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Following the conventions that I have learned, I would assume that saying “my favorite art is...” would translate as “meine Lieblingskunst ist...”

However, this seems to be incorrect to every grammar checker that I have found. It seems that “Lieblings Kunst” is preferred. Why is this?

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    Hello and welcome to german.SE! Which grammar checkers are you referring to specifically? Only Lieblingskunst (upper case, no blank space) is the correct form of the compund.
    – Jonathan Scholbach ♦
    Nov 30, 2020 at 17:35
  • I don‘t understand, what „art“ is supposed to represent, and this determines the translation. A single piece of art, like a special painting or a full category like dancing?
    – guidot ♦
    Nov 30, 2020 at 19:06
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    @jonathan.scholbach I had been using the Google Docs integrated spellchecker as well as Google Translate. Docs "corrected" it as Lieblings Kunst, while Google Translate says "Did you mean: Lieblings Kunst?"
    – NolanTremelling
    Nov 30, 2020 at 19:37
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    @guidot In this case I am referring to a specific piece by Dürer... maybe lieblingskunstwerk or lieblingsmalerei would be more appropriate? I tried to stay away from these originally since Dürer had a vast range of art, both traditional and non-traditional. I am trying to convey that this is my favorite work of his, out of all that he's done.
    – NolanTremelling
    Nov 30, 2020 at 19:41
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    Many spell checkers (including the one from Google Docs) don't handle compound words very well. Lieblingskunst is correct, but it does sound a bit weirder than Lieblingskunstwerk (which my spell check also tries to break up)
    – nleanba
    Nov 30, 2020 at 19:54

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"Lieblingskunst" is not wrong, but most people would probably not use it because "Kunst" is such a vague word.

Was ist deine Lieblingskunst?

... would probably prompt the question "Was meinst du damit?", or if not, the answer would probably be something like "music", "painting" or "tightrope walking".

If you are asking for a painting, "Lieblingsgemälde" would be best. If you mean a poem, say "Lieblingsgedicht", etc.

You can also say "Lieblingskunstwerk", but that could be answered by everything from "Romeo and Juliet" to "Toccata und Fuge von Bach" or "Banksy's little robot".

To ask for an artist, you would ask for the "Lieblingskünstler".

"Lieblings Kunst" (two words) doesn't work as expected. This would mean the art of a person named "Liebling".

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