Luminous Landscape Forum
The Art of Photography => But is it Art? => Topic started by: Justan on November 19, 2009, 12:46:43 pm
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Foreword: This is an interesting if windy essay on the transition of art/poetry/music away from historical themes of beauty and ever more deeply into the realm of what the author terms “transgression” and “betrayal” of earlier forms of morality.
Grab a cup of coffee and devote about 15 minutes to reading the essay. Following are the first few paragraphs and there is a link to the rest of the article, for those who are interested…
By Roger Scruton
At any time between 1750 and 1930, if you had asked an educated person to describe the goal of poetry, art, or music, “beauty” would have been the answer. And if you had asked what the point of that was, you would have learned that beauty is a value, as important in its way as truth and goodness, and indeed hardly distinguishable from them. Philosophers of the Enlightenment saw beauty as a way in which lasting moral and spiritual values acquire sensuous form. And no Romantic painter, musician, or writer would have denied that beauty was the final purpose of his art.
At some time during the aftermath of modernism, beauty ceased to receive those tributes. Art increasingly aimed to disturb, subvert, or transgress moral certainties, and it was not beauty but originality—however achieved and at whatever moral cost—that won the prizes. Indeed, there arose a widespread suspicion of beauty as next in line to kitsch—something too sweet and inoffensive for the serious modern artist to pursue. In a seminal essay—“Avant-Garde and Kitsch,” published in Partisan Review in 1939—critic Clement Greenberg starkly contrasted the avant-garde of his day with the figurative painting that competed with it, dismissing the latter (not just Norman Rockwell, but greats like Edward Hopper) as derivative and without lasting significance. The avant-garde, for Greenberg, promoted the disturbing and the provocative over the soothing and the decorative, and that was why we should admire it.
The value of abstract art, Greenberg claimed, lay not in beauty but in expression. This emphasis on expression was a legacy of the Romantic movement; but now it was joined by the conviction that the artist is outside bourgeois society, defined in opposition to it, so that artistic self-expression is at the same time a transgression of ordinary moral norms. We find this posture overtly adopted in the art of Austria and Germany between the wars—for example, in the paintings and drawings of Georg Grosz, in Alban Berg’s opera Lulu (a loving portrait of a woman whose only discernible goal is moral chaos), and in the seedy novels of Heinrich Mann. And the cult of transgression is a leading theme of the postwar literature of France—from the writings of Georges Bataille, Jean Genet, and Jean-Paul Sartre to the bleak emptiness of the nouveau roman.
The rest: http://www.city-journal.org/2009/19_2_beauty.html (http://www.city-journal.org/2009/19_2_beauty.html)
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Interesting read, Justan, even it there is a danger that the author might be extrapolating somewhat further than he legitimately might.
However, I do think he is quite right in the overall sense of his essay. Many examples of this current disregard - disrespect, even, for beauty come to mind. I watched a programe on BBC FOUR tv last night about the state of contemporary art in Britain. It had short segments on various artists and also visited some art school shows. All I can say is that after the hour of watching, I suddenly felt much more self-satisfied with my own output - meagre as it might be right now - and very firmly of the opinion that the current crop of art students should either be looking for its money back or, worse, was untalented enough actually to be proud of the rubbish it had stuck up on the walls. Speaking of walls, one artist interviewed (not a student) had licked a wall until his tongue bled and the resulting mess was considered art. Indeed.
From the mid 60s until some time in the 70s I had a subscription to Playboy (US edition). I used to leave it lying around the house and never felt troubled that either my son or daughter might care to look through it. In my opinion, the pictures were mainly pretty beautiful and not a million miles from where I was heading with my own work. The kids had no problem accepting models as part of everyday life - in fact, my son who was about eleven at the time, had the pleasure of sitting in the back seat of our hire-car in Rhodes one night between two of the UK's top Page 3 girls as we drove back to the hotel after dinner during a calendar shoot on which our kids had been brought along for a holiday. The girls were rather merry at the time... could have been my personality but was probably the Greek vintages instead; my son probably had nothing to do with it. Anyway, back to Playboy. There came the time when it changed, slowly, from what it had been into something that resembled, in my view, Penthouse. I did not like Penthouse. I would not have been happy that my kids might come across something that resembled Penthouse, particularly at home. I cancelled the subscription to Playboy. Whilst not equating the then Playboy with an art gallery, the changes there were certainly being echoed down many other avenues.
Oddly, considering the brayings of the feminist movements, political correctness and their combined contributions to the eventual demise of my calendar business, it's interesting that the overarching effect has not been what those people had expected: rather than simply sanitising the world's media, they achieved the opposite effect of driving out much that merely put women up there on an anassailable pedestal and turned the ground over to the pornographers. Some alternative! And now, if you want to see good-looking women without their clothes on, where do you go? Exactly! Right into the heart of the women's world - the fashion magazines. Now is that a feminist victory or the annihilation of the movement at source, in the very heart of the gender?
As the author indicates, if you kill off beauty you fill the void with the cult of the ugly, the corrupt and the profane.
Rob C
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It seems that this author has overlooked the inherent existentialism in modernist art, that which helps to underwrite its humanistic nature. The point of Theater of the Absurd, for example, is to point out the absurdity of a world devoid of commitment and engagement with being in the world. Modernism is not a celebration of emptiness, but a cry against it. The celebration of love, truth, justice, and beauty is of its essence. In doing so, he has also overlooked the difference between art and entertainment as he inveighs against films and music that have never pretended to be high art. A vague and florid essay all in all.
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It seems that this author has overlooked the inherent existentialism in modernist art, that which helps to underwrite its humanistic nature. The point of Theater of the Absurd, for example, is to point out the absurdity of a world devoid of commitment and engagement with being in the world. Modernism is not a celebration of emptiness, but a cry against it. The celebration of love, truth, justice, and beauty is of its essence. In doing so, he has also overlooked the difference between art and entertainment as he inveighs against films and music that have never pretended to be high art. A vague and florid essay all in all.
Perhaps not 'high' art, whatever that might be defined to be, but why should there be no beauty in film or music? Though you have not written so in that many words, you could be seen to be suggesting they are mutually exclusive.
Is there no connection between the graphic shock of horror/crime/sex movies and the lack of beauty? Is it, in fact, worse if beauty is present in such cases? Beauty, its lack, morality, they all tend to become interconnected in life; every little stone that tumbles into the water creates such ripples. You can read it here in the forum too - nothing exists of its own, within its own little vacuum; one man's praise is another's condemnation. Perhaps beauty is one of the few qualities that stands a chance of being unambiguous, but then again, is it simply an expression of a cultural expectation, destined to horrify those for whom it is alien?
