Gallery owner Edward Winkleman has an interesting discussion going on at his blog about whether being too well-informed interferes with appreciating/enjoying art.
I’m with Winkleman: I say no. I have no problem blanking my mind and going for the ride. It’s only once the experience has run its course that I may try to figure out why it was the way it was, and it’s just as likely to be influenced by my state at the time as by composition or density range.
Food, on the other hand, is another matter for me. It may be because I’m probably a better pastry chef than I am a photographer, and having spent a large part of my youth in a commercial restaurant kitchen, have spent a lot more time paying attention to the experience of eating than I have to the experience of viewing art, but it’s difficult to go out and enjoy a meal. Dessert? Forget it. 9 times out of 10, I’m not even going to bother. It’s not that I go looking for food to be unenjoyable to boost my ego or anything, I simply can’t help but notice it. It’s like trying to watch a movie in which you can see the crew walking around in the background and the boom mic bobbing up and down at the top of the screen. (Oddly, this happens far less with home-cooked meals than it does at restaurants. Maybe there is something to that whole context thing…)
Who knows, maybe I’ll feel differently when I know more and have more experience looking at art. But for now, it’s not a problem.