Overview

What Is Art? (1897) by Leo Tolstoy is a philosophical critique of traditional aesthetics and a moral redefinition of art. Tolstoy argues that true art is not about beauty or technical skill, but about the sincere expression and transmission of human feeling from artist to audience. Art is good when it communicates emotions that unite people, especially feelings that promote love, compassion, humility, and moral clarity. He criticizes much of elite art-opera, classical music, and high literature-as artificial, exclusive, and morally empty, serving only the upper classes. For Tolstoy, the highest form of art is religious or ethical art, which helps humanity progress morally. Art that is incomprehensible, elitist, or disconnected from everyday human experience, he concludes, fails its true purpose.

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