Tadhg, I asked you some time ago to give me your thoughts on the general tendency of people to worship historical works of art and whether it has a negative impact on modern artists. I am posting it again because I thought it was good.It got erased accidentally whilst I was attempting to remove old posts.....no pun! :laugh: Jed...
Jed, after some thought it's clear that I'm not best placed to answer your simple request. The topic is so great that specialists have to write huge books just to get a few thoughts on the subject across. I have a few beliefs, however, arising from years of desultory reading and unfounded personal prejudices.
All mature art (in whatever medium, and after the student apprenticeship is over, and in the relatively "modern" era) is a revolt against what came before. For fourteen hundred years (after the invention of the cross-carrying Hippie) European art was dictated and controlled by patrons, and the catholic druids of the Vatican. The subject matter in painting was predominantly sacred, in music likewise, and in social architecture (where the main buildings in any community were commissioned by the church) the one aim was towards grandeur and a reaching towards the deity. All of this control led to some wonderful creations, but, for more than a thousand years the "rules" were modified and expanded, though not broken. A few exceptions that I am vaguely aware of would be some heroic but pagan artefacts from Scandinavia and some dirty stuff from the Irish such as the Sheela na Gigs. Also, perhaps peasant music and colloquial architecture, where the people were constrained by the availability of nearby craftsmanship and materials, might represent a bit of an exception. The literary arts were similarly limited so that individual thought was co-opted to serve the greater glory of the druids and their gods. Some nature poetry did appear here and there but this was strictly a sub-genre.
Then, at the beginning of the Italian Renaissance, early in the fifteenth century the mathematical laws of perspective were discovered by the architect Filippo Brunelleschi who worked out the concept of the vanishing point and other basic principles. These principles were applied in painting by Masaccio (as in his "Trinity" fresco in Santa Maria Novella, Florence) and within a short period an entirely new approach to painting came about. Linear perspective opened a new way of seeing things, and with this came a gradual expansion of subject matter as painters began to explore the possibilities of this new toy. The link with the sacred gradually became weaker, and the known, sensed world began to take centre stage
Linear perspective dominated Western painting until the end of the nineteenth century when Paul Cezanne flattened the conventional Renaissance picture space. The Cubists and other twentieth century painters abandoned the depiction of three-dimensional space altogether and hence had no need for linear perspective. So we see that from the fifteenth century until the present day the art of painting and also for instance the construction of stage sets for opera etc. was in a constant state of revolt and development not only in subject matter but in execution.
I see the same kind of development or evolution in relation to Western clothing fashion where the highly differentiated styles of the past became blurred and blended. Broadly speaking, women used to accentuate their rears whilst men exaggerated their fronts with the bustle and codpiece respectively, but the "modern" revolt has led to a type of uniformity or flatness whereby the genders blend to an
androgynous mass except on the beach or the nightclub (what's that?)
For the sake of this brief exploration we might also refer to the "art" of architecture. From Graeco-Roman times major buildings adopted borrowed forms and spatial relationships which seemed to be set in stone (ha ha ) until the invention of the Gothic arch and the technical ability to suspend large unsupported domes. The character of edifices changed as soon as this came about, again showing that tradition was cast aside when the means presented itself. In modern times of course very little tradition applies and architects have a free hand, limited only by the nature of the sub-strata and the feasibility of using exotic materials and geometric shapes. No-one seems to be a slave to tradition in this area and all historical "rules" seem to be discarded at every opportunity.
In literature, as I see it, we have a similar story. The various forms of traditional poetry were from time to time shocked by the arrival of a new mode of expression but in all cases strict rules were applied. Prose writing was largely confined to religious, political or social tracts though some romantic interest did sometimes survive and flourish. From the twentieth century less structured poetry and some completely freeform prose arrived, breaking all traditions and allowing
no barriers to subject matter or thought. The inner person finally had an outlet and, as we know, no forms of self expression are any longer prohibited, with the possible exception too much political truth exposure.
Music, too, is a great universal art medium whose classical structures and conventions might seem to imply a rigid adherence to tradition. It is true that there are many accepted rules relating to its form, notation, theory(harmony, melody, rhythm, modes, scales) and performance. The nineteenth century saw the rediscovery of many medieval and Renaissance musical forms and instruments as well as early efforts at formal music notation. With the rise of music schools and the ready availability of the great classical composers came the notion that these forms represented the pinnacle of musical achievement. The age-old folk traditions were largely derided by the musical "elite" except where a few masters incorporated elements of the native tradition as colour. Once again some wonderful creations emerged from these classical conventions though each of the great composers delivered work which had not been imagined before...in other words a revolt or escape from his precursors. If we rush forward( I'm getting writer's cramp ) to the present we know, of course, that anything goes. There are more musical forms than an octopus could shake a tentacle at. New developments take place every day and a lot of them are driven by technological advances though in every case, I believe, the real engine of change and experiment is what's in peoples heads.
The desire to unchain oneself is fairly universal, I feel. There are those who ply their trade inside the great and immemorial traditions, be it in clothing fashion, architecture, literature, painting, the plastic arts, or even broad social behaviour. That is their choice, but I do not think that it represents enslavement to tradition. There are those who invent new forms in each idiom and that is their choice. In all cases, however,( and this is my only point ) the traditionalists began as revolutionaries and the revolutionaries will come to be seen as traditionalists. There is change and innovation all around us, so, hurray for what's good in tradition and hurray for what's good in change...or not, as the case may be!!
Tadhg.
