UHP399 Gardens & Machines

I recently concluded watching Princess Mononoke, which we began watching in class.  The basic idea is that there is a warrior, Ashitaka, facing a horrible, life threatening curse, must travel to lands far away to try and save himself.  On his journey, he meets Lady Eboshi, who is slowly killing a forest to harvest the iron from the ground underneath.  The forest is inhabited by fantastic gods and creatures who are fighting back, including Moro, the wolf god, and San, a girl raised by Moro.  The story revolves around the struggles they face fighting one another, and the struggles Ashitaka must face trying to stop them.

*NOTE: after this point, plot points might be discussed that we didn’t view in class.  Take this into account, and watch the movie before reading!  Really, it’s good!*

Interestingly, there is no actual villain in this story.  At first, one expects it will be Lady Eboshi, whose city of iron and destruction of the forest seem to be evil (which would seem to send a clear message of technology is evil, return to nature, etc.).  But as the plot progresses, it becomes clear that Lady Eboshi isn’t really a villain, as she has many good qualities.  For instance, she rescued a number of girls from working in brothels and brought them to her town to work, clearly improving their lives greatly.  She also deeply cares about everybody in Iron Town, and they all are very fond of her as well.

Nor are the forest creatures seen as evil, even though they plan to attack Iron Town.  They are simply trying to reclaim what was once theirs, and could probably in fact live with the humans in Iron Town if they stopped killing the forest.

The only character who acts purely for personal gain is the monk, Jigo, who ambushes Iron Town with his samauri warriors and doesn’t wish to stop the killing forest spirit because he needs what he took from it (I’m intentionally trying to be vague on this point, because I don’t want to give it all away, despite the warning above.).  But even he does not appear to be a villain, because he is working on the orders of the emperor, and he is friendly to Ashitaka at the beginning of the movie.

Despite this lack of a villain, or perhaps because of it, there is much that can be learned about the interactions between nature and technology.  Ashitaka represents a balance between the two that must be achieved; neither technology nor nature alone are preferred and one cannot be allowed to kill the other.  Therefore, they must live in harmony with one another.  This is revealed at the end of the movie when San (who has now fallen in love with Ashitaka, SURPRISE!) refuses to come back to Iron Town with him.  He agrees that she should stay and live in the forest, and he will help rebuild the town, returning to the forest to visit whenever he can.  Therefore, nature and technology, San and Ashitaka, can exist together.

But perhaps the lesson held in this movie is that people should live without hate and prejudice.  Ashitaka is told at the beginning to look at everything “with eyes unclouded by hate.”  Despite the fact that he’s cursed due to Lady Eboshi’s iron and shot of the boar god, he does not hate her, and forcibly stops himself from killing her because “it won’t do anything.”  If everyone could take this attitude, then the world would clearly be a better place, is the message that is sent.

However, Ashitaka’s lack of a stance is frustrating at times for the viewer, and particularly for the characters in the movie.  It seems he’s on the side of San, but then he doesn’t allow her to kill Lady Eboshi.  He seems to be very static, merely observing the battle that goes on.  And that would be fine for any character that’s not supposed to be the courageous hero.  Additionally, the relationship between San and Ashitaka seems to be very contrived and very convenient for the plot, which would possibly be improved through its absence.

Overall, though, the movie was very entertaining, gripping, and moving.  It did a very good job of conveying the ideas that nature and technology can live together, and it accomplished the goal of entertainment more.

Tessot’s “The American Lawn:  Surface of Everyday Life” is basically a discussion about surburbia, as told through the quintissential history of the lawn.  The article discusses the beginnings of the lawn, how it came about, and the cultivation techniques that have been employed to produce what we now recognize as a lawn.

