Wednesday 26 February 2014
Sunday 16 February 2014
Saturday 15 February 2014
A Critical Analysis of Warhol's reproduction of the Mona Lisa
Here is my second draft of the essay. Couldn't control the positioning and info attached with the images... but have completed the bibliography. Your comments are much appreciated. Thank you for reading!
During my recent visit to Paris I visited the Louvre and amongst everything else I went to see the Mona Lisa. Everything that I had heard and read about this painting had encouraged me to see it in person. As I entered this large room with double height ceiling and very large paintings on the walls, I noticed a crowd of people gathered in front of the wall at the far end. My curiosity drew me magnetically to this crowd. There behind a glass wall was the famous painting of the Mona Lisa. The painting which is not really very large was displayed on this wall with a barrier in front so you could not get up close. There were lots of cameras clicking and it was impossible to get a quiet and close-up view. I got pulled and pushed in this crowd and can't deny I too made a mechanical record of this artwork of the past (Figure 1) I stood there looking at the painting long and hard to somehow feel its authenticity, it's aura, this painting of Lisa del Giocondo by Leonardo da Vinci was the entire basis of her fame.
As I walked towards the exit, I noticed the museum shop selling many reproductions of this painting in the form of postcards, fridge magnets and T-shirts. The words of Thomas à Kempis crossed my mind, ‘getting closer to things in both spatial and human terms is every bit as passionate a concern of the masses as their tendency to surmount the uniqueness of each circumstance by seeing it in reproduction’. (Benjamin,W.2008: 9)
My cultural text is Warhol's Mona Lisa.I will offer a detailed critical analysis using Walter Benjamin ' Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction'.There is no denying that a reproduction is not the same as the original artwork. In the past reproduction did exist in the form of pre-mechanical methods of copying. When Duchamp made a moustache and goatee on a cheap postcard size reproduction of Mona Lisa it was the beginning of the ‘readymade’ reproduction. (Figure 2) .There are many other artists who made Mona Lisa’s incarnations like Dali, Warhol and Banksy (Figure 3, 4 and 5) to name a few. These reproductions made the meanings of art ambiguous.
Pop artist Andy Warhol recognized the fact that the Mona Lisa was as famous as the celebrity Marilyn Monroe and as such fame was a commodity and that endless replications of the celebrity's face made it so.Warhol adapted a technique from commercial printing, in which a photographic image could be transferred to canvas by pushing paint through a mechanically-produced silkscreen template. Warhol made endless copies in various colours and sizes, these copies can be deemed as appropriation of art. Nobody can mistake Warhol's Mona Lisa as the Renaissance original ,thus proving that art appropriation can be just as legitimate .
This debate about mechanical reproductions in art started with Benjamin's theory on Art in the age of Mechanical Reproduction.Benjamin identified the effect of mechanisation as progressive. The merger of creative and cultural industries would open the arts to a wider audience .With industrialisation and modern technological means of reproduction the relationship between art and the masses has changed. Knowledge concerning the art of the past can now reach a larger proportion of the world’s population. However this mechanisation not only brings about autonomy of the art but also undermines or rather dispels the aura of fine art. ‘Reproductive technology, we might say in general terms, removes the thing reproduced from the realm of tradition. In making[.......]it actualizes what is reproduced’. (Benjamin,W,2008:7)In the Journal of Philosophy of Education ,The Re-reading of Benjamin’s theory of mechanical reproduction, Nick Peim has explained that aura seems to signify something of the symbolic halo generated by objects of special significance that is both powerful and indefinite. He has argued that aura is in fact the necessary property of symbolic representation.
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Benjamin’s ideas have been reiterated in the past by writers as Malraux whose theory of museum-without-walls can be summarised as an imaginary museum of images that have been reproduced and are made universally available to any individual at all times.(Walker, John A. (1983)Art in the age of mass media. Page 70) These reproductions give an impression of homogeneity of artworks which are originally more disparate than they appear in reproduction.
Contrary to this was Adorno who vehemently argued that there are two closely related social developments: the progressive commoditisation of culture, and the aestheticisation of the commodity-form itself. The commoditisation refers to the nature of the art market due to its inherently speculative and manipulative character. The sheer progress and the volume of mechanical reproduction has fuelled the commoditisation even more reducing the use-value to exchange-value. , Secondly, there is the more general aestheticisation of the commodity form in the culture and advertising industries. Adorno expresses his displeasure quite strongly at the neutralization of the critical capacity of particular forms and techniques through their instrumental use, leading to increased marginalisation of authentic art. Thus Adorno argues: ‘To paint a la cubist in the year 1970 is like making advertising posters. And the originals are not immune, either, to this kind of sell out’.(Benjamin, A, 1992: 38-39)
As I reflect on both sides of the argument, I asked myself a question – ‘How does it impact me as an Art Student’? This was an interesting question, because at this point in time, as an Art student I would be naturally biased towards the benefits of mechanical reproduction and other forms of art accessibility. This is simply because it lets me view, feel, know about the art-work and go into the mind of the artist without necessarily travelling miles to the place where it originated. I cannot help but think about the core of Benjamin’s argument: the traditional work of art had a presence, an aura, which was the result of its uniqueness – ‘its presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be’. A widely held belief is that the effect of mechanical reproduction was to eliminate the work’s aura and to emancipate it from its dependence upon ritual. Whilst I agree this could be a consequence of the advent of technology leading to mechanisation of the arts, it has had a positive impact as well. The impact that I refer to is the fact that technological innovations of this kind had a progressive potential, in that they democratised the means of artistic production. The mechanical method of silk screen that Warhol discovered has been universally adopted by many artists.
