Adorno – Seeing is Believing? http://blogs.elsweb.org/carmenc Just another blogs.elsweb.org weblog Wed, 11 Apr 2007 14:49:17 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.3.2 Artists are selfish http://blogs.elsweb.org/carmenc/2007/04/11/artists-are-selfish/ Wed, 11 Apr 2007 14:49:17 +0000 http://blogs.elsweb.org/carmenc/2007/04/11/artists-are-selfish/ I make this statement with the utmost respect for the artistic process.  My mom is an artist that gave up her art and a full scholarship to the Corcoran to marry my dad and start a family.  So I guess I can’t say that they’re entirely selfish or I wouldn’t be here to make this statement.  Instead, what I’m saying is that artists create art for themselves, not for mass consumption.  Many times I have asked my mom to paint something for me to hang in my house.  I really like watercolors.  I told her that it doesn’t matter what it is, just paint something for me.  She has a lot of trouble with this and tells me, “I can’t just paint something.  I have to be inspired.  I have to be in the mood.”  Why, I ask her.  She responds with something like “I have to feel something,” or “I can’t just paint something because someone wants me to.” 

Adorno posited that Art has become commodified because now it is so cheap that everyone can afford it.  Once the masses can afford a mass-produced copy of Monet’s “Waterlillies” or VanGogh’s “Scream,” then art has lost its true essence.  However he did acknowledge that during the Renaissance art was commissioned by the nobility. 

It is curious that Mr. Mathews tells Eben to paint people  because they reflect time, while Mrs. Spinney tells him to paint churches and flowers.  Eben has no problem parting with the churches and flowers but holds on to the portrait of Jennie until he absolutely needs the money.  The money he gets from the sale of Jennie feeds his body while the portrait feeds his soul.  Artists must be so territorial over their art for this very reason.  It feeds their soul.  If the portrait of Jennie fed his soul then does that make them soulmates?  If so, then why couldn’t they be together? 

]]> Adorno and What is unique http://blogs.elsweb.org/carmenc/2007/02/04/adorno-and-what-is-unique/ Mon, 05 Feb 2007 03:30:55 +0000 http://blogs.elsweb.org/carmenc/2007/02/04/adorno-and-what-is-unique/ Last semester in my Culture, Context and Compositon class we read an essay by Adorno and the Culture Industry.  In his many ramblings regarding the making of a movie, Adorno states that there is nothing unique in a movie.  He says that everything new or novel, such as the way a lock of hair falls across the forehead of an actess, gets studied and copied relentlessly until it eventually becomes part of the “formula.”  In this way, the culture industry reduces film, and all forms of art (except Avante Garde) to an equation that solves the problem.  The problem as Adorno sees it, is society’s endless need for commodities-even films.  

This leaves me wondering if Adorno is right about films as byproducts of capitalism.  Are there any unique movies made solely for the artistic expression, or are they simply made to satisfy the demands of a capitalistic society?  If so, wouldn’t genre films lend credence to Adorno’s viewpoints? 

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