· 2018· Book chapter
The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction
- 1,277citations
- 2018year
Short summary
Mechanical reproduction, unlike manual imitation, fundamentally alters the authority and authenticity of a work of art, a shift first seen with woodcuts and later amplified by photography and sound reproduction.
AI-generated from the title and abstract; the full text is not read.
Key points
- Mechanical reproduction is distinct from manual imitation in its impact on art.
- Woodcuts marked the first instance of mechanical pictorial reproduction.
- Photography freed artistic creation from manual execution, shifting focus to the eye and lens.
- Technical reproduction, unlike manual reproduction, undermines the authority of the original work.
AI-generated from the title and abstract; the full text is not read.
Abstract
In principle a work of art has always been reproducible. Man-made artifacts could always be imitated by men. Replicas were made by pupils in practice of their craft, by masters for diffusing their works, and, finally, by third parties in the pursuit of gain. Mechanical reproduction of a work of art represents something new. With the woodcut graphic art became mechanically reproducible for the first time, long before script became reproducible by print. The enormous changes which printing, the mechanical reproduction of writing, has brought about in literature are a familiar story. For the first time in the process of pictorial reproduction, photography freed the hand of the most important artistic functions which henceforth devolved only upon the eye looking into a lens. The technical reproduction of sound was tackled at the end of the last century. Confronted with its manual reproduction the original preserved all its authority; not so vis a vis technical reproduction.
The authors' abstract, as published at the source., 2018 · DOI ↗
Continue with a free account
Ask the paper: 3 free questions a day about this paper; save it, get its citation, new summaries every day for your field. Takeaways are Premium.
Continue free on the webSign in with Google or Apple; no card needed. You come back to this paper.
On your phone:
Field: Visual Arts and Performing Arts
Visual Arts and Performing ArtsArts and Humanities