It's late; I'm hungry but know it is just the pangs of comfort feeding making themselves felt. I shall resist their siren call and shut down the computer and drift off to vegetate before the other screen until such time as I feel inclined to dream.
Buenas noches, those of you still awake.
Rob C
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It seems that this author has overlooked the inherent existentialism in modernist art, that which helps to underwrite its humanistic nature. The point of Theater of the Absurd, for example, is to point out the absurdity of a world devoid of commitment and engagement with being in the world. Modernism is not a celebration of emptiness, but a cry against it. The celebration of love, truth, justice, and beauty is of its essence. In doing so, he has also overlooked the difference between art and entertainment as he inveighs against films and music that have never pretended to be high art. A vague and florid essay all in all.
Florid, maybe, but vague? I don't really think so. There appears to be a bit of a gulf in art criticism/theory between the popular and the 'academy'. Most of us amateurs and phillistines instantly grasp what Roger Scruton is saying. There is a real disconnect between any model of beauty comprehensible to a lay audience, and the 'beauty' notionally demonstrated by a rotting shark carcass in a glass tank or Tracy Emin's trash-as-art. I'm not suggesting that 'art' has to conform to some Hallmark Card æsthetic, but it's self-evident that a lot of contemporary art depends on gratuitous offense for its impact.
You also may be muddying the waters a bit with your terminology. Modernism in art, as generally understood, sought to drop the sentimentality and ornament of Romanticism in favor of clearly communicated truths and the 'beauty of the thing itself'. In photographic terms the pictorialists were romantics, while the 'group f:64' were modernists. Edward Weston in his prime was a perfect example of high modernism—think 'pepper'. No sentiment or artifice, just the thing itself with its own intrinsic beauty.
Of course, I could be wrong about everything. But then, according to Foucault, Derrida et al, we're all of us always wrong about everything anyway.
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Florid, maybe, but vague? I don't really think so. There appears to be a bit of a gulf in art criticism/theory between the popular and the 'academy'. Most of us amateurs and phillistines instantly grasp what Roger Scruton is saying. There is a real disconnect between any model of beauty comprehensible to a lay audience, and the 'beauty' notionally demonstrated by a rotting shark carcass in a glass tank or Tracy Emin's trash-as-art. I'm not suggesting that 'art' has to conform to some Hallmark Card æsthetic, but it's self-evident that a lot of contemporary art depends on gratuitous offense for its impact.
I couldn't agree more. I dabbled in gratuitous impact thing myself when I was younger, but now I have absolutely no interest in doing that kind of work, or viewing any of it either. It seems like I encounter more and more artists who are trying to "challenge" me with this or that political motive now than I could ever possibly pay attention to.
We may have come full circle. The decaying-body-parts-as-art crowd is now the boring establishment, as far as I'm concerned.
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We may have come full circle. The decaying-body-parts-as-art crowd is now the boring establishment, as far as I'm concerned.
Katherine Thayer made precisely this point in her elegant essay in Lenswork #53. She notes that ironic, self-referential and intentionally unpleasant art has become such an accepted standard that pictorially beautiful, nature-inspired art is now subversive.
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Sort of reminds me of Kay Starr's Wheel of Fortune...
Rob C
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This essay reminds me of the question of whether people attach less importance to beauty now than in the past. I don't know the answer to that. Certainly my feeling is that many people today expect to only see it in context, in other words in a box, whether that be a frame or a stage, and have little time for its appreciation as part of their everyday lives. I am thinking specifically of the Washington Post experiment with Joshua Bell
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...7040401721.html (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/04/AR2007040401721.html)
David
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This essay reminds me of the question of whether people attach less importance to beauty now than in the past. I don't know the answer to that. Certainly my feeling is that many people today expect to only see it in context, in other words in a box, whether that be a frame or a stage, and have little time for its appreciation as part of their everyday lives. I am thinking specifically of the Washington Post experiment with Joshua Bell
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...7040401721.html (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/04/AR2007040401721.html)
David
That Washington Post piece is simply hilarious. Kudos to the folks who thought it up.
It goes right to the heart of what motivated William Morris and his followers in the arts & crafts movement of the late 19th century. They noted that the experience of beauty and craft had disappeared from the lives of virtually all workers in industrial Britain. Instead of hand-crafting chairs or brooms in their cottages, workers were slogging away on assembly lines cranking out industrial dreck. Any experience of beauty was squeezed right out of life for most people. Of course, the products of Morris's arts & crafts project ended up as fine art that was far too expensive for working class folks, and they had about as much impact on industrial society as a fly hitting the windshield of an 18-wheeler going 85 mph.
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I think the Washington Post loaded the dice to suit the angle it was pushing.
Next to the bagpipe, the violin is the most anti-social instrument that you can name, worse even than a drum.
I guess the moral is that remove the violin from the dinner-jacket circuit, the complete orchestra, and it is revealed in its splendour for what it is; quite what relationship it claims to beauty defeats me.
Rob C
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I think the Washington Post loaded the dice to suit the angle it was pushing.
Next to the bagpipe, the violin is the most anti-social instrument that you can name, worse even than a drum.
I guess the moral is that remove the violin from the dinner-jacket circuit, the complete orchestra, and it is revealed in its splendour for what it is; quite what relationship it claims to beauty defeats me.
Rob C
Roberto! You have obviously not tried working in a room next to a teenager practising drums. Whether you like violin or not, you can't deny that there are moments when it stops.
David
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Roberto! You have obviously not tried working in a room next to a teenager practising drums. Whether you like violin or not, you can't deny that there are moments when it stops.
David
David, if the teenager is yours, have you considered violence? Have the neighbours?
;-)
Rob C
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I get the impression that many of the points made in this article by Roger Scruton, lamenting an apparent desecration of beauty in much of modern art, could apply in almost any age. I get a sense here, amongst the flowery language and lofty ideals, of an older person complaining and decrying the fact that 'things are not what they used to be when I was young', as many old people tend to do.
We should not forget that what most people consider to be beautiful is largely a result of upbringing and familiarity. It would not be difficult to imagine an ancient Egyptian, familiar with the very stylised figures and carvings that were the norm in ancient Egypt, upon seeing for the first time the (then) modern Greek sculptures depicting so clearly every muscle of the naked human form, might recoil in revulsion.
It is often said that music is the universal language. Not true at all. One has to become familiar with, and make an effort, to appreciate, for example, Arabian music with its quarter tones. Those of us who appreciate opera and classical music, tend to find most modern pop music pretty dreadful, and those who are really into modern pop music tend to find calssical music pretty insipid and boring.
