Forum - View topicFine art vs. Anime
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Septeus7
Posts: 88 |
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I started a thread awhile back about whether or not anime is by definition lower than fine art. The one of the people I know has finally responded. In his reply he called out Aaron White, he wrote this:
Thank you for your thoughts about my comments. My position on art does, indeed, imply a sort of hierarchy in the area of aesthetics. A resistance to this position is relatively new in the history of art and betrays a perfectly understandable tendency on the part of the public to want to render an equivalence to all areas of art.Simply stated, the traditional position held that, because Fine Art demanded the highest degree of excellence in every element of a respective medium--composition, form, line, texture, movement, color(where applicable), depth of subject, etc.--the Folk Arts, and certainly Crafts, were never at the same level because they didn't aspire to these heights, and were generally produced for purposes less demanding. This unnerves many people today.But it shouldn't. Isn't it our experience that, although we may all be able to skate pretty darn well on the neighborhood pond, there are those few who have dazzled us by their exquisite talent and a lifetime of working at the demands of figure skating that culminate in an Olympic medal? Would we not find it ridiculous to see someone demand equal recognition in the sport by sliding around on the ice in an undisciplined manner, however entertaining the act? Yes, I do think that there are lower and higher "rungs" of art. And I wouldn't want to know that there weren't; that there was never anything greater for me to aspire to in my lifetime of work. Also, the "lower rungs" are not without their value. Through the ages, for every symphony composed, there were hundreds of songs for the folk, songs that added as much invaluable spice to everyday life, as simple salt is to the finest filet mignon. In fact, a world of only the highest and finest would soon exhaust us.I often told college classes to remember to not confuse value with taste: because we like something does not make it good, and because we don't like something does not make it bad. I reveled in the music of Elvis, but at no time fooled myself into believing that what he produced satisfied the aesthetic demands of the highest forms of music. Conversely, that I've never enjoyed Schubert in no way makes me deny his full worth as a giant of the medium.In conclusion, I do think that our society is artistically poor. But not because of an "overfamiliarization" with folk art, but with a growing "underfamiliarization" of Fine Art. Sadly, I'm not sure of the remedy for this.Thank you for the time, and please feel welcome to pass this on to Aaron White as my defense to his challenge. Ever so humbly, Robert Florczak On Wednesday, November 5, 2003, at 10:47 PM, [e-mail address removed -T] Aaron, I was wonder what you thoughts on this were. Does some anime strive for the "highest degree of excellence in every element of the medium"? Can Anime or comic books do this? |
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Aaron White
Old Regular
Posts: 1365 Location: Birmingham, Alabama |
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I'm busy with the Thanksgiving weekend coming up, so this is being written in haste; I hope it isn't too incomprehensable!
Okay, I agree that all art is not created equal, and I'm sure Mr. Florczak's post can only be a short gloss on his aesthetic values, rather than an exaustive statement. But I'm naturally suspicious of any standard that proposes to make "The best" its primary criterion. I mean, can one usefully compare Robert Johnson's "Kind-hearted Woman Blues" with a Brandenburg Concerto? They don't play by the same rules. Similarly, by an academic aesthetic standard a Fabrege egg may be considered a finer work of art than a woman's quilt because the egg is made of finer materials and designed by university-trained craftsmen, etc. But another way to look at it is that a Czar-era egg was created by and for the prestige class on the backs of Russian peasants, while the quilt was a more authentic and telling expression of cultural needs and values. Going to the ice skater metaphor, what happens when an Isadora Duncan of the ice rink comes along? Dance critics who held the standards of ballet to be (Echo chamber) The Highest Form of Dance (/Echo chamber) couldn't see the value of Isadora Duncan, or jazz dance. H. L. Mencken, a great and perceptive social critic in many areas, was blind to the value of music and dance forms emerging from Jazz culture precisely because he clung to White European aesthetics as the summit of human artistic expression. Boy, did he miss out. No less a cultural aesthete than T.S. Eliot wrote a great essay on the Minor Poet which does a better job of validating "lesser" artists than I ever could, although it still remains within a White Euro Male etc. context that I find limiting. Anyhow, as I recall this started with the background art in Spirited Away. I agree that it can't be held up to the greatest landscape painting... any more than the bassoon line from any given symphony can be usefully compared to solo bassoon compositions. |
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Aaron White
Old Regular
Posts: 1365 Location: Birmingham, Alabama |
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I got more.
I believe it was I. A. L. Diamond, who coscripted many of Billy Wilder's finest films, who said (of some group of poshlost "Prestige picture" filmmakers) "They tried to make art and failed as artists or entertainers. We just tried to make entertainment, and made art." As much as I am a product of academia and such, and I agree that we need greater exposure to fine art, I'm leery of the often bloodless (and gormless) paradigms that academia uses. I trust artists more than A students. Also, much of the Academy-approved "finest art" would be impossible without the creative ferment of the "lower arts." Just ask Bartok, or Stravinsky. Where would Pynchon be without cartoons, lymericks, show tunes and folk songs? Spirited Away is a brilliant work of cinematic art, and it couldn't exist without the traditions of Japanese folklore and anime. And since it, like all films, is a compound work, its components need not all be major works of art on their own. As Mamet writes, a nail doesn't need to look like a house. It needs to look like a nail. By the same token, an anime background doesn't need to look like the work of the Hudson River School. |
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