ool, in which they tried out some of Dewey's central ideas·the relation of theory to practice, of life to society, and of means to ends (Biography 1).
Dewey did not think that art should be separated from its creator and its society of context. He says in "The Live Creature," "When artistic objects are separated from both conditions of origin and operation in experience, a wall is built around them that renders almost opaque their general significance, with which esthetic theory deals" (Dewey, Stuhr, 518). It seems that the newest forms of art resist that process, getting set aside from the society. For example, skateboard artists take pride in the artwork on the underside of their skateboards, priding themselves on unique combinations of stickers, markings, and paint, layering on collaged meaning that is important in the context of the skateboard culture. However, at this time, it is unlikely that there is yet a museum of skateboard art, although there are filmed documentaries and still shots of skateboarding itself as a sporting form of expression.
In like manner, graffiti came out of gangs and a need for expression, marking territory, and coded communications within gangs and towards opposing gangs. These types of lettering became increasingly stylized, modified, and perfected until graphics companies and advertisers copied the style in order to be seen as modern and appealing to the younger generation. Some art historians have taken up studying graffiti as a specialty, photographing and cataloguing murals from the freeways of Los Angeles, somewhat setting the art form apart from its natural existence, taking it into the lecture hall for perusal and study. It is this splintering off and specializing that Dewey objected to. He could see it in the popularity of the museums and in the growing collections of the corporate barons of America.
The earliest rock musicians did not have a particular aim in mind, to create a...