Art And Value: Alternatives

Leonardo, Vol. 11, pp. 313-320. 0Pergamon Press Ltd. 1978. Printed in Great Britain. 0024494X/78/1001-03 I3$02.00/0 ART AND VALUE: ALTERNATIVES* Richard W. Seaton** I. INTRODUCTION From time to time one or another of the fine arts (here taken to include sculpture, painting, music, writing and architecture) is said to have lost direction, to be in the doldrums, to be mannerist, to be formalist or to be conformist (e.g. to socialist realism). When this occurs, artists no longer appear inner-directed [11; instead they produce for a market, resort to technical tricks, become absorbed in decoration, explore unlikely or costly media (e.g. fireworks with music, or bread dough sculpture) or borrow themes from cultures from other continents. The business of the free artist is in the generation of expressive work. The work of artists differs from that of nature by being intentional and calculated. It differsfrom that of other professionals by not being instrumental or welfare oriented. The free artist on his own responsibility chooses the subject matter, the interpretation of it, the media and technology of its expressionand whether it will be shown to audiences. Each choice is deliberate, and each is reserved to artists alone if they are ‘free’. Any serious artistic choice carries a moral burden, in that it leads to actions or events that, however indirectly, affect the chooser, other individuals or the fabric of the community. The freer the choice, the greater the moral loading. The fewer the people affected, the less the loading-although never does it disappear entirely. The moral burden of the artist asdecision-maker forms the core of Ayne Rand’s famous novel The Fountainhead [2].Her protagonist, an architect, culminates hiscareer by blowing up his tour-de-force when his clients assume responsibility for decisions he regards as properly belonging to himself. The author defends this hubris as proper to the moral authority of the creative artist, whereby he should reject others’ values (especially altruistic sentiments) in rigid adherence to his own convictions about his creation. Of course, Rand’s theme has a fundamental flaw: when artists invoke the support of others, whether in a property or community sense, they undertake a kind of social contract to respect others’ values and to make concessions to them. Artists who accept commissions for creative works should recognizethe obligations to values implied in the fine print. Failure to do so can lead to substantial discomfiture on the part of both artist and client. *This article has been prepared in connection with plans for the organization of an international symposium on Art and Value by the International Association of Art (I.A.A.). Those interested in sponsoring or participating in the symposium should write to the I.A.A., Unesco, 1 rue Miollis, 75015 Paris, France. **Environmental psychologist, School of Architecture, University of British Columbia, 2075 Wesbrook Mall, Vancouver, B.C., V6T 1W5, Canada. A relatively recent instance isthat of Canadian sculptor Vaillancourt’s Embarcadero fountain in San Francisco, (Fig. 1) whichcosts a quarter ofa million dollars of public funds yearly to operate; the rude, crude, violent angulature of the structure considerably offended the populace [31. Most art other than architecture is not commissioned. Even then, it may not be performed or displayed if it is offensive to the public taste; there are plenty of instances of civiccensorship. When it isperformed or displayed,the presentation may not endure; consider, for example, the extremely temporary nature of Christo’s curtain art, which lasted for 10 minutes as a curtain across a valley and for two weeks as a 25-mile curtain fence from Petaluma to the sea [4]. 1 1 . CREATIVE VALUES If a work of art is not commissioned, it represents an individual exploration by the artist. The artist buys personal tools and materials, commits time, decides on display or disposition of work and takes the gains or suffers the losses (real or psychological) that sole responsibilityentails. In addition, he or she alone chooses among techniques and instruments (materials) [5]; topics and themes; and styles and rules, in advancing art enterprises. Each of these decisions is moral insofar as values, human, social or aesthetic, govern the artist...