This article really opened my mind to my views of surburban sprawl and the mindset that I thought I had.  While I fully admit I’m a product of pure surburbia, I have always thought that it was something I hated, wanted to get away from, and couldn’t really relate to.  After reading Tessot’s descriptions of where the lawn was described as “a carpet” that would have floral “embrorderies,” though, I was struck at exactly how I think about my front lawn.  I don’t really consider it “alive” in the sense that woods or fields are, even though technically it’s just as alive as everything else.  I realized that I don’t really think about my lawn at all when I walk across it to get in my car, or look outside to check the weather, it’s more just there.  However, I do know that when I drive past an ill-kept lawn, I will think to myself, “wow, that really needs some work,” instead of “wow, that’s a really nice freedom lawn.”  To be honest, I really think the lawn is more of an extension of the home than actually a part of nature.

This could be, though, because I don’t especially like my lawn.  For instance, I loved the lawn at my first house so much more than the one where my family currently lives, and it had almost no grass at all.  The front yard was taken over by a massive magnolia tree that would lose all its flowers in the summeres, leaving the lawn covered with pink flowers.  My absolute favorite lawns are like this, they have really big, shady trees you can sit under, and are full of pretty flowers.  These lawns arguably are more in touch with “nature” (in the sense that there are more plants) than the traditional surburban plot of grass, but are equally cultivated (if not more so) and removed from nature in that sense.  However, it often takes years of work and natural growth to achieve this effect (for instance, my current house is over ten years old and still doesn’t have any big trees or “old lawn” kind of feel at all,) and so there’re not really what’s associated with the surburban “pop up” town.

The next point that really struck me was the point about the lawn being a woven texture.  I’m reminded of the summers where my dad was teaching me how to mow the grass, and for a long time would only let me mow the backyard because I couldn’t make the lines perfectly straight, and they weren’t all always 100% visible.  This quest for the perfect lawn, woven back and forth like cloth, is definitely something I can relate to.

Overall, I found the article very interesting, and it provided many insights into my own relationship with my lawn.

Questions:

1. Is there some sort of “ideal ratio” between the amount of “wild” elements and “tame” elements in a lawn?

2. To what extent is one’s lawn a reflection of themself?

3. Is lawn care an art or an obligation?  Why do you think this?

Prior to this reading assignment, I considered myself to be fairly well-informed about climate change, carbon emissions, and things like that.  I also felt that I was doing an ok job of minimizing my footprint.  But these opinions have changed based on what I’ve read.

By far more challenging to me personally were the excerpts from Kolbert’s “Field Notes on a Catastrophe,” which gave me a plethora of new information.  While I knew that climate change had been an issue for longer than the world had been paying attention to it (obviously, as it became an issue with the discovery of fire, and then perhaps more explosively so with the Industrial Revolution), but I had no idea the scientific community had been paying attention to it since the 1850s.  This really startled me.  Obviously the scientific community is aware of things that we, as laypeople, aren’t, and scientists dislike to claim anything without extensive support from multiple parties, but this seems a bit of a stretch of an excuse.

I was also shocked to see how much energy Americans use on average, enough so that while reading the article, I got up and turned my overhead lights off, switching instead to my single bulb desk lamp.  I had an extreme reaction, perhaps, but it is one that demonstrates that as long as education continues, eventually the problem could possibly correct itself.

This is an idea that Henson would probably disagree with, as he referenced Hardin’s “Tragedy of the Commons” dilemma.  I found Henson’s description to be slightly vague, so I checked in my records to see if I still had a copy of Hardin’s original, which I did (kudos to electronic storage for allowing me to be a document pack-rat, without killing more trees than absolutely necessary.)  I think Hardin did a much better job of explaining the tragedy.

“As a rational human being, each herdsman seeks to maximize his gain.  Explicitly or implicitly, more or less consciously, he asks, “What is the utility to me of adding one more animal to my herd?” This utility has one negative and one positive component.
I) The positive component is a function of the increment of one animal.  Since the herdsman receives all the proceeds from the sale of the additional animal, the positive utility is nearly +I.
2) The negative component is a function of the additional overgrazing created by one more animal. Since, however, the effects of overgrazing are shared by all the herdsmen, the negative utility for any particular decisionnnaking herdsman is only a fraction of -1.”

