity is irrelevant to whether something is classified as art. My point was that the fact that it was created at all is meaningful and valuable.

It's art, very good art, but it's also far short of 150 artistically different watches. Almost everything is art at some level, but the amount that the artistry should affect price depends on production quantities and methods. Most of the artistry here is one piece.

But all this missed the point. I like that there are artists making these things. If they go on to be copied X times so that it can provide a living wage to the original artists and designers, then in my opinion it's money well spent, even if some of it goes to the (also talented) machinists and assemblers.

I also think it's good that it's accessible to 150 people who maybe appreciate the artistry that went into it, as opposed to 1 super rich guy who maybe doesn't.

All I'm saying is charity is really important, arguably more so than art, but when they're created with skill and artistry; appreciated and not just consumed conspicuously as wealth/status objects, such things have value too.

So I generally agree with all this. But in my opinion there's a limit to how much money you can justify with "it's art". If you're making 150 of something, you shouldn't be justifying a particularly huge price with it being art. If it really cost that much, and the price of making just one would have been ridiculously huge, then there is a point where I'd say the whole project is not worth it, is not making the world a better place. (Note: I am not stating any opinion on where this watch is relative to that level.)

Or to restate and elaborate on my original point: 99% of the time, it's fine to use art as a reason to buy something. You don't always have to be donating every dollar to charities. But for any level of justification you want to reach for the price of a piece of art, the dollar amount that fits under "justified" depends on how many copies are being made.

It is not bad faith at all. He is pointing out that the watches are an example of artificial scarcity. The original engineering may be impressive but once the tooling and quality control has been setup the process will be, to a reasonable extent, automated.

Whether 10, 50 or 100 or 100000 of these watches are made, is the process any different? Is it more like a limited edition print. High DPI printing is an example of technology magic but you can't argue that the choice to limit the output of a printer to a few runs means that the print itself is not mass produced

But that's not going to be how these watches are made. They set it to 150, which means there is almost no value in creating customised tooling just for the assembly. The parts may be mass produced (and used in other products), but their tolerances in this assembly will mean they have a low yield, and expensive manual quality control.

This is called batch production. It is not akin to a printer and even if it was, limiting the production quantity would, by definition, mean it is not mass produced.

Finally, quantity is irrelevant to whether something is classified as art. My point was that the fact that it was created at all is meaningful and valuable.

Does art cease being art because the artist created plates and created 100 prints before it wears out? Is that less art than a painting?

> Does art cease being art because the artist created plates and created 100 prints before it wears out? Is that less art than a painting?

Of course not. It's just as much an art.

But those prints shouldn't be priced with the same premium that a single original often has.

It should be priced at the maximum value someone is willing to pay for it… and naturally in market economy it often will. The Artist needs to also make a living and not all of their artwork will sell at earth shattering prices. It seems just as arbitrary to limit the price of the item to a fraction of the value of a single item. I do wish more art was auctioned rather than come with a fixed price tag to make the market more fluid and less egotistical.

The art world seems to think so.

Imagine thinking that there's 150 of a watch means its mass produced.

> Imagine thinking

You don't have to mock me for using the wrong word.

I hope you realize it's my vocabulary having a slight issue here, and not my understanding of the world, right?

Your vocabulary isn't at fault, nothing to do with that at all, it's that you think 150 of a watch is in some way mass produced.

I had an incorrect sense of when to use the term "mass". It's vocabulary.

What weird hill are you trying to die on here? You're saying that 150 of a watch means it's mass-produced, ie that there's a heap of them, that they're made en masse, in bulk, whatever terminology you want to use. You understand that because it's exactly what you were getting at. The point is that 150 of them is still bugger all.

150 copies of something is enough that it's extremely different from making one or two copies. Isn't that obvious?

It doesn't matter if they're both "bugger all" compared to some arbitrary threshold. It's a huge difference in scale and methodology. There's more than two categories here!

And I don't know why you think I'm trying to die on a hill, the only downvoted comment in the chain is your first one...

Several works of Pissarro, Munch, Matisse, Picasso, Miro et cetera are in museums in a single copy. MOST of their work are in private collections in a numbered signed lithographs.

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