September 15, 2005
alone in a bubble...
I'm too busy to blog, but Luciferous put a great comment into the wind-chimes post...Once upon a time artists made beautiful things and drew from their culture to do so. People in the culture could appreciate the made object. The artist, culture, people, and beauty were connected. But later art became self-referential (Art for Art's sake.) and estranged from beauty, culture, and people. Alone in its self-created bubble it consumed the legacy capital of culture and connection and became deranged and deeply estranged. Now we come to the latest step - antagonism and outright hostility to the ambient culture.Guantanamo Artist-In-Residence Program?
The isolation of artists was never helpful for the culture because it denied it an expression of beauty. But the culture, coarsened, could limp along. Now artists are in direct and overt opposition and will never reconnect to the culture. The have become enemies, and must, for the survival of the culture, be treated as such.
The world of books is not quite so bad, because many writers are still selling to the wide public. But the same thing exists, with writers joining, say, the "Manhattan literary elite," and never again writing anything people want to read (ie: Mailer)
Actually, you see the bubbles everywhere, if you stop to notice. Just look at the fashion world, chosing models who look like depraved drug addicts. Or judges who let criminals off on crazy technicalities--I have little doubt that in judicial in-groups that's considered wicked cool. Posted by John Weidner at September 15, 2005 10:19 AM | TrackBack
For those interested in post-modern art, and how it came to be, here is an essay by one of the sharpest thinkers that I have ever had the pleasure of meeting. We went to school together at Indiana University where he was working on his PhD in Philosophy.
http://www.michaelnewberry.com/soul/others/hicks/index.html
First, thanks for highlighting my comment.
Mike Plaiss suggested link is well worth reading. Another on-point (and fun) read is Tom Wolf's The Painted Word.
On your added comments about other "bubbles" (Tiny Bubbles?, HT to T. Wolf by way of Don Ho) you are spot on. It isn't just the art world but most of the professional world as well, those engaged in elaborating what is true and good, not just what is beautiful.
Robert Bork once remarked that the legal profession had the bit in its teeth and was off pursuing an agenda which had little support among lawmakers, i.e., citizens. They are tyrants.
Culture creates a common bond between the distinct and necessary elements of expertiese required to make it come alive. Key parts of the culture are at war with the culture. The outcome is predictable: either the parts will be disciplined to supoprt the culture or the culture will die.
Posted by: Luciferous at September 15, 2005 12:24 PMI'm late with this comment and probably talking to myself, but I'd like to add a vote for The Painted Word.
Until the Art orthodoxy hijacked the narrative, Art had always derived from the human longing for truth and beauty. In the 20th century, the doctrinaire Left - academics, critics, curators, and collectors, none of whom had ever produced any art of any kind whatsoever - commandeered Art for their own political purposes.
In their telling, the story of Art became an illustration of Marxist dialectic. Now it was about the Shock of the New, epater le bourgeoisie, 'overturning expectations', art as provocation... and led dull-witted, uncreative artists into alienation from their culture. The pursuit of truth and beauty became the pursuit of shock, political point-scoring, and offensiveness as ends in themselves. The new 'Art' became the opposite of true Art.
It was a cul-de-sac. An Art that is alienated from its culture alienates the culture itself.
But there have always been artists who quarantine themselves from the poisonous elite - Winslow Homer, Edward Hopper, Andrew Wyeth and others. When all is said and done, theirs will be the story of American art. While the Left is angrily dying, the human spirit continues to refresh itself.
The Painted Word is a must-read. Also the article by David Brooks: Among the Bourgeoisophobes.
Posted by: John Weidner at September 18, 2005 02:53 PM
