About

more info about the creative type

The definition of an artist is wide-ranging and covers a broad spectrum of activities to do with creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The normal meaning in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only. The term is often used in the entertainment business, especially in a business context, for musicians and other performers (less often for actors). "Artiste" (the French for artist) is a variant used in English only in this context. Use of the term to describe writers, for example, is certainly valid, but less common, and mostly restricted to contexts like criticism.

Dictionary definitions

technically speaking

Wiktionary defines the noun 'artist' (Singular: artist; Plural: artists) as follows:

A person who creates art.

A person who creates art as an occupation.

A person who is skilled at some activity

The Oxford English Dictionary defines the older broad meanings of the term "artist,"

A learned person or Master of Arts (now rather obsolete)

One who pursues a practical science, traditionally medicine, astrology, alchemy, chemistry (also obsolete)

A follower of a pursuit in which skill comes by study or practice - the opposite of a theorist

A follower of a manual art, such as a mechanic - partly obsolete

One who makes their craft a fine art

One who cultivates one of the fine arts - traditionally the arts presided over by the muses - now the dominant usage

The present day concept of an 'artist'

about the creative type today

Artist is a descriptive term applied to a person who engages in an activity deemed to be an art. An artist also may be defined unofficially, as, "a person who expresses themselves through a medium". The word also is used in a qualitative sense of, a person creative in, innovative in, or adept at, an artistic practice.

Most often, the term describes those who create within a context of 'high culture', activities such as drawing, painting, sculpture, acting, dancing, writing, filmmaking, photography, and music-people who use imagination, talent, or skill to create works that may be judged to have an aesthetic value. Art historians and critics will define as artists, those who produce art within a recognized or recognizable discipline.

The term also is used to denote highly skilled people in non-"arts" activities, as well-crafts, law, medicine, alchemy, mechanics, mathematics, defense (martial arts), and architecture, for example. The designation is applied to high skill in illegal activities, such as "scam artist" (a person very adept at deceiving others, often profiting (semi-illegally) from other people) or "con artist" (a person very adept at committing fraud).

Often, discussions on the subject focus on the differences among "artist" and "technician", "entertainer" and "artisan," "fine art" and "applied art," or what constitutes art and what does not. The French word artiste (which in French, simply means "artist") has been imported into the English language where it means a performer (frequently in Music Hall or Vaudeville). Use of the word "artiste" can also be a pejorative term.