Art for Art’s Sake
Friedrich Nietzsche, German philosopher and moralist poet, was allegedly one of the greatest known minds of the time. He was a controversial writer, critiquing traditional values such as organized religion and democratic institutions. He introduced two concepts, “slave” morality and “master” morality, which connote how human beings perceive themselves within the context of their society. Nietzsche’s work is critical of how the government and mainstream society normalizes and reinforces these psychological complexes. Nietzsche was not pleased with the plethora of technological advancements of the society, claiming ‘progress’ is a made-up construct and society is moving backward. Gathering from these disparate beliefs, one can assume Friedrich Nietzsche would argue that being human is about nature, sensuality, and feeling.
L’art pour l’art, the sentiment at the heart of the modernist movement, resembles Nietzsche’s concepts on humanity. The movement emphasizes sensual experience, reconnecting the audience to what truly makes us human: our ability to feel. The movement rejects the common notion that all art must mean something. An absence of moralizing, or communicating a message about righteousness or socially correct values, revitalized the artists of the times, changing the way they engage with and create art. Who cares about morals? Who cares about messages? Just feel something. Anything. There isn’t a right or wrong answer.
In Twilight of the Idols (1888), Nietzsche raises the issues of intention; does the artist intentionally include every detail, or are some things intuitively communicated without the artist’s knowledge? Does it make a difference? These are all valid questions that play into the subjectivity of art. This piece tells us that to be human is to have a multitude of diverse perspectives, to see things differently through a lens tinted with our cultural and personal experiences and beliefs. Instead of trying to create rules around art, allow it to speak to this abstract, individualist part of us, allow it to be what it was supposed to be.
