Every generation must outdo the one before. Not only does everyone know this, everyone has lived it. We all experience the developmental stage of defiance and rebellion. The obsolete is abandoned so new ideas can arise and society is renewed. These are the rites of passage.
Consider the “rite of passage” on the topic of aesthetics though. The philosophy of beauty has intrigued humanity endlessly. On the subject of music, what has baffled parents for generations is how the young kids can tolerate the “new sounds”. To older generations, the new sounds are often dissonant or blatantly offensive. Where is the appeal in this? What is the compulsion for iconoclasm?
This makes one consider exactly what is harmonic and consonant? What actually does appeal to the ear and the mind? Perhaps, instead of pondering a universal quality of beauty, there is only a subjective agreement. The developing mind can adapt to practically any stimuli. With the frequency of exposure, one develops tolerance, then familiarity, then comfort.
Thus many new developments of artistic expression are not based upon appeal; they only attract the younger because they repel the older. The enjoyment is not in the new modes of expression themselves, but rather in how it allows the younger generation to assert their own distinctive identity.
However, despite this, one must consider that without the frame of the past, the new, radical expressions would have no context. Also, the integrity of the past cannot be completely compromised, otherwise it could not provide adequate support for the presentation of the new. Still, it is worth pondering that beauty is not always what entices us into moving forward, but what repulses us from falling backward.
(Photos of Aaron Curry’s sculptures at the Lincoln Center and the Autumn colors at Central Park, 2013.)
Garrett Buhl Robinson is a poet and novelist. garrettrobinson.us
