You Can Have Your Ideology and Make It Pretty Too
Jed Perl, writing for the New Republic in 2014, argued in “Liberals Are Killing Art,” that art “is by its very nature overheated, hot-headed, unreasonable—and, dare we say it, sometimes illiberal. Without ardor there is no art.” Well, duh. But, although Perl makes that his thesis, his argument is that the political left is in effect ruining art by weighing it down with ideology, to the detriment of beauty.
His article is ridiculous on many fronts, propped up by arguments that have the elegance and substance of concrete blocks, a little irony that he must be missing (?). Perl seems to be saying that political correctness, which he blames on the left, has somehow grabbed art by the neck and is pulling it under. So many questions bubble up in response: Why does ideology have to come without ardor? Can’t ideology, in fact, be a form of ardor? Why do liberals get blamed for ugly art? Conversely, does Perl think that Lefties feel that Leni Riefenstahl’s work wasn’t pretty, wasn’t full of ardor, wasn’t art? It can be those things and still not move us to miss the good old days of the Third Reich.
Perl’s arguments are best dismissed by art itself, the excellent stuff that comes full of ardor and, often, ideology. Here are three political pieces of art. Are they leftist? Are they not beautiful?
Chinese artist Ai Weiwei has infused a political/social statement with a glowing beauty. For the February 15, 2006, Cinema for Peace gala, he wrapped the six columns of Berlin’s Konzerthaus with 14,000 life vests used by refugees who successfully crossed the Mediterranean to Lesbos, Greece. The installation is testimony to their struggle, to the more than 400 people who this year alone didn’t survive the journey, and to the ongoing political pressures forcing so many Syrians and others to seek asylum in Europe.
Or what about “Non-Violence,” Swedish artist Carl Fredrik Reuterswärd’s 1980s sculpture?
Or Alexandra Clotfelter’s “The Beginning is Near,” a 2012 lithograph?
Photos of Konzerthaus courtesy of Oliver Lang and Markus Winninghoff.