THE RESPONSIBILITY OF THE ARTIST

by Jacques Maritain ‧ RELEASE DATE: N/A

In an age when art, and art criticism, tends to fragmentary personal language, the flowing and abstractedly-reasoned style of this book gives it an oddly anachronistic flavor. Maritain, a Catholic, begins by saying that Art and Morality are two autonomous worlds; the rest of the book attempts, nevertheless, to discover relationships between, or to synthesize, the two. There is a certain fascination in watching Maritain's adroit manoeuvres on such slippery surfaces. Can a man, no matter how fair, how intellectual, be truly objective about one point of view when he is wholly committed to what, he admits, is its opposite? The very idea of trying to make Art more moral seems odd, particularly to the non-Catholic for whom censorship is a touchy subject. But many of Maritain's other suggestions for control are ingenious. There are, also, a number of useful definitions of Art, some surprisingly frank analyses of the dangers of religion to art. Maritain attempts no solutions, only illuminations... for a problem which has no solution anyway, and which the average artist might be surprised to find considered a problem in the first place... And yet, it is true that the artist does have a responsibility to his community, that some control over, for instance, gratuitous pornography, seems necessary, etc., etc... In short, the questions raised by this book are valid and have a tendency to echo afterwards, no matter what the reader's religious viewpoint.

Pub Date: N/A

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Scribner

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1959

Categories: NONFICTION