Basically, what Hardin is saying is that human nature won’t change unless the costs to the individual outweigh the benefits to the individual, which they rarely do when what they are damaging is common property, shared by all.  This makes it difficult to motivate people, leading to what Henson calls “wide but shallow” support.  Not only are the negatives not large enough to call people to action, but their positives would be being taken away.  Not exactly an ideal situation for motivating people.

Henson also spends a great deal of time discussing the skeptic’s opinions.  I personally feel that many of these “skeptical” opinions could have come from the conclusions of scientist’s journal articles or other such publications that would in fact be calling out against global warming in the general text but end with a statement like “we can’t prove global warming.”  Like Dr. Schulz said while we were touring the Horticulture building, scientists aren’t good at communicating.  While the majority of their research may point in one direction, they will still probably make a statement like “but we can’t be sure” because the repercussions to incorrect information are so bad.  This leads to the community looking at the scientists and thinking “they don’t even believe in it, and they study it all the time” whether or not that is the case.

I felt that these were some of the most stimulating readings that we’ve done all semester, and they really challenged how we live and the lifestyle we’re accustomed to.

Questions for Discussion:

1) If the situation of the “tragedy of the commons” is indeed true, how can we get people to take action against climate change?

2) Why does society feel that the term “climate change” is acceptable, while it has essentially gotten rid of the term “global warming.”

3) To what extent should the economy be sacrificed to “solve” climate change?

Mary Hambleton’s work was, overall, aesthetically pleasing and meaningful at the same time.  While many of the works were bright, colorful, playful abstracts featuring swirls, circles, and straight lines that were pleasant to look at, many others incorporated her personal PET scans of skin cancer spreading and allowed one to really see and feel her pain as a cancer patient.

Although this exhibit focused on Mary Hambleton’s late works, it was quite possible to divide her late works into two periods, that roughly corresponded with the diagnosis of her cancer.  Previously, her work had been largely abstract, focusing on shapes like circles, that reminded the viewer of one of two extremes in relation to the world.  Some of these paintings made one think of the universe, giving a feeling of fleeting insignificance.  Others seemed to be an extreme magnification of a cell, showing the many organelles, leading one to feel that they were the sum of many parts.

While there was no exact correlation between the shift in her works and her diagnosis with melanoma, because her works are extremely laborious and time intensive process, there was an abrupt shift.  Her works changed in almost every way.  For instance, while she had once worked mainly in paints, there was now a shift to incorporate objects and collage like effects into her works.  These collages often featured things such as pictures of extinct animals and Mary’s own PET scans, giving a very strong relation to her own future.

Personally, I feel that while the earlier part of her works were more visually appealing, her later works left me with a deeper message and stronger connection.  Several of these works had a very powerful messege for me, and the relation to the passage of time and the death of everything was interesting in that it was both accepted and defied at the same time.  Perhaps the strongest example of this is the work “Waiting for the Miracle.”  Hambleton clearly showed the passage of time with thin horizontal lines, going through repeated circles that could represent the turns of the Earth.  The top was lined with blocks, showing pictures like the dodo bird, an extinct species of elephant, and Mary’s own PET scans.  These factors scream “Life ends” but there is the image of a hand holding an egg on one of the blocks, which whispers back “but it begins again.”  Several of Hambleton’s works seem to deal with the issue of death and time, but this was the only one featured that also showed a slightly positive outlook.  As Mary passed away within a year of the completion of this work, perhaps that shows an acceptance of her fate?  One cannot be sure.  However, it is clear that Mary Hambleton left us with much to think about as we ponder her artwork for years to come.

