Monday, February 21, 2005
re: Music and Politics
Art and Politics have always existed in a sort of dysfunctional symbiosis. Artists use art to justify or promote political ideologies, and politicians use art for the same purposes. But Artists and the public and politicians also condemn works of art, or aesthetic practices, for exhibiting ideologies that they disapprove of. Shakespeare wrote plays expressly designed to curry favor with royalty, the entire system of artistic patronage by royalty and religions imposed political restrictions on artistic expression, Hitler co-opted Wagner, and the Soviets exerted creative control over the state's artists while in the US the communist artists used art to promote their Socialist viewpoints. And just in the last few years, John Adams got cancelled for being to sympathetic to the terrorists in Klinghoffer, and then Pullitzered and Grammied for writing a tribute to the September 11 victims. It's never going to stop, but even if we think the relationship is dysfunctional and unhealthy, to demand that artists withdraw from the political arena is itself an act of political oppression.
So what do we do about it? We encourage audiences to do their best to separate Aesthetics from Morality. We ask the audience to defuse the problem. Stupid art has been made about great ideas, and great art has been made about terrible ideas; if we can separate the two, we are better equipped to appreciate all art and less vulnerable to manipulation by politicians and artists alike. We can make our political decisions on the practical merits, and our artistic choices on the aesthetic merits.
Now none of this is going to stop me from writing music that advocates a political viewpoint -- but if you ignore my opinion and only listen to the music I promise not to be offended.
posted by Galen H. Brown
4:27 PM
|
