some people on the left retreat to the arts as a space where they are unchallenged

i haven't seen the new adam curtis, but i have read the thread where people are talking about it!

The Power Of Nightmares/Adam Curtis

i was particularly interested in something localgarda said about it:

I felt the part where he says some people on the left retreat to the arts as a space where they are unchallenged was the first time I've ever heard someone say that so directly, having often thought it in recent years.

thought the topic warranted broader discussion, seems interesting!

"Unchallenged" in what way?

Left wing statements are more likely to be well received in the arts than within society in general, is how I'd put it.

Ofc there are right wing artists, critics, etc. and the question of how far left you can do w/o disproving this truism is an open one.

Mainstream media is hostile to left wing thought and seeks to neuter it by stealing its styles and signifiers and pairing them with apolotical content, usually just because it's a good way to make money.

xp dan m
however you want to interpret it! it's a snippet from a post that someone made on another thread about a part of an adam curtis doc i haven't seen yet, and adam curtis is not the most straightforward person in the first place, haha. there are a lot of ways you could interpret unchallenged, also left, retreat, 'some', and 'the arts', it all seems worth discussing to me

when it comes to music, at least, it's probably the one place where your audience won't shrink considerably spreading such a message, because lots of people tune out lyrics, or if they don't, conservatives/apolitical people will sing your lyrics full-throatedly at your shows because they don't know what they mean and I say ack

whereas if you're doing theater or movies, you are much more likely to get challenged from all sides re: the content. even if a lot of the challenge is from terminally online people

Should be noted this is not just about creators - it's as much about audiences. Less likely to meet a tory at the local punk show or book club than lots of other places.

Bringing some context to the original statement within the show it was about liberal middle class ppl, distraught by Thatcher's victory, retreating into the fine arts. But I def think actual leftist ppl often do this toom

Art is no longer praxis huh

'retreat' pfah

Art has never been praxis. Art is art.

pretty comfortable with the thought that some art is definitely praxis, and moreover the great 'retreat' performed by millennial leftists is not into art but into pure supine consumption. if you're still making art that's a hell of a step up

I think billing art as praxis is bad for art and praxis both.

The statement is not specifically about millenials, nor, again, artists, so "if you're still making art" is not what any of this is about.

some people on the left would love to retreat into the arts as a space where they are unchallenged won't be ground into dust if only they had the family money

if he wants to talk shit about comfortable middle class people not being on the barricades then he should just say that. dont tease me with this fantasy idea of the arts as a space where leftism goes unchallenged.

I think billing art as praxis is bad for art and praxis both.

Yeah, there's a word for "art as praxis": it's called propaganda. And if you're a propagandist, that's fine, just say so up front.

I still don't really get the turn of phrase but my first thought when reading it was basically "if you're not challenged in art then you are making/seeing some lousy art."

Kind of feel like Adam Curtis’s steez is as early 2000s amd dated as the Strokes, reading no logo, and being infowars-curious don’t @ me

Patti Smith is personally responsible for the neoliberal era IIRC

he's pretty banksy innit xp

Kind of feel like Adam Curtis’s steez is as early 2000s amd dated as the Strokes, reading no logo, and being infowars-curious don’t @ me

some people on the left retreat to jaded reference humour as a space where they are unchallenged

Some people on the left retreat into the fine art of removing their voiceover narration track to remain unchallenged.

i’ll share my two cents which is that i don’t understand what this phrase means

Can someone please explain what praxis is because I have never known and when I try to google it I don’t get it.

Amos’s BFF on the Expanse

All political factions tend to retreat to spaces where they essentially preach to themselves / the choir. I don't think left-leaning spaces are shrinking or that leftists only have art left as a safe space for expression and challenging norms. The socio-cultural forces that play out at national level will always shape a "left" and a "right", you cannot take that away until you can control minds or put everyone in prison.

Art itself is definitely challenged and critiqued all the time - it's easier than ever to make a faux pas. Only a fraction of artists will be explicit or risk making grand statements. Many artists will at best reflect moods or start quiet revolutions, whose true meaning will be recognized decades from now. Art can still have a transformational power, but more as a piece in the bigger picture. I wouldn't paint it as a sacred space - it has its own biases and evolves with the rest.

I cannot name too many current artists whose work could be said to be a political medium - even if it's a question of degrees. I tend to think that art loses its interest and power when it tries to be too explicit / functional as a signifier, it has to work in indirect ways.

No, all art is inherently political

I struggle to understand what Adam Curtis meant by this, I feel he was commenting on some personal observations rather than anything universal

thank god an actual artist posted

You’d have to have a pretty narrow definition of ‘political’ to exclude the vast amounts of contemporary art dealing with race, gender, power, consumption and the environment.

I think Curtis really just meant that a lot of left/liberal people gave up on active participation in frontline politics and traditional forms of activism and focused on institutions they had more sway over. As people lost faith in their ability to influence government (and, subsequently, governments’ ability to influence the economy / world), people channeled political discussions through art and cultural institutions. idk whether it really holds true in the era of social media and dying culture.

That said, I think you could probably argue that the huge amount of focus right-wing dorks who felt frustrated by ‘liberal orthodoxy’ placed on video games (which ended up having significant downstream political implications) has some parallels.

If that’s what Curtis meant, I think he’s making personal observations rather than stating anything remotely universally true. What does he mean “the arts”? Hollywood? Record labels? Turner Prize bait? “The arts” most broadly is occupied by what once would’ve been called “champagne socialists” but is basically laissez-faire capitalists who vote Democrat/Liberal/Labour

The intersection between “the left” and “the arts” comes from something psychological, I think, a generalized desire for “making the world more beautiful”, capacity for empathy, being able to work within “the arts” to express the transgressive and things that are enraging, etc etc, it’s not because artists are tired activists

Most of the tired activists I know moved on to become therapists or to work at philanthropic orgs/NGOs

The programme is specifically about the UK in the 80s/90s, I don't know how universal it was intended to be.

Ah so I’d have to ask some friends about that then, I wasn’t there

There's plenty space between personal and universal tbf.

i think this is a general phenomenon, not unique to “arts”. people sort into likeminded groups to avoid ideological friction, which is unpleasant. i’ve noticed a version of it in economics; most left wing people become microeconomists, even though macro—which is more conservative and also has a more hierarchical “bro” culture—is arguably where they would have more impact, and is what most young people interested in the topic are drawn in by

“I think Curtis really just meant that a lot of left/liberal people gave up on active participation in frontline politics and traditional forms of activism and focused on institutions they had more sway over”

Yeah i think this is what he means. Strange atmosphere, this thread.