Those of us who really appreciate and find beauty in the music of Beethoven, should not forget that many people who lived in the era when Beethoven was composing, who were steeped in the more traditional and classical forms of Bach and Mozart, found a lot of Beethoven's works pretty dreadful and downright ugly.
It wouldn't susrprise me, if one were to do some historical research and dig into the archives of that era, one would come across an article of very similar tone to Roger Scruton's, decrying this awful trend in modern music towards ugliness, started by Beethoven.
One thing I have to thank Roger Scruton for, in this article, is his reference to the production of Mozart's Die Entführung, directed by Calixto Bieito. Is this avaliable on Blu-ray? (I just checked, and it appears not. Sigh!)
Until I see this (shall we say ultra-realistic) version of this opera, I shouldn't comment on specifics. But in general terms, I can say that operas tend to have silly and unrealistic plots. With drama in general (plays and novels), there's a certain capacity for 'suspension of disbelief' required from the audience. With opera, that capacity for suspension of disbelief needs to be very high. One of Mozart's most popular operas, if not the most popular, The Magic Flute, is totally silly. If it wasn't for the music, one might think one was watching an episode of Sesame Street.
It so often happens in opera, the music is sublime but the plot is silly. Wagner's Ring cycle is considered to be one of the greatest achievments of a marriage between drama and music, yet so often the stage work and acting is turgid, bombastic, boring and plain silly. I really wish someone like Steven Spielberg would modify the drama into something worth watching.
I can only assume that Calixto Bieto tried to make that silly opera by Mozart more credible to a modern audience by injecting a bit of realism into the plot.
There's an interesting turning point in the history of opera around the time of Wagner when Nietsche became dissatisfied with Wagner's heavily romanticised, unrealistic and soporific depictions of ancient myths in his operas. The first performances of Bizet's Carmen were like a breath of fresh air to Nietsche. This was opera verissimo for the first time. A plot that did not require super-human effort in suspension of disbelief, a plot that resonated with the experiences of ordinary people, whether personally or now through the ABC news.
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There you are, Ray, even music gets Photoshopped!
But I am not sure that the idea of beauty should be applied to music, any more than to literature. I tend to believe, increasingly so, that beauty belongs in the visible spectrum and that the other senses are something very else, nothing at all to do with any notions of beauty and having appeal to emotions completely different from those inspired by beauty This may be somewhat deeper an idea than simply an exercise in semantics.
Rob C
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Could it be that the time will come when beauty for beauties sake will become popular again as people are fed up of strife and unhappiness whether portrayed in real life or as an artistic representation of such? If beauty is escapism then I prefer that to delving into what is wrong with this world as a part of my leasure time. I have to live with a significant portion of unhappiness, why wallow in it as well?
I don't think I'm very sophisticated though. I'd take beauty any day over sadness. My cup is half full as far as far as my art is concerned. I'm reminded of a line from a well known psalm. 'From the depths I call to G-d'. When you are in the dark you want to look towards the light, not delve further and rejoice in the lack of light.
Darkness as art, it's an OK place to visit but I wouldn't want to live there.
As I said, I'm not very sophisticated...
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There you are, Ray, even music gets Photoshopped!
Rob,
When I bought my first computer with CD-ROM drive, about 15 years ago, for the purpose of processing some of my slides which I'd had scanned by Kodak onto Photo-CD, I was so fed up with the long time it took an 18mb image to open on my screen (a full 2 minutes), I took to practising scales on the piano instead of making a cup of tea.
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Could it be that the time will come when beauty for beauties sake will become popular again as people are fed up of strife and unhappiness whether portrayed in real life or as an artistic representation of such? If beauty is escapism then I prefer that to delving into what is wrong with this world as a part of my leasure time. I have to live with a significant portion of unhappiness, why wallow in it as well?
Never in the history of humanity have you had such opportunity to escape into any form of beauty that tickles your fancy.
Museums, art galleries, finely printed art and photography books, the internet, even HD images of art works on Blu-ray, are all now available. A smorgasboard of beauty from the beginning of civilisation is laid at your feet. What more do you want? Complain about a few works that don't meet your standards?
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That Washington Post piece is simply hilarious. Kudos to the folks who thought it up.
It goes right to the heart of what motivated William Morris and his followers in the arts & crafts movement of the late 19th century. They noted that the experience of beauty and craft had disappeared from the lives of virtually all workers in industrial Britain. Instead of hand-crafting chairs or brooms in their cottages, workers were slogging away on assembly lines cranking out industrial dreck. Any experience of beauty was squeezed right out of life for most people. Of course, the products of Morris's arts & crafts project ended up as fine art that was far too expensive for working class folks, and they had about as much impact on industrial society as a fly hitting the windshield of an 18-wheeler going 85 mph.
That is interesting. My wife and I bought an arts & crafts house in 2006, and we did a lot of research on the movement as part of our semi-restoration. I'm certain that a bit of the arts & crafts ethic rubbed off on us in the process. Of course, our Morris chair is a factory-made reproduction, because we can't begin to afford the real thing. Great chair though.
The house definitely crystalized some vague feelings we'd had. We spent a lot of time looking through "contemporary" McMansions and so forth before we settled on that particular house. In almost every way I can think of, the newer houses are easier to live with. But somehow, they never seemed like home. The troublesome old bungalow is just terrifically comfortable. No way we're ever leaving.
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I still see this as a vague and florid essay, but maybe this is because I was trained in Ordinary Language Philosophy.
I don't understand why Scruton has to inveigh against people like Grosz and Sartre. I feel he doesn't understand existentialism at all here. Existentialism is a humanism, and theater of the absurd is far from a desecration of beauty, but an affirmation of it.
Some of his targets are strawmen like Serrano, yet even there, what does he intend to uphold as sacred? Religious prerogative? But he also deals a sweeping denouncement of rap, as though it did not have either melody or harmony. A glance at a spectrogram reveals that rap has both melody and harmony composed in the 4-5 simultaneous, distinct and expressive pitch formants of the vocal tract.
I actually do think that much of postmodernism is bankrupt, but that has mostly with its inability to articulate a clear metaphysics of any kind, and its susceptibility to fraud, and not due to its desecration of anything allegedly sacred.
I wonder what he thinks of modern jazz from 1945-1968. Really, just curious on this one.
Luke
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That is interesting. My wife and I bought an arts & crafts house in 2006, and we did a lot of research on the movement as part of our semi-restoration. I'm certain that a bit of the arts & crafts ethic rubbed off on us in the process. Of course, our Morris chair is a factory-made reproduction, because we can't begin to afford the real thing. Great chair though.
