Why Beauty Matters... and does it?

[stlukesguild]

"If at any time between 1750 and 1930 if had had asked educated people to describe the aim of poetry, art, or music, they would have replied, "Beauty." And if you had asked for the point of that, you would have learned that Beauty is a value... as important as truth and goodness. Then in the 20th century, Beauty stopped being important... It was not Beauty, but originality, however achieved and at whatever moral cost that won the prizes..."

"Today people are a little more cynical... But this is not because they have lost the interest in beauty or the need to encounter it in their daily lives. They have lost faith in art as a way of supplying that need...
People may have given up on art... But they still design their own lives...
This search for aesthetic order is not just a luxury; it is essential to life in society. It is one way in which we send out signals of humility, and show that we are not just animals foraging for our needs but civilized beings who wish to live at peace with our neighbours." -Roger Scruton

When old age shall this generation waste,
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say'st,
'Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.'

-John Keats Ode on a Grecian Urn

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65YpzZrwKI4&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mx0l3qfO-ck&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cg-_pTzZUpM&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vX6Gpr0Rlg4&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyulImC-nZE&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKRaIx38aSo&feature=related

I've been recently musing upon the issue of "beauty" in art... in my own work as well as in that of others... and I came across Scruton's short film on subject at the same time as I've been reading Umberto Eco's History of Beauty and Wendy Steiner's Venus in Exile: The Rejection of beauty in 20th Century Art. I am not about to suggest there is no beauty in 20th century art or music... nor would I suggest that I don't understand the Modernist leaning toward the horrific and "ugly"... especially considering the horrors of the century (although what era in history did not have its own horrors to the same or even a greater degree?) Still I ponder how it is that even the term "Beauty" could be seen today as something loaded... a value open to debate as to its merits in art. Steiner suggests that beauty was seen by Modernists as linked with feminine and bourgeois aesthetics and the concept of Man= Culture/Woman= Nature and thus artists such as the Futurist Marinetti could call for banning the female nude from art, critics of Matisse could reject him as too "feminine" as opposed to the "masculine Picasso.

Anyway... just musing. Any thoughts as too how this relates to literature... as well as music and art?

[dfloyd]

"On Viewing Chapman's Iliad." No one today would think of writing poetry about a book.

[mayneverhave]

Well, I'm certainly one of those "cynical people" described by Roger Scruton. I would, perhaps, attribute the reluctance of modern generations to label anything beautiful as a product of the philosophical secularism of the 20th century. One can look towards the logical positivists, such as Bertrand Russell, and other anti-idealist writers and philosophers who strayed away from the lavish concepts of Beauty and Sublimity which were of such importance in the 19th century. Now when you have roughly contemporary philosophers like the recently deceased Richard Rorty, who, like others before him, questioned the nature of Truth as some external, out there thing to be worshiped like a god, and instead, decided that only propositions like, "It's raining", can be true or false, and not nature.

As for me, I tend to avoid searching for beauty in literature (which is the only artistic field in which I feel entirely comfortable and knowledgeable), because the concept is entirely too vague. Perhaps if we could define it.

[JCamilo]

"On Viewing Chapman's Iliad." No one today would think of writing poetry about a book.

To be honest, Keats poem was about his experience reading the book, not about the book itself and today, more than ever, people talk about the effect of reading than anything else, be it a poem or a short story.

Frankly, I think nothing changed. Schiller was more right than wrong and modernists did little that was not done by romantics. Duchamps fountain has the same effect of Lyricall Ballads and how Wordsworth and Coleridge picked themes or a language that should not belong to poetry. That was the main bulk of critics they received and in the end, they are working with poetry or art as inside a context. Of course, Duchamps did inside a ironical context, but it was the same.
Also, we can find aesthetical authors such as Borges in the XX century and among the romantics, we can find Poe and Baudelaire, who had also the notion that the idealization of beauty specially as a woman could be challenged. Poe took Byron morbid approach beyond anything: the grotesque, the ugly, the dead was able to provoque the feeling of beauty. Baudelaire (who was already a defender of newspaper cartoons and the representation of human face smirking,etc as part of art) fame was mostly because his muses are sick, dying rotting, his albatroz is not flying, etc. Everything clumsy, akward...
Beauty should be replaced by some short of aesthetical effect, something that provokes as state of bewilderiment. Something that happens, not something static only identified with one thing (albeit, just like a rose is a rose, a woman is beauty and that is all), Dante probally knew it. Such poet and his name is often identified with Hell, tortures, pain, El Grego painting of a serious and tormented guy, dantesque is something that does not evoke que harmony of his poetry.
If anything, I think the modernism changes is about the access and the place where art is. They already knew, they had notion of the industry, they either embraced it or went radically against it. But originality? I got the feeling most of them feared the excess, the end of creation because all was copied, all was already there which was a probally answer to the industry (and Horkheimer and Adorno and Benjamin influences)...

[The Comedian]

Great question. . . . so good that I'm not sure how to respond to it.

Off the cuff, though. . . . a lot of my students (and probably myself too) see literature as a vehicle to some "truth", large or small, about the human, social, or natural condition. And, because we live in cynical times, most believe that "the truth" is essentially bad news and ugliness -- that beauty is a sort of maple veneer that covers the ugly, mass-produced particle board that gives an unstable structure to our lives. But I'm only guessing.

Of course, maybe there's a modern association with beauty as transitory, fleeting, and therefore not worth our time. But, ugly, we feel somehow has real staying-power. Maybe a long time ago people felt that under the world's ugliness was beauty and, as a result, elevated its value.

[Alexander III]

Well I am of the opinion as Wilde said, that morality is a flaw which must be tolerated, the sole purpose of art is the creation of beauty. I consider the highest and most powerful form of artistic expression to be Music, all other arts simply seek to emulate the beauty of music. Music, there in no social commentary, philosophy, or morality in Vivaldi's four seasons, there is only beauty, and as Keats said beauty is truth. Since the dawn of man, beauty has always been appreciated and revered for its almost holiness, all other things fade away with their epoch, except beauty, beauty is eternal.

The pursuit of anything less than beauty, is a degradation of art.

Of course there is the matter of what is beauty ? Poe and Baudelaire have shows that in the grotesque there can be beauty, so let us not limit ourselves to the cliche notion of beauty.

[LitNetIsGreat]

Interesting stuff - just watching the film at present so I'll comment later, though I'm not too keen on the urinal or can of crap as great art - if that's a clue to my position!

Edit extra:

Ah can only be brief because I want to go to bed and finish a novel...

