Plenty of art forms have their own definitions of Criticism and Critique. In any journey of artistic self-improvement, these are important ideas to recognize because they can be used to help us edit our work. Here’s how I understand them:
CRITICISM is unhelpful. It focuses on the person and what they’re doing incorrectly. In an ideal world, we wouldn’t take those personally and would channel the thought behind the point given into useful change. But we’re humans so we don’t do that.
Criticism comes across feeling like a personal attach because it suggests that the decisions the artist made were wrong in some way.
CRITIQUE – on the other hand – is about the work. It looks at the work as objectively as possible and examines how well it achieved its goals. It takes the intention of the creator into account but focuses on the piece rather than the person.
Critique is what we all need to hear (yes, all of us) without taking personally because it’s generally coming from someone who wants to see us improve. And often, those outside perspectives are much more objective than our own since we’re so close to the piece.
One final note on critique: getting input from experts is great. Listen to what they have to say and the rationale behind it. But critique from laymen and random people is still valuable. An idea I like to keep in mind (and I forget where I first heard it) is that when it comes to critique, people are almost always right; and when it comes to their reasons behind that critique, they are almost always wrong. So listen to what they have to say because it’s based on their (valid) perception!