You've all seen it but have you ever read it? Almost every TV commercial these days comes with its small print, often just a line of text saying "conditions apply", but sometimes paragraphs of obscure regulations and caveats. What follows are a few of the bits of small print found on the weekend of the 11th-13th November 2011 on British TV. Some of it gives health warnings or usage instructions; some reveals the less-than-impressive details of the money-off offers (the high original price may have only been in place a week or two); other texts explain the methodology behind grandiose claims; or reveal the extra cash you'll have to spend to get something useful.
Screens simulated. Sequence shortened. High speed internet, webcams, mobile plan, additional programs and fees required for some features. (Microsoft OS and web services)
7% fibre. Enjoy as part of a healthy balanced diet & active lifestyle. 30g serving = 9% of sugar GDA. (Coco Pops breakfast cereal)
Scale speed 770 kmh. (GX Buggy toy)
Sold separately. Battle fortress around £40. (Zibits toy)
Batteries not included. Adult assembly required. (Elefun game)
Subject to availability. Selected UK Stores. (Clarkson Powered Up DVD)
Not game footage. Game sold separately. (Elder Scrolls V game/X-Box console)
Annual global sales 7/09 - 6/10. Ends 22/11. See in store for details. Selected stores. (Olay beauty product/Superdrug store)
£50 with any Estee Lauder fragrance purchase. While stocks last. (Estee Lauder Beautiful fragrance)
A few rules apply. Ofcom Market Report. (3 mobile phone plan)
At participating restaurants only. Drinks may vary. Oreo is a registered trademark of Kraft foods used under licence. (KFC meal options)
For the facts: drinkaware.co.uk (Press 81 liquor)
Antibacterial handwash. Use biocides safely. Always read the label and product information before use. (Dettol handwash)
12 place setting tested. uSwitch.com prices used. On selected Bosch dishwashers at participating retailers. Ends 20th January. Terms & Conditions apply. (Bosch dishwashers)
16+. Prices include VAT & P&P. Cost of bid varies. Cost of bids included. Savings against RRP. Pay to bid auction site. (Madbid.com auction website)
Active City Stop is active at speeds up to 19mph. Optional features available at extra costs on selected models, see your Ford Dealer for details. (Ford Focus)
Excludes Trax bikes. Selected bikes only. (Halfords stores bicycle department)
18+ (Daily Mail newspaper reader offer)
£349. (struckout) £649. Higher price 1st - 10th Nov. Ends 16th Nov. £269. (struckout) £449. Higher price 3rd - 9th Nov. Ends 17th Nov. (Comet stores)
UK residents and 16+ only. Competition closes: 13/11/11. Full terms at tvterms.co.uk. (Gillette razors)
Associated with dandruff. (Head & Shoulders shampoo for itchy scalps)
Based on December 2010 survey. Funds sent within one hour, if approved between midnight and 10 pm. Maximum of £1,000 for first time customers. 25% off finance charge from which APR is calculated. Approval subject to status. Approvals take less than 30 minutes in most cases. Representative 1734% APR. Online discount. Cannot be combined with other offers. Terms and conditions apply. (QuickQuid money lending service)
While stocks last. Mystery product also available at larger Boots stores. (Boots beauty product promotion)
Selected products and stores. Subject to availability. Enjoy wine responsibly. Offer runs Thursday to Tuesday. (M&S meal offer)
18+. No deposit necessary. Non-withdrawable £10 free bet. Standard network charges and terms apply www.gambleaware.co.uk (Sky Bet gambling)
Fairy, Flash & Febreze will donate £150,000 to Make-A-Wish foundation this Christmas. Charity registration numbers (England & Wales) 296572 (Scotland) SCO37479 (Ireland) CHY15267. (Fairy/Flash/Febreze cleaning products charity appeal)
With dry food always give your cat plenty of water. (IAMS dry cat food)
Toys shown £4.24 to £77.24. Selected lines. Ends Tuesday. Some batteries excluded. Ends Tuesday. NPD Customer Survey, 200 transactions, 2010-11. (Argos stores toy offer)
(C) 2011 Kodak. Based on lowest total ink replacement costs, inkjet printers. Q3 2011 pricing. See printkodak.co.uk. RRP August 2011. (Kodak printers)
Keeps on working for up to 12 hours. Research results - 80% of 130 women. (Simple beauty product)
£659 total separate selling price from 5/8 - 10/9/11. £649 from 17/9 - 12/10/11 AMD Dual Core E2 3000M Accelerated Processor with AMD Radeon HD6380G Discrete-Class Graphics. Currys only. £199 from 20/10 - 9/11/11. (Currys/PC World electronics stores)
Selected UK stores. Subject to availability. Delivery charges may apply online. Toy prices from £34.16-£90. tesco.com/direct. (Tesco stores games offer)
Youth Code day + serum tested on 194 women. (L'Oreal beauty product)
18+ only. Terms and conditions apply. (uniformdating.com dating website)
In taste tests 181 like Lindt. 86% of them also liked Aldi. (Aldi supermarket own-brand chocolate animals)
Friday, November 18, 2011
Banned in Pakistan
The government of Pakistan is reportedly planning to introduce legislation banning people from using obscene language on mobile phone SMS messages (texts). The Pakistan Telecommunications Authority has reportedly ordered telephone networks to implement filtering on their networks to prevent users from sending any words from a list of more than 1000 English and 550 Urdu words and phrases. Some of the terms are obscene, sexual, ethnic slurs, or drug related, but others are medical terms like "athlete's foot" or "period", musical references like "Wuutang", "G Unit", and "OU812" (a Van Halen album), the name of the jailbird American footballer "Rae Carruth", the fruit "Kumquat", and "Jesus Christ". (The Tribune, Pakistan.)
