In this brutish and barbaric world, the bathroom is a place of refuge - an oasis of solitude, a citadel of contemplation - where a gentleman, for a precious few minutes each day, might enjoy the brief, sweet pleasure of a few stanzas of his favourite poet, while granting his body ease.
At the moment, my bathroom book is a collection of the Cantos of Ezra Pound: A brilliant poet and a despicable fascist.
While enjoying his work, I experience a certain sense of unease, being unable to completely cast aside his sympathy with Mussolini and comments about the Jews of Europe, despite the fact that these have no direct relevance to his writing (or, at least, that which I have read so far).
I feel the same when I hear Gary Glitter on a CD collection of glam rock - a man who represented all that was great about that genre of popular music; a man who represents all that is sordid about middle aged men taking holidays in South East Asia.
Should we judge an artist's work by his beliefs and actions? Does it make a difference if the artist is dead and no longer able to receive royalties? Could you continue to enjoy the music of your favourite composer or the books of your favourite author, if it was revealed that he was a murderer, a sexual predator, a drowner of kittens?
Has anybody felt obliged to remove books or CDs from her collection in response to revelations about an artist's private life?
Or can we all make a clear distinction between the person and his work?
That you enjoy an artist's work does not mean you share their ideas of how to live their lives or what ideas go through their minds. I say just enjoy art ... unless it really makes you uncomfortable to buy a book/CD as it would make you feel that you are sponsoring his/her way of life
I often ask myself if I don't watch Mel Gibson movies because he's an anti-semitic(please do not start a discussion of this term) dirtbag or if it's because they're just lacking any iota of value.
Art is a one-way communication between artist to audience. The audience is a passive participant in this process. The content of the art has little to do with value judgment of the audience. They can either ignore it or pay attention to it.
I have a hard time seeing the connection between the aesthetic value of an art piece, and a moral judgment of the artist or perhaps the art itself.
Richard Wagner is an example for me. Although his work may have influenced a whole line of philosophical thinking I despise, I can't help appreciate the execution of his work. It's marvelous to see humans use God-given talents. I love hearing Die Walkuere, but I don't like white supremacist propoganda.
This all got discussed alot in relation to Micheal Jackson when he died...
I guess it depends on whether the personal opinion, actions or behaviours come through or somehow influence the produced art or not? hmm good question DB
I guess every artist was a human being who went through the same trials & viccissitudes that led to the piece of work in the first place. Wagner dressed in pink lingerie, Berlioz would have become a murderer if his plan to kill his ex-lover had succeeded, Picasso did jail time, Van Gogh was a nut, amongst countless examples. Not to mention artists who served in wars & killed people.
Elvis was a notorious pilferer of Black music. Any Elvis CD-burners here?
Ezra Pound, mentored T.S. Eliot, I can't excise Eliot form my collection.I think that it is a bit like the Trolley problem; it depends on how far you are removed form the situation. If so much distance has occurred that the work stands in it's own right, as if it has taken on its own life independent of the genius who made it, then for me its OK. I am sure that many of the temples of ages were built by F-head mass murderers. However if the genius is still alive, profiting and carrying out their devilish deeds, then by buying into their art would be to sustain their depravity.
It raises the whole issue of what we consider immoral, take for example the case of Delara Darabi who was executed for murder, some consider her art and poetry immoral because of her involvement.
That is a very good point. None of us is really any better than anyone else, in the grand scheme of things.
But on an everyday level, if an artist is engaging in activities that are illegal, or which we find morally repugnant, how do we deal with the discomfort which arises from knowing that royalties from the CD or book we have just bought might go towards funding those activities? For example, where a writer is known to make large donations to neo-nazi groups, or is known to fly to Thailand to employ the services of child prostitutes?
Can we hold ourselves responsible for subsidising the unpleasant activities of others? Is it acceptable or justified to boycott the works of a particular artist out of distaste for their activities or beliefs? Or would that be hypocritical, given that we're all far from perfect ourselves?
Doesn't seem to be a question of moral superiority, as much as not wanting to not subsidize behavior you find distasteful. You don't seem to be suggesting that one should judge them.
If one regularly avoided paying the fare on the tram, but boycotted an artist for his/her propensity to ride for free, that'd be one thing. But having normal human failings, with the self awareness to acknowledge them, and still not wanting to underwrite the lifestyle of someone with truly odious failings - like soliciting child prostitutes - doesn't one a hypocrite.
We kind of have an economic democracy where we not so much vote through politics, but we also vote for particular entities by the way we spend our money. I would stop sending my money to someone who I find to be offensive.
Celebrities are strange creatures. They are actually products managed by corporation. A celebrity's public image is its value. There are professional handlers that manage the image of celebrities. In the majority of cases, the public image is quite far from the person themselves. Most of them keep a distance to protect who they truly are. We rarely have the correct information about who the person is behind celebrity.
Tiger Woods is an example. Or take Ozzy, the Prince of Darkness himself. There is some debate about Ozzy's personal religious beliefs. There is the theatrical persona, yet a lot of his lyrics as well as Black Sabbath songs have theist or even Christian themes. Many of is personal statements nod at traditional values.
I don't particularly appreciate the band-wagon witchhunt approach. I believe its all a matter of one's conscience.
There is, I believe, a difference between no longer buying Nike or Tag Hueur products because they sponsor Tiger Woods. It seems that there are only three victims to his conduct - his wife and two children. If someone gets so mad at his conduct towards his wife they no longer want to purchase a particular brand of shoe, or watch, that seems just silly to me.
However, not wanting to purchase the works of a pedophile, then that's something entirely different - in my mind at least.
I agree with you on this - companies that sponsor a sportsman are too far removed from the crime to be held responsible - and, in this case, I wouldn't consider a link between their sponsorship and his personal activities to be relevant anyway.
I'm thinking more of the direct relationship between purchasing the works of an artist, the artist receiving royalties from that purchase, then the artist using that money for purposes with which we might feel uncomfortable.
1. It probably makes little difference if the guy is dead. Josephus wrote about the sack of Jerusalem from the vantage of being there. The work is considered one of the reliable versions of the event, though Josephus himself duped 39 of his colleagues into killing each other (creating the famous Josephus theorem) and then went ahead and surrendered to the enemy anyway. But the written work per se was great. I would read it.
I also enjoyed reading 'Mein kampf'.
2. For the living artists, it's simply personal. For instance, I will not buy any clothes from Tommy Hilfiger due to some rascist remarks he made against Indians a few years ago (he isn't an artist either).
But a depraved lunatic having written a great book? Perfectly okay with me.
... but that raises an interesting point in itself - can one justify illegally downloading a piece of work for moral reasons , that is, because one does not wish to contribute to an artist's odious activities?
It wouldn't hold water in court, of course, but morally?
I think I have to agree with you there - at least where there is some distance of time involved (I'm still awkward about Mr Pound, for example, as his crimes were within living memory for some people). I've got a few books by people whose activities were somewhat questionable, but who died a long time ago.
What if the depraved lunatic whose books you enjoy frequently sends money to terrorists bent on the murder of innocent Indians (for example)?