Art, n.
Etymology: [F. art, L. ars, artis, orig., skill in joining or fitting; prob. akin to E. arm, aristocrat, article.]
1. The employment of means to accomplish some desired end; the adaptation of things in the natural world to the uses of life; the application of knowledge or power to practical purposes. Blest with each grace of nature and of art. Pope.
2. A system of rules serving to facilitate the performance of certain actions; a system of principles and rules for attaining a desired end; method of doing well some special work; -- often contradistinguished from science or speculative principles; as, the art of building or engraving; the art of war; the art of navigation. Science is systematized knowledge . . . Art is knowledge made efficient by skill. J. F. Genung.
3. The systematic application of knowledge or skill in effecting a desired result. Also, an occupation or business requiring such knowledge or skill. The fishermen can't employ their art with so much success in so troubled a sea. Addison.
4. The application of skill to the production of the beautiful by imitation or design, or an occupation in which skill is so employed, as in painting and sculpture; one of the fine arts; as, he prefers art to literature.
10 more senses
5. pl.
Those branches of learning which are taught in the academical course of colleges; as, master of arts. In fearless youth we tempt the heights of arts. Pope. Four years spent in the arts (as they are called in colleges) is, perhaps, laying too laborious a foundation. Goldsmith.
6. Learning; study; applied knowledge, science, or letters. [Archaic] So vast is art, so narrow human wit. Pope.
7. Skill, dexterity, or the power of performing certain actions, asquired by experience, study, or observation; knack; a, a man has the art of managing his business to advantage.
8. Skillful plan; device. They employed every art to soothe . . . the discontented warriors. Macaulay.
9. Cunning; artifice; craft. Madam, I swear I use no art at all. Shak. Animals practice art when opposed to their superiors in strength. Crabb.
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To black art; magic. [Obs.] Shak. Art and part (Scots Law), share or concern by aiding and abetting a criminal in the perpetration of a crime, whether by advice or by assistance in the execution; complicity.
Note: The arts are divided into various classes. The useful, mechanical, or industrial arts are those in which the hands and body are concerned than the mind; as in making clothes and utensils. These are called trades. The fine arts are those which have primarily to do with imagination taste, and are applied to the production of what is beautiful. They include poetry, music, painting, engraving, sculpture, and architecture; but the term is often confined to painting, sculpture, and architecture. The liberal arts (artes liberales, the higher arts, which, among the Romans, only freemen were permitted to pursue) were, in the Middle Ages, these seven branches of learning, -- grammar, logic, rhetoric, arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy. In modern times the liberal arts include the sciences, philosophy, history, etc., which compose the course of academical or collegiate education. Hence, degrees in the arts; master and bachelor of arts. In America, literature and the elegant arts must grow up side by side with the coarser plants of daily necessity. Irving.
Syn. -- Science; literature; aptitude; readiness; skill; dexterity; adroitness; contrivance; profession; business; trade; calling; cunning; artifice; duplicity. See Science.
1 other Webster entry under this spelling
Art.
The second person singular, indicative mode, present tense, of the substantive verb Be; but formed after the analogy of the plural are, with the ending -t, as in thou shalt, wilt, orig. an ending of the second person sing. pret. Cf. Be. Now used only in solemn or poetical style.
Shades of meaning
Fernald has no entry of its own for art; he lists it under artifice, business, science.
Where he writes about it:
Artist, artificer and artisan are all from the root of art, but artist holds to the esthetic sense, while artificer and artisan follow the mechanical or industrial sense of the word (see ART under science). — from artist
Art in the industrial sense is a system of rules and accepted methods for the accomplishment of some practical result; as, the art of printing; collectively, the arts. — from business
Art always relates to something to be done, science to something to be known. — from science
Not only must art be discriminated from science, but art in the industrial or mechanical sense must be distinguished from art in the esthetic sense; the former aims chiefly at utility, the latter at beauty. — from science
Art in the highest esthetic sense, while it makes use of rules, transcends all rule; no rules can be given for the production of a painting like Raffael's "Transfiguration," a statue like the Apollo Belvedere, or a poem like the Iliad. — from science
Science does not, like the mechanic arts, make production its direct aim, yet its possible productive application in the arts is a constant stimulus to scientific investigation; the science, as in the case of chemistry or electricity, is urged on to higher development by the demands of the art, while the art is perfected by the advance of the science. — from science
Creative art seeking beauty for its own sake is closely akin to pure science seeking knowledge for its own sake. — from science