Walter Benjamin talks about the notion of Art through time. From architecture to paintings, to photography, metal casting, movies, etc. He explores different types of creation and their reproduction procedure, while investigating the link between how the mass of viewers interact with those mass reproduced creations. He then delves into the concept of uniqueness and authenticity, using many different examples, amongst others cinema, and showing that they can't be exactly compared. Through history, he observes how methods of reproduction [of art], have modified the way we create and the interaction of the proletariat with art (for example, someone who can afford to paint can't necessarily make movies and someone who bought paintings can't necessarily make a movie!).
"A man who concentrates before a work of art is absorbed by it"... "In contrast, the distracted mass absorbs the work of art." His example is architecture: it is a work which is "[received] by a collectivity in a state of distraction. The laws of its reception are most instructive." This relates to the way film is received by the public, which unlike architecture can be a very dangerous thing. It is not realistic to predict every kind of response from viewers of an artwork, but it is an artist's responsibility to keep this in mind. What the artist intends is not always the reaction intended. But this can go the other way: if someone means to project a particular kind of information onto the public, it is possible to manipulate the way people perceive political issues, for example. Once new technology is available for use and manipulation, it will be both used for good and for evil, this we cannot control. It is a difficult subject to ponder, as technology evolves exponentially. All kinds of mechanical reproduction seem to help us in terms of communication, but also hurt us in terms of propaganda, which is still true today. It seems that its reflection revolves around whether or not it is good to have mass communication(mass reproduction) if the majority of the population (or a large part) are unable to criticize or have a "more objective" point of view on what we show them. Even without mass communication, the problem still persist, too few people have a grasp on the "real" of what they are shown. He references Aldous Huxley saying, at that time, artistic talent is becoming very rare if we observe the ratio of "good artists"/population... However, he could only have imagined that, because he didn't verify the numbers he used and good or bad is very subjective. True, capitalism uses mechanical reproduction to sell whatever is profitable in term of capital, so what is sold is what most people want(And what they want can be modified, but that's something else). Maybe more "trash" is in circulation, but we only need one good work to be massively distributed to be as effective as if many good ones were distributed in small quantities. Indeed, in the former scenario there is still less variety than in the later, but where many persons worked individually on fairly good books, big crews worked "together" on a movie, to produce a greater result(maybe). This way of propagating art works to the masses has its downsides, if we have less variety of works, less directions are taken, which means less potentially merged ideas that would have created new ones in return. However, Internet changed this, as anyone can have access to authorship, and everyone can possibly look for what he wants. If the public still is an absent minded-one, which could still be possible with Internet (if you go on you-tube, you can simply click on the main page's thumbnails and keep going, watching what we propose to you), then we might have to look somewhere else [than in the media] to find a solution for this... education problem...? Art is a product of it's time. Every art work produced in a certain context cannot be fully reproduced without losing a certain quality. Every unique piece of artwork is intricately weaved and embedded within the fabric of it's tradition. Art is always valued and viewed on two different planes: one of cult and one of exhibition. For example, ceremonial art was only meant to be exposed within a specific context, whereas a statue in the town square represents an entirely different approach. It is this emphasis that causes art to have distinctive functions, which may not be (originally) what the creators of these arts intended, but it became so with time. So should all art be treated equally? Would one compare the utter uselessness of art in Dada to a "Masterpiece" from the renaissance? Do both have the same reproductive value? By being able to reproduce these pieces of art, we remove them from their contexts and give them a whole new meaning, readily available to be consumed by whoever willing. Film, on the other hand, creates a whole different conundrum. Static art (ie: paintings) were meant to be absorbed, contemplated upon and thought of. Whereas, film, no one image is static, it is a constant influx of moving pictures, that are but a glimpse in one's mind eye. It is a bastardized and perverted version of simplicity. One moment is is there, the next, gone. Film creates an experience without contact, where the viewer is nothing but a critic of it's whole. Film is a representation of reality (Beaudrillard would say), nothing is ever what it truly seems. The actors within it are performing for an invisible and unknown audience, simulating their presence in their performance, and eradicating their auras from the cameras, baring nothing for us to see nor feel. By creating this reproduction of an altered reality, Western Society capitalizes on spurned interest from the masses through the illusion of film. It recreates a form of Dada, for it brings nothing to an individual but fleeting images that have no content and that will be forgotten in a moment's time.A painter and a cameraman create very differing images. One paints a whole, with soul and aura, the other assembles a sequence through fragments, leaving it's viewer to assemble them themselves or through their own hegemonic position. Painting was never meant as a simultaneous collective individual experience. It is to be absorbed by individuals, at different times in different ways. Film merges the critical and the receptive, in thus, causing the individual reaction to be influenced by the mass reaction.In some respect, the approach that both Benjamin and Duhamel have towards film is the same kind of reaction photographers or the clergy have had towards new technologies. "That will kill this" in reference to Hugo's Hunchback of Notre-Dame. Fear of this new technology and the unknown that it brings along with the changes that it procures us. For is it not technology that allows for advancement, for metamorphosis of what we know? That it allows us to explore new regions and give it new meanings?In his analogy of war, he dictates that we are not able to properly integrate these new technologies in our society and that their mass production draws similarities with war. That the more they happen, that the least we utilize them properly the more they are more likely to destroy us.
With more and more labour geared towards simulations and in "virtuality", can we still say that auras can only truly exist through the real physical world? Is this a rigid concept, that will never evolve from it's roots?
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