Society certainly takes part in forming that personality, but the creative act is her or his own, not of the class of which the artist happened to be a member. Even in collective efforts, like quilting and manufacture, a series of decisions are individual contributions. The most fundamental question I ask is, therefore, why a particular work looks the way it does and how it differs from its kin. Critical acumen, which I am intent on cultivating in my students, starts with the training of the eye to discriminate, that is, to see differences where they were not evident before, and only then they begin to understand that all works are not equal. Historical context of a given work is relevant in so far as it contributes to this process of critical discrimination.
Every artifact is a product of human work.
It is shaped by the hand and the mind guided by the judicious eye. In my courses, whether dealing with Michelangelo, Rembrandt, or American architecture, or with cinema, townscape, cities, gardens, and everyday things, I am essentially concerned with the single issue of form and signification, that is to say, the matter of visual semiotics. Study of art sharpens and deepens our awareness of the visual world, or it should. Life is then so much the richer. Not vice versa.