I don't see it that way. If it is the wealthy that give the arts prestige, then appreciation for art is nothing more than aping the rich, and, to borrow a phrase from Flannery O'Connor, if that is all it is, to hell with it. I'm with Joseph Bottom (and C.S. Lewis) on this. Art is one of the places we look to to explain our lives. But it …
I don't see it that way. If it is the wealthy that give the arts prestige, then appreciation for art is nothing more than aping the rich, and, to borrow a phrase from Flannery O'Connor, if that is all it is, to hell with it. I'm with Joseph Bottom (and C.S. Lewis) on this. Art is one of the places we look to to explain our lives. But it was the fashion of the last century to look to psychology for that, and of this century to look to neurology for it. That has diminished the intellectual and moral status of the arts -- to the point, I suppose, where it is possible to view them simply as a form of bling.
Were the oligarchs of the Renaissance funding art for the sake of art or bling for the sake of bling? It would, at least, require some substantial research to demonstrate the former. But still, I choose to believe that it was not mere bling in their eyes, for what seems to me the significant reason, that the art they funded was among the greatest the world has ever known. It is hard to see how that happens without some application of taste and discernment on the part of those holding the purse strings, or at least of the part of those they chose to advise them.
I don't disagree that, for the end-user, art is "the place we look to explain our lives." But I don't think the end-user and the investor are necessarily the same person.
That's fair. A patron could fund the arts for the sake of their own prestige rather than for the sake of art itself. But this implies that patronage of the arts actually conveys prestige on the patron, which only happens if the arts are valued. (Admittedly, that does not resolve the chicken and egg problem of whether the arts were prestigious because they were supported by the rich or if the rich supported them because they were prestigious.)
I'm sure that did happen in the Renaissance period. On the other hand, I don't believe it is always the case. In particular, I think the wealth in the Renaissance period was usually based on land ownership (though commerce was obviously producing a lot of wealth as well). I think it is not unreasonable to think that a landowning aristocracy, whose preoccupations were less entrepreneurial and managerial, might have given more thought to the arts. Particularly, perhaps, among wealthy women, who might often themselves be educated in the arts as part of their obligations as hosts and entertainers of their guests. But the above is all pretty hand-wavy, not researched in any way.
We might perhaps posit that some among the rich valued the arts and supported them, which made such support prestigious, which led to more philistine patrons following suit for the sake of prestige alone. There is also the factor that new money tends to ape old money. Thus the successful factory owners and entrepreneurs of the Industrial Revolution would sometimes by a great house and retire to the country to live like autocrats and gentry. Thus also T. S. Eliot's snarky reference to "a silk hat on a Bradford millionaire".
I don't see it that way. If it is the wealthy that give the arts prestige, then appreciation for art is nothing more than aping the rich, and, to borrow a phrase from Flannery O'Connor, if that is all it is, to hell with it. I'm with Joseph Bottom (and C.S. Lewis) on this. Art is one of the places we look to to explain our lives. But it was the fashion of the last century to look to psychology for that, and of this century to look to neurology for it. That has diminished the intellectual and moral status of the arts -- to the point, I suppose, where it is possible to view them simply as a form of bling.
Were the oligarchs of the Renaissance funding art for the sake of art or bling for the sake of bling? It would, at least, require some substantial research to demonstrate the former. But still, I choose to believe that it was not mere bling in their eyes, for what seems to me the significant reason, that the art they funded was among the greatest the world has ever known. It is hard to see how that happens without some application of taste and discernment on the part of those holding the purse strings, or at least of the part of those they chose to advise them.
I don't disagree that, for the end-user, art is "the place we look to explain our lives." But I don't think the end-user and the investor are necessarily the same person.
That's fair. A patron could fund the arts for the sake of their own prestige rather than for the sake of art itself. But this implies that patronage of the arts actually conveys prestige on the patron, which only happens if the arts are valued. (Admittedly, that does not resolve the chicken and egg problem of whether the arts were prestigious because they were supported by the rich or if the rich supported them because they were prestigious.)
I'm sure that did happen in the Renaissance period. On the other hand, I don't believe it is always the case. In particular, I think the wealth in the Renaissance period was usually based on land ownership (though commerce was obviously producing a lot of wealth as well). I think it is not unreasonable to think that a landowning aristocracy, whose preoccupations were less entrepreneurial and managerial, might have given more thought to the arts. Particularly, perhaps, among wealthy women, who might often themselves be educated in the arts as part of their obligations as hosts and entertainers of their guests. But the above is all pretty hand-wavy, not researched in any way.
We might perhaps posit that some among the rich valued the arts and supported them, which made such support prestigious, which led to more philistine patrons following suit for the sake of prestige alone. There is also the factor that new money tends to ape old money. Thus the successful factory owners and entrepreneurs of the Industrial Revolution would sometimes by a great house and retire to the country to live like autocrats and gentry. Thus also T. S. Eliot's snarky reference to "a silk hat on a Bradford millionaire".