Descarcă revista în format PDF - idea

popularæ“), decît fiindcæ niøte artiøti de geniu au marcat în prealabil cu pecetea
numelui lor sfîrøitul picturii sau al sculpturii ca idea platonicianæ sau
mimesis aristotelic, iar dincolo de asta sfîrøitul oricærui raport între obiectul
estetic øi crearea sa ca operæ singularæ îndreptatæ spre Frumos, înfleles
ca Bine øi Adevær; operæ a unei techne în care spiritul øi substanfla, arta
(ideea) øi artizanatul (producerea), indisolubil legate, garanteazæ atît originalitatea
(formalæ), cît øi calitatea (materialæ) a operei.
Atelierul artistului modern nu mai e centrul de ucenicie populat de cohorte
de elevi care, potrivit unei ierarhii, schifleazæ sau finiseazæ lucrærile
maestrului. Atelierul artistului al lui Courbet, în vremea ei o pînzæ scandaloasæ,
e un loc de întîlnire a artistului cu egalii sæi, în fafla nuditæflii modelului,
øi prefigureazæ oarecum transformarea acestui atelier într-o stranie vægæunæ
în care, simultan, se joacæ alchimia creafliei singuratice øi punerea în scenæ
mondenæ a acesteia. Odatæ respinsæ orice transcendenflæ ce ar putea fi
gæsitæ în spatele lucrurilor, odatæ înlæturate constrîngerile tradifliei, artistul
nu va mai fi instrumentul uman al voinflei zeilor, øi nici întruparea verbului
unui Dumnezeu trinitar atotputernic, ba nici mæcar paznic al idea. Cufundat
într-o veghe singuraticæ în clipa în care impune irezistibil ideologia
individualismului radical, el se înfæfliøeazæ ca ultimul demiurg, ca ultimul mag
de pe lume.
„Totul e posibil“ va apærea doar mai apoi, øi victoria acestui principiu a implicat
o mutaflie prealabilæ a socialului, cea care a antrenat radicalizarea triumfætoare
a individualismului ca legitimare a profitului øi desfæøurarea
reversului sæu: „mulflimea singuraticæ“, organizatæ în democraflie øi în consumul
de masæ. Unii dintre artiøti, confruntafli cu paradoxul reprezentærii
ideale a obiectului, au început sæ se gîndeascæ la moartea artei plecînd tocmai
de la masificarea socialului ce a putut fi perceputæ în premisele marilor
hecatombe ale secolului nostru. Semnînd cu propriul nume manifestele
teoretice sau operele plastice care proclamau uciderea artei ca aventuræ
individualæ, artiøtii „pre-postmoderni“ øi-au abandonat marea lor luptæ eliberatoare
în seama marelui joc al individului-rege, în strædania sa singuraticæ,
dar øi în aceea a circului mediatic øi financiar planetar. Ghicim cu uøurinflæ
care sînt contradicfliile unei astfel de acfliuni. Luînd aceastæ hotærîre, artiøtii
au alimentat, în domeniul estetic, ideologia unei libertæfli individuale
absolute, despre care øtim cæ nu e decît supunerea faflæ de puterile instalate.
Nonarta, forma neoriginaræ (cea a repetitivitæflii industriale, resturile
acesteia sau obiectele de provenienflæ pluralæ) nu mai existæ (nu se prezintæ
ca atare) øi nu mai e captatæ øi apoi prelucratæ (somatæ la com-punere,
Ge-stell) decît prin semnætura sau numele propriu care îi este alipit. Øi astfel
opera devine intenflia operei, iar reprezentarea ei se poate reduce la
un petic de hîrtie pe care o semnæturæ ar certifica aceastæ intenflie. Din
artæ, cæreia i s-a voit distrugerea, n-a mai ræmas decît artistul, ca individ.
Oare nu aceastæ formæ împlinitæ øi goalæ e ceea ce vizeazæ arta conceptualæ,
færæ s-o declare vreodatæ?
