NP: Pussy Riot and other artists

[Ian Livingston]

> The point I was making a few days back is that the presence of repression
fosters direction and movement in artists.  Would these artists be better
off living in freedom?  Of course.  But their art might not be so pointed,
or so edgy.

Right, political oppression elicits political reaction. On the other hand,
Patti Smith, for instance, wrote most of her work in response to social
oppression of a different sort. Of course, political oppression had been a
significant aspect of the 10 years prior to her success with Horses, but
her poetry was about the social ostracism, angst, and alienation of youth
in the hugely rearranged world of the middle and late 20th C., where all
the traditional anchors underpinning healthy individuation were left askew
in the wake of two world wars, the massive success of industrial society,
the advent of nuclear science, and the creeping malaise Eddie Bernaise gave
us all. The tyranny she spoke to was not strictly political, but her
edginess, and the enduring attractiveness of her work, springs from the
difficulty of pinning down exactly what it is that is so dreadfully wrong.

My point is that tyranny is bountiful, almost godlike in its omnipresence.
I think Pynchon deals quite artfully with that premise. It is handy,
though, when someone gives tyranny a face.

Putin is just another power junkie. (Martha Davis comes to mind: "I'd sell
my soul for total control / over you.") Very Republican. Might have been an
even better running mate for Mitt. (Vlad, I mean, not so much Martha,
maybe.)


On Fri, Aug 17, 2012 at 9:24 AM, <kelber at mindspring.com> wrote:

> A propos of our recent artists under repression discussion:
>
> http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/08/201281610563073589.html
>
> http://freemuse.org/sw1298.asp
>
> Musicians, painters, writers, filmmakers and other artists have been a
> focal point of repression around the world and throughout history.  Often,
> the actual artistic merit of their work (judged by critics, popularity,
> historians or other subjective criteria)is irrelevant.  There's an absurd
> sensitivity to even the most veiled jabs by artists on the part of
> oppressors.  Psychologically, it must go back to fear of taunting in
> childhood, and the subliminally-fueled adult response is brutal.
>
> Laura
>



-- 
"Less than any man have I  excuse for prejudice; and I feel for all creeds
the warm sympathy of one who has come to learn that even the trust in
reason is a precarious faith, and that we are all fragments of darkness
groping for the sun. I know no more about the ultimates than the simplest
urchin in the streets." -- Will Durant
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