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Politics Foreign Affairs Culture Fellows Program

The Cowardice Of Contemporary Artists

Peter Whittle, writing in Standpoint, says the interesting thing about artists today is not how brave they are, but how timid: The growing loss of cultural resonance which characterises all of the arts, even at a time when they are slavishly and sycophantically celebrated by a 24-hour print and broadcast media, derives from their reluctance […]

Peter Whittle, writing in Standpoint, says the interesting thing about artists today is not how brave they are, but how timid:

The growing loss of cultural resonance which characterises all of the arts, even at a time when they are slavishly and sycophantically celebrated by a 24-hour print and broadcast media, derives from their reluctance to take up, comment on or, yes, be shocking or provocative about the most important issues facing us. When they do proclaim or offer an analysis, it is invariably so late as to make it irrelevant, and is furthermore almost always comfortably in line with the political and social orthodoxies of the day. If you doubt this, then try to think of a novel, play, film or piece of installation art which, for example, seriously criticises the doctrine of multiculturalism. With a tiny number of honourable and genuinely brave exceptions — Lloyd Newson’s DV8 dance troupe’s 2011 production of Can We Talk About This? being one — there is a deafening silence on what is one of the most urgent issues of our time. Similarly, the chances of the BBC commissioning a drama which explores the experiences of an ageing white couple in an area transformed by mass immigration — surely a subject with real dramatic potential — are virtually nil. And if such a project ever did see the light of transmission, the audience could be forgiven for predicting quite accurately all the conclusions that would inevitably be drawn. On a whole host of issues — foreign aid, climate change, social inequality — the viewer, gallery-goer and novel-reader, far from being shocked, provoked or given even a slightly alternative perspective, generally know exactly what they are going to get. For our cultural establishment, there is a right and a wrong way of looking at such issues and as a result the arts, far from being “challenging” or “cutting edge”, have essentially become the providers of window dressing, a sort of visual aid unit, for the views and assumptions of the political and media class.

Readers, can you think of an idea for a novel, film, or play that would look into a serious social, cultural, or intellectual problem — something that could be a valuable contribution toward understanding our world and our time — but that would never be made or written because artists are too timid or otherwise conventional? Think seriously about it; don’t just pick something that’s provocative, i.e., simply because it’s politically incorrect, and stands to tick off liberals.

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