The house definitely crystalized some vague feelings we'd had. We spent a lot of time looking through "contemporary" McMansions and so forth before we settled on that particular house. In almost every way I can think of, the newer houses are easier to live with. But somehow, they never seemed like home. The troublesome old bungalow is just terrifically comfortable. No way we're ever leaving.
The more I consider the Washington Post and Roger Scruton articles, the more I wonder at the things people pay attention to. I can't help feeling that if you pay attention to ugliness that is the direction your life will go.
I am happy living in the equivalent of an old pair of slippers. An 1880's cottage is difficult to heat, and has to be constantly watched for decay, but is definitely no museum. You can put your feet up. In several rooms I made my own paint with local coloured clay, chalk and the skins of rabbits. The light catches the crystals of chalk in the walls and throws the red and yellow colour throughout the place. Like an endless country dawn at times.
Can't say what the rabbits thought of the matter, but.
David
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If anyone wanted something to get pissed off about, they should have seen last night's TV show (BBC) on the Saatchi Gallery's search for the next great thing. They took a dozen hopefuls and cut them down to six, who will be further 'tested' in the days ahead. Of the lot, there was a single, non-art school-trained painter with talent.
One 'artist' had a whistle, tipped in red, hanging from a cord over a hand-rail. Another guy had a wheel turning on a treadmill. Yet get the picture.
There was a life-class test, where they had to draw a nude model. None was very good, but one was so bad that the drawing ended up as a series of scribbled lines without form. This was lauded.
Rob C
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If anyone wanted something to get pissed off about, they should have seen last night's TV show (BBC) on the Saatchi Gallery's search for the next great thing. They took a dozen hopefuls and cut them down to six, who will be further 'tested' in the days ahead. Of the lot, there was a single, non-art school-trained painter with talent.
One 'artist' had a whistle, tipped in red, hanging from a cord over a hand-rail. Another guy had a wheel turning on a treadmill. Yet get the picture.
There was a life-class test, where they had to draw a nude model. None was very good, but one was so bad that the drawing ended up as a series of scribbled lines without form. This was lauded.
Rob C
Perfect. As is documented in The Seven Million Dollar Stuffed Shark, the high-end of the art world is an incestuous club dominated by a handful of extremely wealthy dealers and the even wealthier collectors they gull into buying obscenely priced crap masquerading as art. The otherwise intelligent rich people conned into spending millions on trash appear to be attempting to buy street cred, proving they're 'cool'.
I'm reminded of Tom Wolfe's eulogy for sculptor Frederick Hart, in which he describes the withering contempt for Hart's work in the trendy world of high art. Hart was enormously skilled at the craft of sculpting the human form from life, but was dismissed by the arbiters of taste busily promoting Jeff Koons' ceramic kitsch.
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They took a dozen hopefuls and cut them down to six
I didn't see the programme (and am glad as I am sure it would have raised my blood pressure unnecessarily), but it sounds as if they ought to be cut down to size rather than six!
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Having actually had work to do, I’m late to this discussion, but it seems to me that Scruton hit the nail on the head, though it took him a lot of hammering to do it. The guy would be more effective if he were more concise, and if he’d begin a screed like this one by defining some of his terms. One thing I often notice is that when you use the word, “beauty,” most people take that to mean prettiness. Scruton makes it clear that his definition of beauty goes far beyond that, but he spreads the definition over several pages. He covered the field quite well, but I’m sorry Scruton didn’t include something about the damage being done to art by politics, which, when included in any attempt at art, is always terminal.
I’ll be 80 in less than four months, and I’ve been watching art degenerate over most of those years. I’d say, “Don’t get me started,” but you already have. But instead of dumping an extensive screed into this already long thread, I’ll refer you to an essay I wrote a couple years ago on the subject. If you’re interested, go to http://www.russ-lewis.com/essays/articlesframe.htm (http://www.russ-lewis.com/essays/articlesframe.htm), and click on “Recessional.”
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I have never personally felt the Desperate Drive To Be Different, or to significantly separate myself from that which appeals to the Hoi Polloi.
I long ago stopped trying to Be Cool or even Relevant and the barren face of Significance has never seduced me.
I make elegant, even beautiful landscapes which are bought at moderate prices by ordinary people who find them attractive and who wish to make them important parts of their living spaces.
I am the very Essence of Purity. And my press release says so.
The Artists' Chant, with apologies to my Dineh neighbors: BS to my left, BS to my right, BS above me, BS below me, BS before me, I am on the BS Path!
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Perfect. As is documented in The Seven Million Dollar Stuffed Shark, the high-end of the art world is an incestuous club dominated by a handful of extremely wealthy dealers and the even wealthier collectors they gull into buying obscenely priced crap masquerading as art. The otherwise intelligent rich people conned into spending millions on trash appear to be attempting to buy street cred, proving they're 'cool'.
I'm reminded of Tom Wolfe's eulogy for sculptor Frederick Hart, in which he describes the withering contempt for Hart's work in the trendy world of high art. Hart was enormously skilled at the craft of sculpting the human form from life, but was dismissed by the arbiters of taste busily promoting Jeff Koons' ceramic kitsch.
Last night saw yet another UK programme on art: the Contemporary Art Bubble. It was actually rather good, and though some of the big players refused, understandably, to participate in the programme, others did and it was made rather clear that manipulation of the market and insider dealing that would be illegal elsewhere in the commercial world, is running rampant.
A lot of attention was paid to the world of Damian Hirst (he did not wish to participate) and to his auction where he appeared to take on the dealers themselves, and raised around one hundred and fourteen million pounds for his bank account. This seems to have worked because some of the dealers were obliged to bid in order to keep the value of their large inventories of his product at high values.
In the end, the conclusion sems to have been that the modern art bubble has well and truly burst; Hirst has closed several of his 'factory studios' around the globe and now has but his own - if I understood the show correctly. Whether this is actually a reflection of fallen interest in both his work and its monetary value, or yet a further clever move that makes his product now even more exclusive, I am not sure.
Had I even one of his millions as my own, I am certain I wouldn't care too much!
Rob C
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Hi All,
First, thanks for the many replies! I've been busy and haven't had the time to contribute to this as I’d planned.
While I’d like to respond to each post, time doesn’t let me do it. So instead I'll spare most and only comment on only a few.
RobC> As the author indicates, if you kill off beauty you fill the void with the cult of the ugly, the corrupt and the profane.
