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The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction

Walter Benjamin
Outline by Philip Turetzky

Valery quote
Preface: The self-abolition of capital requires new non-fascist concepts of art.
1) Marx’s prognostic value: exploitation and capital abolishing itself (rise
of the masses)
2) Superstructure/substructure: superstructure takes longer to show the
conditions of capital, present conditions make old concepts irrelevant (e.g.
genius, creativity, mystery, eternal works – lead to processing data in the Fascist sense).
We need to replace these Fascist concepts with non-fascist concepts (useless
for fascist purposes – but useful for revolutionary purposes).

I. Mechanical Reproduction of Images increases their speed and distribution

1) Mechanical reproduction of art is something new (developed sporadically
over the ages, e.g. wood cuts, founding & stamping).
2) Lithography: many more copies, faster, and daily changes possible & so
possible to depict daily life.
3) Photography: hand gives way to the eye-->acceleration of production of
images, marketing brings these into the home like utilities (p. 219 –quote
Valery - e.g. cable TV – internet - politics of the market – Oliver W. Holmes quote). By
1900 Mechanical reproduction had become the cause of changes in the
impact of images on the public.
4) So consider the impact of the reproduction of artworks and film on
traditional art.

II. Aura, i.e. authenticity, is destroyed in mechanical reproduction.

1) Unique temporal spatial existence of the work gives it historical and
physical properties which reproductions don’t have – authenticity
determinable and so therefore is ownership! [commodity form – withering
w/reproduction – e.g. bootlegs]
2) Original presupposed to question of authenticity (ftn 2 – Danto & de
Kooning): Technical reproduction of art objects is outside of questions of
authenticity because
a) processes of reproduction are more independent of the original
art object, e.g. camera, slow motion etc. allow us to see more than in
natural perception. {Godard “Film is truth 24 frames a second & every time
you cut, you lie.”}
b) technical reproduction puts copies into situation of the beholder,
recording at home vs. cathedral.
3) Authenticity of a thing = essence of all that is transmissible from its
beginning - reproduction jeopardizes duration, testimony, history – the
authority of the object. The quality of the original’s presence is
depreciated.
4) Aura: withers in the age of mechanical reproduction [negative def. that
which withers], “the technique of reproduction detaches the reproduced
object from the domain of tradition” The technique of reproduction
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substitutes many copies for a unique original & meeting the beholder in
situ, reactivates the original. These two processes shatter traditions and
are connected with mass movements. Film is the most powerful e.g., it
liquidates tradition (cultural heritage).

III. Mass perception is grounded in social causes.

1) History partly determines sense perception (the manner in which it is
organized). Today it is possible to show the social causes of decay of aura.
2) Distance as a unique phenomenon is what gives natural objects their
aura. Decay of aura comes from (a) desire of masses to bring things closer
both spatially and humanly (new significance of the masses), (b) desire to
overcome every reality by accepting its reproduction – original includes
uniqueness and permanence, instant reproduction includes
reproducibility and transitoriness; sense of the universal equality of things
(postmodern – image precedes the real).
3) This is evidence of the adjustment of reality to the masses & of the
masses to reality (like statistics universal equality of things in the intellectual sphere –
Trow nothing judged only counted – Baudrillard pp. 115ff – see VIII below on optical
testing).

IV. Mechanical reproductions frees art from ritual cults.

1) Uniqueness of a work is inseparable from its being embedded in
tradition, different contexts yet confront this aura. Cult: ritual function
(original – use value) as basis of value of authenticity. Beauty cult: l’art pour
l’art cult (reaction to photography & reproduction), i.e. theology of art. (negative
theology of pure art – art is not x,y,z…– ftn. 5 magic  religion  secular art – distance
= cult value re: space/time, i.e. unapproachable)
2) Mechanical reproduction emancipates art from dependence on ritual,
e.g. makes no sense to ask for the authentic print of a photograph. So,
instead of basing art on ritual, it is based on other forces, e.g. politics – see
Berman on Marx p. 95 - (authenticity displaces cult value).

