art
English
Pronunciation
Etymology 1
From Middle English art, from Old French art, from Latin artem, accusative of ars (“art”). Displaced native Middle English liste (“art”) (from Old English list).
Noun

art (countable and uncountable, plural arts)
- (uncountable) The conscious production or arrangement of sounds, colours, forms, movements, or other elements in a manner that affects the senses and emotions, usually specifically the production of the beautiful in a graphic or plastic medium.
- 1992 May 3, "Comrade Bingo" Jeeves and Wooster, Series 3, Episode 6:
- B.W. Wooster: If you ask me, art is responsible for most of the trouble in the world.
R. Jeeves: An interesting theory, sir. Would you care to expatiate upon it?
B.W. Wooster: As a matter of fact, no, Jeeves. The thought just occurred to me, as thoughts do.
R. Jeeves: Very good, sir.
- B.W. Wooster: If you ask me, art is responsible for most of the trouble in the world.
- 2005 July, Lynn Freed, Harper's:
- "I tell her what Donald Hall says: that the problem with workshops is that they trivialize art by minimizing the terror."
- 2009, Alexander Brouwer:
- Visual art is a subjective understanding or perception of the viewer as well as a deliberate/conscious arrangement or creation of elements like colours, forms, movements, sounds, objects or other elements that produce a graphic or plastic whole that expresses thoughts, ideas or visions of the artist.
- There is a debate as to whether graffiti is art or vandalism.
- 1992 May 3, "Comrade Bingo" Jeeves and Wooster, Series 3, Episode 6:
- (countable) Skillful creative activity, usually with an aesthetic focus.
- She's mastered the art of programming.
- (uncountable) The study and the product of these processes.
- He's at university to study art.
- (uncountable) Aesthetic value.
- Her photographs are nice, but there's no art in them.
- (uncountable) Artwork.
- Sotherby's regularly auctions art for millions.
- (countable) A field or category of art, such as painting, sculpture, music, ballet, or literature.
- I'm a great supporter of the arts.
- (countable) A nonscientific branch of learning; one of the liberal arts.
- 2013 August 3, “Boundary problems”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8847:
- Economics is a messy discipline: too fluid to be a science, too rigorous to be an art. Perhaps it is fitting that economists’ most-used metric, gross domestic product (GDP), is a tangle too. GDP measures the total value of output in an economic territory. Its apparent simplicity explains why it is scrutinised down to tenths of a percentage point every month.
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- (countable) Skill that is attained by study, practice, or observation.
- 1796, Matthew Lewis, The Monk, Folio Society 1985, page 217:
- A physician was immediately sent for; but on the first moment of beholding the corpse, he declared that Elvira's recovery was beyond the power of art.
- 1898, Winston Churchill, chapter 4, in The Celebrity:
- The Celebrity, by arts unknown, induced Mrs. Judge Short and two other ladies to call at Mohair on an afternoon when Mr. Cooke was trying a trotter on the track. The three returned wondering and charmed with Mrs. Cooke; they were sure she had had no hand in the furnishing of that atrocious house.
- 1796, Matthew Lewis, The Monk, Folio Society 1985, page 217:
- (uncountable, dated) Contrivance, scheming, manipulation.
- 1847, Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights:
- ...and Mrs. Earnshaw undertook to keep her sister-in-law in due restraint when she returned home; employing art, not force: with force she would have found it impossible.
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Synonyms
- (Human effort): craft
Antonyms
- (Human effort): mundacity, nature, subsistence
Hyponyms
- ABC art
- abstract art
- ASCII art
- black art
- black arts
- body art
- cave art
- clip art
- concept art
- fine arts
- folk art
- graphic art
- high art
- installation art
- junk art
- kinetic art
- liberal arts
- line art
- martial art
- minimal art
- modern art
- naïve art
- op art
- optical art
- outsider art
- performance art
- pixel art
- plastic art
- pop art
- primitive art
- prior art
- process art
- sand art
- sequential art
- seventh art
- street art
- traditional art
- vernacular art
- visual art
Derived terms
- art class
- art collection
- art dealer
- Art Deco
- artefact
- art exhibition
- art film
- art for art's sake
- art form
- artful
- art gallery
- art handler
- art historian
- art history
- art house
- artifact
- artifice
- artificial
- art imitates life
- artisan
- artist
- artiste
- artistic
- art journal
- artless
- art movie
- art music
- art nouveau
- art object
- art paper
- art rock
- art rooom
- arts and crafts
- art school
- arts degree
- art student
- artsy
- artsy-craftsy
- art therapy
- art union
- artwear
- artwork
- artworker
- arty
- arty-farty
- Bachelor of Arts
- down to a fine art
- life imitates art
- Master of Arts
- objet d'art
- person of ordinary skill in the art
- state-of-the-art
- term of art
- work of art
Translations
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- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout#Translations.
