Lauren Rule- Plato (Class Reading #5)

Plato believed art was nothing more than an imitation.  In a sense, I believe Plato is correct.  After all, what are we attempting to accomplish with art, but imitation?  A painting imitates an object.  Music imitates movement or sometimes emotion.  A poem or story imitates an experience.  All art imitates something.  Unlike Plato, however, I believe art to be essential to society, perfect or otherwise.  Plato also thought the objects in our lives were also an imitation; therefore, art would be an imitation of an imitation.  My mind is not at the point where it can accept the objects I can see and touch as merely an imitation of the ultimate form.  Art is insignificant to Plato because of his idea that it is an imitation of an imitation.  Objects are not real and so representations of objects are even more useless.  Ideas are what's important, but they are not tangible.  "The basis for this view is the assumption that the goal of art is the imitation of mundane reality.  Thus, the artist is even less attuned to reality than the craftsperson" (13).  The craftsperson creates an imitation or a copy of the Form.  The artists creates an imitation of an imitation of the Form.  A person should not waste his or her time on an imitation, much less an imitation of an imitation; the distraction hinders a person from seeing the true Form, or so Plato would say.