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Art: A Tool for Change Essay

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“In a decaying society, art, if it is truthful, must also reflect decay. And unless it wants to break faith with its social function, art must show the world as changeable. And help to change it.” This quote by Ernst Fischer, a German composer, means that truth in art exposes the parts of society, and of life, that no one wants to see. In order for art to change society, it must first reflect the fears and failures of its people. The artist can change how people think of themselves and the world by using less conventional methods of creating art. The artist, in doing this, introduces new ideas of human placement in time and space, new frontiers of thought that are furthered by the disciplines of science and philosophy. The artist works to …show more content…

These new expressions of the aesthetic were present in architecture, literature, music, and dance as well, an indication of how modern art began to . Far from the expensive, solemn, old European art that had been regarded before the art world’s shift to modernity as the ideal, modern art introduced a new ideal in art: pure aestheticism and expression. This deviation from image-paintings (landscapes, portraits, and still-life) to the more modern distortion of forms and the gradual elimination of objects, was signified a shift to the personal and internal. This subjective moment of vision, challenged the perceived ideas of what art could or should be. This, in turn, made the audience both apprehensive and thoughtful. The act of introducing American audiences to something as foreign (at least to some) as Marcel Duchamp’s Nude Descending a Staircase, No.2, was very significant. Duchamp, in his painting, introduced a sense of movement and action by capturing many movements in one figure. American artists saw this art and some were outraged and others adopted the style. The Armory Show is merely one example of how art can challenge those standards that society has outlined. The artists of the Armory Show challenged these standards by introducing new ways art could be made and new perspectives of subjects. Artistic

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