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Etymology 2
From Middle English art, from Old English eart (“(thou) art”), second-person singular present indicative of wesan, from Proto-Germanic *ar-t (“(thou) art", originally, "(thou) becamest”), second-person singular preterite indicative form of *iraną (“to rise, be quick, become active”), from Proto-Indo-European *er-, *or(w)- (“to lift, rise, set in motion”). Cognate with Faroese ert (“art”), Icelandic ert (“art”), Old English earon (“are”), from the same preterite-present Germanic verb. More at are.
Further reading
- "art" in Raymond Williams, Keywords (revised), 1983, Fontana Press, page 40.
Catalan
Derived terms
- belles arts
- obra d'art
Further reading
- “art” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.
Cornish
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): [ɒɹt]
Danish
Etymology
From Middle Low German art.
French
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /aʁ/
audio (file)
Derived terms
Related terms
Descendants
- Haitian Creole: la (< l'art)
Further reading
- “art” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).
Irish
Declension
First declension
Bare forms:
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Forms with the definite article:
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Derived terms
- chomh marbh le hart (“stone dead”)
Mutation
Irish mutation | |||
---|---|---|---|
Radical | Eclipsis | with h-prothesis | with t-prothesis |
art | n-art | hart | not applicable |
Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every possible mutated form of every word actually occurs. |
Further reading
- "art" in Foclóir Gaeilge-Béarla, An Gúm, 1977, by Niall Ó Dónaill.
- “art” in Dictionary of the Irish Language, Royal Irish Academy, 1913–76.
Latvian


Etymology
From Proto-Baltic [Term?], from Proto-Indo-European *ar-, *arə-, *h₂erh₃- (“to plow”), from *h₁er- (“sparse; to crumble, to fall to pieces”), whence also the verb irt (q.v.). Cognates include Lithuanian árti, Old Prussian artoys (“plowman”) (compare Lithuanian artójas), Old Church Slavonic орати (orati), Russian dialectal or dated ора́ть (orátʹ), Belarusian ара́ць (arácʹ), Ukrainian ора́ти (oráty), Bulgarian ора́ (orá), Czech orati, Polish orać, Gothic 𐌰𐍂𐌾𐌰𐌽 (arjan), Old Norse erja, Hittite [Term?] (/ẖarra-/, “to crush; (passive form) to disappear”), [Term?] (/ẖarš-/, “to tear open; to plow”), Ancient Greek ἀρόω (aróō), Latin arō.[1]
Verb
art tr., 1st conj., pres. aru, ar, ar, past aru
- to plow (to prepare (land) for sowing by using a plow)
- art zemi ― to plow the land, earth
- art tīrumu, lauku ― to plow a field
- art dārzu ― to plow a garden
- art kūdraino augsni ― to plow the peaty soil
- art ar traktoru ― to plow with a tractor
- papuvi ara divi traktori ― two tractors plowed the fallow (land)
- iziet art agri no rīta ― to go plowing early in the morning
- rudenī, rugāju arot, sekoju Jurim pa vagu un sarunājos ― in autumn, while (he was) plowing the stubble field, I followed Juris along the furrows and talked
Conjugation
INDICATIVE (īstenības izteiksme) | IMPERATIVE (pavēles izteiksme) | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Present (tagadne) |
Past (pagātne) |
Future (nākotne) | |||
1st pers. sg. | es | aru | aru | aršu | — |
2nd pers. sg. | tu | ar | ari | arsi | ar |
3rd pers. sg. | viņš, viņa | ar | ara | ars | lai ar |
1st pers. pl. | mēs | aram | arām | arsim | arsim |
2nd pers. pl. | jūs | arat | arāt | arsiet, arsit |
ariet |
3rd pers. pl. | viņi, viņas | ar | ara | ars | lai ar |
RENARRATIVE (atstāstījuma izteiksme) | PARTICIPLES (divdabji) | ||||
Present | arot | Present Active 1 (Adj.) | arošs | ||
Past | esot aris | Present Active 2 (Adv.) | ardams | ||
Future | aršot | Present Active 3 (Adv.) | arot | ||
Imperative | lai arot | Present Active 4 (Obj.) | aram | ||
CONDITIONAL (vēlējuma izteiksme) | Past Active | aris | |||
Present | artu | Present Passive | arams | ||
Past | būtu aris | Past Passive | arts | ||
DEBITIVE (vajadzības izteiksme) | NOMINAL FORMS | ||||
Indicative | (būt) jāar | Infinitive (nenoteiksme) | art | ||
Conjunctive 1 | esot jāar | Negative Infinitive | neart | ||
Conjunctive 2 | jāarot | Verbal noun | aršana |
References
- Karulis, Konstantīns (1992), “art”, in Latviešu Etimoloģijas Vārdnīca (in Latvian), Rīga: AVOTS, →ISBN.
