Anyone else sick of artistic snobbery in music, literature and visual art?
Stemming from a discussion in another thread, I'm very tired of the amount of snobbery that gets thrown at modern popular culture. Academic study in all of these subjects focuses on the old stuff: Classical music, literary Classics, and Fine Art, and looks down on the more popular counterparts.
Taking an example from the aforementioned thread, somebody who will remain nameless accused people who prefer reading Dan Brown to Shakespeare of being 'inferior' and 'uneducated'. Its as if people think writing the best selling book of the 21st century is easy.
'Bah, Dan Brown? I could have written a multi-million pound franchise of trashy popular fiction, I just didn't want to!'
All the academics have by now agreed that folk culture and popular culture are just as valid as forms of art as high culture, because the latter is arbitrarily chosen to be 'sophisticated' or 'original' based on the cultural values of the time, which has historically had nothing whatsoever to do with the intrinsic merit of the art itself. Not to say that Mozart wasn't a genius, but his contemporaries were also geniuses: the slaves working on plantations who were developing Negro Spirituals that were to become blues and jazz, the immigrants from Europe in Southern America developing old Irish and English tunes into bluegrass that would later become rock music, the Italian peasants whose folk songs would go on to produce the Neapolitan Canzone tradition made famous by the likes of Pavarotti...
Even today, there are some very talented pop artists who a certain sect of young people reject in favour of the 'Classic rock' of the 60s and 70s, not knowing that people back then were saying exactly the same thing about Led Zepellin and the Beatles.
And I hope I don't need to waste my breath convincing people that Banksy is fifty times the artist that Damien Hirst and the other garbage, and that high Fashion should stay on the catwalk where it belongs. Even Oscar Wilde agreed that fashion can be summed up simply as something so hideous it has to be changed every 6 months.
Taking an example from the aforementioned thread, somebody who will remain nameless accused people who prefer reading Dan Brown to Shakespeare of being 'inferior' and 'uneducated'. Its as if people think writing the best selling book of the 21st century is easy.
'Bah, Dan Brown? I could have written a multi-million pound franchise of trashy popular fiction, I just didn't want to!'
All the academics have by now agreed that folk culture and popular culture are just as valid as forms of art as high culture, because the latter is arbitrarily chosen to be 'sophisticated' or 'original' based on the cultural values of the time, which has historically had nothing whatsoever to do with the intrinsic merit of the art itself. Not to say that Mozart wasn't a genius, but his contemporaries were also geniuses: the slaves working on plantations who were developing Negro Spirituals that were to become blues and jazz, the immigrants from Europe in Southern America developing old Irish and English tunes into bluegrass that would later become rock music, the Italian peasants whose folk songs would go on to produce the Neapolitan Canzone tradition made famous by the likes of Pavarotti...
Even today, there are some very talented pop artists who a certain sect of young people reject in favour of the 'Classic rock' of the 60s and 70s, not knowing that people back then were saying exactly the same thing about Led Zepellin and the Beatles.
And I hope I don't need to waste my breath convincing people that Banksy is fifty times the artist that Damien Hirst and the other garbage, and that high Fashion should stay on the catwalk where it belongs. Even Oscar Wilde agreed that fashion can be summed up simply as something so hideous it has to be changed every 6 months.
"I hate artistic snobbery. The stuff I like is much better than their stuff."
Basically, there will always be a bit of a divide between what is popular and what is merit-worthy. Your OP seems a tad confused - I'm really not sure people hated on Led Zeppelin the way they do Bieber, but I'll give you the Beatles, at least early on (or even in the late '60s if you're Frank Zappa). Many people think Banksy is incredible, even 'artistic' people. People also appreciate the early musicians you mention, but there simply aren't many records of early bluegrass and Neopolitan Canzone - they weren't written down like Mozart. There's a huge difference between disliking popular trash and not recognising some of the things you mention.
There's no place for snobbery in art. But equally, don't go around claiming Stephanie Meyer and Justin Bieber are as skilled as Joyce and Mozart. There's a place for entertainment and a place for High Culture, but quite frankly there are a million and one books no less enjoyable than Dan Brown's and equally as many attractive teenagers who'd be willing to autotune their voice.
Basically, there will always be a bit of a divide between what is popular and what is merit-worthy. Your OP seems a tad confused - I'm really not sure people hated on Led Zeppelin the way they do Bieber, but I'll give you the Beatles, at least early on (or even in the late '60s if you're Frank Zappa). Many people think Banksy is incredible, even 'artistic' people. People also appreciate the early musicians you mention, but there simply aren't many records of early bluegrass and Neopolitan Canzone - they weren't written down like Mozart. There's a huge difference between disliking popular trash and not recognising some of the things you mention.
