John James Marshall thesis.pdf - OpenAIR @ RGU - Robert Gordon ...

causing a loss of this ‘aura’. Benjamin suggests that this loss of aura renders
access to cultural objects more democratic and engenders a more critical
attitude towards them. However, he also fears that in substituting a plurality of
copies for a unique object detaches the reproduced object from the domain of
tradition. Benjamin discusses the historical counterpoint to this - the idea of
‘pure’ art (the doctrine of ‘art for art’s sake’) - as a ‘negative theology’ that denies
any didactic or social function for art. Benjamin cites the work of the Dadaists
as exemplary in degrading the aura of the work rendering it useless for
‘contemplative immersion’.
The idea of ‘art for art's sake’ is a strictly Modernist phenomenon grounded in
the philosophical system of Immanuel Kant (Jenkins, 2003). The first use the
phrase ‘l'art pour l'art’ is thought to be in the journal entry of Benjamin
Constant dated February 11, 1804 (Jenkins, 2003). Witcombe (2000) divides
Modernism into two subcategories: progressive and conservative. He asserts
that conservative Modernism looked to the tradition of the institutionalised art
academy and demanded art with a purpose to instruct, delight, or moralise.
Progressive Modernism (which came to be referred to as the avant-garde, see
below) was concerned with artistic freedom and the political and social agenda
of making the world a better place for the future (Witcombe, 2000). Art
historical texts from the turn of the 19 th to the 20 th Century discuss art in a
formalist way free from not just the rules of the academy, but from the demands
of the public (Witcombe, 2000). Before this, the value of works of art had been
primarily regarded as either utilitarian or ornamental (Jenkins, 2003). This
subsequently manifests in the Modernist notion that art objects are to be viewed
in isolation from the everyday world and that questions asked of art may only be
answered on art’s own terms (Greenberg, 1965, p.774).
2.9.2 Beyond binary classification
Traditionally, Western thought tends to be based on dyadic opposition (thesisantithesis)
whereas Eastern thought is conceived on a triadic relationship
(thesis-antithesis-synthesis) (Kim & Gaffikin, 2005). This is supported by the
notion of transdisciplinarity (see section 2.8.1) as
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