Respecting the Work's Own Intent
Whether the work is judged by a standard fitting its own purpose and maker's context (a learning exercise, an experiment, a commercial piece...), rather than held to a goal it never set out to achieve
The five levels
Each anchor describes what separates one level from the next — not a general description of quality. This is the text the evaluator itself reads.
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Level 1 Below Standard
The work is faulted for lacking a quality it never claimed (a learning exercise condemned for "not being a full professional piece")
Example Harsh criticism of a work explicitly labeled experimental for being "incomplete in execution"
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Level 2 Approaching
A passing nod to the work's context without it actually changing the standard being applied
Example "This is a student's work" is mentioned, then it is judged by a full professional standard anyway
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Level 3 At Standard
The applied standard actually fits the work's stated purpose and context
Example A warm-up exercise judged by "did it meet its practice goal" rather than by finished-piece standards
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Level 4 Above Standard
Explicitly distinguishes between what the work should be judged on given its purpose and what falls outside that purpose's scope
Example "As an exercise in rhythm rather than rhyme, I judge it on the former and set the latter aside"
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Level 5 Exemplary
Judges how successfully the work achieves its own specific purpose, and pinpoints exactly where it exceeds and where it falls short of it
Example "By the standard of its own documentary purpose alone, it succeeds on two counts and falls short on one specific third"
Where does your own work sit on these levels?
Submit one work to be read against this criterion alone: your position across the five levels, why you are not higher and why not lower, three literal quotes from your own work, and one exercise with its success check. Your first card is free.
Price: 7 SAR · Included in Pro & Artist Plus · First one free — Pricing details
Read my work by this criterionOther criteria in the same art
Whether every evaluative judgment is paired with a specific pointer to an actual location or detail in the work that grounds it
The five levels →How clearly the critique distinguishes "what is in the work" (description) from "my opinion of it" (judgment), rather than blurring them in one undifferentiated sentence
The five levels →How closely the work's details the critic describes (color, shape, composition, word, rhythm) match what is actually present in the work
The five levels →Whether the critique goes past the first impression to uncover relationships or causes not obvious on the surface, rather than stopping at surface-level description
The five levels →The critic's distinction between "what is seen in the work" and "what it is presumed to mean or symbolize", and whether the move from the first to the second is signalled
The five levels →Whether the critic's judgments hold together across the text, rather than contradicting themself evaluating the same element or equivalent elements
The five levels →Whether evidentiary grounding is sustained throughout the text, rather than concentrated in one paragraph while the rest of the critique is unmoored judgment
The five levels →The critic's use of the discipline's own terms (composition, rhythm, contrast, plot, maqam...) with their precise conventional meaning in that art, rather than as loose metaphor
The five levels →