In his book Signs of Life, Eduardo Kac discusses the connections between biotechnology and art.  The introduction begins with a discussion of the history of bioart, which began with depictions of “grotesque” deformed people and illustrations of imagined “monsters.”  Kac challenges us to wonder, what separates the “grotesque” from the “beautiful”, as both are separated from “average” by their uniqueness, and has our increase in genetic engineering simply led from imagining “monsters” to creating them?  Is a bunny that glows beautiful?  Is a genetically modified strain of corn that can keep thousands of people from starving a monster?  How about a human who has been genetically engineered to be “perfect,” as it could be considered both beautiful and a monster.

The social and societal points this brings up are obviously huge.  It’s impossible to bring up such topics as genetic engineering or stem cells without hearing strong opinions from both sides.  Bioart is a good way to bring this to the forefront and make people notice, and hopefully ask these questions of themselves and really think about the answers.

Kac’s brief discussion of Darwin was truly fascinating.  The link between capitalism and natural selection is one that had never occurred to me, but after having it pointed out, seems almost inherently obvious.  Which brings up several questions: would Darwin have thought of this if it wasn’t the predominant economic thought process?  Would anyone have accepted it?  Did natural selection lead to capitalism?

I feel more personally affected, however, by the discussions of modern biological techniques as means of creating art as opposed to pondering these great philosophical questions Kac brings up.  He quotes Edward Steichen, the first person to actually use genetics as a medium of art when he hybridized flowers and treated them with chemicals to make them undergo mutations, as saying “the science of heredity when applied to plant breeding, which has as its ultimate purpose the aesthetic appeal of beauty, is a creative art.”

While Steichen may have a point, and several valid examples can be called to mind (genetically modifying fruits and vegetables to have more vibrant colors, for example) the practicalities of DNA make it a poor medium for art in some ways.  Maybe it’s the biology student coming out in me, coupled with the fact that we just had an exam over DNA transcription and translation tonight, but when reading about Kac’s “Genesis” project, instead of being struck by the profound ability of bacteria to modify the words of the Bible giving humans control over everything, or the structuring of a protein based on these words in Morse code and how ironic it was to use the technology to create something useless, I was asking the questions “did the protein created begin at a start codon, or just at the beginning of the sentence?” “well what would happen if there was a stop codon somewhere in there, did the protein just end there or does it keep going?” “which end is 3′ and which is 5′ of the DNA, and was that taken into account when the protein synthesis was performed?” “would the antiparallel strand, if translated into Morse code and then words, spell out anything?” “was this inserted into a bacteria as a cyclical DNA or a helix?”

It was very intriguing to see things I’ve done myself in lab translated into the artistic world, and it brought up several of the questions asked in the What is Art? reading.  I have before looked at a representation of a molecule or protein and thought that they were really beautiful molecules, but because they occur naturally, can they still be considered art?  Were the luminescent bacteria I grew in a lab in my AP Biology lab art, just as Kac’s GFP Bunny was, or does one need to declare art as the intent, rather than science, for it to be art?  Can art be a byproduct of science?  Can science be a byproduct of art?

I feel that overall, though, many aspects of bioart frustrated me despite the fascination they held.  Maybe it’s because all my professors throw around phrases like “oh yeah, that’s not an expensive piece of equipment anymore, now you can get them for around 25,000 dollars” or “so each of those micropipetters you have cost about as much as a new iPhone” without blinking, but I feel that resources of this magnitude were used in creating essentially useless genes and proteins.  This thought makes me feel really guilty, because I realize that art is never useless as long as it makes you think (which clearly, the bio-art as a whole brought up a bunch of questions for me) but these are technologies that have the potential to save lives.  While art and research can surely coexist, other means of artistic expression are available, while research is not always so fortunate.

I also took issue with the lack of hard scientific data in the reading.  I assume that Kac was not trained as a biologist, but as a scientist I’m almost constantly left questioning some point.  But then, perhaps that was his goal, as now I’m thinking more and more about what I read and the implications in society it has, as well as about the science.

Questions for consideration:

1. What separates the beautiful and the grotesque?

2. Are social theories just advanced biological theories?  If so, how far separated are we from other species that “lack the ability to reason”?

