It's Very Interesting

I heard recently about how unhelpful the word "interesting" is when you're trying to give advice to someone about their writing/art.
I've heard this many times before, but I took note of this last time because I realized something else. One of my creative writing teachers uses the word "interesting" to describe about half of the things that are read in class. And it was another creative writing teacher who told us to try to avoid "interesting."
What's the difference between the two teachers? Well, one focuses more on fiction. And the other does mostly poetry (She's the one who likes to say interesting). So maybe she's not as quick to think of comments on fiction because she understands poetry better? So "interesting" is her filler word.
That's just a theory.

And yeah, if you ask for feedback about something you created, "interesting" may not be of much help. But it can also depend on the context.
Maybe the reader can't think of any advice to give, but they really are "interested" in what you've done ad would like to see more.
Maybe the reader doesn't really like it, and doesn't want to say so. So they just say "Yeah, it was... interesting."

I've been trying to avoid that word recently. But I also do want to use it sometimes if I really am interested in what's going on. Expecially if I only read part of a larger piece, and there's a lot going on that I don't understand yet.
I sometimes substitute it for "intriguing" but that doesn't seem to fit as naturally.
So "interesting" can be a positive word. Or a negative word. But I think that the bottom line is that it doesn't really give much advice to the artist.