Basically my own instinct is that I hate to put any limitations on what art is or what art should be - that should certainly be left for the individual artist to decide. My only must (in literature) is that a book is well written, then for me most things follow on from there. However, if it can be argued that aestheticism has limitations (which I think in many respects it has) it certainly can be argued that art that intends to shock by being vulgar - cue can of crap - certainly does. As he said in the video, work that seems to purposely avoid beauty by courting the vulgar, perhaps under the guise of originality or shock value cannot last, just like those awful 60s buildings, they seem to quickly lose their appeal. It is fine making a statement through art, and I do understand all the postmodern-fragmentation-of-society-angle business, but for me at the end of the day all that pretty much matters is if the work is any good. For me that's about the only important thing as I have little time or patience for poor/mediocre art.

[stlukesguild]

What Scruton and a host of other critics have pointed out is that the abandonment of "beauty" as a key element of art in many ways is tied to art's lack of relevance to the larger audience. Where the fine arts... music, art, literature... once presented the audience with a concept of beauty... often challenging the accepted stereotypes (ala Baudelaire) the rejection of beauty in no way eliminated the desire of need for beauty. As such, is it surprising that popular music, Hollywood films and celebrities, and other forms of popular arts have become increasingly relevant if only because they provide this concept of beauty to a culture tired of artistic "ugliness"?

Of particular interest I noted the comparative tables in the front of Umberto Eco's History of Beauty. Here Eco explored the evolution of ideals of beauty over history. In one table, for example, he explores "Venus" or the ideal female body. We compare the female nude from Egypt, Greece, Rome, the Renaissance, the Romantic period... all the way until the onset of Modernism... and then suddenly... after Klimt, Modigliani, and Bonnard... this ideal goes missing in art. Picasso painted paintings that were "beautiful"... but no images of women who one might call beautiful. Monet and Bonnard present us with ideals of the beautiful landscape... beauty in nature... but Anselm Kiefer's war-ravaged landscapes? I quite like Penderecki myself... but I don't think that he or Ligeti, Stockhausen, Crumb, etc... offer much that can be called beautiful music.

[Alexander III]

Hmm Well I think the problem we have of contemporary art rejecting beauty and thriving in ugliness, is reminiscent of the extended stagnation of the neo-classical period. For example modernism was a direct reaction to the horrors of WWI which literally traumatized and turned an entire generation into nihilists and cynics. Thus in modernism the seed of the rejection of beauty were sown, as their thought was, how can we sit here and live and create a world of beauty when out our windows a million men died to take 200 yards of land... Beauty became a sort of self satire to itself. The idea was good and produced great art in its own merit which did killed the conventional take of beauty to replace it with a new beauty, if filled the void it made.

Then we come to what happens after modernism, this is what I compare to as the stagnation of neo-classicim, instead of ending the revolution of modernism, or finding a new path, the revolution never ends, due to laziness, or other reasons I do not know. yet the revolution never ends, it goes from revolution out of necessity to revolution for the sake of revolution, and at this pace of revolution, only originality can survive, the constant revolution continues to discard everything of the past and there are countless revolutions against prevails revolutions against revolutions that, the entire thing becomes a sort of satire against itself which takes its self seriously. So we end up with crap in a jar, being the great art, as this is the greatest extenuation of revolution upon revolution possible.

The difference, modernism created a new beauty, yet postmodernism, has not filled the void with a new beauty, as it in in constant revolution without significance that no new beauty can be created. Modernism arrived from necessity, yet post- arrived from a sort of self indulgent frivolity of the glory of revolution, the result, the former has soul, the latter is born in the meaninglessness of revolution for revolutions sake so it can never have true meaning true beauty.

Of course everything I am saying may be wrong an 200 years from now everyone will be saying that the **** in a can was the true start of art....

[mortalterror]

I quite like Penderecki myself... but I don't think that he or Ligeti, Stockhausen, Crumb, etc... offer much that can be called beautiful music.

I was recently listening to those fellows, as well as other contemporary classical musicians, and as usual not liking any of it; when I thought about one of your comments, about how the Beatles would be nothing more than folk music a century from now, and I decided to dig deep and investigate all the popular music which you seemed so down upon. It was a revelation to me how much good music is actually out there, which has nothing to do with the classical genre. So thanks for that.

[JCamilo]

What Scruton and a host of other critics have pointed out is that the abandonment of "beauty" as a key element of art in many ways is tied to art's lack of relevance to the larger audience. Where the fine arts... music, art, literature... once presented the audience with a concept of beauty... often challenging the accepted stereotypes (ala Baudelaire) the rejection of beauty in no way eliminated the desire of need for beauty. As such, is it surprising that popular music, Hollywood films and celebrities, and other forms of popular arts have become increasingly relevant if only because they provide this concept of beauty to a culture tired of artistic "ugliness"?

Of particular interest I noted the comparative tables in the front of Umberto Eco's History of Beauty. Here Eco explored the evolution of ideals of beauty over history. In one table, for example, he explores "Venus" or the ideal female body. We compare the female nude from Egypt, Greece, Rome, the Renaissance, the Romantic period... all the way until the onset of Modernism... and then suddenly... after Klimt, Modigliani, and Bonnard... this ideal goes missing in art. Picasso painted paintings that were "beautiful"... but no images of women who one might call beautiful. Monet and Bonnard present us with ideals of the beautiful landscape... beauty in nature... but Anselm Kiefer's war-ravaged landscapes? I quite like Penderecki myself... but I don't think that he or Ligeti, Stockhausen, Crumb, etc... offer much that can be called beautiful music.

But is the ideal of beauty lost from Graphic Art? Photography and Movies explored it a lot (still do). It is not about the concept of female sensuality, they are elsewhere. So, I would guess it has much more to do with the fact that the woman body was over-used elsewhere that picasso would keep them to for himself...

If The idea of Woman Beauty was lost, we would not see it in any art. We do, literature included (Yeats Maude, Breton Nadja, The female fatale of Raymond Chandler, the women in Neruda or Drummond poetry,etc) not to mention rock and roll (and etc) exploration of women body and the aforementioned movies and pictures...

Now, the abandon of nature is bit more easy, the main shift of all art is the adaptation to urban areas.