3. Can art be a byproduct of science?  Can science be a byproduct of art?

This was a screenshot of the Teri Rueb workshop on Friday:

In Nye’s first chapter, he makes many comparisons that challenge how we typically look at technology.  For instance, he begins with the argument that technology doesn’t exist to fill a need, but rather, the new technology creates a need we didn’t previously know we had.  Nye also suggests that technology is more like art than like science, and quotes Aristotle as saying “the business of every art is to bring something into existence.”  This goes against the typical idea that technology is closely related to science.  People generally look at technology as the application of science, meaning that there is a scientific discovery and a need for a practical application that goes along with it.  However, that isn’t actually the case most of the time.  Generally, a technological advancement brings about the questions which then drive scientific research, because we as inquisitive creatures must know why things work the way they do.  Advancements in technology are also blamed in this work for the “marginalization of women” as technology became a more male dominated field.

In the second chapter of Nye’s work, he discusses the idea that technology has an inevitable effect on society.  The rationale here is that people don’t have to choose to embrace new technology, be it modern methods of farming (the Amish people in the Americas today) or guns (the Japanese until the 1850s).  However, Nye clearly feels that much of society is influenced by technology, because the rest of the chapter is spent analyzing exactly how this happens and to what extent.

Nye makes a really good point here that “rather than assuming that technologies are deterministic, it appears more reasonable to assume that cultural choices shape their uses.”  The technology wasn’t needed before society said it was, echoing his idea from the first chapter that technological advances do not always follow from necessity. Similarly, people would be able to live without conveniences like electricity or indoor plumbing, but the building codes enforced by many governments make this illegal.  The effect that technology has on society will also be driven by the culture.  For instance, television in America had a different effect that television in China or the Middle East.  An interesting discussion of Marx’s thoughts on industrialization reveals that he felt it was largely negative, especially when it was tied to capitalism, because it resulted in lower wages and fewer jobs for the working class.  However, he felt that if properly implemented, technology could prove to be “the basis for a better world.”  However, other scholars feel that technology is given too much credit in its impact on culture.  For instance, it often takes multiple inventions to result in some sort of change.  The example given in Nye’s work is women’s suffrage, which was the outcome of things like mass production, improved education, use of the typewriter, and birth control.  Additionally, there is often a large gap between the implementation of the technology and its societal effect.

I found Nye to be quite an enjoyable author to read, and his points were interesting.  I really relate well to the point he made about computers replacing clerical staff, and how it actually led to a reduction of efficiency in many cases, and an increase in only around 40 percent of them.  Having worked in an office where people relied heavily on computers, it’s visible first hand.  For instance, when people’s computers were down so that the software could be updated, many times people didn’t really know what to do with themselves.  Similarly, I wasted lots of time on the internet at my clerical job.  While it’s true I got all the work that I was supposed to do done faster due to technology, I didn’t get any more work to do after that, so there was lots of wasted time.

I feel that Nye’s views on the sociological effects of technology might be slightly exaggerated.  While yes, technology has changed society, so has everything else, whether it be our day to day interactions with people or nature or anything.  Technology has also been effected by culture, as only certain things are attempted or improved upon based on the cultural values of that community.  Too often, technology is viewed as an “evil” or a “good,” instead of what it really is:  a tool to accomplish things.  Nye does a good job of stressing the tool part of this in the beginning, but doesn’t take the argument far enough.

Some things to consider:

1. In what ways has technology been influenced by art?

2. If technology caused both the “marginalization of women” and “women’s liberation,” would you say technology has helped or harmed women as a whole?

