Main ideas
- History of invention of lithography in the early 19th century but then followed just a few decades later by photography
- Concept of aura
- Film as mass medium where people can laugh together
- Fascism leads to aestheticization of politics. Whereas Communism leads to politicization of art to see it as a means of communication, exhortation, and education.
Quotes
- “First, process reproduction is more independent of the original than manual reproduction.
- “For example, in photography, process reproduction can bring out those aspects of the original that are unattainable to the naked eye yet accessible to the lens, which is adjustable and chooses its angle at will. And photographic reproduction, with the aid of certain processes, such as enlargement or slow motion, can capture images which escape natural vision.
- “Secondly, technical reproduction can put the copy of the original into situations which would be out of reach for the original itself. Above all, it enables the original to meet the beholder halfway, be it in the form of a photograph or a phonograph record. The cathedral leaves its locale to be received in the studio of a lover of art; the choral production, performed in an auditorium or in the open air, resounds in the drawing room.
- “The situations into which the product of mechanical reproduction can be brought may not touch the actual work of art, yet the quality of its presence is always depreciated. This holds not only for the art work but also, for instance, for a landscape which passes in review before the spectator in a movie.
- “…that which withers in the age of mechanical reproduction is the aura of the work of art.
- “These two processes lead to a tremendous shattering of tradition which is the obverse of the contemporary crisis and renewal of mankind.
- “The uniqueness of a work of art is inseparable from its being imbedded in the fabric of tradition. This tradition itself is thoroughly alive and extremely changeable. An ancient statue of Venus, for example, stood in a different traditional context with the Greeks, who made it an object of veneration, than with the clerics of the Middle Ages, who viewed it as an ominous idol.
Quotes from other summaries.
- In history, there is only one original, which has aura
- Mechanically reproduced copies devalue the original; it loses it’s aura
- thinkers have objected to this thesis given the skyrocketing prices of originals since then
- Per Benjamin, we value things in their exchange value rather than their use value.
- We do not have a close relationship to things we own because we didn’t make it.
- We are more skeptical of things because we did not make it; we are more skeptical
- Per Benjamin, authenticity in mechanical reproduction cannot exist
- To make up for shriveld aura, Hollywood plays up their stars and thepublic’s desire to know them. The public feels like they are participating by being interested in them. The actor sells their shadows and are therefore detached from their work.
- The basic argument of this essay is that modern art develops as a response to new modes of technological reproduction (lithography, photography and film).
- Benjamin argues that these mechanical processes deprive the artwork of its ‘aura’. The ‘aura’ is (was) the ritual status of the artwork as a ‘genuine’, unique object produced by the hand of the artist. Mechanical reproduction destroys the aura because it enables multiple copies to be created by mechanical means; this strips the artwork of its uniqueness. Benjamin is essentially positive about the passing of the aura, but he also fears about fascism’s ability to pervert the new media and - perhaps - he has a little bit of residual nostalgia for the ritual function of art.
- Benjamin is essentially positive about the passing of the aura because:
- it makes art both more accessible and more democratic; it means that art is judged by a mass of people and not just by a narrow clique of critics;
- it has led to the politicisation of art (paragraph 4) (which he thinks is important);
- it emancipates art from religion (paragraph 5).
- Benjamin is particularly positive about film because film actors perform for the camera and this enables the audience to assume a more objective stance (see sections 8-10).
- He is also positive about the new form of distracted perception brought about by new media (in the penultimate paragraph).
- Benjamin’s idea that modern art develops in response to technology can also be applied to literature and music. In the field of literature, modernist writers found themselves in competition with new forms of textual mass media such as telegrams, newspapers, advertisements and popular music