Art Versus Nature
December 21st 2006 08:15
Aristotle said “art completes what nature cannot bring to finish” almost 2.5 millennia ago, and while definitions of ‘art’ and the ‘natural’ remain elusive, the divide between the two has consistently fueled fierce philosophical debate. Perhaps never more so than during the artistic and intellectual movement of late 18th century Western Europe, known as Romanticism. The Romantics glorified nature over man; challenged aristocratic, social and political norms of the Enlightenment; and elevated emotions, imagination and passion over rationality.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the most influential political philosopher of the Enlightenment, had paved the way for much Romantic theory. Some of his attitudes were not unlike 20th century hippies – he was anti-industrialist,
anti-competitive, broadly idealistic, and a worshipper of nature. In Discourse on the Arts and Sciences he argued that art and science had not been beneficial to humankind. According to him art and science were not human needs, but results of pride and vanity which created opportunities for idleness and luxury that contributed to the corruption of man. In our natural states we are good and pure and at liberty but with the imposition of society and civilisation and art, we are captive and bastardised: in Rousseau's words, "man is born free but everywhere he is in chains."
Then in late Romanticism, one particular school of French poets developed a very different view of art and nature, vehemently rejecting the Romantic veneration of the natural. According to the poet Théophile Gautier, ‘Nature is stupid, without consciousness of itself, without thought or passion … art is more beautiful, more true, more powerful than nature.” He preferred not only blatant artificiality to phoney naturalness but all artifice to all nature - his famous slogan was “l’art pour l’art” or “art for art’s sake.”
The discourse carries with it interesting questions. Do we need art? Does it corrupt our ‘natural’ state? Or is it precisely what makes us humans, in the most natural sense? Is art more powerful than the natural? If the breathtaking colours and textures of an ocean or sunset or rainforest, for example, happened to be man-made and were viewed in a domestic setting or gallery, would they have the same impact? Or is their potency not intrinsic to them and dependent rather upon our knowing that they are of nature’s creation?
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the most influential political philosopher of the Enlightenment, had paved the way for much Romantic theory. Some of his attitudes were not unlike 20th century hippies – he was anti-industrialist,
Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog, by Caspar David Friedrich, 1817
Then in late Romanticism, one particular school of French poets developed a very different view of art and nature, vehemently rejecting the Romantic veneration of the natural. According to the poet Théophile Gautier, ‘Nature is stupid, without consciousness of itself, without thought or passion … art is more beautiful, more true, more powerful than nature.” He preferred not only blatant artificiality to phoney naturalness but all artifice to all nature - his famous slogan was “l’art pour l’art” or “art for art’s sake.”
The discourse carries with it interesting questions. Do we need art? Does it corrupt our ‘natural’ state? Or is it precisely what makes us humans, in the most natural sense? Is art more powerful than the natural? If the breathtaking colours and textures of an ocean or sunset or rainforest, for example, happened to be man-made and were viewed in a domestic setting or gallery, would they have the same impact? Or is their potency not intrinsic to them and dependent rather upon our knowing that they are of nature’s creation?
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