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From: ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis)
Newsgroups: net.music,net.music.classical
Subject: Re: Progress, the Arts, Razor Blades and Bull
Message-ID: <121@spar.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 4-Mar-85 14:32:33 EST
Article-I.D.: spar.121
Posted: Mon Mar  4 14:32:33 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 7-Mar-85 05:37:12 EST
References: <8347@brl-tgr.ARPA> <109@spar.UUCP> <963@hound.UUCP> <3096@allegra.UUCP> <631@mhuxt.UUCP>
Reply-To: ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis)
Organization: Schlumberger Palo Alto Research, CA
Lines: 70
Xref: watmath net.music:6387 net.music.classical:962

> The rhythmic drive and unconventional harmony of an Ornette  Coleman DOES
> represent progress over the unaccented 4/4 of a Louis Armstrong. This does
> not demean the colossal genius of Armstrong, but Coleman has clearly
> traveled further down the road of musical discovery. If that's not progress,
> then I don't know what is.
> Marcel

    No doubt that a limited degree of growth must occur within an artistic
    subvariety (such as jazz or rock) during its infancy.  But such change
    disguises the essential sameness of artistic expression over the vast
    spread of history, especially to those whose viewpoints are limited to a
    very narrow period (less than a hundred years).

    Not to belittle modern music, but I'd pity the fool who'd attempt to
    demonstrate that any music written in the past hundred years was more
    sophisticated than, say, Thomas Tallis's 40 part motet `Spem in Alium',
    in either technical complexity or emotional subtlety.

    Going further afield, how about the extreme harmonic and rhythmic
    complexities of Classical Indian music? Sophistication that easily
    rivals that found in modern western music has apparently existed for
    millenia. So how can you speak of progress?

    One could just as easily argue that degeneration and decay have
    characterized modern arts -- indeed, such opinions are very commonly
    heard today. 

    Unlike the sciences, which invented the concept of progress, the arts
    will not tolerate the unabated increase in formal complexity. Balance is
    usually maintained by trading a gain in complexity here with a loss in
    richness there (baroque polyphony vs. classical harmony).  Extreme
    overdevelopment will frequently be countered by a total and magnificent
    destruction of all complexity (progressive rock's bombast => punk's 
    raw energy).

> Arts are made by people using tools and the tools improve.  What if Leonardo
> had available the paints we have today. ...more can be done by the artist
> with the better tools.  What if a Leonardo or a Titian could work in the
> present audio-visual arts?

    I must take exception to such sentiments. Are modern tools, precise and
    efficient though they can be, more expressive than those of the past?
    Have you not heard our artists, who must frequently work with the
    inhuman, faceless, plastic artifacts of our machine driven era, lamenting
    the disappearance of the ancient crafts? 

    Worse yet, such thinking confuses technique with art, which exists in
    the spiritual, and not the physical, realm. Art lives in the depths of
    the soul; it is inspired by and it touches human emotions. Only fools
    and engineers equate technical precision with beauty.

    Those who seek to perfect art by focusing on what they perceive as
    physical imperfections have been blinded by its color, shape or sound.
    Leonardo's art is a natural expression of the spirit and form of his
    world. The assertion that it might be improved by modern paints is
    horribly mistaken.

> That doesn't make our painters Leonardos, but given equal talent (almost
> never happens - or hasn't happened yet ...  Furthermore, I assert that the
> works of Leonardo ... are in every way superior to those of
> {prehistoric cave art}.

    Perhaps the reason why masterpieces from the past remain unsurpassable
    is that artistic progress is a bogus concept. And I suggest that you
    look again, not only at those Mondrians and Matisses, but also at those
    prehistoric cave paintings.

    `A pair of monkeys reach for a moon in the water.'

-michael