[stlukesguild]

Mortal... I never suggested that I dislike "folk music" or popular music. Some I quite like... some I dislike... some is quite good... and some I suspect is quite worthless. Recently I've been exploring the blues in some depth: Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, Son House, B.B. King, Big Maybelle, Big Mamma Thornton, Elmore James, Junior Wells, Sonny Boy Williamson, John Lee Hooker, etc... Some of the music deigned as folk music will survive... just as Greensleeves and various medieval and Renaissance folk melodies have survived. Indeed... as a result of the access to recording technology much more of the folk music of our time is likely to survive than at any time in the past where the only means of preserving music was through written scoring... unknown to most folk musicians.

Still there is a clear difference between the genre. Recently listening to a new release of Philip Glass' Einstein on the Beach I came upon a description by the composer of this difference which I quite agree with:

"There's one important distinction between concert musicians and pop musicians; I think it's the only important distinction. When you talk about concert musicians, you're talking about people who actually invent language.
They create values, a value being a unit of meaning that is new and different. Pop musicians package language. I don't think there's anything wrong with packaging language; some of that can be very good music. I realized long ago that people were going to make money off of my ideas in a way that I'm not capable or interested in doing.One thing these... groups have done, though, they've taken the language and made it much more accessible. It's been helpful."

Composers of classical music or concert music are certainly much more self-conscious... much more aware of the whole of the tradition, the mechanics, and how they are adding to or building upon this tradition. I suspect that some popular music involves innovations of language that are just as great... but these seem to evolve more organically... less self-consciously. One doubts that Elvis was aware of how his music fused elements of Scottish/Irish folk music through Appalachia, bluegrass, jazz, R&B, etc... Even a group like the Beatles that shattered conventions in rock and popular music is not inventing a new language, but rather fusing pop with elements of classical, jazz, cabaret, marching music, and even the experiments of Varese and Stockhausen. Honestly I would rather listen to their use of sound effects (concrete music) than Varese and Stockhausen's any day... until they get to Revolution Number 9... which owes much more to Yoko and her pretentious notions of the avant garde.

But is the ideal of beauty lost from Graphic Art? Photography and Movies explored it a lot (still do). It is not about the concept of female sensuality, they are elsewhere. So, I would guess it has much more to do with the fact that the woman body was over-used elsewhere that picasso would keep them to for himself...

If The idea of Woman Beauty was lost, we would not see it in any art. We do, literature included (Yeats Maude, Breton Nadja, The female fatale of Raymond Chandler, the women in Neruda or Drummond poetry,etc) not to mention rock and roll (and etc) exploration of women body and the aforementioned movies and pictures...

Now, the abandon of nature is bit more easy, the main shift of all art is the adaptation to urban areas.

It is not merely the disappearance of the image of the ideal beautiful woman... but also of the ideal beautiful male or the ideal beauty in nature... or even architecture. And yes... I am talking about the traditional "fine arts" as opposed to photography, film, and pop music... which have largely filled this void. Picasso arguably creates objects... paintings that are beautiful. The same might be said of Matisse. But they are not images of beauty. No one seeing one of Picasso's women in real life... fragmented... with blue face and three breasts... would imagine her as "beautiful".

I am just throwing out the question with regard to literature... although it would seem that for whatever reason literature seems far less infected with the concept of the rejection of beauty... just as it seems far less infected with many of the extremes of music and art. Certainly, the are probably literary counterparts to Duchamp's urinal, Manzoni's can of crap, Cage's 4:33, Stockhausen's Quartet for Helicopter, or Damian Hirst pickled shark... but they seem to be afforded far less serious consideration than they are in art. Perhaps because the intellectual underpinnings that seem profound to the less literate visual artist or musician would be more rapidly dismissed as absurd by serious literary critic?:shocked:

[JCamilo]

Well, I do not know if you are just in a moody moment after beauty :D, but it literature can be trash as hell. I mean, you do not need even to be deep to write a good. We have the penny dreadfulls of XIX century, we have the haird boiled, we have Paulo Coelho, we have Milan Kundera… Jesus, how many pretentious philosophers or students do you find? And here even? Guys who will use a French hat and pretend to know Baudelaire and quote him to impress some girl (which, it would be the uttermost offense, considering Baudelaire muses were often ugly)…
Literature has a problem that no other art form has, which is the fact that literacy is a social question. It shows domain of idiom and the idiom is a form of socio-cultural domination. So people must learn how to read. I do not see people saying “Hey, that one is excluded from society, he cannt draw a square”, or “Just how awful was his whistle..” Literature is used to be profane, never was truly sacred art, but rather a technological movement from the myth…The place for the non-artistic in literature is much better defined (it is always more practical), either you like or not, Journalism is literature, for example. So, yeah, it affects less, a poet wont tremble before a scientific thesis. Because frankly, literary critic and visual art critics ? I am not sure which one is the more rabid…
I do not think you can ignore other arts. You can not ignore photography in XIX century and how it affected the perception of colors, you can not ignore that the development of poetry has affected some of musical production,etc. I think most people were wrong when they think Cinema, tv etc would take the space of other arts regarding the production. No, it is the influence of perception and more, talents would move to that area. So, I am sure Painting lost some blood to phography and cinema. Just like Literature or drama did too. So, I am sure if we find the concept of beauty (human or female) elsewhere, it is valid. It is traditional arts who did not found interest to represent it anymore or at least in the realistic way, since it was very covered by other fields. Cannt forget comic book artists which ideal of men physical shape is near Adonis or Dianas representations. In female situation, even comical representations go near it (A female in Asterix is often more realistic than Obelix or Asterix).
Regarding Picasso, I must say I never saw a greek representation of Helen that strikes me as beautiful. Neither in the text of Homer. They do not look like the women I know. You probably can understand those women were beautiful (if that was Picasso intent) more than if I say she was like the dawn or a rose. As nature, well nature was replaced, if the story of literature could be resume to a single conflict in the XIX century it would be the adaptation of traditional forms to urban areas. That was what Poe did basically. There is now a concept if ideal city…

[mortalterror]

I am just throwing out the question with regard to literature... although it would seem that for whatever reason literature seems far less infected with the concept of the rejection of beauty... just as it seems far less infected with many of the extremes of music and art. Certainly, the are probably literary counterparts to Duchamp's urinal, Manzoni's can of crap, Cage's 4:33, Stockhausen's Quartet for Helicopter, or Damian Hirst pickled shark... but they seem to be afforded far less serious consideration than they are in art. Perhaps because the intellectual underpinnings that seem profound to the less literate visual artist or musician would be more rapidly dismissed as absurd by serious literary critic?:shocked:

Probably because nobody's ever made a good case for abstract language, or conceptual literature. Matisse's definition of painting as color applied to a surface, just wouldn't fly in literature. Letters applied to a surface do not make good reading. Somebody above said that all art, all beauty aspired to the simplicity of music. I see a lot more order and structure in music than I see in scent, so maybe that should be your goal if your ideal is an aery nothing. Personally, I think that good art comes from good structure.

