An Evolution of Aesthetic Esoterica

Today, art criticism may as well only exist as a tool of capitalism. That the most prevalent platitude of art criticism in everyday culture is a shocked “someone paid (x) for that?” gives an idea of the flippant attitude we as individuals adopt toward the taste of others. Formal criticism, then, acts as a redeeming defense of art. In an obsessively capitalist market, it is vital that the content of the piece reflects the ticketed price, and through this need authoritative reviews of artwork become as much evaluations as they are celebrations. This is a symptom of the problematic necessity for affirmation of taste, a condition stemming from the fallacy of art as content, having definable value and form.

Part of taste’s inherent difficulty is the ineffable nature of the essence of beauty. An ability to discern beauty implies a certainty of value, again quantifying - or at least qualifying - aesthetic principle. This mistakenly conflates the need for review with the totally unnecessary impulse for validation. Troublingly, art education can perpetuate and empower this self-serving process. The misunderstanding that art observation is applicable in more than a therapeutic and formative sense is the fault of consensus. Art does not evoke the same emotion from all that observe it, but the process of aggregating reactions in cases of wide exposure creates a popular opinion. Thus, we have “textbook” art - famous artwork that achieves pseudo-acclaim from its perseverance in culture. It is by this process that the ten “most famous” artworks may become the ten “greatest” artworks in an internet age.

Even with this in mind, such artwork is vital to art education in an economic sense as a review of effective techniques. Popular and enduring art offers clues to the elusive public eye that a commercial artist seeks. In this case, it is right to appease the idea of taste. Virtuous as it may be to remain impervious to outside criticism and influence, it is a luxury that cannot be afforded to any artist dependent on income from their work. So in this way, economic virtue can become a direct rival to artistic virtue.

Susan Sontag posited in her famous “Against Interpretation” essay that the process of critique is proof that intellectual virtue can be similarly destructive, and notices a troubling trend: “the contemporary zeal for the project of interpretation is often prompted not by piety toward the troublesome text (which may conceal an aggression), but by an open aggressiveness, an overt contempt for appearances.” (Sontag 4). It is worth noting the ignored hierarchy of criticism; during the act of critique, intellect is inherently more important than art, as the task of communicating ideas means it must be approached from the perspective of the intellect. She goes on. “The old style of interpretation was insistent, but respectful; it erected another meaning on top of the literal one. The modern style of interpretation excavates, and as it excavates, destroys; it digs “behind” the text, to find a sub-text which is the true one.” Even though Sontag says this cynically, some would attach enthusiastically to the process. Freudian analyses of latent content are common especially in literature, but have their place in art review - most notably tied to the work of Warhol and Basquiat.

Where Warhol and Basquiat encourage the investigation and interpretation of their art, however, many others do not. Basquiat’s art in particular was remarkable for his publishing of hidden, but core narrative within the larger piece. In cases where the artist doesn’t leave these meanings to be found, it is a game. Sontag gives this game a demerit: “It is the revenge of the intellect upon the world. To interpret is to impoverish, to deplete the world - in order to set up a shadow world of “meanings.” It is to turn the world into this world. (“This world”! As if there were any other.)”

How to approach art, then? Sontag’s assessment of contemporary zeal for interpretation seems to cynically suggest that we consume art unjustly, and selfishly. But Arnold Wirtala believes the solution to be treating art even more selfishly. “If people enjoyed their preferences in silence, without resources to communication, there would be no problem.”(Wirtala 118). Introverting the consumption of art returns the process to a more natural dynamic. Private observation of art eliminates the natural inclination to reach a consensus. “It is a characteristic of conversations about art that people try to reach agreements in their judgements of the worth of art objects” he says. When Wirtala involves worth, it may not mean the problematic monetization of art, but rather the therapeutic value. It is maybe even less reasonable, however, to crowdsource this value, and fruitless to seek it in the first place.

Any reached consensus represents an obvious insecurity on the part of those who seek it. Whatever value art may have to an individual (and despite the tone of this essay, it most certainly does offer value), there is none to be found in the evaluation of it. The art itself remains unchanged regardless of any particular understanding an audience may apply to it. Though it may take on different meanings, the need for a correct one is social, and not artistic. This insecurity is epitomic of the fight art faces in modern society. The appearance of economic, intellectual and social consensus in the process of consuming art shackles the beauty of the form and relegates it to commodity. It is a fitting paradox then that only in an environment that does not insist on justifying and evaluating art can art reach its full value.

Sontag, Susan. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. Farrar, Straus & Giroux,  New York, 1966.

Wirtala, Arnold. Taste in the Arts: a Problem of Aesthetic Value. Appearing in Volume 5, Issue 2 of Educational Theory, University of Illinois, 1955.