The complete list has been posted on the internet: A.S.S., ANAL, ANAL ANNIE, ANAL SEX, ANALANNIE, ANALSEX, ANUS, ARSE, ASS, ASS BAGGER, ASS BLASTER, ASS CLOWN, ASS COWBOY, ASS FUCK, ASS FUCKER, ASS HOLE, ASS HOLES, ASS HORE, ASS JOCKEY, ASS KISS, ASS KISSER, ASS KLOWN, ASS LICK, ASS LICKER, ASS LOVER, ASS MAN, ASS MONKEY, ASS MUNCH, ASS MUNCHER, ASS PACKER, ASS PIRATE, ASS PUPPIES, ASS RANGER, ASS WHORE, ASS WIPE, ASSBAGGER, ASSBLASTER, ASSCLOWN, ASSCOWBOY, ASSFUCK, ASSFUCKER, ASSHOLE, ASSHOLES, ASSHORE, ASSJOCKEY, ASSKISS, ASSKISSER, ASSKLOWN, ASSLICK, ASSLICKER, ASSLOVER, ASSMAN, ASSMONKEY, ASSMUNCH, ASSMUNCHER, ASSPACKER, ASSPIRATE, ASSPUPPIES, ASSRANGER, ASSWHORE, ASSWIPE, ATHLETES FOOT, ATHLETESFOOT, AXING THE WEASEL, B HARD, BACK DOOR, BACK DOOR MAN, BACKDOOR, BACKDOORMAN, BACKSEAT, BAD ASS, BAD FUCK, BADFUCK, BALL LICKER, BALL SACK, BALLLICKER, BALLSACK, BANGING, BARELY LEGAL, BARELYLEGAL, BARF, BARF FACE, BARFACE, BARFFACE, BASTARD, BAZONGAS, BAZOOMS, BEASTALITY, BEASTIALITY, BEAT OFF, BEAT YOUR MEAT, BEATOFF, BEAT-OFF, BEATYOURMEAT, BI SEXUAL, BIATCH, BIG ASS, BIG BITCH, BIG BITCH, BIG BUTT, BIGASS, BIGBASTARD, BIGBUTT, BISEXUAL, BI-SEXUAL, BITCH, BITCHES, BITCHIN, BITCHY, BITE ME, BITEME, BLACK OUT, BLACKOUT, BLOW JOB, BLOWJOB, BONER, BOOBIES, BOOBS, BOODY, BREAST, BREAST JOB, BREAST LOVER, BREAST MAN, BREASTJOB, BREASTLOVER, BREASTMAN, BUDWEISER, BULL CRAP, BULL DIKE, BULL DYKE, BULL SHIT, BULLCRAP, BULLDIKE, BULLDYKE, BULLSHIT, BUMBLE FUCK, BUMBLEFUCK, BUMFUCK, BUNGHOLE, BUTCH BABES, BUTCH DIKE, BUTCH DYKE, BUTCHBABES, BUTCHDIKE, BUTCHDYKE, BUTT BANG, BUTT FUCK, BUTT FUCKER, BUTT FUCKERS, BUTT HEAD, BUTT MAN, BUTT PLUG, BUTT STAIN, BUTTBANG, BUTT-BANG, BUTTFACE, BUTTFUCK, BUTT-FUCK, BUTTFUCKER, BUTT-FUCKER, BUTTFUCKERS, BUTT-FUCKERS, BUTTHEAD, BUTTMAN, BUTTPIRATE, BUTTPLUG, BUTTSTAIN, CAMEL TOE, CAMELTOE, CARPET MUNCHER, CARPETMUNCHER, CARRUTH, CHERRY POPPER, CHERRYPOPPER, CHICK SLICK, CHICKSLICK, CLAM DIGGER, CLAM DIVER, CLAMDIGGER, CLAMDIVER, CLIT, CLITORIS, COCK, COCK BLOCK, COCK BLOCKER, COCK COWBOY, COCK FIGHT, COCK KNOB, COCK LICKER, COCK LOVER, COCK NOB, COCK QUEEN, COCK RIDER, COCK SMITH, COCK SUCKER, COCK TAIL, COCK TEASE, COCKBLOCK, COCKBLOCKER, COCKCOWBOY, COCKFIGHT, COCKHEAD, COCKKNOB, COCKLICKER, COCKLOVER, COCKNOB, COCKQUEEN, COCKRIDER, COCKS MAN, COCKSMAN, COCKSMITH, COCKSUCER, COCKSUCKER, COCKTAIL, COCKTEASE, COCKY, CONDOM, COPULATE, CORN HOLE, CORNHOLE, CRACK PIPE, CRACK WHORE, CRACKPIPE, CRACKWHORE, CRACK-WHORE, CRAP, CRAPPY, CREAMY, CROTCH, CROTCH JOCKEY, CROTCH MONKEY, CROTCH ROT, CROTCHJOCKEY, CROTCHMONKEY, CROTCHROT, CUM, CUM BUBBLE, CUM FEST, CUM JOCKEY, CUM QUAT, CUM QUEEN, CUM SHOT, CUMBUBBLE, CUMFEST, CUMJOCKEY, CUMM, CUMMING, CUMQUAT, CUMQUEEN, CUMSHOT, CUNNILINGUS, CUNT, CUNT FUCK, CUNT FUCKER, CUNT LICKER, CUNTFUCK, CUNTFUCKER, CUNTLICKER, CYBER SEX, CYBER SLIMER, CYBERSEX, CYBERSLIMER, DAHMER, DAMN, DAMN IT, DAMNIT, DATNIGGA, DEAP THROAT, DEAPER, DEAPTHROAT, DEEP THROAT, DEEPER, DEEPTHROAT, DEFECATE, DEPOSIT, DEVIL, DICK BRAIN, DICK FART, DICK FOR BRAINS, DICK HEAD, DICK LICK, DICK LICKER, DICK LIKCER, DICK WAD, DICK WEED, DICKBRAIN, DICKFORBRAINS, DICKHEAD, DICKLESS, DICKLICK, DICKLICKER, DICKMAN, DICKWAD, DICKWEED, DIKE, DILDO, DIP STICK, DIPSTICK, DIRTY HO, DIXIE DIKE, DIXIE DYKE, DIXIEDIKE, DIXIEDYKE, DO ME, DOGGIE STYLE, DOGGIESTYLE, DOGGY STLYE, DOGGYSTYLE, DOME, DONG, DOPE, DRAG QUEEN, DRAGQUEEN, DRAGQWEEN, DRIP DICK, DRIPDICK, DRUNK, DRUNKEN, DUMB ASS, DUMB BITCH, DUMB FUCK, DUMBASS, DUMBBITCH, DUMBFUCK, EASY SLUT, EASYSLUT, EAT ME, EAT PUSSY, EATBALLS, EATME, EATPUSSY, EJACULATE, ERECTION, EVL, EXCREMENT, F.U.C.K., FACE FUCKER, FACEFUCKER, FAGGOT, FAGOT, FAIRY, FANNY FUCKER, FANNYFUCKER, FART, FAST FUCK, FASTFUCK, FAT ASS, FAT FUCK, FAT FUCKER, FATASS, FATFUCK, FATFUCKER, FATSO, FELLATIO, FEMME, FINGER FOOD, FINGER FUCK, FINGER FUCKER, FINGERFOOD, FINGERFUCK, FINGERFUCKER, FIST FUCK, FIST FUCKER, FISTFUCK, FISTFUCKER, FISTING, FLASHER, FLATULENCE, FLOGGIN THE DOLPHIN, FONDLE, FOOT FUCK, FOOT FUCKER, FOOT LICKER, FOOTACTION, FOOTFUCK, FOOTFUCKER, FOOTLICKER, FOOTSTAR, FORE SKIN, FORESKIN, FORNICATE, FOUR 20, FOUR TWENTY, FOUR20, FOURTWENTY, FREAK FUCK, FREAKFUCK, FREAKY FUCKER, FREAKYFUCKER, FREE FUCK, FREEFUCK, FUCK, FUCK BAG, FUCK BUDDY, FUCK FACE, FUCK FEST, FUCK FREAK, FUCK FRIEND, FUCK HEAD, FUCK HER, FUCK IT, FUCK KNOB, FUCK ME, FUCK ME HARD, FUCK MONKEY, FUCK OFF, FUCK PIG, FUCK THEM, FUCK WHORE, FUCK YOU, FUCKA, FUCKABLE, FUCKBAG, FUCKBUDDY, FUCKED, FUCKED UP, FUCKEDUP, FUCKER, FUCKERS, FUCKFACE, FUCKFEST, FUCKFREAK, FUCKFRIEND, FUCKHEAD, FUCKHER, FUCKIN, FUCKIN A, FUCKIN NUTS, FUCKIN RIGHT, FUCKINA, FUCKING, FUCKING A, FUCKING BITCH, FUCKING NUTS, FUCKINGBITCH, FUCKINNUTS, FUCKINRIGHT, FUCKIT, FUCKKNOB, FUCKME, FUCKMEHARD, FUCKMONKEY, FUCKOFF, FUCKPIG, FUCKWHORE, FUCKYOU, FUDGE PAKCERS, FUN FUCK, FUNFUCK, FUUCK, G UNIT, GANG BANG, GANG BANGER, GANGBANG, GANGBANGER, GAY, GAY ASS, GAY MUTHA FUCKIN QUEER, GAY PRIDE, GAYMUTHAFUCKINWHORE, GENITAL, GET IT ON, GETITON, GIEHN, GIVE HEAD, GIVEHEAD, GLAZED