BTW StLukes, when you finish On Beauty, maybe you should read Eco's companion piece On Ugliness, if this topic intrigues you so much.

[JCamilo]

Well, concrete poetry went too much direct to this... didnt worked quite well i think...

[Drkshadow03]

Interesting stuff - just watching the film at present so I'll comment later, though I'm not too keen on the urinal or can of crap as great art - if that's a clue to my position!


Are you saying my creation in the bathroom this morning wasn't art!!!! :shocked:

[mortalterror]

Mortal... I never suggested that I dislike "folk music" or popular music. Some I quite like... some I dislike... some is quite good... and some I suspect is quite worthless. Recently I've been exploring the blues in some depth: Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, Son House, B.B. King, Big Maybelle, Big Mamma Thornton, Elmore James, Junior Wells, Sonny Boy Williamson, John Lee Hooker, etc... Some of the music deigned as folk music will survive... just as Greensleeves and various medieval and Renaissance folk melodies have survived. Indeed... as a result of the access to recording technology much more of the folk music of our time is likely to survive than at any time in the past where the only means of preserving music was through written scoring... unknown to most folk musicians.

Still there is a clear difference between the genre. Recently listening to a new release of Philip Glass' Einstein on the Beach I came upon a description by the composer of this difference which I quite agree with:

"There's one important distinction between concert musicians and pop musicians; I think it's the only important distinction. When you talk about concert musicians, you're talking about people who actually invent language.
They create values, a value being a unit of meaning that is new and different. Pop musicians package language. I don't think there's anything wrong with packaging language; some of that can be very good music. I realized long ago that people were going to make money off of my ideas in a way that I'm not capable or interested in doing.One thing these... groups have done, though, they've taken the language and made it much more accessible. It's been helpful."

Composers of classical music or concert music are certainly much more self-conscious... much more aware of the whole of the tradition, the mechanics, and how they are adding to or building upon this tradition. I suspect that some popular music involves innovations of language that are just as great... but these seem to evolve more organically... less self-consciously. One doubts that Elvis was aware of how his music fused elements of Scottish/Irish folk music through Appalachia, bluegrass, jazz, R&B, etc... Even a group like the Beatles that shattered conventions in rock and popular music is not inventing a new language, but rather fusing pop with elements of classical, jazz, cabaret, marching music, and even the experiments of Varese and Stockhausen. Honestly I would rather listen to their use of sound effects (concrete music) than Varese and Stockhausen's any day... until they get to Revolution Number 9... which owes much more to Yoko and her pretentious notions of the avant garde.

I'm not so sure that popular musicians, the best popular musicians, can be written off as uneducated or unaware of musical history. Based on the virtuosity I've seen displayed from certain quarters, I have to seriously doubt that they are even less well trained than their classical contemporaries. Bands like Pink Floyd or Led Zepplin are far from unsophisticated country bumpkins which the labels "folk" or "popular" conjure up.

As for Mr. Glass, I'm not sure what he's attempting to say there. Perhaps, you could provide another quote, or explain his quote in your own words?

I quite like your list of blues musicians, and would add:

Henry VIII- Greensleeves
Richard Shuckburgh- Yankee Doodle
John Newton- Amazing Grace
Francis Scott Key- The Star-Spangled Banner
Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle- The Marseillaise
Julia Ward Howe- Battle Hymn of the Republic
John Owen- Men of Harlech
Jesus Gonzalez Rubio- Jarabe Tapatio
Daniel Decatur Emmett- Dixie
Patrick Gilmore- When Johnny Comes Marching Home
Percy Montrose- My Darling, Clementine
Gilbert and Sullivan- Major-General's Song
Eugene Pottier- The Internationale
John Philip Sousa- Stars and Stripes Forever
Banjo Paterson- Waltzing Matilda
Anonymous- I've Been Working on the Railroad
Charles H. Brown- The Yellow Rose of Texas
Frederick Weatherly- Danny Boy
Chauncey Olcott- When Irish Eyes Are Smiling
20s
Mykola Dmytrovych Leontovych- Carol of the Bells
Paul Robeson- Ol' Man River
Al Jolson- I'm Sitting On Top of the World
Joseito Fernandez- Guantanamera
30s
Comedian Harmonists- Veronika
Robert Johnson- Crossroad
Benny Goodman- Sing, Sing, Sing
Cab Calloway- Minnie the Moocher
The Andrews Sisters- Bei Mir Bist du Schoen
Cole Porter- Anything Goes
Leadbelly- Pick a Bale of Cotton
Carlos Gardel- Por una cabeza
Judy Garland- Over the Rainbow
Fred Astaire- Cheek to Cheek
Glenn Miller- In the Mood
Artie Shaw- Begin the Beguine
Duke Ellington- It Don't Mean a Thing (If it Ain't Got that Swing)
40s
The Ink Spots- Maybe
Bing Crosby- White Christmas
Lena Horne- Stormy Weather
The Mills Brothers- Till Then
Woody Guthrie- This Land is Your Land
John Lee Hooker- Boogie Chillen
Vera Lynn- We'll Meet Again
Edith Piaf- La Vie en Rose
Tino Rossi- Besame Mucho
Louis Jordan- Choo Choo Ch'Boogie
50s
Elmore James- Dust My Broom
Muddy Waters- Mannish Boy
Hank Williams- Your Cheatin' Heart
Bo Diddley- Bo Diddley
The Platters- Only You
Eddy Arnold- Cattle Call
Tennessee Ernie Ford - Sixteen Tons
Little Richard- Tutti Fruity
Buddy Holly- Peggy Sue
Ella Fitzgerald- Blue Skies
Jerry Louis- Great Balls of Fire
Elvis Presley- Jailhouse Rock
Chuck Berry- Johnny B. Goode
60s
Howlin' Wolf- Spoonful
Etta James- At Last
Ray Charles- Hit the Road Jack
Sam Cooke- Chain Gang
The Animals- House of the Rising Sun
The Kingsmen- Louie Louie
The Four Seasons- Walk Like a Man
Gene Chandler- Duke of Earl
Patsy Cline- Crazy
Ennio Morricone- The Ecstasy of Gold
Bob Dylan- Like a Rolling Stone
Wilson Pickett- Mustang Sally
Aretha Franklin- Respect
The Beatles- Hey Jude
Cannonball Adderly- Mercy, Mercy, Mercy
Johnny Cash- Ring of Fire
Jimi Hendrix- All Along the Watchtower
The Velvet Underground- I'm Waiting For The Man
Credence Clearwater Revival- Bad Moon Rising
The Doors- Break on Through
Frank Sinatra- My Way
Steppenwolf- Born to Be Wild
Otis Redding- Sitting on the Dock of the Bay
Louis Armstrong- What a Wonderful World
Crosby, Stills, and Nash- Suite: Judy Blue Eyes
Janis Joplin- Me and Bobby McGee
David Bowie- Space Oddity
70s
B.B. King- The Thrill is Gone
The Rolling Stones-Angie
Marvin Gaye- What's Going On?
Black Sabbath- Iron Man
Jethro Tull- Aqualung
Eric Clapton- Layla
John Denver- Rocky Mountain High
Deep Purple- Smoke on the Water
John Lennon- Imagine
Aerosmith- Dream On
Led Zepplin- Stairway to Heaven
The Who- Baba O'Riley
Neil Young- Heart of Gold
KISS- Detroit Rock City
Alice Cooper- No More Mr Nice Guy
Pink Floyd- Eclipse
Lynryd Skynyrd- Free bird
Van Halen- Eruption
Sex Pistols- Anarchy in the UK
The Eagles- Hotel California
Queen- Bohemian Rhapsody
Sugarhill Gang- Rapper's Delight
80s
Ozzy Osbourne- Crazy Train
Rush- Tom Sawyer
Iron Maiden- Run to the Hills
George Thorogood- Bad to the Bone
Dio- Holy Diver
Saxon- Crusader
Anthrax- Madhouse
Michael Jackson- Thriller
Megadeth- Peace Sells
Run DMC- Rock Box
Bruce Springsteen- Born in the USA
Guns N Roses- Sweet Child of Mine
Poison- Every Rose Has It's Thorn
Jane's Addiction- Jane Says
Danzig- Mother
Public Enemy- Fight the Power
90s
LL Cool J- Mama Said Knock You Out
Pantera- Cemetery Gates
AC/DC- Thunderstruck
Pearl Jam- Black
Metallica- Enter Sandman
2pac- Changes
Nirvana- Smells Like Teen Spirit
Kyuss- Thong Song
Dr. Dre- Nuthin' But a G Thang
Green Day- Good Riddance(Time of Your Life)
Alice in Chains- Rooster
Nine Inch Nails- Closer
Smashing Pumpkins- Today
Radiohead- Karma Police
Blind Guardian- Mirror Mirror
Rammstein- Engel
The Offspring- The Kids Aren't Alright
00s
Rage Against the Machine- Renegades of Funk
Daft Punk- Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger
Andrew W.K.- Party Hard
Eminem- Stan
Wolfmother- The Joker and the Thief in the Night
The Darkness- I Believe in a Thing Called Love
Queens of the Stone Age- Go With the Flow
JayZ- Dirt Off Your Shoulder
Kanye West- Jesus Walks
Judas Priest- Judas Rising

