I would like to give my own advice about appreciating art. The first thing is - theres no such thing as bad art if its come from within your mind. What you manage to put onto paper is your attempt to capture some vision you have in your head and that makes it precious.
The second thing is do not attempt to understand what the artist is about - don't try and analyse what the artist was attempting. Its irrelevant to your appreciation because YOUR appreciation should be based on whether this piece of art grabs you...does it hold you...does it make you think of something from your life or tug at some emotion. The meaning of the art you see in front of you is what YOU believe it is. Think about ONLY what it means to YOU.
Now this isn't necessarily such a simple thing to do though - so here's what I do...I go to art galleries...I hang out in them as often as I can ( yea I know geek hey). I love the vibe. But I DONT look at all the pieces of art. In fact I walk very quickly past each one and stop when suddenly a piece grabs me... and I think about why its stopped me. Sometimes its the image that grabs at me and other times I imagine a strange geometric shape to mean something about whats going on in my life... eg a straight thick black line can mean a path to destiny for one person, a barrier to another and a rope to a depressed person.
So I advise...go to a gallery but ONLY stop at no more than three pieces and think about why your standing there - who cares what the artist thought - youré way more important.