DONUT, GLAZEDDONUT, GO TO HELL, GOD DAMED MUTHA FUCKA, GOD DAMIT, GOD DAMN, GOD DAMNED, GOD MANIT, GODDAMIT, GODDAMN, GODDAMNED, GODDAMNES, GODDAMNIT, GODDAMNMUTHAFUCKER, GONORREHEA, GONZAGAS, GOOK, GOT JESUS, GOT2HAVEIT, GOTOHELL, G-UNIT, HAND JOB, HANDJOB, HARD ON, HARDER, HARDON, HAREM, HE HATE ME, HEAD FUCK, HEAD LIGHTS, HEADFUCK, HEADLIGHTS, HEHATEME, HELL NO, HELL YES, HELLNO, HELLYES, HEN HOUSE, HENHOUSE, HERPES, HERSHEY HI WAY, HERSHEYHIGHWAY, HERSHEYHIWAY, HERSHY HIGH WAY, HO MO, HOBO, HOLE, HOLE STUFFER, HOLESTUFFER, HOMO, HOMO BANGERS, HOMO SEXUAL, HOMOBANGERS, HOMOSEXUAL, HONKERS, HONKEY, HOOKER, HOOKERS, HOOTERS, HORE, HORNEY, HORNY, HORSESHIT, HOSE JOB, HOSEJOB, HOSER, HOSTAGE, HOT DAMN, HOT PUSSY, HOT TO TROT, HOT2TROT, HOTDAMN, HOTPUSSY, HOTTOTROT, HUSSY, HUSTLER, ID10T, IDIOT, IDOIT, IN THE ASS, IN THE BUFF, INGIN, INSEST, INTER COURSE, INTER RACIAL, INTERCOURSE, INTERRACIAL, INTHEASS, INTHEBUFF, JACK THE RIPPER, JACKASS, JACKOFF, JACKTHERIPPER, JAP, JAP CRAP, JAPCRAP, JERK OFF, JERKOFF, JESUS CHIRST, JESUSCHRIST, JISM, JIZ, JIZ JUICE, JIZIM, JIZJUICE, JIZZ, JIZZIM, JOINT, JUGGALO, JUGS, K MART, KILL, KILLER, KILLING, KISS ASS, KISSASS, KKK, KMART, KNOCKERS, KOON, KOTEX, KRAP, KRAPPY, KUM, KUM BUBBLE, KUM QUAT, KUMBUBBLE, KUMBULLBE, KUMQUAT, KUNT, KY, KY JELLY, LACTATE, LADY BOOG, LAID, LAP DANCE, LAPDANCE, LESBAIN, LESBAYN, LESBIAN, LESBIN, LESBO, LEZ, LEZ BE, LEZ BE FRIENDS, LEZBE, LEZBEFRIENDS, LEZBO, LEZZ, LEZZO, LICK ME, LICKER, LICKME, LIMP DICK, LIMPDICK, LIMY, LIVE SEX, LIVESEX, LOLITA, LOOSER, LOTION, LOVE BONE, LOVE GOO, LOVE GUN, LOVE JUICE, LOVE MUSCLE, LOVE PISTOL, LOVE ROCKET, LOVEBONE, LOVEGOO, LOVEGUN, LOVEJUICE, LOVEMUSCLE, LOVEPISTOL, LOVEROCKET, LOW LIFE, LOWLIFE, LUBE JOB, LUBEJOB, LUCKY CAMEL TOE, LUCKYCAMMELTOE, MAMS, MAN HATER, MAN PASTE, MANHATER, MANPASTE, MARY JANE, MARYJANE, MASTABATE, MASTABATER, MASTER BLASTER, MASTERBATE, MASTERBLASTER, MASTRABATOR, MATTRESS PRINCESS, MATTRESSPRINCESS, MEAT BEATTER, MEATBEATTER, MOLEST, MOLESTER, MOLESTOR, MONEY SHOT, MONEYSHOT, MOTHER FUCKER, MOTHER LOVE BONE, MOTHERFUCK, MOTHERFUCKER, MOTHERLOVEBONE, MUFF, MUFF DIVE, MUFF DIVER, MUFF LICKER, MUFFDIVE, MUFFDIVER, MUFFIN DIVER, MUFFINDIVER, MUFFLIKCER, MURDER, MUTHA FUCKER, NAKED, NASTY BITCH, NASTY HO, NASTY SLUT, NASTY WHORE, NASTYBITCH, NASTYHO, NASTYSLUT, NASTYWHORE, NEON DEON, NIG, NIGER, NIGGA, NIGGER, NIPPLE, NIPPLE RING, NIPPLERING, NIT TIT, NITTIT, NO FUCKING WAY, NO SEX, NOFUCKINGWAY, NOOKIE, NOONER, NUDE, NUT FUCKER, NUTFUCKER, OICU812, ON THE RAG, ONTHERAG, ORGASM, ORGY, OU812, OUI, PIMP, PEARL NECKLACE, PEARLNECKLACE, PECKER, PEE, PEEP SHOW, PEEPSHOW, PEEPSHPW, PENETRATION, PENIS, PENTHOUSE, PERIOD, PHQUE, PIMP, PIMP SIMP, PIMPED, PIMPER, PIMPJUIC, PIMPJUICE, PIMPSIMP, PISS, PISS HEAD, PISSED, PISSER, PISSHEAD, PLAY BOY, PLAY GIRL, PLAYBOY, PLAYGIRL, POCKET POOL, POCKETPOOL, POLACK, POON TANG, POONTANG, POOP, POOPER, POOR WHITE TRASH, POORWHITETRASH, POPIMP, PORCH MONKEY, PORCHMONKEY, PORN, PORN FLICK, PORN KING, PORN PRINCESS, PORNFLICK, PORNKING, PORNO, PORNPRINCESS, PREMATURE, PRICK, PRICK HEAD, PRICKHEAD, PRIMETIME, PROSTITUTE, PUBIC, PUBIC LICE, PUBICLICE, PUD, PUD BOY, PUDBOY, PUDD, PUDD BOY, PUDDBOY, PUN TANG, PUNTANG, PURINA PRINCESS, PURINAPRICNESS, PUSSY, PUSSY CAT, PUSSY EATER, PUSSY FUCKER, PUSSY LICKER, PUSSY LIPS, PUSSY LOVER, PUSSY POUNDER, PUSSYCAT, PUSSYEATER, PUSSYFUCKER, PUSSYLICKER, PUSSYLIPS, PUSSYLOVER, PUSSYPOUNDER, PUTT PIRATE, PWT, QUEEF, QUEER, QUICKIE, RAE CARRUTH, RAPE, RAPIST, REAR END, REAR ENTRY, REAREND, REARENTRY, RECTUM, RED LIGHT, REDLIGHT, REEFER, RENT A FUCK, RENTAFUCK, RETARD, RETARDED, RIBBED, RIM JOB, RIMJOB, ROACH, ROBBER, S AND M, S&M, SAMCKDADDY, SANDM, SATAN, SCHLONG, SCREW, SCREW YOU, SCREWYOU, SCROTUM, SEMEN, SEX, SEX FARM, SEX HOUND, SEX HOUSE, SEX KITTEN, SEX POT, SEX SLAVE, SEX TO GO, SEX TOY, SEX TOYS, SEX WHORE, SEXFARM, SEXHOUND, SEXHOUSE, SEXKITTEN, SEXPOT, SEXSLAVE, SEXTOGO, SEXTOY, SEXTOYS, SEXUAL, SEXWHORE, SEXY, SEXY BIATCH, SEXY BITCH, SEXY MOMA, SEXY SLIM, SEXYMOMA, SEXY-SLIM, SHAG, SHAGGIN, SHAGGING, SHAWTYPIMP, SHIT, SHIT DICK, SHIT EATER, SHIT FACE, SHIT FOR BRAINS, SHIT FUCK, SHIT FUCKER, SHIT HAPPENS, SHIT HEAD, SHIT OUT OF LUCK, SHIT STAIN, SHIT4BRAINS, SHITDICK, SHITEATER, SHITFACE, SHITFORBRAINS, SHITFUCK, SHITFUCKER, SHITHAPENS, SHITHAPPENS, SHITHEAD, SHITOUTOFLUCK, SHITS, SHITSTAIN, SHITTER, SHITTING, SHITTY, SHORT FUCK, SHORTFUCK, SHOWTIME, SIX SIX SIX, SIXSIXSIX, SIXTY 9, SIXTY NINE, SIXTY9, SIXTYNINE, SKANK, SKANK BITCH, SKANK FUCK, SKANK WHORE, SKANKBITCH, SKANKFUCK, SKANKWHORE, SKANKY BITCH, SKANKY WHORE, SKANKYBITCH, SKANKYWHORE, SKIN FLUTE, SKINFLUTE, SKUM, SKUM BAG, SKUMBAG, SLANT, SLANT EYE, SLANTEYE, SLAVE, SLAVE DRIVER, SLAVEDRIVER, SLEEZE BAG, SLEEZE BALL, SLEEZEBAG, SLEEZEBALL, SLIDE IT IN, SLIDEITIN, SLIME, SLIME BALL, SLIME BUCKET, SLIMEBALL, SLIMEBUCKET, SLUT, SLUT WEAR, SLUT WHORE, SLUTS, SLUTT, SLUTTING, SLUTTY, SLUTWEAR, SLUTWHORE, SMACK DADDY, SMACK THE MONKEY, SMACKTHEMONKEY, SMAGMA, SMART ASS, SNATCH, SNATCH