6.3.25

Art history


As Lucien Goldmann argued with respect to literary works first establishing the immanent structure of meaning of an art work or style, and then situating it in the broader structure of class relations in a given mode of production. On the other side, some kinds of art may be regarded as ideological weapons of a subordinate class in its struggle for emancipation, and the dispute over realism and modernism was very largely concerned with the proper characterization and analysis of "revolutionary art". Art in the era of advanced capitalism is not only degraded as a result of mechanical reproduction and wide diffusion, but also acquires a greater power of pacifying and integrating dissident classes and groups; while at the same time the ideological effectiveness of any revolutionary art is diminished because radical innovations are easily assimilated into the body of dominant images.