[spookymulder93]

That's a long list dude.

[mortalterror]

That's a long list dude.

I tried to make it as thorough as I could, so that people wouldn't doubt the veracity of my claim, to wit: that there are a great number of popular songs that rise to a very high standard. However, when you look at the list, it rarely goes over about 15 songs per decade; so you can see that I'm being discriminating and not just letting anything in there. There are a number of songs and artists I personally love which I just didn't think could make the cut or breathe the same air as Frank Sinatra, Bob Dylan, and Ella Fitzgerald. It's not even a complete list, since I don't know about the international scene. There are probably good Salsa, Reggae, Enka, and yodeling songs which kick ***, but I've never heard of. I was also looking into some of the Victorian era music hall stuff, and the golden age of parlour music as well, thinking there might be some undiscovered gems lying in wait, but it's pretty difficult to unearth the number one hit in Scotland from 1857 without doing some fairly intensive research, and I'm probably not the best guy to do it. Mainly, my point was just to enlarge on an earlier discussion Stlukes and I were having, and point out that popular music isn't just Britney Spears or Lady Gaga, and show that the mass of people actually do show some taste and discrimination from time to time. Culture and well developed artistic sense are not a sort of monopoly of the rich or intellectual elite.

[blazeofglory]

Beauty was the subject in the romantic era and a beautiful damsel became the sum and substance of most romantic poets. But that does not mean that in the twentieth century beauty is not taken that way but that does not mean that there is no appreciation of beauty.l Beauty took a different form. Beauty is everything and everywhere. I still adore beauty in my writing. I try to write beautifully and this suggests beauty is there inherently in everything we do. But the issue is there is no personification of beauty modern literature. The beauty of the rose is appreciated even in modern poetry but it is in a different light. A rural girl can arrest our minds but the ugliness of the society that renders her poor there too cannot be ruled out in a modern poem. We kind of give weightage to the negativity of the poem. This is an intricate issue

[JCamilo]

Beauty is not just fancy, it is style and substance. If it was everywhere, it would be not admired and neither sought for.
The romantic beauty was not just imagem(and neither it was just a damsel, where is the ladies of William Blake? or the Ancient Mariner), it was a concept. No wonder Coleridge had demands that a poet needs to be philosopher, he does not consider the aim needed to be just a representative of style. Keats does not use only Fanny to talk about beauty and art, he used an urn and a bird. In many aspects, the popular female idea is from the romance writers, not from poets, who were much less direct on their approach.
I think the problem of beauty in modern times is exactly the idea that it is commun or so relative that would not matter. Would greeks and trojans fight for 10 years if there was women like Helen everywhere?


That's a long list dude.

Poor Mortalterror, he did created a canon... :party:

[Alexander III]

Yes Jc is right, ugliness is easy to create an is everywhere, beauty is rare, and dam near impossible to create in art, that is why the past stove for it so much, in their worlds of suffering, which make ours look almost like a heaven (the west) beauty in art was one of the few lights they had, I suppose the elimination of true suffering in the west has rendered beauty more trivial as we are no longer surrounded by suffering and ugliness, so beauty is less required.

[Patrick_Bateman]

Not everyone wrote and painted in awe and appreciation of beauty.
Dorian Gray for example shows the villainy and evil that comes with or from beauty.

