What happens to our experience of art when it become easy to reproduce it?
Well, art becomes based on politics instead of ritual - and this is good for revolutionary demands.
- German, marxist literary/social critic
- Frankfurt School - critics of capitalism
- critique of society, sought revolution to transform society of capitalism to socialism
- class analysis > conflict between proletariat (who sell their labor) & the bourgeosie (who own the means of production)
- alienation > proletariat produces goods but don't have access to them and the bourgeoisie exploit and oppress the rest of society >> crime
big leap > faster, direct tracing rather than incision, kept up with printing
- removes the hand from the process !! becomes completely visual !!
the concept of authenticity is predicated on the existence of an original - or - originals had authority
reproduction of an original use to be called a *forgery*
not so with technical reproduction for 2 reasons
1. technical reproduction is more independent of the original than manual reproduction: photographic enlargement, slow motion
2. copies can be put in situations out of reach of the original: audio recording of a symphony in a living room
- readymade > shifting the focus of art from the physical craft to the intellectual interpretation
http://www.afterwalkerevans.com/
http://www.aftersherrielevine.com/
the quality of a copy is always depreciated > its authority is affected [a landscape in a movie is different from the real thing] : Benjamin calls this lost element **aura**
- lost aura may be most noticeable with works of art, but is symptomatic of beyond the realm of art
- reproduction detaches the object from tradition (the hand of the artist) [shatters]
- reproduction meets the beholder in a new and particular situation [reactivation]
1. the desire to bring things closer
2. a willingness to accept reproduction in place of unique reality
E. the unique value of "authentic" work is tied to ritual and mechanical reproduction **emancipates** the work of art from its dependence on ritual
- what is an "authentic" print from a negative from which we can make an infinite number of prints
F. exhibition value (fitness for travel) vs cult (fetish value)
G. every new medium is forced to prove that it is art
H. discussion of difference of film and stage, how editing contributes to the decay of the aura - a dislocation between the actor and the audience in time and space
I. One of the foremost tasks of art has always been the creation of a demand which could be fully satisfied only later. - how might we think about this in the context of art we see today?
Simply put, Benjamin's theory of an original artwork's aura remains central to our understanding of modern art's essential character. He frames what remains the central question confronting all who attempt to understand the social and aesthetic relationships established by new technological paradigms and how that influences our understanding of art. Benjamin's question was in regards to an understanding of photography and its contested presence in a world of art and ideas in its time. Is photography actually art, might it function as an extension of the work of an artist, might a photograph contain the auratic qualities that Benjamin ascribed as essential qualities of a work of art?
mutability, disposability, permeability
Susan Vega letter to the editor
http://lonelygirl15.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lonelygirl15