The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction Reading Questions

"Examine the development of mechanical visual reproduction from copying a master's work..."

1.      Walter Benjamin says:

"One might subsume the eliminated element in the term “aura” and go on to say: that which withers in the age of mechanical reproduction is the aura of the work of art. This is a symptomatic process whose significance points beyond the realm of art. One might generalize by saying: the technique of reproduction detaches the reproduced object from the domain of tradition. By making many reproductions it substitutes a plurality of copies for a unique existence." (III)

 It is here when Benjamin discusses the authenticity of work that has been reproduced and how, lacking time and presence in history, is missing a particular uniqueness or originality. The fact that reproduction has changed the context means that it lacks the "aura" Benjamin so often brings up. How do you feel about the concept of a work lacking this "aura"? Do you feel this makes you connect differently to art? 

Later on, he continues this concept and says:

"Magician and surgeon compare to painter and cameraman. The painter maintains in his work a natural distance from reality, the cameraman penetrates deeply into its web. There is a tremendous difference between the pictures they obtain. That of the painter is a total one, that of the cameraman consists of multiple fragments which are assembled under a new law. Thus, for contemporary man the representation of reality by the film is incomparably more significant than that of the painter, since it offers, precisely because of the thoroughgoing permeation of reality with mechanical equipment, an aspect of reality which is free of all equipment. And that is what one is entitled to ask from a work of art." (XI)

Due to war and political change, the different forms of art had to be changed as well as their content. Benjamin saw that it is not enough, for example, simply to make people aware of human misery: photography can “make human misery an object of consumption” and can even turn “the struggle against misery into an object of consumption.” What are the effects and significance of new art forms like photography and film? Do you believe they still do not contain an "aura" because they are an image of an image?

2.      In part VIII of Benjamin's article he explains how film can detach the audience emotionally from the actor. Unlike theater acting, the big screen creates critics of the audience rather than devote them to the story emotionally. When you watch a film, do you feel that this is true? What films, actors, or directors have felt as real as the personal contact of theater (if any)? Are they considered cult?