[LitNetIsGreat]

You could certainly read Dorian Gray as a critique of aestheticism, but at the end of the day you can't forget that the book itself is a work of art, whereas the can of crap is just a can of crap - it has no lasting appeal and its only merit, if it has to have one, is for its initial shock value or comment on society/consumer culture - or whatever it was supposed to be about. Yes it might provoke comment and argument but for how long are you supposed to sit and look at it?:shocked:

[OrphanPip]

That's a long list dude.

A lot of which I disagree with, I think this calls for a pop music cannon thread in General Chat!

[JCamilo]

You could certainly read Dorian Gray as a critique of aestheticism, but at the end of the day you can't forget that the book itself is a work of art, whereas the can of crap is just a can of crap - it has no lasting appeal and its only merit, if it has to have one, is for its initial shock value or comment on society/consumer culture - or whatever it was supposed to be about. Yes it might provoke comment and argument but for how long are you supposed to sit and look at it?:shocked:

The problem of his comment lies in three directions:

1 - Villany and Evil also provokes awe. As Oscar said, there is not immoral books...

2 - Oscar Wilde uses irony. He does not think what is written in his plays, he proposes ideas to contrasts with the victorias society or his own philosophical musings. Anyone who reads Wilde art criticism finds someone who appreciates beauty a lot.

3 - Dorian still about Beauty. Not the absence of it.


Yes Jc is right, ugliness is easy to create an is everywhere, beauty is rare, and dam near impossible to create in art, that is why the past stove for it so much, in their worlds of suffering, which make ours look almost like a heaven (the west) beauty in art was one of the few lights they had, I suppose the elimination of true suffering in the west has rendered beauty more trivial as we are no longer surrounded by suffering and ugliness, so beauty is less required.

Well, I do not think it is possible to eliminate suffering and I do not think Western society had done it. I think the image of tormented artists is a cultural counter argument to the bummer artists, that good for nothing dude who keeps musing and not working. Slowly, culture provides both vision when we know truth is more like in the middle... Art is work (and yes, I am aware work is a punishment otherwise would be enterteiment, it was the effort of Eve to catch the fruit that was the sin!) and obviously does not happens without effort.

[Patrick_Bateman]

The problem of his comment lies in three directions:

1 - Villany and Evil also provokes awe. As Oscar said, there is not immoral books...

2 - Oscar Wilde uses irony. He does not think what is written in his plays, he proposes ideas to contrasts with the victorias society or his own philosophical musings. Anyone who reads Wilde art criticism finds someone who appreciates beauty a lot.

3 - Dorian still about Beauty. Not the absence of it.

Wow you tore me apart there


I agreed with number 1 though before hand however.
I just didn't articulate my initial comment properly

[LitNetIsGreat]

The problem of his comment lies in three directions:

1 - Villany and Evil also provokes awe. As Oscar said, there is not immoral books...

2 - Oscar Wilde uses irony. He does not think what is written in his plays, he proposes ideas to contrasts with the victorias society or his own philosophical musings. Anyone who reads Wilde art criticism finds someone who appreciates beauty a lot.

3 - Dorian still about Beauty. Not the absence of it.

... it was the can of crap I was refering to as "no lasting appeal" not Dorian Gray.:lol:

I'm well aware of Wilde's position, believe me, and I agree with your assessments.

:lol:

[stlukesguild]

Yes Jc is right, ugliness is easy to create an is everywhere, beauty is rare, and dam near impossible to create in art, that is why the past stove for it so much, in their worlds of suffering, which make ours look almost like a heaven (the west) beauty in art was one of the few lights they had, I suppose the elimination of true suffering in the west has rendered beauty more trivial as we are no longer surrounded by suffering and ugliness, so beauty is less required.

Funny, but your thoughts here remind me of my college painting teacher. Julian Stanczak was born in Poland and was studying to be a cellist when the Second World War began.

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4109/4974726705_8b07f108bb.jpg

He was in Eastern Poland which was subjected to Soviet occupation as part of the Russian pact with Hitler. Like many intellectuals he was shipped off to a gulag for re-education. Soviet guards in the gulag broke his arm in multiple places after catching the then 14-year-old making comic drawings of Stalin. He was given no medical treatment. When the Germans invaded the Soviet Union, the Russians were forced to release all Polish nationals if they were to garner any support from the Western allies. These Poles were left to fend for themselves amidst the chaos of the rapid German invasion.

Julian found his way through the southern Soviet republics into Turkey and eventually Africa. In Africa he was stricken with malaria which infected his already damaged arm leaving it useless. He eventually found his way to Britain and then the US where he taught himself to use his other arm and went on to major in art, studying under Joseph Albers of the Bauhaus School at Yale.

Julian frequently commented upon how he was confused by the work of so many of his American students. In spite of all he had lived through and witnessed, his goal in art was that of a transcendent beauty. The work was abstract... yet reveled in the sublime and even spiritually suggestive effects of light and color:

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4133/4975338894_abb0a06d2a.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4092/4975339012_ec738bc9a4.jpg

Stanczak was of the belief that beauty was perhaps the greatest protest against ugliness.

On the other hand... so many of his students... young, healthy, Americans born and raised in perhaps the wealthiest and most privileged culture to ever have existed seemed driven to churn out bleak angst-laden images of horror and ugliness. One almost suspects these students felt a certain envy... for not having experienced the horrors that they imagined would inspire artistic depth and profundity.

On a more succinct personal note this desire to be seen as tragic... suffering... reminds me of a college girlfriend who once declared, "I wish I were a black lesbian, then I'd really have something to bi**h about!":shocked::crazy::smilielol5:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDw3ZOUrPTY&feature=player_embedded#!

[Alexander III]

@ JC, Didnt say suffering is eliminated, just greatly reduced (in the west)

@St.Lukes great minds think a like I suppose :P...though I admit I also agree with his stance that there is something in colors which is sublime, Colors seem the cherubs of Beauty almost.

I suppose that saying, The grass is always greener on the other side, holds true in art as well.

[JBI]

Lionel Trilling described something similar as the emergence during the late Enlightenment of the idea of Sincerity as essential to art, and that eventually shifting to a bigger focus on authenticity. Arguably the commercial presses of modernity really jolted the concept of art, giving in to a break from sincerity, as how can something so mechanical be sincere, to authenticity, as in, something that is genuine and original within a world of mechanical reproduction.

I think this is all nonsense to be honest, I doubt beauty has ever left.

My general opinion is that in the Freudian, Darwinian, and Marxist world, and what has come since, the concept of beauty has shifted to include a sort of new aesthetic of mechanical, or political, or structural emphasis. Violence, for instance, has become a sort of "Beauty" again, as it was on the Elizabethan stage.

