Everyone who creates does so with a purpose. Perusing some of what passes for art (from any era, not just our own), this isn't always patently clear—a lot of paintings, songs, books, etc. look as purposeless as one feels after engaging them. But creation is not possible without at least a modicum of intention, and that intention is the purpose for which the creator creates.
By art, I'm including everything that is not explicitly utile except for recreational or contemplative purposes. It's easy to try to distinguish between art and entertainment, but ultimately the distinction is impossible to maintain: there's simply good art and bad art, art that is entertaining and art that isn't, stupid art and intelligent art, and so on. An attempt to dissociate art from entertainment is wrong both because it elevates art beyond its proper due, and because it simultaneously insinuates that art is not meant to be entertaining or enjoyable.
But properly made art is meant to be enjoyable, even while it's meant to instruct and to direct its audience toward the better life. To make art of this kind, the artist must do so intentionally; good art doesn't come about by accident.
On the reverse of the "entertainment vs. art" coin, attempting to distinguish some attempts from the real or perceived dross that surround them is usually little more than arrogance and posturing either on the part of the artist or his fans. For instance, movies become "art films" to differentiate them from the typical box office hash; novels are called "literary fiction" as opposed to genre titles; avant garde music is "art rock" as opposed to pop. There's some good stuff in these categories, but the only reason to stand by such designations is to make sure everyone knows you aren't just part of the herd, consuming the same intellectual junk food as everyone else.
All that isn't to suggest I'm advocating watching run-of-the-mill movies or reading a bunch of cheap paperbacks, just that we need to recognize the tendency for status-elevation based on our so-called superior tastes. Increasingly, what is often deemed most intelligent is simply transgressive or simply nonsensical; our goal should be to find what is good, not simply to promote our own intelligence by jumping on some bandwagon.
So how do we go about finding the good? If there are objective standards for separating good and bad art, what are they? I don't think they're as difficult as a lot of people seem to assume. There's a pretty widespread attitude that, even if objective standards exist, we can't know them. I vehemently repudiate that notion, and assert that the objective standards can and must be known, especially if Christians are going to engage the arts on any level, either as creators or consumers.
To return to the beginning idea: everything that is created is created with a purpose. If the purpose of the artist is simply to make money, that will be evident in what he creates; if he wants to celebrate sin, he will; if he wants to make a significant statement about God or hunanity, that will be apparent; if he simply wants to create something with lots of explosions and knife fights, he will do just that. It isn't possible for anyone to make anything with no purpose at all, and it isn't possible for them to obscure or hide that purpose.
The first objective standard for evaluating art, then, is found in determining the purpose of the given artwork. This may be more difficult in some cases than in others, but with proper training in logic and reason it's never impossible. A major reason people are often unwilling to analyze a book or movie in this way is because they're afraid the conclusion will force them to give up something they like, which in turn means they're often unwilling to admit this as an objective standard for art analysis, but there is nowhere else to begin evaluation.
If a movie (for instance) passes the first test (i.e., the purpose of the film is legitimate and not merely meant to titillate or shock or violate), the secone step is to determine whether it adequately lives up to its purpose. For instance, the classic Western The Sons of Katie Elder is clearly meant to demonstrate the influence of a good woman on her community, but through directorial ineptitude, poor acting, and clumsy symbolism the point is lost. On the other hand, a movie like Ingmar Bergman's Winter Light is clearly meant to explore the phenomenon of loss of faith and depression from an existential perspective, and ably does so.
These are the two most basic litmus tests for objectively judging a work of art. Both withhold value judgments and allow the audience member to analyze the work based solely on the work itself. If we don't start here, we can hope to make observations only in the most desultory manner, finding elements here and there yet unable to connect them. To avoid this, we must assume an objective base for analysis, and proceed from there.
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