I enjoyed your post onto itself. It is an accurate and a good analogy of what has changed in ideal world of Playboy over the time. And it is a fair micro-cosim of the broader changes. This is also a very instructive place to view the advances of photographing women. There is a site somewhere in cyberspace (http://igorkazakov.ru/playboy/)where one can see the centerfolds of each playboy. The site is instructive if only for the changes it portrays.
LKaven> It seems that this author has overlooked the inherent existentialism in modernist art, that which helps to underwrite its humanistic nature. …
He didn’t over look it. He acknowledge it in the 3rd paragraph: “…from the writings of Georges Bataille….and Jean-Paul Sartre to the bleak emptiness of the nouveau roman.”
While existentialism is most definitely a part of life and by accounts has been so since the early 1800s (and by some acute observations there are roots to existentialism that date to the late 1400s), existentialism seeks to explain nature rather than to lead it. Indeed, Scruton takes a very Foucault-like approach to his article in his attempt to show the history of the silence regarding the slow death of beauty in art.
And that is where his thesis develops. Why should all elements of life be about apprehending one’s anxiety? Sooner or later everyone seeks a change of pace. Even Sartre points out that the inherent freedom of existentialism is a dilemma. The quandary is that given infinite freedom to make different choices, why do most people make the same choices over and over?
That said, yours was a very thought provoking comment!
Geoff Wittig > Modernism in art, as generally understood, sought to drop the sentimentality and ornament of Romanticism in favor of clearly communicated truths and the 'beauty of the thing itself'. In photographic terms the pictorialists were romantics, while the 'group f:64' were modernists. Edward Weston in his prime was a perfect example of high modernism—think 'pepper'. No sentiment or artifice, just the thing itself with its own intrinsic beauty.
Excellent comments!
Geoff Wittig > Katherine Thayer made precisely this point in her elegant essay in Lenswork #53. She notes that ironic, self-referential and intentionally unpleasant art has become such an accepted standard that pictorially beautiful, nature-inspired art is now subversive.
Got link? On the surface, this sounds to lean more to theatrics than analysis.
Taquin > This essay reminds me of the question of whether people attach less importance to beauty now than in the past.
I remember the Pearls Before Breakfast article. That was a topic about people’s sensitivity to music when removed from it’s traditional context. It was a result of that article that I bought my first Joshua Bell CDs. Which I'm pretty sure was the point of the exercise, at least it was for Mr. Bell. Anyway, the article wasn’t about the importance of beauty. It was about if anyone would notice it on while in a dingy walkway by on their hirried way to work. The answer, at least in DC, was an unequivocal NFW.[/i][/u]
Ray> I get the impression that many of the points made in this article by Roger Scruton, lamenting an apparent desecration of beauty in much of modern art, could apply in almost any age. I get a sense here, amongst the flowery language and lofty ideals, of an older person complaining and decrying the fact that 'things are not what they used to be when I was young', as many old people tend to do.
An interesting and not unfair interpretation, even though it’s done in a bare fisted way. I agree it was a lament. But don’t think it is a suitable lament for the ages.
Ray, op cit)> But in general terms, I can say that operas tend to have silly and unrealistic plots. With drama in general (plays and novels), there's a certain capacity for 'suspension of disbelief' required from the audience. With opera, that capacity for suspension of disbelief needs to be very high. One of Mozart's most popular operas, if not the most popular, The Magic Flute, is totally silly. If it wasn't for the music, one might think one was watching an episode of Sesame Street.
Agreed. The tools used in opera (music, plot, dance) take the audience to a place where it’s easier to suspend disbelief. The audience wants this. That’s why most are there. Well that and the girls love it.
Geoff Wittig > I'm reminded of Tom Wolfe's eulogy for sculptor Frederick Hart, in which he describes the withering contempt for Hart's work in the trendy world of high art. Hart was enormously skilled at the craft of sculpting the human form from life, but was dismissed by the arbiters of taste busily promoting Jeff Koons' ceramic kitsch.
Which hints at the pressures placed upon people to conform. In turn, this says what about existentialism and freedom?
RSL > …but I’m sorry Scruton didn’t include something about the damage being done to art by politics, which, when included in any attempt at art, is always terminal.
I think I understand what you are getting at but disagree. Historically nearly all successful artists are supported by the politics of the time. Would the Italian Renaissance had been the same had not Christianity played a dominant role in the politics of the time? Was there ever a time when art didn’t serve someone’s social agenda? Even traditionally beauty is to a large degree about conformity with someone else’s perceptions.
Put in a different light, I've been researching how to get some of my fotos into galleries in 2 different states. Interestingly and of note, most of the opportunities I've come across for emerging artists are sponsored by the state….
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Justan, Certainly politics mixes with organized religion, but during the Italian Renaissance artists were actually hired by their patrons to produce what the patrons wanted. I'd distinguish that from our current situation where "artists" are gratuitously influenced by political correctness. The modern kind of influence almost always results in crap.
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Geoff Wittig > Katherine Thayer made precisely this point in her elegant essay in Lenswork #53. She notes that ironic, self-referential and intentionally unpleasant art has become such an accepted standard that pictorially beautiful, nature-inspired art is now subversive.
Got link? On the surface, this sounds to lean more to theatrics than analysis.
I wish I could. I haven't been able to find the text available on line. I have it in my 'dead tree edition of Lenswork #53. I'd be delighted if someone else could locate a linkable version. I'm not doing it justice with my brief summary.
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> Justan, Certainly politics mixes with organized religion, but during the Italian Renaissance artists were actually hired by their patrons to produce what the patrons wanted.
In some cases, yes, but in most, the artists were given a mostly free hand. But none of that had a real influence on the work being propaganda.
> I'd distinguish that from our current situation where "artists" are gratuitously influenced by political correctness. The modern kind of influence almost always results in crap.
That would depend on the skills of the artist(s), wouldn’t it?
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I wish I could. I haven't been able to find the text available on line. I have it in my 'dead tree edition of Lenswork #53. I'd be delighted if someone else could locate a linkable version. I'm not doing it justice with my brief summary.
I'll have to look up Katherine Thayer's musings when i get a free moment...
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The more I consider the Washington Post and Roger Scruton articles, the more I wonder at the things people pay attention to. I can't help feeling that if you pay attention to ugliness that is the direction your life will go.
I am happy living in the equivalent of an old pair of slippers. An 1880's cottage is difficult to heat, and has to be constantly watched for decay, but is definitely no museum. You can put your feet up. In several rooms I made my own paint with local coloured clay, chalk and the skins of rabbits. The light catches the crystals of chalk in the walls and throws the red and yellow colour throughout the place. Like an endless country dawn at times.
