The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction

The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction, written by Walter Benjamin, is a very interesting article focused on the reproduction of different art forms. The article first looks at different processes used to reproduce art, including founding and stamping by the Greeks. This allowed them to reproduce bronzes, terra cottas, and coins. The woodcut allowed graphic art to be mechanically reproducible. Engraving, etching, and lithography were also added to the list. Lithography was quickly replaced by photography. As Benjamin says, “...photography freed the hand of the most important artistic functions which henceforth devolved only upon the eye looking into a lens. Since the eye perceives more swiftly than the hand can draw, the process of pictorial reproduction was accelerated so enormously that it could keep pace with speech” (98). Photography essentially foreshadowed the sound film. The refining of one art form led to the creation of another. The article then looks at the repercussions the reproduction of works of art and the art of film have had on art in its traditional sense.

Benjamin writes that, “Even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking in one element: its presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be” (98). Anyone looking at a reproduction or duplicate of a work of art is viewing it in a totally different time and space from the artist and the original viewers. Its meaning could be changed drastically as a result. For example, the statue of Venus was made an object of veneration by the Greeks, but viewed as an ominous idol by the clerics of the Middle Ages. It was the same statue, but it faced two very opposing interpretations. As a musician, this is an intriguing thought to me. Because I am a classically trained pianist and dabble into the world of composition very rarely, I play others' works ninety nine percent of the time. While pieces generally contain instruction left to little interpretation, like tempo and dynamics, much of the piece can be interpreted and played many different ways by many different pianists. Playing the Children's Corner suite in the year 2009 is putting the piece in a very different time than when it was composed in 1908. It means something different to me than it did to Claude Debussy.

Benjamin notes that, “During longs periods of history, the mode of human sense perception changes with humanity's entire mode of existence” (99). Both historical circumstances and nature determine how a medium is perceived by humans. I think this notion is particularly relevant in today’s society. While it may be a stretch, children today are born practically knowing how to use a computer and an iPod. It’s simply human nature to use technology to perceive different art forms. As it is commonly said, one can find anything on the internet. You might not be able to make it the Louvre in your lifetime, but you will certainly be able to Google the exhibits in the Louvre and see them a foot away from your face. I can say with almost one hundred percent certainty that the artist of a painting never intended for the viewer to see their work via a million pixels on a screen. The work loses its authenticity when it’s not viewed in real life. Benjamin might say it loses its aura. Aura is defined as “the unique phenomenon of a distance, however close it may be” (100). Mass reproduction of art forms gradually puts distance between the original work and its intent and the reproduction.

On one hand, I like mass reproduction of many art forms because it allows them to be seen, heard, and felt by many people across the globe. Ultimately though, I agree with Benjamin’s belief that the uniqueness of art is lost through reproduction of a particular work. It can be compared to the childhood game of telephone. As the message gets passed from person to person, it slowly changes. By the end, it’s often very different from when it started.

Concerning Human Understanding...

John Locke's piece of "An Essay Concerning Human Understanding" emphasizes the ideology that everyone is born with everything there is to know. In addition, it's just about being able to trigger those views and ideas within us.

I found Locke's piece quite fascinating because in so many ways, we do gain our knowledge through personal experiences and how we are able to reflect upon ourselves. In this essay, Locke revolves around two primarily points: sensation and reflection. To begin, Locke draws on the illusion of the mind as a white piece of paper. As we go through life, this white piece of paper clings onto the knowledge that is triggered and created from personal experiences. I personally agree with Locke on this matter. Experiences, I would have to say are very essential to the development of life because it helps define who we are and develops our views and thinking. I'm sure that on some level, we were all able to gain at least a one or two things from life experiences. Experiences allows us to see things and perceive things on a different level we would not have seen, thus ideas and views are found. Quite similarly, Locke then focuses on how perception is gain from sensible items such as how something would look to how it tastes. For example, if a little kid were to touch a hot stove and have a bad experience, the kid will consider the next encounter with a stove. The hot stove triggers the kid's understanding, therefore, the kid's is able to draw a new idea.These perception of these direct senses also help trigger our understandings and views within us.

On the other hand, Locke focuses on how we are able to reflect upon ourselves, hence our ideas and understandings are also created. The ideology that we are already born with everything we need to know draws upon the bases of reflection. Locke use reflection in the sense that everyone has the ability to reason and reflect within themselves, and if done correctly, ideas will be generated. In sense, that also means that we are able to doubt, believe, have the will, and observe within ourselves. I particularly find this interesting because of the constant inner-struggle everyone has inside of them as well as other things. In our minds, we all have common understand of what is right or wrong, therefore, there is always a constant battle between ourselves to do what we feel is right. These constant battles, to which we can refer to Locke's term of reflection, at the same time create more understandings and views just from these simple or complex operation within our minds.

