Whoa, heavy! I know, I thought the exact same thing. This is a pretty complex and difficult task so I hope my blog is not too mind numbingly boring and that it is a tad more coherent and exciting than Benjamin Walter's article.I highly doubt the excitement part. Sorry! Whoever it was who complained saying our tutorials were "too easy" should wake up to themselves, because it didn't get a little harder it got a heck of a lot harder. I hope they don't get top marks, yes I am cruel.
Benjamin Walter believed that modern technologies destroyed the uniqueness of art work, this applies to contemporary digital media, as art can be reproduced and duplicated with the click of a mouse and a push of a button. Walter thought that these technologies wrecked the historical concepts of art work, so to answer the question about digital things having an "aura", Benjamin Walter would say no. Walter states art works that are reproduced, lack presence in time and space because it it fails to be there at that unique time, where the art work originated and existed. It is similar as my refusal to burn Cd's off friends because I like to have the original CD with the front and back sleeves and the oh so pretty band name and their artwork on the actual CD. CD'S are just not the same if they are burnt.
I believe that contemporary digital media can have a very negative and painful outcome when it comes to singing as an art because any half wit actress or actor that came straight off the Neighbours or Home and Away set can digitally enhance their voice and make a career out of it, even if it is a short lived one. Take Bec Cartwright for example, her voice is as plain as the girl next door, but due to her acting role on Home and Away and her connections she got her hands on a pitch corrector and Ta-Da, she recorded an album by singing line by line and over lapping those lines to make her voice sound stronger. Marvelous you may think but not for those who listen to mainstream radio.
The standards of technology today can make anybody an artist so to speak. Benjamin questions the authenticity of reproduced art work. Walter Benjamin states "mechanical reproduction emancipates the work of art from its parasitical dependence on ritual." This meaning that reproduced art work loses its ritual, where it orginated. He believes that the moment where the art work was created is stripped and it is no longer contemporary to the person who is viewing it. Walter states that reproductions made by magazines and newsreels of art works do not portray the true essence of the art work to the "unarmed eye." Benjamin also questions and compares performances of a stage actor to a screen actor, the former being presented to an audience in person and the latter being presented through a camera, stating that "The camera that presents the performance of the film actor to the public need not respect the performance as an integral whole." Meaning that the camera person and special effects comprise certain aspects of the actor's movement, whereas a stage actor adjusts to thier audience during the performance relating with the audience on a deeper and more pesonal level. When the audience is replaced by a camera the viewers of the screen play become more like critics. Benjamin believes that by filming performances the values of cult can not be "exposed."
Benjamin uses the analogy of a painter and a cameraman, the painter being a "magician" and the cameraman being a "surgeon." He states that a painter maintains his distance from reality while the camerman delves straight into realities web and that there is a noticable difference between the pictures they attain, saying that the painters picture is complete where as the cameraman's picture's are fragments which are assembled under a complete different "law." Benjamin concludes "Thus, for contemporary man the representation of reality by the film is incomparably more significant than that of the painter, since it offers, precisely because of the thoroughgoing permeation of reality with mechanical equipment, an aspect of reality which is free of all equipment. And that is what one is entitled to ask from a work of art." Meaning that because the cameraman has access to so much evidence they are able to portray reality with more conviction with the use of contemporary mechanical equipment such as the camera and editoring material.
Personally I believe that only sometimes a photoshopped image can be authentic in an individual way, as you are creating a new element or meaning to the art work, however it can be unauthentic as it was not your work to begin with and you are reproducing the art work and stripping away its original aura and history. Digital things can have an aura, especially a movie like Sweeney Todd with the hunk Johnny Depp as the main character (had to add that fact), this movie had a massive impact on me as it's atmospshere became apart of you and made you feel the emotions the characters felt which tended to make you brood. Comtemporary digital media and the mechinical reproduction of art definately has many positivie aspects when it comes to creating art but it can also have a negative impact on art work when it is mass produced and when its history and cult are lost.
Readers, I hope I did not loose you in the first paragraph and hopefully you learnt something new, because I sure did. Whoever thought movies and acting were so complex and indepth? I can not say I know too many people that would sit down to watch a movie and ponder if the art work is being ruined because of a certain camera angle.I'm pretty sure that the only thing they would be pondering is how the hell can you open a stupid bag of maltesers with out spilling them all over the hygenic carpet at the cinema?
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