3. What technological advancement do you think has had the greatest impact on American culture since you were born?

In his work “Ideas of Nature” Raymond Williams attempts to explain what people have thought about nature throughout history.  He claims that how nature is interpreted by people has evolved and changed as human history has progressed.  For instance, in early history, Nature was a competitor or God for control of the natural world.  As history progresses, it becomes clear that Nature is interpreted as second to God, “His minister and deputy.”  Nature was greatly personified (the “laws of nature”), and a paradox (fierce, yet innocent; calm, yet ferocious).  But as history progressed, people began to see nature differently.  It was thought at one point (the Scientific Revolution) that one must know all about nature that they could, and then later, that nature was unknowable.  There were, of course, differing opinions on what nature was and how to use it.  For instance, Hobbes looked at man being in nature only while primitive, while Locke saw nature as “peace, goodwill, mutual assistance, and cooperation,” one would assume including humans in it.

The history of man became removed from the history of nature, as two separate entities.  Later, during the Industrial Revolution, nature became a resource to be exploited for profit by man.  It was no longer that man was a part of the history of nature, but that nature was a part of the history of man.  Later, though, Charles Darwin brought humans back into the history of nature with his Theory of Evolution and Natural Selection.    Man became a competitor in this “social jungle,” all thoughts that humans had been above such primal laws were denounced.

Williams continues with the idea that nothing can be done about the view of nature by humans as long as we fail to see the reasons for the alienation of nature.  However, these ideas cannot be seen by moving backwards and examining human history, because the separation began essentially at the beginning of human history; with the cultivation of land for farming.  Williams claims that the only way to accomplish this is to look at everything as a product, not merely as a by-product of a favorable process.

Although I feel that Williams brings up many valid points throughout his work, and some of his insights are extremely intriguing, I feel that he in essence misses his own point.  He claims that by looking back, one cannot change their view of nature, yet this is exactly what he does.  He then goes on to explain how to do it, but by that point, it seems futile to even attempt.  For indeed, nature is an abstract notion.  And why shouldn’t it stay that way?  Couldn’t nature exist as an abstract idea, like freedom or equality, that we work towards without knowing exactly what it is?  These ideas are studied, as nature has been studied (although perhaps not quite as extensively) and we have a number of laws in place to protect them, but nobody can tell you exactly what they are.  This has proved to be a decent system for achieving these ideas, why should it not work with nature as well?  It is true, people must see nature as something of value that is worth protecting, but there is no reason it can’t remain an abstract idea, connected as a part of human history.  Freedom and equality were exploited as well during human history, but work has been done to rectify that.  The same could be achieved of nature.

In Marx’s work “The Machine in the Garden,” he focuses on how nature is represented in American literature.  He begins with a summary of writers feelings for nature, how many wish to achieve a return to the rural, or an escape from the urban.  Marx goes on to cite a number of academics whose thoughts on the matter view this wishing to return to nature as a block to clear thinking and social progress.  This view is not shared by many writers, however, for Marx continues to analyze a number of examples where writers wish to return to nature, or where they are already immersed in nature and it is invaded by the machine, or the grip of the modern, urban world.

This work by Marx does not go on to offer an explanation as to why this is so, outside of some brief postulates mentioned early in the writing.  The ending of the excerpt does suggest that this topic is covered more extensively in a later part.  Instead, it merely explains that writers were extremely drawn to nature, and seemed to reject industrialization.  For this reason, it seems less valid that the work by Williams, as it is only an analysis that appears to offer no new original thought.

Some questions to consider:

1. To what extent does technology impact culture, and to what extent does that impact the view of nature?

2. Can technology influence nature without first influencing culture?

3. Why are authors, or literary people in general, more likely to be drawn to nature than the common person?

Cynthia Freeland’s book But is it Art? deals with the idea of defining exactly what art is, obviously not an easy thing to do, as art means something different to everybody. Chapter 6, “Cognition, Creation, Comprehension” deals with the idea of defining this exactly. Art, Freeland claims, can do a variety of things, and the same piece of artwork can do different things for different people. For instance, Freeland cites work by the painter Francis Bacon, whose artwork seemed horrific to many people due to the images of screaming people. However, other critics saw only his superb technique, taking nothing from it symbolically.

