I thought perhaps I could jump-start this week’s cyber-discussion with an unanswered question I have had with Benjamin’s "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction.” The lynch point of his entire discussion seems to center on the presence and subsequent loss of an “aura” in works of art. To begin, I have a hard time comprehending what Benjamin means by the word “art,” as news reels and letters to the editor are argued on the same plane as plays and sculpture (I think this moves beyond the collapse of a high\/low distinction, as he seems to be more concerned with political ramifications and the replacement of the “artist” by the propagandist.) It seems to me that any form of mass communication fits comfortably in his definition. Isn’t this problematic? If he wishes to analyze the loss of an “aura,” shouldn’t he also look to “high art” and how its reproduction affects the modern viewer? What if, instead of a long diatribe on film, he had analyzed the contemporary reaction to “The Mona Lisa,” (a piece that he recognizes as being highly reproduced) would his conclusion still be the same? <\/p>\n
However, my greatest trouble in understanding this essay lies in Benjamin’s connotative use of the word “aura.” I have never been clear whether he is celebrating, lamenting or simply reporting its death. I think Benjamin provides his clearest definition of the word in his 5th footnote as he critiques its meaning. He writes, “The definition of the aura as a ‘unique phenomenon of a distance however close it may be’ represents nothing but a formulation of the cult value of the work of art in categories of space and time perception. Distance is the opposite of closeness. The essentially distant object is the unapproachable one” (243). At times, it seems that he is troubled by the loss of uniqueness, the creation of a Hollywood star system, and the creation of a “distracted audience.” Indeed, in his 4th footnote, he writes, “the poorest provincial staging of Faust is superior to a Faust film in that, it competes with the first performance at Weimar” (243). However, he also seems to be calling for the politicization of art in response to the Fascist’s use of art in politics (again, a clear definition of art would be useful in this discussion). In this sense, it would seem that he would be excited to demystify a cult, especially that of Hitler’s. To further my confusion, Benjamin doesn’t seem very troubled with his own ambiguity. Is this a sign that he has given a clear opinion on the matter and I have just missed it? <\/p>\n
So, what do y’all think? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I thought perhaps I could jump-start this week’s cyber-discussion with an unanswered question I have had with Benjamin’s "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction.” The lynch point of his entire discussion seems to center on the presence and subsequent loss of an “aura” in works of art. To begin, I have … Continue reading The Trouble with \u201cAura\u201d<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reflections"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2005\/660\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2005\/660\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2005\/660\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2005\/660\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2005\/660\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=112"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2005\/660\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2005\/660\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2005\/660\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2005\/660\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}