Where is the line?

The topic of anti-sublime vs sublime within visualizations is a long debate that I believe doesn't have an answer yet. It like the discussion of what is art? Something that can be argued but only can be answered within a certain amount of rules to restrict the broad definition. But for this response I am going to discuss my own feeling towards the topic of anti-sublime vs sublime within visualizations.

Coming from a computer science background I want to agree that anti-sublime is better. In my User Interface class my professor put strong emphases on "you can have the best program in the world. It can compute faster then any computer program and tell you all the information you want. It can have over a billion functions but if the user is unable to use it, then by default it is the worse program because all that power it has, can't be used." I do believe this does transfer over to visualizations for you can have all the information you want that shows and proves a very interesting point, it can be as beautiful as you want but if the user can't understand it, then the whole visualization is useless.

Here is a harsh review on visualization

http://eagereyes.org/criticism/visualization-can-never-be-art

At the same time I like what sublime does to a visualizations. It shows you information in these abstract interesting ways. These method that put emphases on elements that normally wouldn't be seen in an anit-sublime visualization. In a sense it shows you multiple meaning to a single visualization, and allows the user to experience the visualization in their own way. Which is better then just showing a visualization and saying "THIS IS THE POINT, THERE NO WAY YOU CAN MISUNDERSTAND BECAUSE I PUT LABELS EVERYWHERE". Its not aesthetically pleasing.

The question still stands, how can we find a mid point between anti-sublime and sublime. How can we make a visualization that is aesthetically pleasing without clouding all the information, or making it to abstract.

Personality this problem came up during my assignment 1. How can I make a visualization that is easy to read, looks appealing but doesn't confuse the user with to much information. I hope I made some right choices that will be discussed tomorrow in class. 

As to the topic, I am still unsure where the common line is between these two methods. Hopefully by the end of this course, I will understand more of the sublime for I do see my work being more anti-sublime.