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Walter Benjamin (1892-1940)
The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical
Reproduction
V
Works of art are received and valued on different
planes. Two polar types stand out; with one, the accent is on the cult
value; with the other, on the exhibition value of the work. Artistic production
begins with ceremonial objects destined to serve in a cult. One may assume
that what mattered was their existence, not their being on view. The elk
portrayed by the man of the Stone Age on the walls of his cave was an instrument
of magic. He did expose it to his fellow men, but in the main it was meant
for the spirits. Today the cult value would seem to demand that the work
of art remain hidden. Certain statues of gods are accessible only to the
priest in the cella; certain Madonnas remain covered nearly all year round;
certain sculptures on medieval cathedrals are invisible to the spectator
on ground level. With the emancipation of the various art practices from
ritual go increasing opportunities for the exhibition of their products.
It is easier to exhibit a portrait bust that can be sent here and there
than to exhibit the statue of a divinity that has its fixed place in the
interior of a temple. The same holds for the painting as against the mosaic
or fresco that preceded it. And even though the public presentability of
a mass originally may have been just as great as that of a symphony, the
latter originated at the moment when its public presentability promised
to surpass that of the mass.
With the different methods of technical reproduction
of a work of art, its fitness for exhibition increased to such an extent
that the quantitative shift between its two poles turned into a qualitative
transformation of its nature. This is comparable to the situation of the
work of art in prehistoric times when, by the absolute emphasis on its
cult value, it was, first and foremost, an instrument of magic. Only later
did it come to be recognized as a work of art. In the same way today, by
the absolute emphasis on its exhibition value the work of art becomes a
creation with entirely new functions, among which the one we are conscious
of, the artistic function, later may be recognized as incidental. This
much is certain: today photography and the film are the most serviceable
exemplifications of this new function. |