PATCH, SNATCHPATCH, SNIPER, SNOT, SODOMITE, SODOMY, SON OF A BITCH, SONOFABITCH, SONOFBITCH, SPANK THE MONKEY, SPANKTHEMONKEY, SPERM, SPERM BAG, SPERM HEARDER, SPERM HERDER, SPERMACIDE, SPERMBAG, SPERMHEARDER, SPERMHERDER, SPIC, SPICK, SPIT, SPITTER, SPLIT TAIL, SPLIT TIAL, SPLITTAIL, STAGG, STRAP ON, STRAPON, STRINGER, STRIP CLUB, STRIPCLUB, STROKE, STROKING, STUPID, STUPID FUCK, STUPID FUCKER, STUPIDFUCK, STUPIDFUCKER, SUCK, SUCK DICK, SUCK ME, SUCK MY ASS, SUCK MY DICK, SUCK MY TIT, SUCK OFF, SUCKDICK, SUCKER, SUCKME, SUCKMYASS, SUCKMYDICK, SUCKMYTIT, SUCKOFF, SUICIDE, SWIGN DIXX, SWING DIXX, SWINGIN DIXX, SWINGING DICKS, SYPHILIS, TAMPON, TESTICLE, TESTICLES, THIRD EYE, THIRD LEG, THIRDEYE, THIRDLEG, THREE SOME, THREESOME, TIT, TIT BIT NIPPLY, TIT FUCK, TIT FUCKER, TIT FUCKIN, TIT JOB, TIT LICKER, TIT LOVER, TITBITNIPPLY, TITFUCK, TITFUCKER, TITFUCKIN, TITJOB, TITLICKER, TITLOVER, TITS, TITTIES, TITTY, TONGETHRUSTER, TONGUE, TONGUE THRUSTER, TONGUE TRAMP, TONGUETHRUST, TONGUETRAMP, TOUNG THRUSTER, TOUNGE BALLER, TOUNGE THRUST, TRAILER TRASH, TRAILERTRASH, TRAMP, TRI SEXUAL, TRIPLE X, TRIPLEX, TRISEXUAL, TROJAN, TROTS, TUNNEL OF LOVE, TUNNELOFLOVE, TURD, TWO BIT WHORE, TWO ON ONE, TWOBITWHORE, UNFUCKABLE, UP THE ASS, UP THE BUTT, UPSKIRT, UPTHEASS, UPTHEBUTT, URINATE, URINE, UTERUS, VAGINA, VAGINAL, VD, VIBRATER, VIBRATOR, VIRGIN, VIRGIN BREAKER, VIRGINBREAKER, VULVA, WAYSTED, WEENIE, WET SPOT, WETSPOT, WHACKER, WHISKEY DICK, WHISKEYDICK, WHISKY DICK, WHISKYDICK, WHITE TRASH, WHITETRASH, WHORE, WHORE FUCKER, WHORE HOUSE, WHOREFUCKER, WHOREHOUSE, WIGGER, WILLIE WANKER, WILLIEWANKER, WUUTANG, XXX, YELLOW MAN, YELLOWMAN
The complete list has been posted on the internet: A.S.S., ANAL, ANAL ANNIE, ANAL SEX, ANALANNIE, ANALSEX, ANUS, ARSE, ASS, ASS BAGGER, ASS BLASTER, ASS CLOWN, ASS COWBOY, ASS FUCK, ASS FUCKER, ASS HOLE, ASS HOLES, ASS HORE, ASS JOCKEY, ASS KISS, ASS KISSER, ASS KLOWN, ASS LICK, ASS LICKER, ASS LOVER, ASS MAN, ASS MONKEY, ASS MUNCH, ASS MUNCHER, ASS PACKER, ASS PIRATE, ASS PUPPIES, ASS RANGER, ASS WHORE, ASS WIPE, ASSBAGGER, ASSBLASTER, ASSCLOWN, ASSCOWBOY, ASSFUCK, ASSFUCKER, ASSHOLE, ASSHOLES, ASSHORE, ASSJOCKEY, ASSKISS, ASSKISSER, ASSKLOWN, ASSLICK, ASSLICKER, ASSLOVER, ASSMAN, ASSMONKEY, ASSMUNCH, ASSMUNCHER, ASSPACKER, ASSPIRATE, ASSPUPPIES, ASSRANGER, ASSWHORE, ASSWIPE, ATHLETES FOOT, ATHLETESFOOT, AXING THE WEASEL, B HARD, BACK DOOR, BACK DOOR MAN, BACKDOOR, BACKDOORMAN, BACKSEAT, BAD ASS, BAD FUCK, BADFUCK, BALL LICKER, BALL SACK, BALLLICKER, BALLSACK, BANGING, BARELY LEGAL, BARELYLEGAL, BARF, BARF FACE, BARFACE, BARFFACE, BASTARD, BAZONGAS, BAZOOMS, BEASTALITY, BEASTIALITY, BEAT OFF, BEAT YOUR MEAT, BEATOFF, BEAT-OFF, BEATYOURMEAT, BI SEXUAL, BIATCH, BIG ASS, BIG BITCH, BIG BITCH, BIG BUTT, BIGASS, BIGBASTARD, BIGBUTT, BISEXUAL, BI-SEXUAL, BITCH, BITCHES, BITCHIN, BITCHY, BITE ME, BITEME, BLACK OUT, BLACKOUT, BLOW JOB, BLOWJOB, BONER, BOOBIES, BOOBS, BOODY, BREAST, BREAST JOB, BREAST LOVER, BREAST MAN, BREASTJOB, BREASTLOVER, BREASTMAN, BUDWEISER, BULL CRAP, BULL DIKE, BULL DYKE, BULL SHIT, BULLCRAP, BULLDIKE, BULLDYKE, BULLSHIT, BUMBLE FUCK, BUMBLEFUCK, BUMFUCK, BUNGHOLE, BUTCH BABES, BUTCH DIKE, BUTCH DYKE, BUTCHBABES, BUTCHDIKE, BUTCHDYKE, BUTT BANG, BUTT FUCK, BUTT FUCKER, BUTT FUCKERS, BUTT HEAD, BUTT MAN, BUTT PLUG, BUTT STAIN, BUTTBANG, BUTT-BANG, BUTTFACE, BUTTFUCK, BUTT-FUCK, BUTTFUCKER, BUTT-FUCKER, BUTTFUCKERS, BUTT-FUCKERS, BUTTHEAD, BUTTMAN, BUTTPIRATE, BUTTPLUG, BUTTSTAIN, CAMEL TOE, CAMELTOE, CARPET MUNCHER, CARPETMUNCHER, CARRUTH, CHERRY POPPER, CHERRYPOPPER, CHICK SLICK, CHICKSLICK, CLAM DIGGER, CLAM DIVER, CLAMDIGGER, CLAMDIVER, CLIT, CLITORIS, COCK, COCK BLOCK, COCK BLOCKER, COCK COWBOY, COCK FIGHT, COCK KNOB, COCK LICKER, COCK LOVER, COCK NOB, COCK QUEEN, COCK RIDER, COCK SMITH, COCK SUCKER, COCK TAIL, COCK TEASE, COCKBLOCK, COCKBLOCKER, COCKCOWBOY, COCKFIGHT, COCKHEAD, COCKKNOB, COCKLICKER, COCKLOVER, COCKNOB, COCKQUEEN, COCKRIDER, COCKS MAN, COCKSMAN, COCKSMITH, COCKSUCER, COCKSUCKER, COCKTAIL, COCKTEASE, COCKY, CONDOM, COPULATE, CORN HOLE, CORNHOLE, CRACK PIPE, CRACK WHORE, CRACKPIPE, CRACKWHORE, CRACK-WHORE, CRAP, CRAPPY, CREAMY, CROTCH, CROTCH JOCKEY, CROTCH MONKEY, CROTCH ROT, CROTCHJOCKEY, CROTCHMONKEY, CROTCHROT, CUM, CUM BUBBLE, CUM FEST, CUM JOCKEY, CUM QUAT, CUM QUEEN, CUM SHOT, CUMBUBBLE, CUMFEST, CUMJOCKEY, CUMM, CUMMING, CUMQUAT, CUMQUEEN, CUMSHOT, CUNNILINGUS, CUNT, CUNT FUCK, CUNT FUCKER, CUNT LICKER, CUNTFUCK, CUNTFUCKER, CUNTLICKER, CYBER SEX, CYBER SLIMER, CYBERSEX, CYBERSLIMER, DAHMER, DAMN, DAMN IT, DAMNIT, DATNIGGA, DEAP THROAT, DEAPER, DEAPTHROAT, DEEP THROAT, DEEPER, DEEPTHROAT, DEFECATE, DEPOSIT, DEVIL, DICK BRAIN, DICK FART, DICK FOR BRAINS, DICK HEAD, DICK LICK, DICK LICKER, DICK LIKCER, DICK WAD, DICK WEED, DICKBRAIN, DICKFORBRAINS, DICKHEAD, DICKLESS, DICKLICK, DICKLICKER, DICKMAN, DICKWAD, DICKWEED, DIKE, DILDO, DIP STICK, DIPSTICK, DIRTY HO, DIXIE DIKE, DIXIE DYKE, DIXIEDIKE, DIXIEDYKE, DO ME, DOGGIE STYLE, DOGGIESTYLE, DOGGY STLYE, DOGGYSTYLE, DOME, DONG, DOPE, DRAG QUEEN, DRAGQUEEN, DRAGQWEEN, DRIP