In the end, Locke fully shows believes that ideas are generated from these two points. Sensation that holds as a gateway opening idea flowing from inside of us. From there, our abilities to think within these sensation leads to being able to reflect within our own thoughts, therefore, triggering more locked ideas and views. Locke's essay doesn't believe that ideas are created outside of us, but really inside of us. It's just a matter of being able to trigger those ideas and views inside of us.

I found David Hume’s fascination to find the scientific understanding of man to be quite interesting in his Of the Standard of Taste. His idea that everything man knows comes from one of two things, experience or observation, strikes up much thought within me. While I never considered this to be an option of how we know and learn the things we do, I can relate to what he is saying and understand where he is coming from. He actually reminds me of John Locke in the respect that Locke also felt that what we know comes from experience. Locke takes it a step farther though and explains that whatever it is that one experiences is experienced through senses. This is our most immediate way to interact with the world around us. Whatever it is that one senses, it is the most immediate and direct aspect of that object. Lock then argues that after the sensation, inner thoughts occur as one steps back to think about it and learn from that experience.

Hume on the other hand takes his ideas in a different direction and begins discussing taste and whether there is something as objective taste. He writes, “Men of the most confined knowledge are able to remark a difference of taste in the narrow circle of their acquaintance, even where the persons have been educated under the same government…” In this quote I understand Hume to be saying that at first glance it seems there is a great variety of taste. He then goes on to make an interesting point that we all seem to use the same words, like beautiful for example, but when asked why whatever is being discussed is beautiful, people do not agree on what beautiful means. This can be seen in his quote, “As this variety of taste is obvious to the most careless enquirer; so will it be found on examination, to be still greater in reality than in appearance. The sentiments of men often differ with regard to beauty and deformity of all kinds, even while their general discourse is the same.”

Hume continues on to say how there is a science world and an art world. The science world is of fact and “judgment,” as he puts it, and the art world is of emotions, personal opinion and “sentiment.” While science can sometimes be wrong, sentiment is always right because it is only how one feels. I can agree with Hume on this level. How can someone be wrong about how they feel? Feelings are personal and something that moves someone in one direction may not move others that same way. For this reason, sentiment is never a matter of truth, but a matter of personal feeling. Hume wrote “ a thousand different sentiments, excited by the same object, are all right.” I agree whole heartedly with that statement.

Hume then touches base on how the human race is somewhat contradictory of themselves when looking as something artistic. Once again, I can relate to Hume on this idea because on one hand we want to believe that taste and beauty are private and personal but on the other hand people want to agree on what is beautiful together. How is that possible? It is simply not. If we say that something is one’s own opinion, then there is no need to make sure that others agree with you, because they are entitled to their own opinion as well. What is objective about art though, is the fact that people can be moved by it. Take a painting for example, maybe the picture portrayed is not even real, but yet there is something about the picture that moves those who look at it. The audience is not all moved in the same direction, some may find it beautiful while others repulsive, but the fact that all are moved is objective. There is something in that piece that can move the audience is such a way that it is not arguable, their is something objective and universal to all good art.

Social Hierarchy

Karl Marx, Max Horkheimer, and Theodor Adorno share similar ideas, although Marx was writing more about the economy and Horkheimer and Adorno were writing about culture. In Marx’s A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy he speaks about how the forces of production dictate the structure of society. Similarly Horkheimer and Adorno write about how culture has become standardized because people will not accept anything other than the status quo as “good”. Therefore, Marx, Horkheimer, and Adorno agree that the means of production create society.

Marx’s ideas are about the economy because he is writing during a time when the economy in Europe was terrible because there was a strangle-hold control on the economies of the majority of European nations. Marx advocated for the release of these holds and letting the market determine prices and operate on the basis of supply and demand. According to Marx, “the totality of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation on which arises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness”(20). This means that the path to production creates the superstructure of society. Horkheimer and Adorno apply this same idea to culture.

Horkheimer and Adorno believe that the media dictates to people in a specific culture the definition of good and bad music, films, photography, drawing, painting etc. However, they also explain that the media uses the technology of the culture industry to standardize and influence social systems. Horkheimer and Adorno say that the culture industry is what shapes a society just as the means of production shape a society in the eyes of Marx. This culture industry caters to the public with a range of pass-produced products of varying quality in order to quantify culture (1038). Simply, the media shape culture into whatever they want it to be and society laps up the ideals that the industry says are right. For example, smoking was extremely popular on television, in books, etc. because it was made to look sexy, mysterious, and just cool in general. However, once smoking was found to be harmful smoking has appeared less and less in movies, on T.V., in books, etc. As a result of this lower profile fewer people start smoking today because it is not as glamorous as it once was. Once again, the media has and is changing the culture.

Now we come full-circle that the media is the means. Marx said that the means of production drives social hierarchy. Horkheimer and Adorno say that media, the machine of culture, now drives our social hierarchy. Different levels of society are marketed to differently. Culture however, does impose its own stamp on society by detailing exactly what is and is not acceptable and good or bad.