Agreed. While there are degrees of talent behind art, what it eventually boils down to is what moves the viewer.
Some artists, with a better grasp of what moves the human spirit, create enduring works that resonate with large swaths of humanity. Other artists tap a less prevalent frequency in the human condition that only moves a smaller demographic. A further group (and, tragically, the majority of 'artists') fail to understand how 'art' works and create at best inept and at worst cynical works that serve no purpose. This is merely playing a numbers game; which works resonate with the viewer is entirely a subjective matter; those works I see as inept may arouse interest in another viewer; after all, the museum dropped a couple grand on the damn thing, so someone must find it interesting, right?
That subjectivity, incidentally, is due to the fact that each individual has a unique take on reality (though the influences that skew that take, of course, apply to larger demographics); I see RoboCop as satire, the next man might see it as a bad 80's action flick, and another viewer might latch on to the heavy Christian allegory attached to the titular hero. Which view is 'right?' Paul Verhoeven, for instance, made Murphy's death as violent as possible expressly to depict a 'crucifixion.' Is this to say that missing the Christ angle is somehow a bankrupt interpretation of the film? Or, rather, do the multiple viewpoints reflect a dedication to the craft on the part of the auteur?
One (though, of course, not the only) characteristic of an enduring work is such a complexity; the ability for a wide variety of viewers to extract individual and valid viewpoints that withstand scrutiny.
Or conspire amongst contemporary critics to establish one's name in the history books, thus making it 'good' art in the textbooks of the future and making the associated works far more valuable than they should be. There's no other explanation of the New York School. And Andy Warhol. What a fucking hack.
This is actually a fairly interesting conversation, in a goofy interpol-trollish sort of way. Please continue.