Are tyrants good for art?

[Joe Allonby]

Artists have to make a living too, even if it's not what they intended
from the get go.

I'm sure that Profokiev would have been happier composing and
conducting symphonies instead of soundtracks for propaganda films.
Bulgakov worked as a stagehand when he wasn't writing novels that were
banned by his biggest fan Stalin. Or writing plays that were closed
after one performance.

I wouldn't knock the Soviet artists too hard. They were struggling to
make art under an oppressive regime that sought to use them as
propaganda pawns.



On Mon, Aug 13, 2012 at 4:25 AM, Max Nemtsov <max.nemtsov at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> hm, a hectic mix
> and, this list covers at least 3 different tyrants, with different
> degrees of tightening screws on art (not to mention, several works from
> it are specimens of pre-ordered propaganda art). and, this is cinema
> which, according to the greatest moviegoer of all times, named
> Ulyanov-Lenin, was nothing better for the masses than circus, so of
> course it thrived under the Soviets, why shouldn't it. and it
> disproportionately veers towards one director
> try to take instead, something like a typical annual output of Soviet
> film studios of mid-seventies, and see how many gems you could find.
> then, let's talk art
> Mx
>
> jesus, i just adore people nostalgic for the soviet era, it's like the
> 60s. have you lived there?
>
>
> On 12.08.2012 23:14, kelber at mindspring.com wrote:
>>
>> Battleship Potemkin (1925)
>> Alexander Nevsky (1938)
>> The Cranes are Flying (1957)
>> Ivan's Childhood (1962)
>> Andrei Rublev (1966)
>> Stalker (1979)
>> Come and See (1985)
>>
>> And for all of its repressive structures in place, Iran has a great cinema
>> movement.
>>
>> Laura
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>>>
>>> From: Joe Allonby <joeallonby at gmail.com>
>>> Sent: Aug 12, 2012 1:08 PM
>>> To: Alex Colter <recoignishon at gmail.com>
>>> Cc: Dave Monroe <against.the.dave at gmail.com>, pynchon -l
>>> <pynchon-l at waste.org>
>>> Subject: Re: Are tyrants good for art?
>>>
>>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-oRbStmxvm4
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Sun, Aug 12, 2012 at 1:03 PM, Alex Colter <recoignishon at gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> "It's because traditional tyrants left a good deal of freedom in
>>>> society.
>>>> Ancient China wasn't anything like a modern democracy, but it produced
>>>> some
>>>> of the greatest art there's ever been, while Mao's China produced
>>>> nothing.
>>>> Tsarist Russia contained many kinds of discrimination and injustice, but
>>>> in
>>>> the late 19th and early 20th Century it was in the vanguard of
>>>> literature,
>>>> painting, music and dance. The Soviet Union produced little that was
>>>> even
>>>> remotely comparable. The arts flourished in the empire of the Habsburgs,
>>>> while Nazism produced Leni Riefenstahl's repugnant and much over-rated
>>>> Triumph of the Will. Whereas authoritarian regimes leave much of society
>>>> alone, totalitarianism aims to control everything. Invariably, the
>>>> result is
>>>> a cultural desert."
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On Sun, Aug 12, 2012 at 11:08 AM, Dave Monroe
>>>> <against.the.dave at gmail.com>
>>>> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Culture thrives on conflict and antagonism, not social harmony - a
>>>>> point made rather memorably by a certain Harry Lime, says philosopher
>>>>> John Gray.
>>>>>
>>>>> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-19202527
>>>>>
>>>>> John Gray
>>>>>
>>>>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_N._Gray
>>>>
>>>>
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