Lets be honest, beauty has never not been popular - you speak of art stopping to try and capture beauty, but then fail to see how many photographers are out taking pictures of naked women for centerfolds. We live in a world obsessed with visual stimulation, and physicality.

What you really see the end of, I am guessing, is the unified agreement amongst "educated individuals", that is rich literati men, on what is beauty. Folk music, folk poetry, and a different ideal have always been present. What the 20th century just is make accessing anything you can think of much faster, thereby destabilizing the consensus of what beauty is.

[Drkshadow03]

I'm wonder if ugliness versus beauty is really a false binary? I realize my knowledge of the visual arts is nowhere near St. Luke's, but when I was reading through Janson's History of Western Art (art survey book) the introduction makes the excellent point that often ugliness can be beautiful in the emotions it stirs from us.

Certainly many of the figures in this image are ugly, although they contrast with Christ's solemnity and resignation, his eyes closed to all the ugliness around him.

http://faculty.up.edu/asarnow/351/bosch_kruisdraging_gent.jpg

And what about Grunewald's image of the Crucifixion?

http://static.artbible.info/large/kruis.jpg

I realize one could argue, "Well, you need to view the entire altarpiece together" and certainly the other images fit a more traditional view of beauty. Still, I think you can view Grunewald's image by itself and certainly is ugly. But in its ugliness and grim Christ there is a beauty in the message itself, in the stark power of the ugliness.

[JCamilo]

Well, in those cases, it is really the whole, or perhaps the structure that Mortalterror mentions. For pre-romantics germans, Beauty is not just a physical manifestation, they do put apart the aesthetical approach and the attractness to physical objects.
I sometimes do not like to use the word harmony, because attracts the notion of classical order, but I think it is relevant. Beauty happens when what you use is in harmony with the context and technique. Those ugly men constrast with Christ is a good example. It is the idea. The guitar riff seems out of place in a opera (or may sound) just like a sax can look odd in a punk rock music... who knows.

[LitNetIsGreat]

In the video Roger Scruton talks about great art as taking the everyday and forging that into the beautiful, so that beauty can be found in many things - the lines of age in an old man, the artist’s studio etc, etc as in Drk's painting. It is also what Wilde would argue for example in “The Decay of Lying” when he says that “art takes life as part of her rough material, recreates it in fresh forms.” It is not necessary anything to do with what we might mean by everyday notions of beauty. Scruton was not dismissing the notion that beauty can be found in many things; he was merely questioning the idea of craft and rejecting the modern notion of vulgarity as art or at least good art. Whether this is a messy bed with a condom on or a smashed sculpture covered in diarrhoea or a video of some silly women making herself puke. There is a big difference between taking the everyday and finding beauty within it (or recreating it into fresh forms) and the other things which come across to him (and to me) as simply vulgar and somewhat stupid.

[JCamilo]

Yeah, that goes to another question alltogether. It is fine to be a breakthru like Duchamps or I dunno, the pop art artists (who were not pop at all, but punkish) and then the commercial version of it.

Where I work there is a curse for oral storytellers and I am responsable for teaching Aesthetics (and also the history of storytelling, a bit of traditional forms and how it became the modern forms) and they are always questioning (Because in the end, I only tell them to apply socratic method to anything a teacher or however tell them and question any "definition" with direct pratical events. Obviously, the first person they target it is myself) with several examples : Is X, Y,Z art. And sometimes I give them: it is bad art. Obviously the vulgar can be transformed on art (Rabelais is art, peeing is art material for him) but the absusive use of it is? I think they are out of place, no context, no contribution, a process being cut. (Which obviously does not mean there is some Midas' pee somewhere.)

As using the popular, the mundane, I think it is an old lesson. I gave example of Wordsworth, but Virgil talked about mundane things also on Bucolicas and Georgicas and Ovid about make up in Ars Amadoria, havent them? But being mundane material to inspire art (a flower, the sunset, the sea are all mundane, we see them daily. So, a chair or a dead fish can be such material) does not mean it is not exceptional beauty. As some blind man said, quoting browning I think, beauty is there to surprise you.

[stlukesguild]

I would agree that Grünwald's Isenheim Crucifixion is "ugly". The artist clearly broke away from the tradition of crucifixions as somewhat idealized:

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4085/4977854907_e0c50f4777_z.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4149/4978463654_3a0778a457_b.jpg

Grünwald's altarpiece was intended for a Monastery of St. Anthony which dealt with those suffering from the ravages of the disease, "St. Anthony's Fire" or ergot poisoning. The disease was caused by eating grain which had been infected with Claviceps purpurea or ergot fungus. The symptoms of the disease included LSD-like hallucinations (thus the connection with Saint Anthony who was famous for his hallucinatory visions), convulsions, vomiting, diarrhea, and gangrenous infections leading to the loss of limbs, etc...

Grünwald clearly intended that the viewer recognize that the suffering of Christ through the crucifixion was as horrific as any suffering that he or she might have experienced in order to bolster his or her faith.

Ultimately, one might argue that there is a certain beauty in the horrific which Burke (among others) defined as the "sublime". One might argue that much art leans toward the "sublime" as opposed to the "beautiful". What Scruton suggests... and others have also recognized... is that not only is "beauty" as opposed to "sublimity" become challenged or questioned by a great many within the arts of the last century... to the point that there seems to be far less of the "beautiful"... but there is also a great push toward art which denies either sublimity or beauty... an art of banality for banality's sake or ugliness for ugliness' sake... shock art that ultimately employs shock and ugliness simply as a means of gain the attention of an increasingly jaded and desensitized audience:

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4153/4978500086_ef9e3d3852.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4111/4977892273_57103dfb67.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4151/4977892423_ba8e2efc28.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4154/4978500298_78006c7db3.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4148/4978500356_dcc4eb8e13.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4085/4978500320_eaf9fda196.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4125/4977892339_fec87bc4b1.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4131/4978500236_f39d55d65a_b.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4154/4978502770_17083eff46.jpg

While such art is not representative of the whole of what was happening and continues to be happening in the "art world", it is somewhat disturbing that art such as this is often dismissed as dated, anachronistic... or even mere "kitsch":

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4148/4978542532_4091974906_z.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4088/4978542560_3716828f43.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4127/4977935111_76c8d0a46b.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4128/4977935139_6773610659.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4129/4978542674_cc429835ab_z.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4154/4977935231_5d9e922b0a_z.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4131/4978542732_da2001869c_z.jpg

continued...