Can't say what the rabbits thought of the matter, but.
David
There's an old saying, Jewish I believe: "That which you gaze upon, you become."
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In some cases, yes, but in most, the artists were given a mostly free hand. But none of that had a real influence on the work being propaganda.
I'm not sure what sources you're reading, but my own tell me that the "free hand" was pretty much confined to the specifics of construction, not to the subject matter. I'm not sure I understand what you're saying about "propaganda" though, so I can't answer that.
That would depend on the skills of the artist(s), wouldn’t it?
Not necessarily. Even very good artists can trash their work by bringing current politics into it.
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I like this painting by Caravaggio, around 1598. I think the composition is great. The diagonals of the blood spurting from Holofernes' throat, and the diagonals of Judith's arms holding the knife, the red curtains above, and the totally black spaces in the background reducing any diversion of attention, are all technical ingredients of a masterpiece.
However, one might ask, is this beautiful? Is a representation of the slitting a Babylonian general's throat by an attractive Jewish woman, beautiful?
I also find interesting, the fact that in the original painting, Judith had bare breasts. They've been censored, and a white blouse was later painted over the bare breasts. What desecration! I want to see Judth's breasts .
[attachment=18268:Judith_B...s_c_1598.jpg]
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I like this painting by Caravaggio, around 1598. I think the composition is great. The diagonals of the blood spurting from Holofernes' throat, and the diagonals of Judith's arms holding the knife, the red curtains above, and the totally black spaces in the background reducing any diversion of attention, are all technical ingredients of a masterpiece.
However, one might ask, is this beautiful? Is a representation of the slitting a Babylonian general's throat by an attractive Jewish woman, beautiful?
I also find interesting, the fact that in the original painting, Judith had bare breasts. They've been censored, and a white blouse was later painted over the bare breasts. What desecration! I want to see Judth's breasts .
[attachment=18268:Judith_B...s_c_1598.jpg]
Be patient, Ray: she's got them covered whilst they recover from her implant job and all will be revealed again in due course. Or she renegotiates her model release.
Rob C
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Be patient, Ray: she's got them covered whilst they recover from her implant job and all will be revealed again in due course. Or she renegotiates her model release.
Rob C
I think you might have missed the point, Rob. I'm not after mere titillation here. There's a biblical story of a Jewish heroine basically prostituting herself to a Babylonian general in order to save the destruction of Israel by Nebucadnezzar. She is invited into his tent for a bit of hanky panky, preumably because he fancies her and she's a bit of 'all right'.
The Babylonian general, Holofernes, gets very drunk. Do we presume that Judith was nicely dressed during this episode. Caravaggio thought otherwise and painted her in the nude as though she had just got out of bed.
Now, I ask you. Where is the desecration? The ugly depiction of a man having his throat cut and head decapitated (basically murdered), or the later censoring of Judith's bare breasts which Caravaggio had originally painted?
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Now, I ask you. Where is the desecration? The ugly depiction of a man having his throat cut and head decapitated (basically murdered), or the later censoring of Judith's bare breasts which Caravaggio had originally painted?
Similar dichotomy is alive and well today in movie and game ratings. Anything to do with exposed breasts or genitalia gets the adult or mature rating no matter how innocent (American Pie), while there can be wanton death and destruction in movies marketed to kids in their early teens no matter how bleak (Dark Knight). This is not so apparent in Europe as it is in the US, though.
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I think you might have missed the point, Rob. I'm not after mere titillation here.
...or the later censoring of Judith's bare breasts which Caravaggio had originally painted?
And to think that I'd imagined body painting in the Western World came in with the Sixties!
Life is so complex!
Rob C
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I like to highlight one of LKaven's comments (not because I have something again LKaven, of course, but because I have heard / read that same argument upon extenuation):
[...]I feel he doesn't understand existentialism at all here.[...]
There it is.
First there is this concept that there is something out there to be understood. Merely contemplating a piece of art is no longer enough: you have to know the artist's statement, you need to talk to him / her and understand his / her motives, you must be versed on the true meaning of art, and keep informed about the latest and greatest in art; that is what you have to do to understand what you are seeing.
But then... then nothing, you just stay there, staring and feeling absolutely nothing. Sorry, but if it does not make me feel something deep inside, I am not interested. Call me primitive if you want, but art that does not transmit a feeling bores me; no matter what it talks about, and no matter how much meaning the author thinks it has.
And there is also this emperor's new clothes emanating from that argument: if you criticize someone's work, it has to be because you do not understand it (there is no other imaginable reason why you could disagree with the author, of course); thus, unless you want to be called a fool, you must say great things about the most absurd occurrences.
This is what I think; now, feel free to bash me for my rudeness and ignorance: I am young, I will recover.
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I like to highlight one of LKaven's comments (not because I have something again LKaven, of course, but because I have heard / read that same argument upon extenuation):
There it is.
First there is this concept that there is something out there to be understood. Merely contemplating a piece of art is no longer enough: you have to know the artist's statement, you need to talk to him / her and understand his / her motives, you must be versed on the true meaning of art, and keep informed about the latest and greatest in art; that is what you have to do to understand what you are seeing.
But then... then nothing, you just stay there, staring and feeling absolutely nothing. Sorry, but if it does not make me feel something deep inside, I am not interested. Call me primitive if you want, but art that does not transmit a feeling bores me; no matter what it talks about, and no matter how much meaning the author thinks it has.
And there is also this emperor's new clothes emanating from that argument: if you criticize someone's work, it has to be because you do not understand it (there is no other imaginable reason why you could disagree with the author, of course); thus, unless you want to be called a fool, you must say great things about the most absurd occurrences.
This is what I think; now, feel free to bash me for my rudeness and ignorance: I am young, I will recover.
There are a couple of issues to separate out. In this case, I was making a point about exegesis of existentialist works, and whether they mean what Scrutin takes them to mean. [I claimed he didn't. It's been a couple of weeks since I wrote that, so I would have to take a second look at everything to explain that further.] This is aside from the point of whether or not a correct understanding would affect his aesthetic experience of them.
Speaking to your point, I think there is always a question of whether the experience of an art work will yield aesthetic rewards, and to what extent it is necessary for the viewer/listener to meet the art work (or the artist) halfway in order to achieve satisfaction. One of the beautiful things about art is of course that this question often can't be answered a priori. So the question for the viewer/listener is to make a judgment about how much s/he should invest of herself in the hope of achieving satisfaction. This judgment involves a balancing of considerations involving judgments about what the work promises, and in cases where the work promises eventual satisfaction, whether it is worth the investment to gain it. Making these judgments are fraught with uncertainty, but are also tied up in the direction of "the long journey" that the neophyte (necessarily) undertakes.
