The City of Collective Memory
The City of Collective Memory
The City of Collective Memory
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<strong>The</strong> Politics <strong>of</strong> Representational Forms<br />
• As every economic formation or structure engenders a cultural form or an aesthetic<br />
convention, the representational forms <strong>of</strong> the <strong>City</strong> as a Work <strong>of</strong> Art, Panorama, or Spectacle<br />
reflect different stages <strong>of</strong> capitalism.<br />
• <strong>The</strong> term “work <strong>of</strong> art” implied that there existed a market for these “works”, that art was a<br />
commodity for sale & no longer limited only to the aristocrats.<br />
• This 19 th century art market was compromised : the old aristocrats and acamedicians still<br />
ruled over popular taste.<br />
• To cover the changes wrought by political revolutions, industrialization, rise <strong>of</strong> capitalists with<br />
their materialistic aspirations, old styles such as Gothic, Baroque or Classical was used all over<br />
again.<br />
• Thus the battle <strong>of</strong> styles & the <strong>City</strong> as a work <strong>of</strong> art were nothing other than a backward<br />
binding gesture.