There's no place for snobbery in art. But equally, don't go around claiming Stephanie Meyer and Justin Bieber are as skilled as Joyce and Mozart. There's a place for entertainment and a place for High Culture, but quite frankly there are a million and one books no less enjoyable than Dan Brown's and equally as many attractive teenagers who'd be willing to autotune their voice.
Original post by Copperknickers
Stemming from a discussion in another thread, I'm very tired of the amount of snobbery that gets thrown at modern popular culture. Academic study in all of these subjects focuses on the old stuff: Classical music, literary Classics, and Fine Art, and looks down on the more popular counterparts.
Taking an example from the aforementioned thread, somebody who will remain nameless accused people who prefer reading Dan Brown to Shakespeare of being 'inferior' and 'uneducated'. Its as if people think writing the best selling book of the 21st century is easy.
'Bah, Dan Brown? I could have written a multi-million pound franchise of trashy popular fiction, I just didn't want to!'
All the academics have by now agreed that folk culture and popular culture are just as valid as forms of art as high culture, because the latter is arbitrarily chosen to be 'sophisticated' or 'original' based on the cultural values of the time, which has historically had nothing whatsoever to do with the intrinsic merit of the art itself. Not to say that Mozart wasn't a genius, but his contemporaries were also geniuses: the slaves working on plantations who were developing Negro Spirituals that were to become blues and jazz, the immigrants from Europe in Southern America developing old Irish and English tunes into bluegrass that would later become rock music, the Italian peasants whose folk songs would go on to produce the Neapolitan Canzone tradition made famous by the likes of Pavarotti...
Even today, there are some very talented pop artists who a certain sect of young people reject in favour of the 'Classic rock' of the 60s and 70s, not knowing that people back then were saying exactly the same thing about Led Zepellin and the Beatles.
And I hope I don't need to waste my breath convincing people that Banksy is fifty times the artist that Damien Hirst and the other garbage, and that high Fashion should stay on the catwalk where it belongs. Even Oscar Wilde agreed that fashion can be summed up simply as something so hideous it has to be changed every 6 months.
Taking an example from the aforementioned thread, somebody who will remain nameless accused people who prefer reading Dan Brown to Shakespeare of being 'inferior' and 'uneducated'. Its as if people think writing the best selling book of the 21st century is easy.
'Bah, Dan Brown? I could have written a multi-million pound franchise of trashy popular fiction, I just didn't want to!'
All the academics have by now agreed that folk culture and popular culture are just as valid as forms of art as high culture, because the latter is arbitrarily chosen to be 'sophisticated' or 'original' based on the cultural values of the time, which has historically had nothing whatsoever to do with the intrinsic merit of the art itself. Not to say that Mozart wasn't a genius, but his contemporaries were also geniuses: the slaves working on plantations who were developing Negro Spirituals that were to become blues and jazz, the immigrants from Europe in Southern America developing old Irish and English tunes into bluegrass that would later become rock music, the Italian peasants whose folk songs would go on to produce the Neapolitan Canzone tradition made famous by the likes of Pavarotti...
Even today, there are some very talented pop artists who a certain sect of young people reject in favour of the 'Classic rock' of the 60s and 70s, not knowing that people back then were saying exactly the same thing about Led Zepellin and the Beatles.
And I hope I don't need to waste my breath convincing people that Banksy is fifty times the artist that Damien Hirst and the other garbage, and that high Fashion should stay on the catwalk where it belongs. Even Oscar Wilde agreed that fashion can be summed up simply as something so hideous it has to be changed every 6 months.
"**** on a canvas? Bah, I could have done a giant turd on a canvas if I wanted to"
"red square on white canvas? Bah I could have done that if I wanted to"
"toothbrush stuck in an apple? Bah I could have stuck 2 toothbrushes in there"
Your post doesn't really apply to art tbh lol. People actually do stuff like that to pass uni courses
No, it's entirely valid in some cases.
No.
Some people need to appreciate history more.
Some people need to appreciate history more.
Yus.
I would rather read a P.K.Dick book than Pride and Prejudice. Sci-fi ghetto for life bro
I would rather read a P.K.Dick book than Pride and Prejudice. Sci-fi ghetto for life bro
I know what your on about here. I read Vogue magazine a lot, the American edition, but never as much as British Vogue and Vogue Paris but I do not understand some of the stuff that gets written on there in the US Vogue.