Also, the key question I ask is: has the religious aura really been dissipated? The cult-value surrounding it may have been replaced by exhibition-value, but the function of the museum is to preserve the aura of the work of art and to externalise it. While reviewing and studying art, I have always felt that the aura still remains a function of the originals. The evidence of this is the genre known as art photography – where some photographic prints are being bought and sold at auction rooms for high prices in just the same way as handmade articles.
Interestingly, when one looks at the United Kingdom, the ministry responsible for Art – the Department of Culture, Media and Sport has one of its key objectives as ‘[...] working to support the arts community to give access to all, improve wellbeing in the UK and boost the UK’s economy.’( Department of Culture , Media and Sport (2014). Arts and Culture) They have presented an economic and social argument here at the same time! This loft aim cannot be possibly achieved by displaying reproductions, using images in mass media and also using income from selling memorabilia to develop these museums further. So this is a virtuous spiral that creates a future generation of artists through access to museums and art galleries funded by income from different sources and profits then used to improve the facilities! As you go around this cycle, it grows into a spiral for overall benefit of the common good.
figure 1. Da Vinci, L.Mona Lisa,Author's own.(2014)
Figure 2 Duchamp, M.(1919)‘LHOOQ’ (pencil on readymade postcard). http://www.marcelduchamp.net/L.H.O.O.Q.php [Assessed on 15 Feb 2014]
Figure 3. Dali. S. (1954 )Self Portrait as Mona Lisa. Available from http://www.examiner.com/article/salvador-dali-poses-the-question-why-they-attack-the-mona-lisa [Accessed on 18 Feb 2014]
Figure 4. Warhol,A.( 1963)Thirty Are Better Than One, Silkscreen print. Available from http://www.previewberlin.com/Data/presse2011/PB2011_CATALOGTEXT_MPIESBERGEN.pdf
[accessed on 18 Feb 2014]
Figure 5
Banksy.( 2000) Mona Lisa, spray paint stencil on board, 48in by
48in. Available from http://arrestedmotion.com/2011/09/banksy-top-25-most-expensive-works-ever/
[Accessed on 18 Feb 2014]
Bibliography
Images
Figure 1- Author’s own [2014]Figure 2-Duchamp,M. (1919) LHOOQ’ ,pencil on readymade postcard. http://www.marcelduchamp.net/L.H.O.O.Q.php [Accessed 15th Feb 2014]
Figure 3- Dali,S.(1954) Self Portrait as Mona Lisa. Available from http://www.examiner.com/article/salvador-dali-poses-the-question-why-they-attack-the-mona-lisa [Assessed on 18 Feb 2014]
Figure 4- Warhol,A. (1963)Thirty Are Better Than One. Serigraph prints. Available from http://projects.ecfs.org/fieldston272/SlideIndexes/renaissance02.html, http://www.previewberlin.com/Data/presse2011/PB2011_CATALOGTEXT_MPIESBERGEN.pdf
[Assessed on 18 Feb 2014]
Figure 5- Banksy ( 2000) Mona Lisa, spray paint stencil on board, 48in by 48in. Available from http://arrestedmotion.com/2011/09/banksy-top-25-most-expensive-works-ever/ [Accessed on 18 Feb 2014]
Website
Department of Culture, media and Sport and The Tate (2014) Arts and Culture. Available from: https://www.gov.uk/government/topics/arts-and-culture [Accessed on 15 Feb 2014]Musee du Louvre ( 2005)A Closer Look At The Mona Lisa. Available from: http://musee.louvre.fr/oal/joconde/indexEN.html [Accessed 14 Feb 2014]
Television programme viewed on the Internet
John Berger/ Ways of Seeing ( 1972) Series 1, Episode 1-4 .BBC, 1972. Available from: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0pDE4VX_9Kk [ Accessed 14 Feb 2014]
Journal Articles
Peim, N.(2007)Walter Benjamin in the Age of Digital Reproduction:Aura in Education:A Rereading of 'The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction'.Journal of Philosophy of Education[online].
Books
Benjamin.A, (1992 ) Problems of Modernity: Adorno and Benjamin .Cornwall: T.J.Press Ltd.Benjamin,W (2008) The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction Translated by J.A. Underwood. London: Penguin Books.
Berger, J.( 1972) Ways of Seeing. London: British Broadcasting Corporation and Penguin Books
Vygotsky,Lev S.(1971) The Psychology Of Art . Translated by Scripta Technica,Inc.U.S.A:The M.I.T. Press
Walker, John A. (1983) Art in the Age of Mass Media .London: Pluto Press Limited
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