Nietzsche and ArtLudovici, Anthony M. (Anthony Mario)
Philosophy
Nietzsche and Art
Ludovici, Anthony M. (Anthony Mario)
Aesthetics, German -- 19th century; Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm, 1844-1900 -- Aesthetics
He points out that there is not only a difference of degree, but
actually a marked difference of kind, between the intensely realistic
drawing of the Madeleine finds and of some Australian cave painting
and rock sculptures,[18] which are the work of the rudest savages, and the
rhythmic decoration of other races; and that whereas the former are
simply the result of a truly imitative instinct which the savage does
well to cultivate for his own self-preservation--since the ability
to imitate also implies sharpened detective senses[19]--the latter is
the result of a genuine desire for order and simple and organized
arrangement, and an attempt in a small way to overcome confusion. "It
is man's only possible way of emancipating himself from the accidental
and chaotic character of reality."[20]
The author also shows very ably that, even where plant forms are
selected by the original geometric artist, it is only owing to some
peculiarly orderly or systematic arrangement of their parts, and that
the first impulse in the selective artist is not to imitate Nature, but
to obtain a symmetrical and systematic arrangement of lines,[21] to gratify
his will to be master of natural disorder.
These objections of Riegl and Worringer are both necessary and
important; for, as the former declares: "It is now high time that we
should retreat from the position in which it is maintained that the
roots of Art lie in purely technical prototypes."[22]
Even in the camp of the out-and-out evolutionists, however, there seems
always to have been some uncertainty as to whether they were actually
on the right scent. One has only to read Grosse, where he throws doubt
on the technical origin of ornament, and acknowledges that he clings
to it simply because he can see no other,[23] and the concluding word of
Dr. Haddon's book, _Evolution in Art_,[24] in order to understand how
very much a proper concept of the Art-instinct would have helped these
writers to explain a larger field of facts than they were able to
explain, and to do so with greater accuracy.
Nobody, of course, denies that the patterns on alligators' backs, the
beaks of birds, and even the regular disposition of features in the
human face, have been incorporated into designs; but what must be
established, once and for all, is the fact that there is a whole ocean
of difference between the theory which would ascribe such coincidences
to the imitative faculty, and that which would show them to be merely
the outcome of an original desire for rhythmic order, simplification,
and organization, which may or may not avail itself of natural or
technical forms suggestive of symmetrical arrangement that happen to be
at hand.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account