As someone who understands modern jazz very well, I can say that knowledge about musical theory, modernist aesthetics, as well as an acquaintance with a certain musical/cultural vocabulary involved in "what the artist is saying" all make a crucial difference in the experience of the music. There is, in many such cases, a sense in which the listener "gets it" or "doesn't get it", and in that way, it can be an all-or-nothing affair. In order to grasp a simple joke, it is necessary to have the relevant background beliefs to render the joke sensible in the first place. Without those beliefs, a joke is vacuous to the listener. It is certainly the case in music that a period of study can transform the listener's experience radically, overwhelmingly, and ultimately deliver enormous satisfaction. But this long journey only seems worthwhile to those who see it's promise from a great distance. And of course, there are some journeys that lead to nowhere.
Add to this that there is often a certain gamesmanship in the art world involving people maneuvering for power, fame, and money. The commonplaces of these games are such claims as "I am avant garde," "I am complex and misunderstood," "you are old" (and by nefarious implication thereby obsolete), "you are envious," or "you don't understand". At its worst, this is a shell game involving semantic sleight of hand played around an empty pursuit. Sometimes, though, the most overlooked artists yield unexpected and satisfying aesthetic experiences when you finally get around to seeing/hearing it.
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Roger Scruton is an ultra right-wing reactionary essayist. He can't be taken seriously.
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Roger Scruton is an ultra right-wing reactionary essayist. He can't be taken seriously.
In that case, I had better read everything he has to say.
;-)
Rob C
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Roger Scruton is an ultra right-wing reactionary essayist. He can't be taken seriously.
Interesting. Prior to your note I’d never considered political affiliation as a driving force in art essays. But it certainly can be.
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Interesting. Prior to your note I’d never considered political affiliation as a driving force in art essays. But it certainly can be.
"One response is to look for beauty in its other and more everyday forms—the beauty of settled streets and cheerful faces, of natural objects and genial landscapes. It is possible to throw dirt on these things, too, and it is the mark of a second-rate artist to take such a path to our attention—the via negativa of desecration."
Scruton, Beauty and Desecration.
"beauty of settled streets and cheerful faces", "genial landscapes", sounds like John Betjeman, but that was 50 years ago wasn't it? Certainly isn't Iraq or Afghanistan. Scrotum has always hankered after the countryside, and fox hunting too.
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Scruton, Beauty and Desecration.
"beauty of settled streets and cheerful faces", "genial landscapes", sounds like John Betjeman, but that was 50 years ago wasn't it? Certainly isn't Iraq or Afghanistan. Scrotum has always hankered after the countryside, and fox hunting too.
As you indicated, must have been a tough name to live with as a child!
Rob C
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"One response is to look for beauty in its other and more everyday forms—the beauty of settled streets and cheerful faces, of natural objects and genial landscapes. It is possible to throw dirt on these things, too, and it is the mark of a second-rate artist to take such a path to our attention—the via negativa of desecration."
Scruton, Beauty and Desecration.
"beauty of settled streets and cheerful faces", "genial landscapes", sounds like John Betjeman, but that was 50 years ago wasn't it? Certainly isn't Iraq or Afghanistan. Scrotum has always hankered after the countryside, and fox hunting too.
Hmmm.
That would be what is known as an ad hominem attack; going after the person rather than his ideas or arguments. It's certainly fine to have issues with someone's thesis or argument. That's what we're here for, to debate and contend with ideas. But schoolyard taunts? Seriously?
Let's be adults, please.
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There are a couple of issues to separate out. In this case, I was making a point about exegesis of existentialist works, and whether they mean what Scrutin takes them to mean. [I claimed he didn't. It's been a couple of weeks since I wrote that, so I would have to take a second look at everything to explain that further.] This is aside from the point of whether or not a correct understanding would affect his aesthetic experience of them.
Speaking to your point, I think there is always a question of whether the experience of an art work will yield aesthetic rewards, and to what extent it is necessary for the viewer/listener to meet the art work (or the artist) halfway in order to achieve satisfaction. One of the beautiful things about art is of course that this question often can't be answered a priori. So the question for the viewer/listener is to make a judgment about how much s/he should invest of herself in the hope of achieving satisfaction. This judgment involves a balancing of considerations involving judgments about what the work promises, and in cases where the work promises eventual satisfaction, whether it is worth the investment to gain it. Making these judgments are fraught with uncertainty, but are also tied up in the direction of "the long journey" that the neophyte (necessarily) undertakes.
As someone who understands modern jazz very well, I can say that knowledge about musical theory, modernist aesthetics, as well as an acquaintance with a certain musical/cultural vocabulary involved in "what the artist is saying" all make a crucial difference in the experience of the music. There is, in many such cases, a sense in which the listener "gets it" or "doesn't get it", and in that way, it can be an all-or-nothing affair. In order to grasp a simple joke, it is necessary to have the relevant background beliefs to render the joke sensible in the first place. Without those beliefs, a joke is vacuous to the listener. It is certainly the case in music that a period of study can transform the listener's experience radically, overwhelmingly, and ultimately deliver enormous satisfaction. But this long journey only seems worthwhile to those who see it's promise from a great distance. And of course, there are some journeys that lead to nowhere.
Add to this that there is often a certain gamesmanship in the art world involving people maneuvering for power, fame, and money. The commonplaces of these games are such claims as "I am avant garde," "I am complex and misunderstood," "you are old" (and by nefarious implication thereby obsolete), "you are envious," or "you don't understand". At its worst, this is a shell game involving semantic sleight of hand played around an empty pursuit. Sometimes, though, the most overlooked artists yield unexpected and satisfying aesthetic experiences when you finally get around to seeing/hearing it.
Thank you for your patience; I appreciate your efforts, and I see your point, but I still find it hard to believe that education can lead me to enjoy someone's feces put inside of a can, or that I will admire a blank canvas on a gallery more that on a hardware store, or that a shark inside a tank is art because it is inside an art museum instead of a biology museum, or that I will be able to telepathically receive someone's performance.
I confess I am a complete ignorant about jazz, but I am pretty sure that there are musicians on the stage during concerts, and that they are supposed to play their instruments; I may not be able to appreciate all the fine details, but I think I can distinguish a sad theme from a happy one. Now, a blank canvas...
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Thank you for your patience; I appreciate your efforts, and I see your point, but I still find it hard to believe that education can lead me to enjoy someone's feces put inside of a can, or that I will admire a blank canvas on a gallery more that on a hardware store, or that a shark inside a tank is art because it is inside an art museum instead of a biology museum, or that I will be able to telepathically receive someone's performance.