DICK, DRIPDICK, DRUNK, DRUNKEN, DUMB ASS, DUMB BITCH, DUMB FUCK, DUMBASS, DUMBBITCH, DUMBFUCK, EASY SLUT, EASYSLUT, EAT ME, EAT PUSSY, EATBALLS, EATME, EATPUSSY, EJACULATE, ERECTION, EVL, EXCREMENT, F.U.C.K., FACE FUCKER, FACEFUCKER, FAGGOT, FAGOT, FAIRY, FANNY FUCKER, FANNYFUCKER, FART, FAST FUCK, FASTFUCK, FAT ASS, FAT FUCK, FAT FUCKER, FATASS, FATFUCK, FATFUCKER, FATSO, FELLATIO, FEMME, FINGER FOOD, FINGER FUCK, FINGER FUCKER, FINGERFOOD, FINGERFUCK, FINGERFUCKER, FIST FUCK, FIST FUCKER, FISTFUCK, FISTFUCKER, FISTING, FLASHER, FLATULENCE, FLOGGIN THE DOLPHIN, FONDLE, FOOT FUCK, FOOT FUCKER, FOOT LICKER, FOOTACTION, FOOTFUCK, FOOTFUCKER, FOOTLICKER, FOOTSTAR, FORE SKIN, FORESKIN, FORNICATE, FOUR 20, FOUR TWENTY, FOUR20, FOURTWENTY, FREAK FUCK, FREAKFUCK, FREAKY FUCKER, FREAKYFUCKER, FREE FUCK, FREEFUCK, FUCK, FUCK BAG, FUCK BUDDY, FUCK FACE, FUCK FEST, FUCK FREAK, FUCK FRIEND, FUCK HEAD, FUCK HER, FUCK IT, FUCK KNOB, FUCK ME, FUCK ME HARD, FUCK MONKEY, FUCK OFF, FUCK PIG, FUCK THEM, FUCK WHORE, FUCK YOU, FUCKA, FUCKABLE, FUCKBAG, FUCKBUDDY, FUCKED, FUCKED UP, FUCKEDUP, FUCKER, FUCKERS, FUCKFACE, FUCKFEST, FUCKFREAK, FUCKFRIEND, FUCKHEAD, FUCKHER, FUCKIN, FUCKIN A, FUCKIN NUTS, FUCKIN RIGHT, FUCKINA, FUCKING, FUCKING A, FUCKING BITCH, FUCKING NUTS, FUCKINGBITCH, FUCKINNUTS, FUCKINRIGHT, FUCKIT, FUCKKNOB, FUCKME, FUCKMEHARD, FUCKMONKEY, FUCKOFF, FUCKPIG, FUCKWHORE, FUCKYOU, FUDGE PAKCERS, FUN FUCK, FUNFUCK, FUUCK, G UNIT, GANG BANG, GANG BANGER, GANGBANG, GANGBANGER, GAY, GAY ASS, GAY MUTHA FUCKIN QUEER, GAY PRIDE, GAYMUTHAFUCKINWHORE, GENITAL, GET IT ON, GETITON, GIEHN, GIVE HEAD, GIVEHEAD, GLAZED DONUT, GLAZEDDONUT, GO TO HELL, GOD DAMED MUTHA FUCKA, GOD DAMIT, GOD DAMN, GOD DAMNED, GOD MANIT, GODDAMIT, GODDAMN, GODDAMNED, GODDAMNES, GODDAMNIT, GODDAMNMUTHAFUCKER, GONORREHEA, GONZAGAS, GOOK, GOT JESUS, GOT2HAVEIT, GOTOHELL, G-UNIT, HAND JOB, HANDJOB, HARD ON, HARDER, HARDON, HAREM, HE HATE ME, HEAD FUCK, HEAD LIGHTS, HEADFUCK, HEADLIGHTS, HEHATEME, HELL NO, HELL YES, HELLNO, HELLYES, HEN HOUSE, HENHOUSE, HERPES, HERSHEY HI WAY, HERSHEYHIGHWAY, HERSHEYHIWAY, HERSHY HIGH WAY, HO MO, HOBO, HOLE, HOLE STUFFER, HOLESTUFFER, HOMO, HOMO BANGERS, HOMO SEXUAL, HOMOBANGERS, HOMOSEXUAL, HONKERS, HONKEY, HOOKER, HOOKERS, HOOTERS, HORE, HORNEY, HORNY, HORSESHIT, HOSE JOB, HOSEJOB, HOSER, HOSTAGE, HOT DAMN, HOT PUSSY, HOT TO TROT, HOT2TROT, HOTDAMN, HOTPUSSY, HOTTOTROT, HUSSY, HUSTLER, ID10T, IDIOT, IDOIT, IN THE ASS, IN THE BUFF, INGIN, INSEST, INTER COURSE, INTER RACIAL, INTERCOURSE, INTERRACIAL, INTHEASS, INTHEBUFF, JACK THE RIPPER, JACKASS, JACKOFF, JACKTHERIPPER, JAP, JAP CRAP, JAPCRAP, JERK OFF, JERKOFF, JESUS CHIRST, JESUSCHRIST, JISM, JIZ, JIZ JUICE, JIZIM, JIZJUICE, JIZZ, JIZZIM, JOINT, JUGGALO, JUGS, K MART, KILL, KILLER, KILLING, KISS ASS, KISSASS, KKK, KMART, KNOCKERS, KOON, KOTEX, KRAP, KRAPPY, KUM, KUM BUBBLE, KUM QUAT, KUMBUBBLE, KUMBULLBE, KUMQUAT, KUNT, KY, KY JELLY, LACTATE, LADY BOOG, LAID, LAP DANCE, LAPDANCE, LESBAIN, LESBAYN, LESBIAN, LESBIN, LESBO, LEZ, LEZ BE, LEZ BE FRIENDS, LEZBE, LEZBEFRIENDS, LEZBO, LEZZ, LEZZO, LICK ME, LICKER, LICKME, LIMP DICK, LIMPDICK, LIMY, LIVE SEX, LIVESEX, LOLITA, LOOSER, LOTION, LOVE BONE, LOVE GOO, LOVE GUN, LOVE JUICE, LOVE MUSCLE, LOVE PISTOL, LOVE ROCKET, LOVEBONE, LOVEGOO, LOVEGUN, LOVEJUICE, LOVEMUSCLE, LOVEPISTOL, LOVEROCKET, LOW LIFE, LOWLIFE, LUBE JOB, LUBEJOB, LUCKY CAMEL TOE, LUCKYCAMMELTOE, MAMS, MAN HATER, MAN PASTE, MANHATER, MANPASTE, MARY JANE, MARYJANE, MASTABATE, MASTABATER, MASTER BLASTER, MASTERBATE, MASTERBLASTER, MASTRABATOR, MATTRESS PRINCESS, MATTRESSPRINCESS, MEAT BEATTER, MEATBEATTER, MOLEST, MOLESTER, MOLESTOR, MONEY SHOT, MONEYSHOT, MOTHER FUCKER, MOTHER LOVE BONE, MOTHERFUCK, MOTHERFUCKER, MOTHERLOVEBONE, MUFF, MUFF DIVE, MUFF DIVER, MUFF LICKER, MUFFDIVE, MUFFDIVER, MUFFIN DIVER, MUFFINDIVER, MUFFLIKCER, MURDER, MUTHA FUCKER, NAKED, NASTY BITCH, NASTY HO, NASTY SLUT, NASTY WHORE, NASTYBITCH, NASTYHO, NASTYSLUT, NASTYWHORE, NEON DEON, NIG, NIGER, NIGGA, NIGGER, NIPPLE, NIPPLE RING, NIPPLERING, NIT TIT, NITTIT, NO FUCKING WAY, NO SEX, NOFUCKINGWAY, NOOKIE, NOONER, NUDE, NUT FUCKER, NUTFUCKER, OICU812, ON THE RAG, ONTHERAG, ORGASM, ORGY, OU812, OUI, PIMP, PEARL NECKLACE, PEARLNECKLACE, PECKER, PEE, PEEP SHOW, PEEPSHOW, PEEPSHPW, PENETRATION, PENIS, PENTHOUSE, PERIOD, PHQUE, PIMP, PIMP SIMP, PIMPED, PIMPER, PIMPJUIC, PIMPJUICE, PIMPSIMP, PISS, PISS HEAD, PISSED, PISSER, PISSHEAD, PLAY BOY, PLAY GIRL, PLAYBOY, PLAYGIRL, POCKET POOL, POCKETPOOL, POLACK, POON TANG, POONTANG, POOP, POOPER, POOR WHITE TRASH, POORWHITETRASH, POPIMP, PORCH MONKEY, PORCHMONKEY, PORN, PORN FLICK, PORN KING, PORN PRINCESS, PORNFLICK, PORNKING, PORNO, PORNPRINCESS, PREMATURE, PRICK, PRICK HEAD, PRICKHEAD, PRIMETIME, PROSTITUTE, PUBIC, PUBIC LICE, PUBICLICE, PUD, PUD BOY, PUDBOY, PUDD, PUDD BOY, PUDDBOY, PUN TANG, PUNTANG, PURINA PRINCESS, PURINAPRICNESS, PUSSY, PUSSY CAT, PUSSY EATER, PUSSY FUCKER, PUSSY LICKER, PUSSY LIPS, PUSSY LOVER, PUSSY POUNDER, PUSSYCAT, PUSSYEATER, PUSSYFUCKER, PUSSYLICKER, PUSSYLIPS, PUSSYLOVER, PUSSYPOUNDER, PUTT