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Transcript

Walter Benjamin and Film's Lack of Aura

"The Work of Art in the Age of its Technological Reproducibility"

Context on Walter Benjamin

Walter Benjamin

- Went to Goethe University in Frankfurt, Germany

- School was critical of capitalism

- Also on Marxist Leninism

- Overall Marxist

- Examine the failure of Marxist revolutionary social change

- Examine mass culture (including film)

Technological Reproducability

- Nowadays we would call it : copy and paste

- Manufacture of objects/items for cosumption within a capitalist system

- Even the ancient Greeks had technologies to reproduce art (founding and stamping)

only difference to nowadays is speed

The Work of Art

“In principle a work of art has always been reproducible“.

- Walter Benjamin

- When works are created for ritual, they function as a type of magic and can only be recognized as art over time

- They are considered works of art from the start when works are created to be exhibited

The work of art

Work of Art in Film

Film

- According to Walter Benjamin, a film is perceived in a state of distraction – and a collective one at that.

The Aura

- The here and now of the work of art

- Its unique existence in a particular place and time

- Bears the mark of the history to which the work has been subject

- In many ways, aura is an antiquated idea, connected to a distant history of religious icons and mysticism.

"What withers in the age of technological reproducibility (i.e. Photography) is... the aura"

- Walter Benjamin

The Symbolic Aura of the Mona Lisa

- The aura is what the "original" Mona Lisa has that its photographed reproduction -no matter how precise in its replication- does not have

The Aura of the Mona Lisa

Aura

No Aura

Aura in the eyes of Walter Benjamin

Walter Benjamin on Aura

- Since he is a Marxist, he is against the aura

- The uniqueness makes works of art with aura to an element of capitalism

- I would go so far to say that he dislikes Aura

Aura

Lack of Aura in Film

Lack of Aura in Film

- original painting is more authentic than its reproductions that are mechanically reproduced by photography or film

- Photographic arts (especially film) = no originals, no aura (in theory)

According to Walter Benjamin

Why does film not have Aura?

- paintings and sculptures -> people with a lot of money

- film is for everyone, not just for people who can afford it (Marxist)

- actor has to operate with the whole body, yet forgoing his aura

- The viewer does not identify with the actor's work but with the point of view of the camera

Why?

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