They say it's about the jetsetting lifestyle, induging in the music and arts scene in New York or Shanghai, but it makes no sense at all because these cities have their own unique culture and taking a plane ride and a holiday to Athens, isn't a big deal to a New Yorker, let's say, apart from the fact that they are probably very excited about the holiday.
If you want to talk about concierge, luxury hotel chains, and that kind of lifestyle, than that is clearly not the way to do it. If you want to talk about the indie scene, then you have no idea what indie is, to begin with (that's "independent music" btw!) so I do not know what is this high arts and cultural references they try to regularly evoke in their pages because conceptually when you think of New York, the Big Apple, the arts scene is simply reflective of Broadway, nothing else.
If you want luxury hotels then you have the Four Seasons or the Trump Towers, and if you want to write about that, and draw cultural references to it, then why are you talking about art and music that no one has ever heard of? This is like going above and beyond Rolling Stone and Billboard, which is just an incomprehensible idea.
Meanwhile, on the point you made for literature, I found that a shocking revelation, that someone would refer to Dan Brown's novel as something not worth reading simply because its modern fiction. This is classic illiterate behaviour, I'm sure the works of E. M. Forster published by Penguin would like to disagree.
They say it's about the jetsetting lifestyle, induging in the music and arts scene in New York or Shanghai, but it makes no sense at all because these cities have their own unique culture and taking a plane ride and a holiday to Athens, isn't a big deal to a New Yorker, let's say, apart from the fact that they are probably very excited about the holiday.
If you want to talk about concierge, luxury hotel chains, and that kind of lifestyle, than that is clearly not the way to do it. If you want to talk about the indie scene, then you have no idea what indie is, to begin with (that's "independent music" btw!) so I do not know what is this high arts and cultural references they try to regularly evoke in their pages because conceptually when you think of New York, the Big Apple, the arts scene is simply reflective of Broadway, nothing else.
If you want luxury hotels then you have the Four Seasons or the Trump Towers, and if you want to write about that, and draw cultural references to it, then why are you talking about art and music that no one has ever heard of? This is like going above and beyond Rolling Stone and Billboard, which is just an incomprehensible idea.
Meanwhile, on the point you made for literature, I found that a shocking revelation, that someone would refer to Dan Brown's novel as something not worth reading simply because its modern fiction. This is classic illiterate behaviour, I'm sure the works of E. M. Forster published by Penguin would like to disagree.
Hello Copperknickers,
While I agree with you on the fact that there is a gap in recognition between popular culture and "highbrow" culture, have you taken into account a) the rates at which new works of art are created and b) the lasting effect each work is wished to have ?
As much as today's bestsellers (be they musical, literary,etc) may deserve the recognition and success they get, the fact is, imho, that culture today can also become a product meant to be quickly consumed and forgotten.
The reason I say this is that I find it hard to imagine that some recent popular works won't be completely forgotten in, let's say, a hundred years' time, unlike the so-called high culture.
Another point I'd like to mention is the relation between 'effort spent to understand/appreciate' a work, and lasting interest for said work. In other words, the more effort you put into studying and understanding a novel / song / etc., the more its value will sink in for you, and consequently, you'll be able to enjoy it for far longer. On the other hand, (to be grossly extreme), you have songs that are computer-made with a double serving of auto-tune, which are popular for a week / a month, and then (gladly) forgotten.
All this to say that, yes, there is a snobbery problem, (and it sadly doesn't seem to be going away, on the contrary), but the gap aforementioned has some grounds.
Cheers,
Xavier
While I agree with you on the fact that there is a gap in recognition between popular culture and "highbrow" culture, have you taken into account a) the rates at which new works of art are created and b) the lasting effect each work is wished to have ?
As much as today's bestsellers (be they musical, literary,etc) may deserve the recognition and success they get, the fact is, imho, that culture today can also become a product meant to be quickly consumed and forgotten.
The reason I say this is that I find it hard to imagine that some recent popular works won't be completely forgotten in, let's say, a hundred years' time, unlike the so-called high culture.
Another point I'd like to mention is the relation between 'effort spent to understand/appreciate' a work, and lasting interest for said work. In other words, the more effort you put into studying and understanding a novel / song / etc., the more its value will sink in for you, and consequently, you'll be able to enjoy it for far longer. On the other hand, (to be grossly extreme), you have songs that are computer-made with a double serving of auto-tune, which are popular for a week / a month, and then (gladly) forgotten.
All this to say that, yes, there is a snobbery problem, (and it sadly doesn't seem to be going away, on the contrary), but the gap aforementioned has some grounds.
Cheers,
Xavier
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