PIRATE, PWT, QUEEF, QUEER, QUICKIE, RAE CARRUTH, RAPE, RAPIST, REAR END, REAR ENTRY, REAREND, REARENTRY, RECTUM, RED LIGHT, REDLIGHT, REEFER, RENT A FUCK, RENTAFUCK, RETARD, RETARDED, RIBBED, RIM JOB, RIMJOB, ROACH, ROBBER, S AND M, S&M, SAMCKDADDY, SANDM, SATAN, SCHLONG, SCREW, SCREW YOU, SCREWYOU, SCROTUM, SEMEN, SEX, SEX FARM, SEX HOUND, SEX HOUSE, SEX KITTEN, SEX POT, SEX SLAVE, SEX TO GO, SEX TOY, SEX TOYS, SEX WHORE, SEXFARM, SEXHOUND, SEXHOUSE, SEXKITTEN, SEXPOT, SEXSLAVE, SEXTOGO, SEXTOY, SEXTOYS, SEXUAL, SEXWHORE, SEXY, SEXY BIATCH, SEXY BITCH, SEXY MOMA, SEXY SLIM, SEXYMOMA, SEXY-SLIM, SHAG, SHAGGIN, SHAGGING, SHAWTYPIMP, SHIT, SHIT DICK, SHIT EATER, SHIT FACE, SHIT FOR BRAINS, SHIT FUCK, SHIT FUCKER, SHIT HAPPENS, SHIT HEAD, SHIT OUT OF LUCK, SHIT STAIN, SHIT4BRAINS, SHITDICK, SHITEATER, SHITFACE, SHITFORBRAINS, SHITFUCK, SHITFUCKER, SHITHAPENS, SHITHAPPENS, SHITHEAD, SHITOUTOFLUCK, SHITS, SHITSTAIN, SHITTER, SHITTING, SHITTY, SHORT FUCK, SHORTFUCK, SHOWTIME, SIX SIX SIX, SIXSIXSIX, SIXTY 9, SIXTY NINE, SIXTY9, SIXTYNINE, SKANK, SKANK BITCH, SKANK FUCK, SKANK WHORE, SKANKBITCH, SKANKFUCK, SKANKWHORE, SKANKY BITCH, SKANKY WHORE, SKANKYBITCH, SKANKYWHORE, SKIN FLUTE, SKINFLUTE, SKUM, SKUM BAG, SKUMBAG, SLANT, SLANT EYE, SLANTEYE, SLAVE, SLAVE DRIVER, SLAVEDRIVER, SLEEZE BAG, SLEEZE BALL, SLEEZEBAG, SLEEZEBALL, SLIDE IT IN, SLIDEITIN, SLIME, SLIME BALL, SLIME BUCKET, SLIMEBALL, SLIMEBUCKET, SLUT, SLUT WEAR, SLUT WHORE, SLUTS, SLUTT, SLUTTING, SLUTTY, SLUTWEAR, SLUTWHORE, SMACK DADDY, SMACK THE MONKEY, SMACKTHEMONKEY, SMAGMA, SMART ASS, SNATCH, SNATCH PATCH, SNATCHPATCH, SNIPER, SNOT, SODOMITE, SODOMY, SON OF A BITCH, SONOFABITCH, SONOFBITCH, SPANK THE MONKEY, SPANKTHEMONKEY, SPERM, SPERM BAG, SPERM HEARDER, SPERM HERDER, SPERMACIDE, SPERMBAG, SPERMHEARDER, SPERMHERDER, SPIC, SPICK, SPIT, SPITTER, SPLIT TAIL, SPLIT TIAL, SPLITTAIL, STAGG, STRAP ON, STRAPON, STRINGER, STRIP CLUB, STRIPCLUB, STROKE, STROKING, STUPID, STUPID FUCK, STUPID FUCKER, STUPIDFUCK, STUPIDFUCKER, SUCK, SUCK DICK, SUCK ME, SUCK MY ASS, SUCK MY DICK, SUCK MY TIT, SUCK OFF, SUCKDICK, SUCKER, SUCKME, SUCKMYASS, SUCKMYDICK, SUCKMYTIT, SUCKOFF, SUICIDE, SWIGN DIXX, SWING DIXX, SWINGIN DIXX, SWINGING DICKS, SYPHILIS, TAMPON, TESTICLE, TESTICLES, THIRD EYE, THIRD LEG, THIRDEYE, THIRDLEG, THREE SOME, THREESOME, TIT, TIT BIT NIPPLY, TIT FUCK, TIT FUCKER, TIT FUCKIN, TIT JOB, TIT LICKER, TIT LOVER, TITBITNIPPLY, TITFUCK, TITFUCKER, TITFUCKIN, TITJOB, TITLICKER, TITLOVER, TITS, TITTIES, TITTY, TONGETHRUSTER, TONGUE, TONGUE THRUSTER, TONGUE TRAMP, TONGUETHRUST, TONGUETRAMP, TOUNG THRUSTER, TOUNGE BALLER, TOUNGE THRUST, TRAILER TRASH, TRAILERTRASH, TRAMP, TRI SEXUAL, TRIPLE X, TRIPLEX, TRISEXUAL, TROJAN, TROTS, TUNNEL OF LOVE, TUNNELOFLOVE, TURD, TWO BIT WHORE, TWO ON ONE, TWOBITWHORE, UNFUCKABLE, UP THE ASS, UP THE BUTT, UPSKIRT, UPTHEASS, UPTHEBUTT, URINATE, URINE, UTERUS, VAGINA, VAGINAL, VD, VIBRATER, VIBRATOR, VIRGIN, VIRGIN BREAKER, VIRGINBREAKER, VULVA, WAYSTED, WEENIE, WET SPOT, WETSPOT, WHACKER, WHISKEY DICK, WHISKEYDICK, WHISKY DICK, WHISKYDICK, WHITE TRASH, WHITETRASH, WHORE, WHORE FUCKER, WHORE HOUSE, WHOREFUCKER, WHOREHOUSE, WIGGER, WILLIE WANKER, WILLIEWANKER, WUUTANG, XXX, YELLOW MAN, YELLOWMAN
Thursday, September 22, 2011
A brief history of the evil of art
Social conservatives, right-wingers, and opponents of government spending are fond of attacking the arts. Modern visual art is considered immoral, sometimes blasphemous, a waste of time and public money. But at the same time, from the left there's been a far quieter Marxist critique of the arts, suggesting that art fulfuls a disreputable role, necessary for the maintenance of an unequal and unfair capitalist society.
The French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu is the first important figure. He wondered how class and social divisions persist in an allegedly mobile society, and he realised that what matters in society isn't just your bank balance, it's who you know and what you know. He introduced the idea of social capital - the network of connections you have - and cultural capital - how much you know about the arts and other topics that are shared by the ruling classes. Social capital quantifies how in many industries today, particularly the media, it's a question of who you know, with the children of existing well-paid staff getting the placements and internships; if 500 people apply for a job, it takes something more than talent to get your CV to the top of the pile, to even get an interview. Cultural capital connects with older ideas like the "two cultures" and connoisseurship in the arts: that the upper classes are supposed to know about certain things, discuss certain topics, and attend certain cultural events (formerly Glyndebourne, now maybe Glastonbury), and not to know about other things (with the British upper classes, science, manufacturing, maybe even business).
Roger L Taylor, author of Art, an Enemy of the People, has described how art exists to promote a feeling of superiority in those in the know, and a corresponding condescension towards people not in the know. He focused on how jazz went from popular music in New Orleans brothels to the province of chin-stroking obsessives (generally white and highly educated). It's just as true among hipster music fans. The teaching of art history may fulfil the same function as fee-paying schools or elite universities: it makes the children of the wealthy feel superior to the tastes of the masses and thus better able to govern, control, hire and fire them.
Taylor followed on from the work of John Berger and others in the early 1970s, who began to study art as part of a wider pattern of visual culture. They showed the resemblance between art and advertising images, both historically (oil painting became popular because it was so good at painting people's lustrous possessions) and recently, where commercial art constantly refers to high art to gain prestige and to sell us stuff. More recently, advertisers have moved away from the traditional high arts to use alternative music, punk, and other subcultural media which is used less for its popularity than for the aura of sophistication and exclusivity it presents (hence despite the popularity of One Direction you're more likely to hear some winsome alt-folk in an advert than to get mainstream pop).
Larry Shiner's The Invention of Art is a more recent contribution, focusing particularly on the question of how some arts became high-status (classical music, which until the late 18th century was used by the rich as background noise) and others low-status (tapestry, weaving, things women did). The fact is inescapable that the development of the modern concept of art coincided with the development of modern capitalism and the end of a social system based on privilege of birth. A new system of privilege was required. This is well-attested in studies of art connoisseurship from the 18th century, the first time that paintings were sold openly by art-dealers to wealthy collectors rather than being primarily commissioned for religious and political institutions; to promote their products, dealers encouraged people to differentiate good and bad art and promoted the idea of taste, the judgement you need to buy paintings, which is so central to 18th century art-buying.
However, most critics and historians have failed to understand the full radicalism of this position. Feminist art historians have noted that the entire system of art history exists to support patriarchy and class-based power. Yet, most refuse to accept that art is simply a creation of capitalism: they believe that somehow you can destroy the entire evil system of our thinking about art, and then be left with the pure essence of art which can be directly appreciated. It's been common in the past 40 years for artists and art historians to challenge the artworld, the system of teaching and studying and selling art, and the history of the twentieth century avant-garde is largely a series of calls for all the old art to be destroyed and replaced with new art. Yet far fewer artists or art historians are willing to accept that art may be a force for evil rather than good.
The French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu is the first important figure. He wondered how class and social divisions persist in an allegedly mobile society, and he realised that what matters in society isn't just your bank balance, it's who you know and what you know. He introduced the idea of social capital - the network of connections you have - and cultural capital - how much you know about the arts and other topics that are shared by the ruling classes. Social capital quantifies how in many industries today, particularly the media, it's a question of who you know, with the children of existing well-paid staff getting the placements and internships; if 500 people apply for a job, it takes something more than talent to get your CV to the top of the pile, to even get an interview. Cultural capital connects with older ideas like the "two cultures" and connoisseurship in the arts: that the upper classes are supposed to know about certain things, discuss certain topics, and attend certain cultural events (formerly Glyndebourne, now maybe Glastonbury), and not to know about other things (with the British upper classes, science, manufacturing, maybe even business).
Roger L Taylor, author of Art, an Enemy of the People, has described how art exists to promote a feeling of superiority in those in the know, and a corresponding condescension towards people not in the know. He focused on how jazz went from popular music in New Orleans brothels to the province of chin-stroking obsessives (generally white and highly educated). It's just as true among hipster music fans. The teaching of art history may fulfil the same function as fee-paying schools or elite universities: it makes the children of the wealthy feel superior to the tastes of the masses and thus better able to govern, control, hire and fire them.
