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From: Mary_Couse.osbunorth@Xerox.ARPA
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Subject: The Classics weren't always...
Message-ID: <4047@topaz.RUTGERS.EDU>
Date: Wed, 16-Oct-85 12:19:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: topaz.4047
Posted: Wed Oct 16 12:19:00 1985
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From: Couse.osbunorth@Xerox.ARPA


(Just before leaving town for a week, I sent this response to a comment
made by Steve Brust.  Having looked through the digests that came while
I was away, I've discovered that it never made it.  Much as it may seem
like adding fuel to a fire that has almost burned out, I hate to just
toss it away.)

Steve Brust writes:
>You mention the classics: can you name one art form
>(painting, music, etc) in which those works which are now regarded
>as the classics were not, at the time, entertainment for the masses?

Well, actually, yes I can.  But first, let me say that "entertainment
for the masses" is a tricky way of putting things.  There's a world of
difference between a folk tune and a symphony.  The "masses" don't
always attend the symphony - at least they haven't historically - and
symphonies are seldom performed on the streetcorner.  So the question
is, which masses?  Much of what we now consider classical music was
written on commission for royalty or wealthy patrons - i.e. for the
elite.  Mass media did not exist, so the educated and the wealthy were
the target audience - not the masses.   Nevertheless, let us take
classical music as an example and see how some of the more recent
classics - ones that weren't commissioned by royalty - were received by
audiences of the time.  
 
The audience at the premiere performance of Igor Stravinsky's work "Le
sacre du printemps"  (The Rites of Spring - 1913) showed  their disfavor
by virtually rioting.  Stravinsky had made such a radical departure from
the expected musical means that the audience wouldn't accept the work.  
  
Camille Saint-Saens' "Danse Macabre, Op 40" was met at it's premiere by
boos and catcalls of such intensity that the composer's mother fainted.

We're not talking about waiting for the critics to decide here - we're
talking immediate and vociferous rejection by the public.   

These works are now considered classics.  The fact that the public
rejected them initially is some indication that art is not always
immediately obvious or entertaining to the masses...or even to the
elite, for that matter.  Radical departures from our "comfort zone" in
any area, including music, art and literature, often need the passage of
time to become palatable.  Appreciation comes even later.  What we who
make up the general public are willing to acknowlege as art is often
safely removed from the cutting edge.  Art is constantly pushing on the
boundaries of the comfort zone.

Moving to the visual arts, we again find this "entertainment for the
masses" to be a tricky proviso.  Again, as with music, much of classic
art was NOT created for the masses but rather was done on commission for
those with the money to indulge themselves.  Commissioned work needs to
satisfy only the person who's paying the bill - it does not have to
satisfy the masses.   (The starving artist creating his work for the
public at large is a recent phenomena.)  The first example that comes to
mind of a generally acknowledged classic work that was created recently
enough to have the masses as its audience - and be rejected by them at
the time - is Picasso's "Young Ladies of Avignon" (1907).  This work is
now considered to be a pivotal work in modern art - however it was not
well received in 1907.  (Of course many people have trouble with modern
art.  Those who demand that paintings be lifelike still consider Picasso
inaccessible.) 

So what does this all mean?  Perhaps just that a culture's perception of
art changes over time, just as an individual's taste changes (hopefully
maturing).  

As an ending thought, I give you a definition of art that came from a
graduate student working on his MFA:   "Art is whatever you can get away
with."  Go into almost any museum of art in the country that has
contemporary works on exhibit and I think you'll agree.  Then let's all
meet in fifty years and see what's survived and what we think then.

Have we beaten poor old Art to death yet?  :-}