Throughout this article Walter Benjamin
sparks the question of whether the constant evolution of art (due to
technology) is diluting the importance of retaining skillful art techniques.
This is illustrated when he states, “But only a few decades after its invention, lithography was
surpassed by photography. For the first time in the process of pictorial
reproduction, photography freed the hand of the most important artistic
functions which henceforth devolved only upon the eye looking into a lens.”
With digital technology revolutionizing how art is created, will there be a
need for knowing the “original” way of making certain types of artwork, when it
can be re-created with technology?
When
Walter Benjamin states “By close-ups of the things around us, by focusing on
hidden details of familiar objects, by exploring common place milieus under the
ingenious guidance of the camera, the film, on the one hand, extends our
comprehension of the necessities which rule our lives ,” He denotes that
through film we are able to see a different more realistic perspective of life.
With painting, for example, we are left with more room for interpretation. On
the other hand, although film allows for manipulation, we see real images that
have a devised meaning. Is this affecting our creative thinking skills due to
the fact that we are given less room for interpretation?
You know, I ask myself every day if we 'need' to know the original way of making something like a collage of layered triptych. Do we need? No, not necessarily. Though I think there is something gained in knowing how the original way was done, and what relevance it has on the way we do things now. An e-book reads completely different than a digital painting. To know why, I would have to accept that both of those forms came from the analog book to painting to begin with. Just for example's sake, confusing an e-book by critiquing it with the criteria of a painting would just be silly. :) It's important to know where our digital forms come from originally.
ReplyDeleteGood second question too. Too much of reality often leaves little room for the imagination, sometimes. I know in this Postmodern era of art we are currently in, it is less about the individual creativity of someone but how they 'borrow objects' and place them in a context which speaks using that iconography. And using so much of that familiar iconography from reality sets some kind of a 'limit' on what the mind can come up with. To answer the question, I wouldn't say it 'limits' so much as 'changes' the way we creatively come up with things. In actuality, fantasy cannot exist without reality as a reference. We would really have 'no' creativity if it weren't for reality to reference what it may look like. My two cents.