Culture has always encountered cases in which the private behaviour of artists makes it very difficult for the viewer to value their work. The latest episodes have been those of the recently deceased Alain Delon, an icon of cinema but a recognised homophobe and extremist, and the revelation that Alice Munro, a Nobel Prize winner in literature who died in May, hid the abuse suffered by her daughter at the hands of her husband.
Writers give their point of view on this matter Carmen Domingo and Alexander Palomas. Domingo believes that imagining a world built by good people is not only naive, but can be “disastrous for creation” because ethics is no guarantee of quality. For his part, Palomas believes that artists “cannot separate themselves” from their works, nor vice versa: “Artists are our work, whether we like it or not.”
Ideology can prevent us from enjoying art
CARMEN SUNDAY
The death of Alain Delon and the comments about his ideology – he was a voter for the National Front and a declared homophobe – have reopened the debate on the difference between the artist and his work. If I were to ask myself whether we should read Flaubert, Wilde or Baudelaire, the first accused of praising adultery, the second tried for his homosexuality and the third for some of his poems of The flowers of evil, They would probably say, to be gentle, that I am a reactionary. Things would change if my approach referred to Roman Polanski, Michael Jackson, Richard Wagner, Martin Heidegger or Pablo Ruiz Picasso. There I would certainly find more consensus, and would advocate applying the much-repeated culture of cancellation to them. Perhaps I am cheating: while the former did not attack anyone, physically, of course, the latter did: anti-Semitism, sexist violence… But it is no less true that the latter, in their time, did not have the same consideration as they do when analysed with today’s eyes. In short, the morality of the time determines the forms of condemnation.
Do we judge the author with the eyes of the time in which he lived or with contemporary eyes? Do we apply moral sanctions retroactively? Should we believe that works – masterful ones – should be invalidated because their author is a despicable being? In other words: does the life of the author discredit his work? It is true that the relationship between author and work is close, but it is no less true that we cannot judge creators by their lives, but by their works. Imagining a world of creation built by “good people” is not only naive, but, I would say, even harmful to creation. Ethics, like ideology, are no guarantee of aesthetic quality. It goes without saying that, otherwise, we would have a world full of geniuses.
Should we, then, separate the work from its author? Do we feel uneasy if we appreciate, enjoy or value the work of someone at the antipodes of our thinking? Would we live in a better world if we did not enjoy the work of someone who is at the opposite end of the spectrum? Guernica Or if we were to watch a film by Polanski or Delon again? In any of these examples, the works cannot be separated from their context or their author. If we did so, we might even end up not understanding them. This interpretation makes us recognize that at that time the world was racist, anti-Semitic or sexist and that was tolerable.
In the 21st century, the analysis does not stop at the contemporary, but rather reviews the past with today’s eyes, and one has the feeling that a rewriting is being forced which – I hope involuntarily – brings us closer to applying the authoritarian will that has been criticised before. But censorship and cancellations – historically associated with the right and now emerging in sectors that we call progressive – do not resolve violence, sexism, anti-Semitism, racism or paedophilia.
Can we then imagine a future world in which something we do regularly today would be socially sanctioned or even a crime? Would we be despicable in that future and our work reprehensible? What should we do, then, with those works made by people who do not share our ideas, or who have committed crimes according to current law? The answer to whether we approach them or not cannot be just yes or no. Let us accept that the identification of the work with the author is never complete (sometimes one intends to do one thing and ends up doing another, or one wants to convey an idea and the reception is the opposite). Perhaps the most sensible thing would be to assume, know and explain the trajectory of each of the authors and, knowing that, simply enjoy the work. And now, let’s assume that John Lennon confessed that he beat his wife, that Lou Reed was accused of anti-Semitism and racism, that Picasso’s relationship with women would recommend not having him as a partner, that Hemingway doesn’t seem like the best company for a night out, or that Alain Delon was homophobic and sexist.
At this point, and knowing his life, let us enjoy the works that helped, in one way or another, to advance humanity. At least I will continue to enjoy a painting by Picasso, a novel by Hemingway and a film by Delon.
Consuming culture from the heart and the head
ALEXANDER PALOMAS
I will try not to talk in these lines about the case of Alice Munro or her dark family history. I will also try not to do so as a writer, but as a consumer of culture – should I perhaps say user? – who has long been thinking about whether it is appropriate to separate the artist from his work or whether, on the contrary, what the hand creates is the extension of the hand itself and, therefore, of the blood that feeds its creation.
A few months ago, a good friend of mine worked under the direct orders of a genius of theatre direction, a creator highly “admired and respected” in the profession. I followed the rehearsal process very closely – I was even able to attend a couple of them – and I saw the hell that theatre became under the baton of a person who directed – and continues to do so – by punishing and humiliating his actors and crew, putting special focus and interest on his assistant director, my friend. I know A. well, and, as he is experienced in handling difficult characters (as he expresses it in his kindness: “difficult characters”, he said), he maintained his composure and his inexplicable ability to conciliate throughout the process until he got the best out of that totem of unbridled shortcomings and insecurities that directed the play.
From the moment she entered the theatre, the tension was almost solid. Everything and everyone – especially the technicians – depended on the indecipherable daily labyrinth of mood swings, fits of rage and unbelievable regret that governed the ship. The play, when it finally premiered, was a success. A resounding one. Practically no one knows about the mud and human suffering on which the genius that underpins this show rests. Not me. Today, I am the only one in my circle who has not seen it and will not see it again. They cannot explain it to themselves and I am torn between two waters: on the one hand, my head tells me that the private information I have about its director should not interfere with my enjoyment of the play; on the other, my heart is still impregnated with what I felt watching her shine over her team based on insults, mockery and mistreatment, and the wound persists even today.
The question is: does applauding the work of an artist like her validate the artist or just her work? Can we separate the creative process from its result? Should we? And if we do, would we be censoring, judging? What do we gain? What do we lose? “Artists… you know.”
Several of the colleagues I consulted with about my doubt offered me this answer, and the one who writes —who is no longer a culture user, but above all an artist— confesses that this umbrella of five words is our own condemnation and shame because it includes us in that ugly bag of “what we do not see does not exist.” Being an artist does not exempt you from anything. There are some who are wonderful people and others, authentic monsters —and I know several—, but that “you already know” cannot and should not represent us.
We artists are what we do. We are our work, whether we like it or not, whether we want it or not. There is no choice. We are what we share with those who read us, with those who come to see us at the theatre, with those who enjoy our concerts. And I wish it were not so, but art has that, that truth that cannot be separated from the one who creates it or from the one who receives it. There is too much intimate communion, too much vulnerability exposed in the act of opening the doors of your emotionality to another human being who asks for your trust. Because without trust there is no enjoyment, there is no art.
My head scolds me with that paternal voice that I know well and repeats the overused phrase: “If we all thought like you, we wouldn’t have had Picasso, Gauguin, Von Trier, Alice Munro and a string of artists —I’m only citing the dead, just in case…— without equal.” Surely my head is right. Even so, unfortunately for those great “geniuses” of humanity who forgot to plant flowers instead of corpses in their path, when I create and consume art, I do so with the plexus, seeking a glimpse of sincere communion with the truth of the other.
My heart tells me that, even if the genius’s claw offers me an unparalleled work, it is still a claw and what I want from an artist is his hand. In the end, there is nothing more brilliant in an artist than his generosity. Or his kindness. We have plenty of evil.
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