Purist or Snob?

I recently had a passionate conversation with a dear friend about whether he's a music purist or music snob. He loves classical music and will listen to some contemporary music, but hates most of it--including my music, which may be why I'd rather call him a music snob than music purist. I like my music, I'm a huge John Mayer fan, I'm really into alt-J and Gregory Alan Isakov right now, and I like country music, but I really like classical music too. Here's the thing-- classical music is beautiful, systematic, and respected because you don't just throw something like that together. You take years to develop skills to truly create something beautiful.

Outside the Louvre

I don't know enough about art to be an art snob, and I don't want to discount modern art because I don't understand it. But let's be honest, sometimes it's just weird. I appreciate classical academic art because I understand it, and because it's beautiful. Art captures truth, and artists are historians. I don't like the idea that modern artists are typefying our generation with installation of arbitrary objects. My roommate, who appreciates art as much as the next person, explained that what touches her the most when she goes to galleries are pieces that illustrate life-- she'd rather see a portrait or a landscape than a sculpture of stacked chairs.

This last January I asked my hairdresser, an art history major, why people like modern art. She explained that with the invention of photography, there's no longer a need for career portrait painters because a person's features can instantaneously be captured on film. So art itself has deviated towards a different kind of philosophy, "can something exist for the sake of existing?" must everything have a meaning? 

What do you think? What is the value of modern art? What am I not seeing?

Love // Christelle