[stlukesguild]

Even in those instances where there is a certain surface beauty or beauty of craftsmanship... the actual work is often campy... mocking... ridiculous:

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4132/4978542768_4ecfd46356.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4124/4977935347_72e831998b.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4107/4977935391_65c47cd3c3.jpg

As I stated earlier... while I am aware of such ridiculous avant-garde experiments in literature... it never seems to have been taken seriously... let alone become a dominant voice. I somewhat wonder whether this is due to the fact that literature is supported by a larger audience whereas the visual arts are still largely "owned" by those with vast expendable wealth... a somewhat bored and jaded audience that falls for the scams of instant celebrity and the "Emperor's New Clothes"? Then again... there are equally absurd and ugly voices within the classical musical world that are also taken seriously: John Cage's 4:33... 4 minutes and 33 seconds of silence...

or Stockhausen:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13D1YY_BvWU

György Ligeti:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCp7bL-AWvw

Xenakis:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDP8H5IK5nw&feature=related

Luc Ferrari & Otomo Yoshihide:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yhcgm3rdaUY&feature=related

[JCamilo]

Are you telling me that Joyce wasnt taken seriously? Bataille? Beckett? Henry Miller?

[David Lurie]

there are equally absurd and ugly voices within the classical musical world that are also taken seriously: John Cage's 4:33... 4 minutes and 33 seconds of silence...

Cage was a genius and decontextualizing 4'33'' from the time and the intellectual life conceiving it and the research Cage was doing at the time on accidental sounds doesn't make much sense to me. Cage was a serious musician and thinker, his writings leave no doubt about that.


or Stockhausen: György Ligeti: Xenakis:

three geniuses.

As for the "helicopter quartet" it is an entertaining and thought provoking experience - I'm talkin' of the live experience, a necessary condition for a lot of contemporary music where the composers themselves design visual accompaniment to their music - and it is what you get when you ask a composer who has never written a single work according to the classic forms to write a string quartet, a form born in the 18th century and dead with Beethoven, the string quartet is about interplay, about conversation and Stockhausen reinvents it in a spectacular way using the technology that in our time represent the way we communicate.

[stlukesguild]

Cage was a genius and decontextualizing 4'33'' from the time and the intellectual life conceiving it and the research Cage was doing at the time on accidental sounds doesn't make much sense to me. Cage was a serious musician and thinker, his writings leave no doubt about that.

Whether he was genius or not is irrelevant. What matters is the body of art produced. Cage left a body of curiosities and a few decent pieces... but I have yet to come across anything by cage that I imagine will continue to resonate with future eras of music lovers.

Stockhausen: György Ligeti: Xenakis:
three geniuses.

As for the "helicopter quartet" it is an entertaining and thought provoking experience - I'm talkin' of the live experience, a necessary condition for a lot of contemporary music where the composers themselves design visual accompaniment to their music

Xenakis, Ligeti, Xenakis... each have produced some interesting music. Some is indeed quite good. The helicopter quartet or the 100 Metronomes, however, is nothing but mental masturbation... no different from Manzoni's artist's poop in a can, Vito Aconci or Marina Abramovic masturbating under a stage, or Rauschenberg's erased drawing. The visual accompaniment doesn't move the work into the realm of great art either... because it ain't much to write home about in terms of visual experience.

it is what you get when you ask a composer who has never written a single work according to the classic forms to write a string quartet, a form born in the 18th century and dead with Beethoven...

The string quartet lasted long after Beethoven with major examples found by Schubert, Dvorak, Shostakovitch, Bela Bartok, Eliot Carter, etc...

the string quartet is about interplay, about conversation and Stockhausen reinvents it in a spectacular way using the technology that in our time represent the way we communicate.

Mental Onanism. :icon_bs:

[stlukesguild]

Are you telling me that Joyce wasnt taken seriously? Bataille? Beckett? Henry Miller?

Bataille is questionable. Henry Miller seems minor at best. Joyce and Beckett are incredibly experimental... but don't strike me as having pushed into the realm of the absurd: the book without words... or with mere gibberish text... the found object... the phone book or the laundry receipt as poetry.

[JCamilo]

Do mean a scientific thesis as Poem? Like Poe's Eureka? Or that Encyclopedia thing?

I know Bataile is arguable, but he is seriously studied and considered. I seriously have no idea how much Cage is considered, but is not he arguable (You can say : of course, I am doing it). Or wasnt he minor like Miller. We can give Lewis Carroll Jabberwocky of course, or the fact Mallarme demanded that his poems to be written in the way he left in the papper, with the black space (wasnt it the silence ?) and all...

I would suggest you finding Cortazar (experimental, but it would describe every Cage work), where he used newspapers cuts, etc to build short stories. Very unlikely but it is Cortazar so everyone pays attention. I think joyce gibberish may be what "helicopter noise", at least in Communication theory, any form of message that have something like Joyce words is considered "noise" as it produces something extra that hinders the clear understandment of the text.

[Drkshadow03]

[COLOR="DarkRed"] the book without words... or with mere gibberish text... the found object... the phone book or the laundry receipt as poetry.

You forgot the Lovecraftian chowder recipe (http://www.brainharvestmag.com/2010/07/h-p-lovecraft/)!!!!

[David Lurie]

The string quartet lasted long after Beethoven with major examples found by Schubert, Dvorak, Shostakovitch, Bela Bartok, Eliot Carter, etc...

you forgot John Cage :party:
How many composers wrote string quartets between 1770 and 1827? all of them maybe
I guess that 95% of the existing string quartets have been composed in that lapse of time, we can easily say that between 1860 and 1960 the string quartet represents a marginal area in the music of that time (Dvorak and later Bartok are exceptions, Debussy wrote 1, and so did Ravel, Shostakovich doesn't count: the reason why he wrote string quartets is rather political than musical) when we find composers who simply ignored this format. The works you have mentioned are not examples but constitute almost the whole output of the that period of time. Carter on the other hand is one the precursors of a generation of composers who later in the century will renovate this musical form, we can even say that nowadays the string quartet is the most audacious field in classical music - Xenakis, Kurtag, Norgard and youngsters the likes of Pintscher or Rueda and many many others have explored and are exploring the form - but the reasons and the ideas behind this newborn interest are very far from the impulses who gave life to the string quartet in the 18th century.



the string quartet is about interplay, about conversation and Stockhausen reinvents it in a spectacular way using the technology that in our time represent the way we communicate.

Mental Onanism. :icon_bs:

playfulness :smilewinkgrin: