Page 123 - Darko Štrajn, Umetnost v realnosti, Dissertationes 18
P. 123
mary
Art within Reality
Walter Benjamin, of course, was not the first writer, who dis-
covered the so-called phenomenon of the masses, such as
many authors in the 19th Century have already identified. What Ben-
jamin “discovered,” was something that actually was not hidden to an-
yone, and it has been at the time also an object of philistine indigna-
tion. Benjamin’s theory concerns the discovery of the fact of technical
reproduction, i.e. the fact that it is visible on the surface of any descrip-
tion of social production. Hence, this fact was of no “theoretical im-
portance” for many of Benjamin’s contemporaries, because it was cen-
sored by (in a way still present) aesthetics of the sublime. Culture of
today is mass culture or, we may say, there is no culture unaffected by
mass culture. Probably the first author, who introduced this fact in a
decisive, definite, clear and condensed manner, was Walter Benjamin
with his surprisingly short essay The Work of Art in the Age of Mechani-
cal Reproduction. For more than twenty years his work has not been re-
ally and properly understood. However, most of interpretations, that
are piling up from the 1960s on, miss the decisive point that Benjamin
made by establishing the concept of aura. Those authors, who were jus-
tifiably fascinated by Benjamin’s other works, somehow missed to see
that aura was not any “vague notion,” but very precise and, above all, di-
alectical concept. To grasp the theoretical relevance of this concept one
should take into account the position, from which author’s discourse is
articulated. What is elaborated in this book, is a demonstration of how
the concept of aura is closely related with the category of disappear-
ing. When the definition of the aura is made clear, it is possible to elu-
Art within Reality
Walter Benjamin, of course, was not the first writer, who dis-
covered the so-called phenomenon of the masses, such as
many authors in the 19th Century have already identified. What Ben-
jamin “discovered,” was something that actually was not hidden to an-
yone, and it has been at the time also an object of philistine indigna-
tion. Benjamin’s theory concerns the discovery of the fact of technical
reproduction, i.e. the fact that it is visible on the surface of any descrip-
tion of social production. Hence, this fact was of no “theoretical im-
portance” for many of Benjamin’s contemporaries, because it was cen-
sored by (in a way still present) aesthetics of the sublime. Culture of
today is mass culture or, we may say, there is no culture unaffected by
mass culture. Probably the first author, who introduced this fact in a
decisive, definite, clear and condensed manner, was Walter Benjamin
with his surprisingly short essay The Work of Art in the Age of Mechani-
cal Reproduction. For more than twenty years his work has not been re-
ally and properly understood. However, most of interpretations, that
are piling up from the 1960s on, miss the decisive point that Benjamin
made by establishing the concept of aura. Those authors, who were jus-
tifiably fascinated by Benjamin’s other works, somehow missed to see
that aura was not any “vague notion,” but very precise and, above all, di-
alectical concept. To grasp the theoretical relevance of this concept one
should take into account the position, from which author’s discourse is
articulated. What is elaborated in this book, is a demonstration of how
the concept of aura is closely related with the category of disappear-
ing. When the definition of the aura is made clear, it is possible to elu-
