What are the Limits of Art?

While I was watching Ruben Östlund's 2017 “The Square”, about a Swedish curator, this question about what are the limits of art popped up. The fictional museum this curator worked in, made a promotional video for an exhibition, where it depicted a homeless child being blown up. This was made with the intent to convey the message that the artist gave the square installation while also trying to get the viral video status; “The Square is a sanctuary of trust and caring, within its bounds we all share equal rights and obligations.” (The Square, 2017) . After this controversial video, the curator held a conference where he explained what it actually meant and apologised, however this act of apologising showed that the curator thinks that there are certain limits of social ethics that art shouldn’t cross, which begs the question if there should be limits to art.

For centuries, art has defied societies expectations and believes, shaping what we find socially acceptable today. However, most of the art that defied these beliefs was controversial at a certain point and made people think if it was going too far or not. This is when freedom of thought and expression come to play. In a lot of countries there is freedom of speech, however, this is restricted by the political correctness, which protects people from the deemed more “sensitive topics”, like racism, abuse, cruelty, between many other. This makes us think what can be incorporated into art, and who decides it. As Oscar Wilde said “People sometimes inquire what form of government is most suitable for an artist to live under. To this question, there is only one answer. The form of government that is most suitable to the artist is no government at all. Authority over him and his art is ridiculous.”(Oscar Wilde, The Soul of Man under Socialism,1891) , even though this is an anarchist ideology, this is the only way art can strive in complete and absolute freedom. So is art something impossible to get at its purest form, in the society we currently live? The answer would probably be yes.

In the 2018 Cannes festival, this was proven to be right. Cannes markets itself as a visionary festival, where freedom of expression is valued and a priority. Despite this, Lars Von Trier’s recent movie “The House that Jack Built” received a huge backlash for depicting violent acts against animals and children, even if the movie tells the story of a serial killer. This made people question if these graphic and gruesome scenes should have appeared in the movie. Even so, a lot of people criticised the movie, not because of its violent nature, but rather questioned if these scenes were only for shock value, questioning if it serves any other propose or if it has a deeper meaning. And if these scenes were there only to shock people, isn’t the creator of the movie free to do so?

The limitations of art start when one’s freedom ends, and another one’s begin. “It was a shocking thing to say and I knew it was a shocking thing to say. But no one has the right to live without being shocked. No one has the right to spend their life without being offended. Nobody has to read this book. Nobody has to pick it up. Nobody has to open it. And if you open it and read it, you don't have to like it. And if you read it and you dislike it, you don't have to remain silent about it. You can write to me, you can complain about it, you can write to the publisher, you can write to the papers, you can write your own book. You can do all those things, but there your rights stop. No one has the right to stop me writing this book. No one has the right to stop it being published, or sold, or bought, or read.” (Philip Pullman, The Good Man Jesus & the Scoundrel Christ, 2010).

Even though we like to believe that we have complete freedom of speech, this is not entirely true. We have fewer restrictions on expression than some other countries, but because of our ethic and personal beliefs, a lot of our thoughts and ideas might suffer some kind of censorship. It’s artists’ job to expand our horizons of what can be said or showed. Surely it might offend and confuse people along the way, but nonetheless essential to a society's evolution.

It’s still controversial until this day Kazimir Malevich’s “White on White” (1955). With a lot of people claiming that it is not art or that they could do it. And this is what people fail to see. It’s this type of art that offends and challenge people’s preconceptions of art is or what can do. This painting was a provocation to the art community. And claiming that they themselves could do it, shows lack of knowledge of the context this painting appeared in. It’s not a question of being able to do it, it’s a question of who thought of it first, who had the courage to show the community, and who caused an impact on societies’ behaviour and perception.

Even if this essay is making a case for complete freedom of expression to achieve a limitless art, it would be careless to assume that I think that living in a society like this would be possible. There are a number of reasons why some topics are seen as “sensitive”, and for a good reason. In 2008, Guillermo Vargas, an artist from Costa Rica, tied a stray dog and left him to starve in the middle of the exhibition in Nicaragua. Even if this might be seen as pushing the boundaries of what art is, its animal cruelty nonetheless. This creates a fine line between what an artist is and when psychopathic behaviour begins. It’s this type of interventions that make us question if cruelty and complete disregard of ethics can be considered art. Are these acts done for the sake of art? Or simply to amuse the artist by shocking and creating a reaction from the audience?

From a personal perspective, art should have limits if it steps onto physical cruelty, like the example of Guillermo Vargas. However, if it is only a representation of the act, and no human or animal was hurt in the process, I don't think it should be out of reach for the artist to showcase. There will always be people who don’t agree with your opinions or acts, and that might say that because the thing you talk about is deemed sensitive you can’t talk about it, however, this shouldn’t be the case; “To criticise a person for their race is manifestly irrational and ridiculous, but to criticise their religion, that is a right. That is a freedom. The freedom to criticise ideas, any ideas - even if they are sincerely held beliefs - is one of the fundamental freedoms of society. A law which attempts to say you can criticise and ridicule ideas as long as they are not religious ideas is a very peculiar law indeed. It all points to the promotion of the idea that there should be a right not to be offended. But in my view, the right to offend is far more important than any right not to be offended. The right to ridicule is far more important to society than any right not to be ridiculed because one in my view represents openness - and the other represents oppression(…)” (Rowan Atkinson, speech at The House of Commons, 2004).

To sum it up, in a utopian world art should indeed be limitless, however, because we are human, such a thing is impossible to achieve. What we have to strive for is to expand those barriers that already surround us, in order to make our society evolve. And to do so, we have to fight for complete freedom of speech so ideas can be shared. “We forget that, although freedom of speech constitutes an important victory in the battle against old restraints, modern man is in a position where much of what "he" thinks and says are the things that everybody else thinks and says; that he has not acquired the ability to think originally - that is, for himself - which alone gives meaning to his claim that nobody can interfere with the expression of his thoughts.” (Erich Fromm, The Fear of Freedom, 1941).

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References

Atkinson, R. (2004), “Atkinson defends right to offend”, The Telegraph, 7 December. Available at: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/3348850/Atkinson-defends-right-to-offend.html (Accessed: 12/12/2019);

Fromm E. (1941), The Fear of Freedom, Farrar & Rinehart;

Pullman, P. (2010), The Good Man Jesus & the Scoundrel Christ, Canongate Books;

The House That Jack Built (2018) Directed by: Lars Von Trier [Film]. North America: IFC Films;

The Square (2017) Directed by: Ruben Östlund [Film]. Sweden: TriArt Film;

Vargas, G. (2007), Exposición N° 1 [Installation]. Códice Gallery, Nicaragua;

Wilde, O. (1891), The Soul of Man under Socialism, Fortnightly Review;