Middle English
Etymology 1
From Old English eart, second person singular of wesan (“to be”), from Proto-Germanic *art, second person singular of *iraną.
Alternative forms
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /art/
Usage notes
This form is mpre common than bist for the second-person singular.
Descendants
- English: art (archaic or dialectal)
Etymology 2
Borrowed from Old French art, from Latin artem, accusative form of ars, from Proto-Indo-European *h₂r̥tís.
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /art/
Noun
- A member of the seven medieval liberal arts (the trivium and quadrivium).
- The seven medieval liberal arts as a group; the trivium and quadrivium combined.
- The foundational knowledge and activities of a field or subject (either academic or trade).
- Applied or practical knowledge; the execution or realisation of knowledge.
- Guile, craft or an instance of it; the use of deception or sleight-of hand.
- Competency, skill; one's aptitude or ability in a given area or at a given task.
- A set of rules or guidelines for conducting oneself; a code of conduct.
- (rare) Knowledge, information; the set of things which one has learned about (through formal study).
- (rare) Rhetoric; skill in oration, argument, speech, or speaking.
- (rare) Human behaviour or action (as opposed to natural happenings).
References
- “art (n.(1))” in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2019-1-7.
Middle French
Noun
art m (plural ars)
- art
- 15th century, Rustichello da Pisa (original author), Mazarine Master (scribe), The Travels of Marco Polo, page 15, line 7-8:
- Il y a de toutes choses habondance, et ils vivent de marchandise et d'art.
- There is an abundance of everything and they make a living from merchandise and from art
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Norwegian Bokmål
Derived terms
Norwegian Nynorsk
Noun
art m or f (definite singular arten or arta, indefinite plural artar or arter, definite plural artane or artene)
Derived terms
Old French
Noun
art m or f (oblique plural arz or artz, nominative singular arz or artz, nominative plural art)
- art (skill; practice; method)
- Walter of Bibbesworth: Le Tretiz, ed. W. Rothwell, ANTS Plain Texts Series 6, 1990. Date of cited text: circa 1250
- ore serroit a saver de l’art a bresser & brasyr
- Now would be the time to know the art of brewing
- ore serroit a saver de l’art a bresser & brasyr
- Walter of Bibbesworth: Le Tretiz, ed. W. Rothwell, ANTS Plain Texts Series 6, 1990. Date of cited text: circa 1250
Descendants
References
- Godefroy, Frédéric, Dictionnaire de l'ancienne langue française et de tous ses dialectes du IXe au XVe siècle (1881) (art, supplement)
- art on the Anglo-Norman On-Line Hub
- “art” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).
Old Irish
Etymology
From Proto-Celtic *artos (“bear”) (compare Cornish arth, Welsh arth), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂ŕ̥tḱos (“bear”).
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ar͈t/
Inflection
Masculine o-stem | |||
---|---|---|---|
Singular | Dual | Plural | |
Nominative | |||
Vocative | |||
Accusative | |||
Genitive | |||
Dative | |||
Initial mutations of a following adjective:
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Mutation
Old Irish mutation | ||
---|---|---|
Radical | Lenition | Nasalization |
art | unchanged | n-art |
Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every possible mutated form of every word actually occurs. |
Swedish
Pronunciation
audio (file)
Turkish
Etymology
From Proto-Turkic *hārt (“back”). Cognate with Old Turkic [Term?].