V. Exhibition value differs from cult value.

1) Ritual depends on fixity (hidden art for the gods, & god in temple, e.g.s) vs.
exhibition value depends on mobility
2) Techniques of reproduction increase the possibilities of exhibition to a
degree where a qualitative change in the nature of art has occurred. New
functions, therefore, take over works, artistic function becomes incidental.
ftn 9 (Brecht, eliminate artwork – e.g. photography & film).

VI. Cult resistance fails.

1) Cult value resists transformation, e.g. face and portrait photography as
cult of remembrance (aura’s last gasp).
2) But exhibition value takes over: Atget’s photos of streets as scene of the
crime, magazines, series of pictures, captions necessary ≠ titles of pictures
(e.g. photographs as evidence – historical evidence & therefore political).
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VII. Has Art changed its nature?

1) Autonomy of art disappeared w/techniques of reproduction; photo vs.
painting dispute is a sign of this historical transformation. (read p. 227 re: has
art changed its nature?)
2) Q ≠ is photography art? but Q = has photography changed the nature of
art? Film: early film theorists (Arnheim) try to defend film as art, i.e. as
having an aura, by treating film as sacred and a cult object (reading ritual
elements into film – Gance 1927 eyes adjust – Griffith e.g. others expression for elite
prayer – compare “The Gold Rush”).

VIII. Film is a type optical testing. (ftn. 10 – aptitude tests, economic)

1) Film acting has no whole of a performance; editing and shots, also
optical tests of actor (framing, lighting, angles, etc. [sampling] camera movement,
& movement viewed – the camera need not respect the integrity of the performance).
2) Film actor cannot adjust to the audience during the performance, so the
audience identifies w/camera (I am a camera) and plays the role of critic, i.e.
testing – cult value cannot survive this test procedure (Bits o’ information
Baudrillard p. 115, 116, 119 – Deleuze DR p. 158 – problems disappear in solutions).

IX. Presence & Absence: Film has no aura.

1) Aura is tied to presence, so in film the person operates w/o a personal
aura, e.g. John Wayne actor represents himself (test) – person w/o aura –
aura is tied to persona (Pirandello quote p. 229 – melts into air (see below))
2) Actor becomes a prop and acts as little as possible in a film, actor’s
work is split (cost, isolable actions, sets, etc.) into separate episodes also, of
course, montage separates actor from performance decisively. e.g. Shot -
arranged reactions [e.g. Alien], therefore, art ≠ beautiful semblance. (ftn. 11
prop as actor, e.g. clock in High Noon).

X. You are the event.

1) Compare mirror image [Plato] (a) strangeness of one’s own reflection
(images become transportable) (b) images become separable, So actor is
separated from his whole self which is a market commodity [Rock Stars &
Politicians – Read Berman/Marx p. 116ff.– revolutionary potential as critique of Fascist
values of the traditional concept of art] So, “personality is built up as another
marketable product (The Louds – Baudrillard p. 50-51 – reality TV).
2) Film and Sport make audience into experts & anyone can claim that
they are filmed. (ftn. 12 politicians as filmed sampled actor props - selection)
3) Author/Public distinction is now passé merely a functional difference.
[radio call-in shows] – expert (information - testing).
4) In film capitalism resists the claim of everyman to be reproduced by
producing spectacles (ftn 13 quote).

XI. The camera penetrates reality.

1) The mise en scene of the theater can be seen, but that of the studio is
always hidden the penetration of reality is freed from the foreign
scaffolding of the production process (e.g. Sadaam Statue), then making a
pure spectacle. (text p. 233)
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2) A magician preserves the personhood of the one he heals (& distance -

laying on of hands) the surgeon cuts into the patient as object (not as person)
3) Compare the painter who maintains distance w/the cameraman who
penetrates into reality: the painter produces a picture which is a whole,
while the cameraman yields a picture which consists in fragments
reassembled under a new law (Editing/Montage, Liana e.g. Eisenstein & the
Dialectic). [Persona - Potemkin – Griffith convergent parallel montage]
4) Film is more significant now than painting because the “thorough going
permeation of reality (height of artifice – reversal re: nature) with mechanical
equipment [offers] an aspect of reality free of any equipment.”