Dacæ ar fi sæ rezum în fafla unui public, în cîteva cuvinte, istoria artei „clasice“,
de la Renaøtere încoace, iatæ ce aø spune: redescoperind mæsura
platonicianæ a unei idea, care o susfline, øi transpunînd pe pînzæ armonia
formalæ a naturii øi a omului, pictorii Renaøterii au dat mînæ liberæ
generafliilor ulterioare în cæutarea cvasiabsurdæ a absolutului. (Cf. La Città
ideale a lui Piero della Francesca. 6 )
Pentru marele public contemporan, acestea sînt probleme frivole. De la
inventarea fotografiei, oamenii se stræduie sæ caute în picturæ asemænæri
objects) and this has happened precisely because some art geniuses used their
names to mark the end of painting or sculpture as Platonic idea or Aristotelian
mimesis and, what’s more, the end of any relation between the aesthetic object
and its creation as a singular work aiming at Beauty, understood as Good and
True; a work of a certain technique where the spirit and the substance, the art
(idea) and the handicraft (making), indissolubly related, not only guarantee the
(formal) originality, but also the (material) quality of the work.
The modern artist’s studio is no longer a study centre populated by armies
of students sketching or finishing the works of the master. Painter’s Studio of
Courbet, a scandalous painting in its time, is a place of meeting for the artist
with his equals, in front of the model’s nudity, anticipates in a way the studio
becoming a strange cave where both the alchemy of the lonely creation and its
fashionable enactment are being played out simultaneously. Once any transcendence
that could be found behind things is rejected, once the constraints of tradition
are removed, the artist is no longer the human instrument of gods’ will,
or the word made flesh by some almighty trinitarian God, not even the guardian
of the idea. Absorbed in a lonely wake while he imposes the ideology of radical
individualism, he presents him or herself as the last demiurge, as the world’s
last magician.
“Everything’s possible” will only occur later for its victory presupposed a prior
mutation of the social engaging the triumphant radicalisation of individualism as
a legitimisation of the profit and the unfolding of its reverse: the lonely crowd,
organised in democracy and mass consumption. Some artists, faced with the
paradox of the ideal representation of the object, started to think about the
death of art precisely due to massification of the social domain perceivable in
the premises of the great hecatombs of our century. Signing in their own names
the theoretical manifestos or the artworks proclaiming the murdering of art as
an individual adventure, the “pre-post-modern” artists left their great emancipative
struggle to the game of the king-individual, in his lonely endeavour, but also
to the media and financial world circus. We can easily guess the consequence
of such an action. By taking this decision, the artists nurtured, in the field of aesthetics,
the ideology of an absolute individual freedom which, as we know,
is nothing but the submission to the established powers. Non-art, the non-original
form (that of the industrial repetitiveness, its vestiges or the objects of a plural
origin) does no longer exist and it is only captured or elaborated (put together,
Ge-stell) by means of the signature or the name attached to it. And thus the
work becomes the intention of a work, and its representation may be reduced
to a piece of paper on which a signature would certificate this intention.
What is left of art, whose destruction was intended, is the artist, as an individual.
And does not conceptual art aim, without ever stating so, exactly at the completed
and empty form of individualism?
If I were to sum up the history of “classical” art in a few words, from the Renaissance
on, before an audience, here is what I would say: rediscovering the Platonic
standard of idea which endorses it, and transposing on canvas the formal
harmony of nature and man, the Renaissance painters handed over to the next
generations the quasi-absurd search of the absolute (cf. Città ideale of Piero
della Francesca). 6
For the large contemporary audience, these are frivolous issues. Ever since the
invention of photography, people try to find in painting similarities with their
immediate perceptions. An issue for which, we can rest assured, there was not
and there will never be an ultimate solution, except for the case we give up
every artistic representation. Let’s get over with the issue of idea, that’s the
188