And then I went to Debates and Discussions section, and there was a selection of questions put up by The Guardian Debates:
- is religion a force for good in modern times?
- do art and politics mix?
- is London bad for Britain?
These are said to be the issues that are to be debated by ‘some of the world’s finest minds‘. I’d especially love to hear their views on the third question, considering how important capital cities are in the development of most of the careers. As far as the first question goes, I’ll gladly quote Mr Tony Blair, ‘I’m certainly not bothered about that‘. Arts and politics is, however, a different subject, and before I go to the debate this afternoon I’ll jot down some of my views here.
Before I do, however, may I say that these generic questions often enrage me. They are usually asked in order to coax the audience into a “debate”, in which any common ground cannot be found by definition. Seriously, how many definitions of art do you know? They say that truth is born of an argument, which is true, providing we know exactly what we’re arguing about.
I had a short-period email correspondence with my compatriot, in which we were talking comfortably about globalisation, Europe, Heidegger, etc. All was fine, until I noticed that he wasn’t actually reading my letters. He was sieving through them, picking up certain phrases out of context, which led to various degrees of misunderstanding. When I finally expressed my concerns, he reproached me: ‘This is the beauty of an argument – soar freely, exchanging ideas, leaving them behind. Disagreements are what I find beautiful, and you don’t‘. I replied that there was nothing beautiful about losing my time.
Let us get back to our sheep. Do art and politics mix? Questions like this force on a thinker a suggestion that art and politics are two completely different, unconnected spheres of life. Whether or not this is possible, each of us can decide for themselves. As far as George Orwell was concerned, one of the four reasons why writers write was ‘political purpose – using the word ‘political’ in the widest possible sense. Desire to push the world in a certain direction, to alter other people’s idea of the kind of society that they should strive after. Once again, no book is genuinely free from political bias. The opinion that art should have nothing to do with politics is itself a political attitude‘ (Why I Write).
This must be second or third time I’m quoting this passage from Why I Write in my blog, which should unambiguously suggest where I stand. This blog is not about politics, although I expressed my opinion on certain political issues. However, there’s another reason, why I avoid writing about politics in my blog.
There is today what I would call “the politics of art“, which comprises absolutely everything: from language to the themes of your art. The very fact that political correctness is now fully integrated in the process of making or discussing art manifests that art possesses (or is developing) its own political culture. I personally experienced this during Brokeback Mountain release, when even the most humble critical opinion of the film was decried as a homophobic propaganda. I put the word “film” in bold because the whole BM-gate showed the inability of some faithful followers to distinguish between nasty anti-gay comments and a careful critique of the film as a work of art. The art scene thus came across as even less democratic than politics.
So, art and politics not only mix, they’re always entwined to the extent when you can no longer say exactly what feeds from what, art from politics or politics from art. This occasionally leads to confusion. One such on my memory was calling the monumental architecture and sculpture of the 1930s “totalitarian” because the author analysed it on the examples of Italy, Germany and Soviet Russia, failing to notice the examples of similarly “totalitarian” structures on the other side of the Atlantics. Had this been done, the 1930s monumentalism in art would have had to be placed in the context of industrialisation and the world economic crisis. But objectivity wasn’t the author’s political purpose.
I’ll be writing more on the subject after this afternoon’s debate. Since I don’t see the reason to refute the exchange and connection between politics and art, I think the fundamental question to ask is where the two are heading. How do politics and art see progress and mankind? I’ll wait to see if today’s panellists bring this question up.
“<>art and politics not only mix, they’re always entwined<>“I assume that you’re including music in the term, Julia? I absolutely agree with you. In fact, if Prokof’yev and Shostakovich were still with us they would no doubt put it more strongly still and say that politics and art are inseparable. In light of current events surrounding Salman Rushdie we can see that it is still the case today.
Carola, I agree absolutely! Someone from the audience did actually ask a question, whether Chopin was about art or politics. Someone also suggested that Shostakovich wasn’t about politics, but about music. However, if we consider his symphony no. 7 ‘Leningrad’, everything in it, including the name, is political. I’m thinking at the moment that perhaps one of the reasons why this question has risen is because we confound politics and ideology. There’s no way to deny a connection, but whereas every public act is political, it doesn’t have to be ideological – and if the act confronts the official ideology, it becomes non-conformist, and politically, creates a challenge to ideology. Am I right here?
I think history has shown that frequently politics and ideology are practically the same thing, or perhaps it is that ideological concepts lie at the root of politics. Every political leader starts out with a vision, a dream, of how he sees the future of his nation. It is how he ‘grows’ that vision, which in the end determines his standing in his own country as well as overseas. It is unfortunate that only a few who take on this mantle don’t at some point fall victim to their own power, serious misjudgement of events or the bad counsel of their advisers. If not the entire population of a nation, then at least a certain section of it will suffer the consequences of inappropriate political and/or governmental doctrines.