Freeland claims that a proper interpretation is somewhere between these two extremes, looking partly at both and taking the art as a medium to express complicated thoughts. She goes on to explain why she finds this view relevant, as well as other ways art can be used for expression, and cites specific scholars who take that approach. For instance, Tolstoy feels that art expresses an emotion, Freud that it serves to express unconscious desires and lust, Suzanne Langer (among others) feels that art represents an idea instead of a feeling, and Dewey sees art as a tool to enhance people’s world and perceptions.

I feel that while this is a good basis, there is still the issue that each analysis is essentially correct. Nobody can really entirely know what the artist was trying to express except the artist. Therefore, there is no one “correct” way to interpret art. Art says different things to different people, and that is what makes it so wonderful. The fact that the meaning isn’t spelled out in black letters on white paper is what makes you want to come back to it time and time again, because each time you take a different meaning out of it. It also is what makes us reach for art as an expressive medium when we have feelings too complicated to express in words, or if we are confused about what we’re thinking. For instance, I know if I’m confused or angry or upset but don’t know exactly why, I reach for my camera or cello and lose myself in art momentarily. Once I’ve come back and thought about what I’ve done, it becomes easier to realize what my feelings were because they have been spelled out in the art, even if I couldn’t put them into words. This doesn’t mean that they say the same thing to everybody, but I can retroactively see what I was trying to say, what I couldn’t get across with words.  Therefore, an essay on how to interpret art can only achieve limited usefulness, as there is no one “right” way to go about it.  Freeland’s critique is good for trying to see different ways that one could interpret things, but in the end, art is still a highly personal endeavor.  Another reason that this was hurt was that each method that was examined was used to evaluate a different work of art.  Therefore, there was no consensus on when one interpretation should be applied over another.  It is as if the reader is expected to know this, and to intuitively know how to look at art.  While this is true in the sense that people look at art differently, it would seem that if people know which way to view the art, they would know what that view is used to say.

The next chapter, “Digitizing and Disseminating” looks at how technology has impacted our views of art.  The main arguments follow the thoughts of three main philosophers.  The first to be analyzed is Walter Benjamin.  Benjamin believes that each work of art has an “aura,” something that can not be easily explained.  This so-called “aura” is lost as art has become more easily accessible through technology, but Benjamin does not find this to be a bad thing.  Instead, he claims that it makes people more perceptive and that it brings art to many people who would previously have been put off by the aura.  The second view is that of Boudrillard, who takes a much more negative, dystopic view of the impact of technology.  Boudrillard finds that life has become “hyperreal” or larger than life.  An example of this would be Disney World, where everything is more perfect than it could possibly be in the real world, and weddings, which now seem to exist only for taking pictures and video, so that one can remember it rather than experiencing it.  The third view, that of McLuhan, is again optimistic.  He feels that art has become more democratic, it can be experienced by more people.  It also increases the level which people are social through technology.

Again, Freeland takes a moderate approach between the extremes.  She questions the optimism of Benjamin and McLuhan, but also finds Boudrillard to be overly pessimistic.  She ends the conclusion encouraging readers to make their own decisions.

I find myself agreeing with Freeland to an extent.  I feel that Benjamin is perhaps too optimistic, for there is still something to be experienced in seeing the aura of a piece of work. Boudrillard’s view is definitely valid, as one can see the effects he mentions all around us.  Buildings are bigger, the lives of the extremely wealthy more extravagant than before.  However, it seems a bit excessive to believe that people are no longer experiencing life, but only a simulation of it.  McLuhan brings up some good points, but often, technology leaves us as lonely as before.  If people are truly “interacting” with it, then it is only as a faceless stranger somewhere in space. The human element has then become meaningless.

Overall, the reading left me with several questions:

1. Does the medium of the artwork effect the magnitude of the impact of technology?

2. Has society always been this way and technology only heightened our awareness of it, or has technology truly impacted society?

3. If someone’s view of a work of art is different than the conventional view, to what extent is it “wrong” or merely “different”?