Beds in the World

Plato was an Athenian philosopher during the Classical period in Ancient Greece, founder of the Platonist school of thought, and the Academy, the first institution of higher learning in the Western World. In The Republic: Book X , Plato tackles “the idea of a bed” and the “beds in the world.” He makes it clear that there is a major difference between the two “things.” The difference between “beds of the world” and “the idea of the bed” is, there is only one original idea and form of the bed, created by god, and all the other beds of the world are imitations of that original idea. Plato states “no artificer makes the ideas themselves.” In this argument god has created all ideas and the first of each idea, and every other reproduction of said idea is just an imitation. The maker can only make physical shape of the idea but will never be able to make an idea.  

Art in the eyes of Plato is simply imitation of what has already been created. He calls to attention the occupation of painters and poets. Both illustrate things in the physical world; one with words and the other with color and shape. They both use the physical aspects of the world to shape things together. They have not created anything like the god has, but rather given a different shape or form to what has already existed. Plato considers art to be “deceptive,” because imitation can be used as a form of manipulation to change the minds of others. This can be seen everywhere in Art today. A lot of artists can use their work as political statements. Political comics are a good example of this because they are using the medium of art to change the ideas of those viewing the comic, with perhaps portraying the opposing side in a negative light or showing their own side of heavenly. Art is so broad that it can take any shape or form which makes adding deceptiveness easy. According to Plato, art can lead a man to think the artist to be more knowledgeable than they actually are. Art is also deceptive because of how they appeal to the senses. Our senses are misleading because they are all subjective. We all perceive our own realities thanks to our senses. Our mind interprets our senses, but our senses can be tricked to believe what the author wants us to believe. Subliminal messaging is real and can trick our senses, also it can be tricked using the optical illusions and other tricks of that nature. This is another way that art can be deceptive and in the eyes of Plato should not be trusted.

I agree with this criticism of art. In this day and age, there is no longer any objective art. All art has its own agenda and its own level of deceptiveness. When analyzing art one must take into account the intention of the artist and the bias of the artist before making any definitive beliefs about art. We can all decide for ourselves how much we want to be deceived. We must investigate any beliefs before we can fully commit to a belief.

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