Following up on Objectivist Advice


Reidy

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The revival of the Doris Lessing thread brings up a question that is not closely-related enough to bring up there: how have people here fared when pursuing recommendations in the various arts from Rand and the people around her?

Most rewarding has been Noel Coward, who remains one of the bright spots in my life after all these decades. Hugo has been difficult but worth the effort. After about eight years of struggle with Notre Dame I'm within forty pages of the end. This is what a lot of people go through with Atlas Shrugged, and they, too, would be wise to persevere. The Scarlet Letter did not repay the effort, and I struck out completely with Conrad and Dostoyevsky. Discovered Merwin and Webster at a used-book store (the much-mourned Acres of Books in Long Beach CA) and found several that I prefer to Calumet K. Schiller didn't grab me, but Rand did say you have to see/read him in the original.

I already liked the nineteenth-century musical repertoire, but, before discovering Rand, wouldn't admit it. In the manner of The Emperor's New Clothes I tried to convince myself that, being a highbrow and all, I liked Stravinsky, Schoenberg and their spawn. Favorites remain Bach and Sibelius, though, way ahead of Rachmaninoff. The first seems, like all pre-romantics, not to be on the approved list, and I never heard any Objectivist mention of the latter one way or another.

Rand didn't exactly lead me to Garbo, but absorbing the Randian esthetic did, and I wasn't surprised to learn later that she based at least two characters on her (Gonda in Ideal, Ludlow in Atlas Shrugged and, physically perhaps, Dominique Francon).

(Leaving aside the question of whether architecture fully qualifies as an art or not) I came to Rand already appreciating Wright. Part of what hooked me in on The Fountainhead, in fact, was spotting the Wrightian touches that start about three pages into the book.

Most of the paintings that get mentioned in Objectivist circles are an embarrassment, including everything I've ever seen from Cordair. Somebody in one of these forums coined the wonderful word "Objectikitsch".

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I've found Rand's tastes basically uncorrelated to mine, even when I like some of the same works she did. There's most overlap in literature, but I think that that's only because I've been a lover of literature since I was a child, so the likelihood is high that among the many writers I appreciate are some she liked. Also among the many writers I appreciate are some she loathed.

Ellen

The credit for "Objectikitsch" goes to Dragonfly.

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Most of the paintings that get mentioned in Objectivist circles are an embarrassment, including everything I've ever seen from Cordair. Somebody in one of these forums coined the wonderful word "Objectikitsch".

I went to the Cordair site and have to agree with you. Some of these artists I had seen before. An exception might be a Capuletti self portrait. Capu always seemed much more under the influence of Spain than Objectikitsch. I think I know what the problem is. If you wear imagined Objectivist esthetics like a suit of clothes your human portraiture will be people wearing those clothes and not portrayed displaying an inner self. The Mona Lisa is about that inner self--it's playing with the mystery of what's behind that smile. Now Maxfield Parish seems to be something akin to what you find in Cordair, and Rand despised Parish. Interestingly, Frank O'Connor seems to have escaped much of this, even though not that good a painter overall.

--Brant

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Speaking of Objectikitsch, whenever I've walked past the Redbox in my neighborhood this year, I've seen horror movie dvd imagery that make use of the back-bender, floating-through-the-air pose that is common in Objectikitsch. Here are a few examples:

The-Last-Exorcism-2-(2013)-R2-CUSTOM.jpg

Dark-Skies-one-sheet-200x300.jpg

3cbef8d185a4210f8cecf94.jpg

It makes me wonder if these Hollywood people have seen Objectikitsch and thought, "Damn, that stuff is creepy! Let's copy it in our horror movies."

J

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Rand helped set up Objectikitsch somewhat by describing Dominique's statue in The Fountainhead as having the theme of "exaltation." Does anyone know any good examples of this in what you think is great visual art? Then there was the criticism of The David in The Objectivist, by Mary Ann Sures, I think, for having a slightly worried look on his face. I mean, naked boy with a sling going out to fight the big G--and he's not a little worried? Give me some body armor and a Gatling gun; you can plaster a grin on my kisser. Esthetics follow the artist. Vice versa, there's a problem. It's called circularity and indicates a fallacy.

--Brant

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I suspect that the Dominique statue came from Dietrich's Song of Songs. No, I don't think it's great art. Would you consider Nike of Samothrace an example of exaltation?

Head-back or arms-back poses are frequent in Art Deco, which was in vogue in the years when Rand was writing The Fountainhead. Eli Jaques Kahn, whose office she typed in, was one of its greatest practitioners.

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The automatic links are from Viglink.

Sometimes a few pennies comes in from this (these days, that is literal).

I live in Illinois, so I am unable to get referral fees from Amazon. The state wanted to tax Amazon affiliate sales, so Amazon pulled the plug on affiliates within the state.

I signed up to Viglink as a workaround. It started working, but after a few months, the Amazon part of that got canceled, too. I'm keeping Viglink enabled for a bit to see if there is anything useful that will come of it.

Michael

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and I hate the way links are put into our text by a third party

What does that mean? I don't think I've ever had a link which I didn't put there inserted into one of my posts.

Ellen

Nike takes you to Nike shoe company. You don't see that highlighted? Do you get OL via email? (Try putting your mouse pointer on it.) That might roust it off the text.

--Brant

it's highlighted in my previous post on this thread and I guess it will be too in this one

might be my browser does this, not OL

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and I hate the way links are put into our text by a third party

What does that mean? I don't think I've ever had a link which I didn't put there inserted into one of my posts.

Ellen

Nike takes you to Nike shoe company. You don't see that highlighted? Do you get OL via email? (Try putting your mouse pointer on it.) That might roust it off the text.

--Brant

it's highlighted in my previous post on this thread and I guess it will be too in this one

might be my browser does this, not OL

You think that shoes are an example of exalted art?!! And here I thought that I was something of an aesthetic rebel in O'land.

J

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Nike takes you to Nike shoe company. You don't see that highlighted? Do you get OL via email? (Try putting your mouse pointer on it.) That might roust it off the text.

--Brant

it's highlighted in my previous post on this thread and I guess it will be too in this one

might be my browser does this, not OL

It isn't highlighted in my text, and I didn't know it was there until I "clicked" (touched it with a finger - I'm reading OL on an iPad). My browser is Safari, the latest version, whatever number that is.

Links that posters put in themselves appear in blue and underlined on my screen.

Ellen

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