Much of the art in the Hermitage Museum from the 20th century collection was taken as spoils from underground bunkers when the Soviet army ended World War II (translated from Russian as the Great Patriot War) in Europe by capturing Berlin. These paintings were part of a broad program of purges from German art museums that later became the “Entarte Kunst” (Degenerate Art) exhibit that premièred in Munich in 1937, organized by the Nationalist-Socialists to highlight the aesthetic, idealogical, and moral depravity of modern art. After this huge travelling exhibition ended, what was not sold at auction in Switzerland or taken as private property by military officers was buried away under the city. There is notoriously no official documentation of how the works ended up in the Hermitage.
A deep sense of irony gripped me after a museum venture in Saint Petersburg when a rather heated conversation sprang up with one of my travelling companions in which it was insisted that the production and exhibition of such art works as what is in the modern art displays at the Hermitage, especially abstract painting, was “offensive.” A litany of defences to that opinion was produced that sharply mimicked most of the important points in the concept of Degenerate Art; rather by accident I believe and minus the theories of racial conspiracy. That someone would find modern, and by proxy, contemporary art relevant enough to be morally outraged on such a broad scale fascinated me at the same time that it dismayed me and I never would have expected someone specializing in business administration to demand that a return to the populist, heroic, and nationalist Romanticism in the art of 19th century Europe be universally instituted. To say the least, after years of witnessing people shrug their shoulders in disinterest when touring a modern art museum, I was caught quite off guard by a rather reactionary and aggressive aesthetic philosophy that in essence hearkened back to the romantic precursors of fascism. Even more so by someone born and bred in Berlin, being the relativist cultural capital that it is today.
Anyone ever encountered something like this?
A deep sense of irony gripped me after a museum venture in Saint Petersburg when a rather heated conversation sprang up with one of my travelling companions in which it was insisted that the production and exhibition of such art works as what is in the modern art displays at the Hermitage, especially abstract painting, was “offensive.” A litany of defences to that opinion was produced that sharply mimicked most of the important points in the concept of Degenerate Art; rather by accident I believe and minus the theories of racial conspiracy. That someone would find modern, and by proxy, contemporary art relevant enough to be morally outraged on such a broad scale fascinated me at the same time that it dismayed me and I never would have expected someone specializing in business administration to demand that a return to the populist, heroic, and nationalist Romanticism in the art of 19th century Europe be universally instituted. To say the least, after years of witnessing people shrug their shoulders in disinterest when touring a modern art museum, I was caught quite off guard by a rather reactionary and aggressive aesthetic philosophy that in essence hearkened back to the romantic precursors of fascism. Even more so by someone born and bred in Berlin, being the relativist cultural capital that it is today.
Anyone ever encountered something like this?
2 comments:
Only in movies about Hitler...
Maybe it's the sort of conversation that commonly happens without anyone from our particular subculture around to report (retort)?
Dave's recent post makes a good point. The demographic in America most likely have such a take on modern art are the evangelical christians.
Post a Comment