Hey there! Welcome to my Tutorial for Arts Critiques! In this I will teach you how to critique and write reviews for art of visual and other mediums. Hopefully you will have a good time! 

  There are many ways to critique art, but here I want to show you two simple ones that can be used by anybody and showcase a bit of what's possible.

  These will be based on the famous method of Edmund Burke Feldman for visual arts, though adapted to make it simpler, broader and factoring notable theories from hermeneutics and aesthetics. Herme-wow, what? Haha, don't worry about it...because that's my job! Anyway let's get started!

First Method: The Experience.

  The first way to critique art that I'll show is what I'll call "the experience". The first thing you need to do is get in contact with the artwork and, as you guessed, experience it. But pay attention to all parts of this experience! What do you see or listen, sense? What do you feel? What thoughts come to mind? What does it remind you of?

  I must add that there is no rush in this, it may even change as you go through it, especially your thoughts. What's important is that it's tied to the experience somehow, just don't think or imagine too far on your own! Check out the art again if you need to. Take your time and let it all develop for as long as you want, until you reached a point when you think it's final. After it, that will be what's called your interpretation, you may share any part of it in your critique.

  With that done, it's time to evaluate your experience! How good or bad was it? How intense, vivid, clear, was it? How does it compare to other artworks you've experienced? Again, mention whichever of it you want in your critique. If you already said something like that before, no problem! Repeat if you want, or don't.

  And with that, we're done! You may notice this barely sounds special, and maybe you've even done it before. That's great, it just means you were a critic all along! Specifically, a critic following Heidegger's phenomenology alongside degrees of Croce's expression theory! And now you can sound like you know what you're doing, you're welcome!

  For this method of critique, I want to end things with an example. For such, let us critique the song "Sunlit Resort", composed by @ZaazNG and displayed here with permission from the author. You can click on the CD icon to use the player if you don't want to leave this page:

  After some reflection, I'd say this song makes me feel pleased and relaxed, maybe because of the slow rhythm, the flute sounds remind me of a breeze and the steelpan reminds me of the beach. The violin and the guitar also make me feel welcome and cared for.

  I'd say it is a really good song, the music notes are crisp to hear and it makes me feel good, as I said before, and on par with other songs that I like. This is my critique.

  You may notice that I linked my feelings to specific things and talked about rhythm and specific instruments on this critique. This sensibility comes from practicing critiques and the knowledge comes from, well, life and stuff, books. Those are some ways you can improve your critiques.

Second Method: The Intentions.

  Well, that was only one method, let's see another one, shall we? This one I'll call "the intentions". What we'll do is investigate the author's intentions behind the artwork, and base our critique on it.

  Sometimes, the author will just tell you what those were in a comment or if asked. But if you don't believe, want or have that, what you do is gather any info present in the art and its context while also trying to empathize with the author (just avoid biases if you can).

  Now you should be able to make a guess about the intentions behind the art! That's your interpretation, mention what you want.

  With that, now we evaluate it. Were they good intentions? Did the author succeed at them? Why? And if so, what were the consequences? Once again, say what you want of that, and you've done it!

  This method is good for critiquing design too, by the way. Also propaganda, marketing, publicity and didactic art! In case you're a nerd, this uses romanticist hermeneutics with an instrumentalist value theory; now you know.

  And here, too, I'd like to end things with an example. I want to critique "the necromancer", an artwork made by @jouste and used here with author permission: 

  What an emphatic piece, from how the character was placed in the picture to the contrast between earth and sky and how it all seems to converge to the center. Also, the chicken is funny.

  Considering all that, I interpret that jouste intended to exalt this character, the necromancer, while also creating an exhilarating (though not burdensome) experience. With how this thing makes me feel, I'll say he did it, this necromancer dude is cool! This is my critique.

  Now, the savvy among you might know that this isn't just any necromancer. It's actually a boss from the game Castle Crashers, this is fanart! Yeah, remember when I said to gather info from the context? That's the bare minimum... any info can matter, from any context. When you critique like this, the more you know the better. Indeed, if you check "the necromancer"'s submission page, jouste mentions he sent this art as a gift to the game's developers, in celebration of its successes (including the release of the "necromancer pack"!). Considering that would've changed my critique, for one, the "Behemoth" plaque now makes more sense. This goes to show that solid logic might still be incomplete.

Final Thoughts

  No matter how you choose to critique art, always be humble and respectful. Words can hurt and you don't know everything. Not only that, you are only critiquing because the artist took the time and effort to make the art in the first place, be thankful. When in doubt on how to phrase something, use common sense and empathy (and not just to guess a meaning!).

  Well, that's it for this tutorial, I hope you learned a thing or two for critiquing art and helping artists in their journeys. Special thanks to Zaaz and jouste for allowing me to use their art! If you liked this thing, let me know! If enough people want it, I can make an advanced tutorial for critiques, including other methods, more tips for improving, art vocabulary and historical contextualization. Anyway, bye!