Preservation Of Art

932 Words4 Pages
Preservation of Art The idea of a wonderful thing within our approach and understanding is irresistible. Our desire to feel closer to the objects that please or inspire us gave birth to the idea of copying and reproducing. Benjamin in his essay “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” points towards this fact, he says, “Everyday the urge grows stronger to get hold of an object at very close range by way of its likeness, its reproduction” (223). The most basic tool for this reproduction is a person’s own memory. An old man can carry a moment from his childhood days captured in his memory for years. Yet, this man’s memory will not be as precise in its details as a photograph or a painting of that same moment can be. We see painters trying to capture the scene of a beautiful sunset on their canvas and sculptors making sculptures of public heroes or loved ones, and then we see people making copies of these art pieces. Whether one makes an original art piece or copies of an already existing artwork, these are all actions for preserving moments, great creations, memories, or events that would otherwise easily be lost and forgotten over time Benjamin, in his essay analyzes how reproduction of artwork has degraded it. Although Benjamin’s view is true that through mass reproduction, the originality of an art piece is lost, but there is no better way to preserve these great creations and events than to reproduce them. Benjamin says, “…that which withers in the age of mechanical reproduction is the aura of the work of art” (221). Benjamin defines this aura as the authenticity, the history, the culture and the meaning, thus as all the elements that contribute towards the ‘presence’ of an artwork. Benjamin’s foremost concern is the degradation or liquidation of the ‘aura’ of an art piece, which takes place with the reproduction of art. This is
Open Document