I’m not sure memes in the original Dawkins sense can be art, so I suppose we must be talking about the modern sense of “funny images and short videos”.
Elitists will say that for something to be art it has to be produced by someone who is capable of producing traditional kinds of art, but who for artistic reasons has chosen to do otherwise (see: Cubism), and there’s the whole problem of, at least for images, certain meme templates being recycled over and over which diminishes the artistic value of any specific instance.
But for specific rare instances? Sure. Art is often in the eye of the beholder, regardless of the intent of the creator.
And as for videos. See any Vine compilation. There’s bound to be at least couple in there.
Finally, if you really want to turn an existing meme into art, use those elitist traditional methods to imitate one. An oil-painting triptych of “OMG they were roommates” without captions would be both art and lean into the meme incredibly heavily.
Would that be a comic strip writ large? Maybe. But there’d be nothing inherently funny about two frames of a woman walking and then a man’s face in close up. But if you know the meme, buddy, that’s art.
I’m not sure memes in the original Dawkins sense can be art, so I suppose we must be talking about the modern sense of “funny images and short videos”.
Elitists will say that for something to be art it has to be produced by someone who is capable of producing traditional kinds of art, but who for artistic reasons has chosen to do otherwise (see: Cubism), and there’s the whole problem of, at least for images, certain meme templates being recycled over and over which diminishes the artistic value of any specific instance.
But for specific rare instances? Sure. Art is often in the eye of the beholder, regardless of the intent of the creator.
And as for videos. See any Vine compilation. There’s bound to be at least couple in there.
Finally, if you really want to turn an existing meme into art, use those elitist traditional methods to imitate one. An oil-painting triptych of “OMG they were roommates” without captions would be both art and lean into the meme incredibly heavily.
Would that be a comic strip writ large? Maybe. But there’d be nothing inherently funny about two frames of a woman walking and then a man’s face in close up. But if you know the meme, buddy, that’s art.