XII. Enjoyment is inseparable from criticism.

1) With film visual enjoyment and criticism are fused (unlike in painting) as
social significance decreases the sharper the criticism/public enjoyment
distinction increases/the conventional is uncritically enjoyed and the new
criticized with aversion. Why? because “individual reactions are
predetermined by the mass audience response they are about to produce.”
– testing.
2) Painting reaches its audience via hierarchical mediation, Hence the
reactionary response by audience to surrealism, yet progressive in
response to a “grotesque’ film – (e.g. German Expressionism).

XIII. Film is analytical perception.

1) Film has changed and deepened our optical apperception (self-
consciousness of mind’s own processes – unifying, unity of, conditions of consciousness)
(compare Freudian slips) art and science mutually interpenetrate. (ftn. 16
Leonardo)
2) Close-ups expand space (Slow motion extends movement) These reveal new
aspects of reality (e.g. burst prison of the city – the ordinary text p. 236) and
introduces us to unconscious optics & new structural formations of the
subject (apperception) (e.g. film Microcosmos – science = art, close-ups – 1st close-ups
hard to see – severed heads).

XIV. Dada and film trade on shock effects.

1) Art creates a demand that can only be satisfied with technical
development, e.g. Dada & Film.
2) What Dada achieved was destruction of aura by focusing on already
reproduced and on outraging the public (e.g. word salad poem & other
experimental collages).
3) Dada makes art happen to the audience (not possible to contemplate/Dada
useless for contemplation & immersion - distraction). Film (unlike painting) does not
allow spectator to abandon self to private associations (theology (cult) alone
w/God who contemplates presence), since scenes keep changing, thought is
replaced by moving images = shock effect – Duhamel quote p. 238 (which
“should be cushioned by heightened awareness – change in apperception), ((danger)
which is necessary to face the dangers of the modern world), physical shock effect
separated by film from moral shock effect in Dada.
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XV. Habits can be formed in conditions of distraction.

1) distraction and concentration (hackneyed comment by Duhamel p. 239):
concentration is absorption of the viewer by the work (story - Chinese
painting e.g. compare “Purple Rose of Cairo”) distraction is absorption of the
work into the masses (architecture e.g. )
2) Architecture is rooted in practical needs so it doesn’t disappear like e.g.
Greek tragedy. Buildings are always relevant (by use & by perception: tactile &
habit – no tactile counterpart to contemplation) to the relation between the masses
and art. Habit is necessary to master the problems of human perception
(including vision – covert control) contemplation is not sufficient (setting tasks for
apperception).
3) Distracted people can still form habits. The ability to master tasks in a
state of distraction proves that habit is necessary. Distraction art provides
a force for mobilizing the masses by molding their habits covertly making
them absent minded examiners – making the masses critical. Film is the
current means for this (Bypassing individuals/consciousness who avoid such tasks).

Epilogue: Fascism aestheticizes politics.

1) Fascism introduces aesthetics into politics (Hitler – Mussolini quotes – TV
politicians assume this) by encouraging expression of the masses while
preserving property relations. This forces modern apparatuses (cameras
etc.) in the service of ritual values (leader, Führer, cult – Leni Riefenstahl) war &
machine.
2) All effort to make politics aesthetic end in war. [cf. Marinetti quote p. 241 –
art for art’s sake]. War makes mass movements & technological change
while preserving property rights (i.e. Fascism). (ftn. 21)
3) If the natural utilization of reproductive devices is repressed then they
will be used ‘unnaturally’
4) War as artistic gratification (Video games – Gulf war) is the consummation
of art for art’s sake. Greek’s - man is a spectacle for the gods - Now man is
a spectacle for man and it is alienation to the degree that its own
destruction is experienced as aesthetic pleasure.