I confess I am a complete ignorant about jazz, but I am pretty sure that there are musicians on the stage during concerts, and that they are supposed to play their instruments; I may not be able to appreciate all the fine details, but I think I can distinguish a sad theme from a happy one. Now, a blank canvas...
Good point! But we should not use the exception to demonstrate a trend. That which does not inspire or is not meaningful, will eventually fall by the wayside.
I too have seen in art galleries the occasional painting of a clear wash with no detail, essentially, a blank canvas. I've thought to myself (or commented to my partner), how silly and pointless, and what a waste of money and effort sponsoring such a work.
On the other hand, I sometimes think, when struggling to be as kind and understanding as possible, that perhaps such a work does have a point and purpose, which is to define and provide an example of something that is meaningless and pointless. The title of such a work could be, 'Meaningless, Pointless, and a Complete Waste of Money'. A benchmark has thus been set suggesting that from here forward, just about anything might be better.
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Good point! But we should not use the exception to demonstrate a trend. That which does not inspire or is not meaningful, will eventually fall by the wayside.
I too have seen in art galleries the occasional painting of a clear wash with no detail, essentially, a blank canvas. I've thought to myself (or commented to my partner), how silly and pointless, and what a waste of money and effort sponsoring such a work.
On the other hand, I sometimes think, when struggling to be as kind and understanding as possible, that perhaps such a work does have a point and purpose, which is to define and provide an example of something that is meaningless and pointless. The title of such a work could be, 'Meaningless, Pointless, and a Complete Waste of Money'. A benchmark has thus been set suggesting that from here forward, just about anything might be better.
So there you have it: generosity of spirit in both artist and viewer - the best interface of all!
Rob C
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Oddly, considering the brayings of the feminist movements, political correctness and their combined contributions to the eventual demise of my calendar business, it's interesting that the overarching effect has not been what those people had expected: rather than simply sanitising the world's media, they achieved the opposite effect of driving out much that merely put women up there on an anassailable pedestal and turned the ground over to the pornographers. Some alternative! And now, if you want to see good-looking women without their clothes on, where do you go? Exactly! Right into the heart of the women's world - the fashion magazines. Now is that a feminist victory or the annihilation of the movement at source, in the very heart of the gender?
As the author indicates, if you kill off beauty you fill the void with the cult of the ugly, the corrupt and the profane.
Rob C
As a woman I find fashion magazines and glamour photography degrading. I think you are "braying" against the trend to see beauty in how women really are, not their glamourizing in the pornographic images of the fashion photography world and your loss of access to the pornography you were used to. The world is not composed only of young, smooth skinned women but of women who have struggled through life and their bodies show it. I find real images of people beautiful, an obviously subjective category and one that you have objectified. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
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As a woman I find fashion magazines and glamour photography degrading. I think you are "braying" against the trend to see beauty in how women really are, not their glamourizing in the pornographic images of the fashion photography world and your loss of access to the pornography you were used to. The world is not composed only of young, smooth skinned women but of women who have struggled through life and their bodies show it. I find real images of people beautiful, an obviously subjective category and one that you have objectified. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
An interesting take on my post, and I might have misunderstood what you appeared to be saying. I attempt, below, to try and make my position unambiguous.
1. I was never a pornographer; I hated that genre and still do.
2. Women 'really are' as women are; some are undeniably beautiful and others undeniably ugly with the majority in the middle, just as are men available in similar styles.
3. Beauty is most certainly not in the eye of the beholder; all that is in the eye of the beholder is subjectivity and then perhaps when directed by the underlying feeling that such a justification is necessary as a form of self-defence or self-justification as, perhaps, in the case of finding one's self with a less than spectacular girlfriend. I will grant you that beauty might mean different physical things within different ethnic groupings, but by the way that trophy wives etc. are traded I am beginning to think otherwise. Were beauty purely a subjective tick in the eye, then no trophy ladies could, by definition, be deemed to exist.
4. Confusing the fact that some women struggle through life - who doesn't? - with beauty is bizarre; beauty is physical; character is spiritual. Beauty is probably temporary, accidental and on loan to anyone who has it whilst character is pretty well fixed and either ugly or beautiful or neutral. It is all too easy to equate the gentleness of an angel with the beauty of a Bardot; they have nothing in common though Miss B might also have been an exception... I used to think so.
5. The moment you select anything in order to photograph it you have 'objectified' it; what else have you imagined yourself to have done?
Rob C
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I think it is partly in our nature to have our self-images reflected as idealized versions of ourselves and our potential. Men characteristically see themselves -- or their own potential -- reflected in movies and stories about other men with heroic qualities, superhuman strength and stamina, and highly idealized bodies. Of course, many women see themselves correspondingly too, as reflected in stories about women with superhuman qualities. But women characteristically see themselves reflected in idealized forms as creatures of special beauty and grace and make use of a mise en scene in order to form the image, along with imaginative props and accessories, and special finesse in color and composition.
And one thing I think increasingly is that all women, regardless of whether they fit the ideal exactly, are closer themselves to the ideal than anything else in creation that isn't a woman. In other words, the ideal partly reinforces the sense that all (all to an approximation) women are special and beautiful, paradoxical as it sounds. However, this is not to deny that the entire business is infected with games having to do with brutal competition for wealth, power, and status, and other predatory pursuits. Fashion is at its essence about selling something, and in its historical practice, it is often vacuous, especially where it pretends to be something else -- such as social commentary or high art. To put one's self forth falsely as social commentary when one's true purpose is selling is a prostitution of a special kind, one that is not unique to gender.
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Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
This is an unfortunate but common misconception.
There has been quite a bit of research on both female and male beauty. Beauty is directly correlated with left/right symmetry in body proportions and facial characteristics, smooth skin, shiny hair, and small waist-to-hip ratio in women (correlated with fertility). A beautiful face is "average," meaning that the proportions correspond with those of the average face in the population - although I postulate that the most beautiful faces are beyond average, eg. Angelina Jolie with her lips which are "too" thick, and Cindy Crawford with her mole. These are universal, regardless of race, upbringing and social status. Even babies with no pre-conceived cultural influences look at pictures of pretty people longer than those of ugly kissers.
Also, striving for external beauty is certainly not limited to women: taller men earn more than shorter, and body images portrayed by action figures and on Men's Health magazine are just as unreachable as those of Barbie's proportions or found in women's fashion magazines.
There is a fascinating book titled Survival of the Prettiest which summarizes much of such research. Incidentally written by a woman. Highly recommended.