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artists and critics
Feb. 3rd, 2003 11:00 pmSo I was just at this screening of By Hook Or By Crook, which was followed by a panel discussion with some academics and the filmmakers. It was funny and sad at the same time because the way academics talk about films and the way filmmakers talk about their own films are entirely incommensurate. And yet, they were all being so friendly and diplomatic, really trying to engage each other. But they just didn't.
This is why I wonder a lot about my career choice as a literary critic. Does what I say matter in any way outside of a community of literary critics? Is it true that all we do is write for and against (arguments) each other? Criticsm . . . to what end?
But then again, do we really want to leave interpretation and the possibility of meaning only to cultural producers -- those people who make films, novels, visual art, etc.? I would almost without reserve say no. Once let loose into the world as a shared object, isn't a film, novel, etc. automatically a point of contact and communication, and as such carries meaning through the way people use it, describe it, analyze it, etc.?
It is both refreshing and oddly depressing to hear filmmakers insist that they were striving for "beauty" (undefined) and that they were not making a film about lesbians, specifically, or about gender. It is refreshing because there is a lot to be said for the film as cultural object that is not reducible to the representation of sexuality or gender. But it is also depressing because, frankly, it seems to be true for many artists that representation is not the medium through which they are thinking critically and trying consciously to affect cultural politics (against what cultural critics would argue?).
This is why I wonder a lot about my career choice as a literary critic. Does what I say matter in any way outside of a community of literary critics? Is it true that all we do is write for and against (arguments) each other? Criticsm . . . to what end?
But then again, do we really want to leave interpretation and the possibility of meaning only to cultural producers -- those people who make films, novels, visual art, etc.? I would almost without reserve say no. Once let loose into the world as a shared object, isn't a film, novel, etc. automatically a point of contact and communication, and as such carries meaning through the way people use it, describe it, analyze it, etc.?
It is both refreshing and oddly depressing to hear filmmakers insist that they were striving for "beauty" (undefined) and that they were not making a film about lesbians, specifically, or about gender. It is refreshing because there is a lot to be said for the film as cultural object that is not reducible to the representation of sexuality or gender. But it is also depressing because, frankly, it seems to be true for many artists that representation is not the medium through which they are thinking critically and trying consciously to affect cultural politics (against what cultural critics would argue?).