Taylor followed on from the work of John Berger and others in the early 1970s, who began to study art as part of a wider pattern of visual culture. They showed the resemblance between art and advertising images, both historically (oil painting became popular because it was so good at painting people's lustrous possessions) and recently, where commercial art constantly refers to high art to gain prestige and to sell us stuff. More recently, advertisers have moved away from the traditional high arts to use alternative music, punk, and other subcultural media which is used less for its popularity than for the aura of sophistication and exclusivity it presents (hence despite the popularity of One Direction you're more likely to hear some winsome alt-folk in an advert than to get mainstream pop).
Larry Shiner's The Invention of Art is a more recent contribution, focusing particularly on the question of how some arts became high-status (classical music, which until the late 18th century was used by the rich as background noise) and others low-status (tapestry, weaving, things women did). The fact is inescapable that the development of the modern concept of art coincided with the development of modern capitalism and the end of a social system based on privilege of birth. A new system of privilege was required. This is well-attested in studies of art connoisseurship from the 18th century, the first time that paintings were sold openly by art-dealers to wealthy collectors rather than being primarily commissioned for religious and political institutions; to promote their products, dealers encouraged people to differentiate good and bad art and promoted the idea of taste, the judgement you need to buy paintings, which is so central to 18th century art-buying.
However, most critics and historians have failed to understand the full radicalism of this position. Feminist art historians have noted that the entire system of art history exists to support patriarchy and class-based power. Yet, most refuse to accept that art is simply a creation of capitalism: they believe that somehow you can destroy the entire evil system of our thinking about art, and then be left with the pure essence of art which can be directly appreciated. It's been common in the past 40 years for artists and art historians to challenge the artworld, the system of teaching and studying and selling art, and the history of the twentieth century avant-garde is largely a series of calls for all the old art to be destroyed and replaced with new art. Yet far fewer artists or art historians are willing to accept that art may be a force for evil rather than good.
Saturday, September 17, 2011
Everybody writes propaganda songs
Imagine some of the most daring and experimental artists of the era making propaganda for an authoritarian, militaristic regime. This is exactly what some of the brightest stars of German art did during World War One: John Heartfield went on to fiercely oppose Hitler; his brother Wieland Herzefelde published numerous books on Marxism and avant-garde art; and George Grosz produced some of the most outstanding paintings of the era, showing greedy corrupt businessmen and prostitutes who represented the corrupting forces of capitalism.
But in December 1917 Heartfield joined the German Foreign Office as a director of propaganda films, soon after followed by Grosz and Herzefelde. Perhaps they reckoned that making films for the government would be less trouble than dying in the trenches. Heartfield has already, in 1916 anglicised his name in protest against the war. And the German propaganda machine had shown itself open to the widest reaches of art, sending Expressionist paintings to Zurich for exhibitions held by the Dadaist Cabaret Voltaire; the Italian government, on the side of Britain and France, competed by sending Giorgio de Chirico.
Preceding Goebbels' view that the most important thing for propaganda was to be entertaining, the Imperial German authorities felt that the best propaganda was the best art. Hence, the projects that the Heartfield/Herzefeld brothers and Grosz worked on were strange choices for propaganda: they made animations of the dark, violent Struwwelpeter stories, and considered adaptations of Poe's Masque of the Red Death and even Wilde's Picture of Dorian Grey. Sadly, none of their work appears to have survived.
After the war, Grosz and his friends went on to a very different kind of propaganda. Along with Max Beckmann and Otto Dix, Grosz produced some of the most brutal artistic critiques of the war and its lasting effects on German society. Heartfield fought in another kind of war, producing anti-nazi propaganda until he was forced to flee Germany. Grosz left for the USA in 1933; Heartfield and Herzfelde went via Czechoslovakia to the UK, and Herzfelde went on to the USA.
They are not the only artists to answer the call to make propaganda in times of war. Britain has excelled at it, with artists from William Orpen to Henry Moore working as official war artists. Writers such as George Orwell produced propaganda broadcasts. The best of British film-making turned their eyes and hands to the war effort in World War Two. Leftist experimental documentarist Humphrey Jennings made two extraordinary films: the verite drama I Was A Fireman, and the brilliantly avant-garde Silent Village in which a mining community from Wales re-enacts the nazi's destruction of the Czech mining village of Lidice following the assassination of Heydrich. Brazilian-born Alberto Cavalcanti made Went The Day Well?, a satire about Germans taking over an English town aided by the nazi-sympathising upper classes.
Powell and Pressburger, then the leading talents in Britain, made some of their best work: A Matter of Life and Death, completed after the war, and the Hitchcockian thriller A Canterbury Tale, in which a British and an American soldier team up with an English girl to track down a sexual pervert targeting the wives of soldiers; it's a generally light-hearted picture, aside from one brilliant scene in which the main characters come across streets of bombed out houses, revealing the true devastation caused even in the most ancient corner of the English countryside.
The Spanish Civil War had perhaps changed the opinions of many; one war which was mediated through propaganda. But writers and artists will tend to defend their homeland. E M Forster may have said he'd rather betray his country than his friends; Orwell famously did the opposite.
Main source: Andrés Mario Zervigón, 'A "Political Struwwelpeter"? John Heartfield's Early Film Animation and the Crisis of Photographic Representation'. New German Critique, Summer 2009, Issue 107, pages 5-51.
For more on propaganda in Zurich, see Hans Richter's Dada: Art and Anti-Art.
But in December 1917 Heartfield joined the German Foreign Office as a director of propaganda films, soon after followed by Grosz and Herzefelde. Perhaps they reckoned that making films for the government would be less trouble than dying in the trenches. Heartfield has already, in 1916 anglicised his name in protest against the war. And the German propaganda machine had shown itself open to the widest reaches of art, sending Expressionist paintings to Zurich for exhibitions held by the Dadaist Cabaret Voltaire; the Italian government, on the side of Britain and France, competed by sending Giorgio de Chirico.
Preceding Goebbels' view that the most important thing for propaganda was to be entertaining, the Imperial German authorities felt that the best propaganda was the best art. Hence, the projects that the Heartfield/Herzefeld brothers and Grosz worked on were strange choices for propaganda: they made animations of the dark, violent Struwwelpeter stories, and considered adaptations of Poe's Masque of the Red Death and even Wilde's Picture of Dorian Grey. Sadly, none of their work appears to have survived.
After the war, Grosz and his friends went on to a very different kind of propaganda. Along with Max Beckmann and Otto Dix, Grosz produced some of the most brutal artistic critiques of the war and its lasting effects on German society. Heartfield fought in another kind of war, producing anti-nazi propaganda until he was forced to flee Germany. Grosz left for the USA in 1933; Heartfield and Herzfelde went via Czechoslovakia to the UK, and Herzfelde went on to the USA.
They are not the only artists to answer the call to make propaganda in times of war. Britain has excelled at it, with artists from William Orpen to Henry Moore working as official war artists. Writers such as George Orwell produced propaganda broadcasts. The best of British film-making turned their eyes and hands to the war effort in World War Two. Leftist experimental documentarist Humphrey Jennings made two extraordinary films: the verite drama I Was A Fireman, and the brilliantly avant-garde Silent Village in which a mining community from Wales re-enacts the nazi's destruction of the Czech mining village of Lidice following the assassination of Heydrich. Brazilian-born Alberto Cavalcanti made Went The Day Well?, a satire about Germans taking over an English town aided by the nazi-sympathising upper classes.
Powell and Pressburger, then the leading talents in Britain, made some of their best work: A Matter of Life and Death, completed after the war, and the Hitchcockian thriller A Canterbury Tale, in which a British and an American soldier team up with an English girl to track down a sexual pervert targeting the wives of soldiers; it's a generally light-hearted picture, aside from one brilliant scene in which the main characters come across streets of bombed out houses, revealing the true devastation caused even in the most ancient corner of the English countryside.
The Spanish Civil War had perhaps changed the opinions of many; one war which was mediated through propaganda. But writers and artists will tend to defend their homeland. E M Forster may have said he'd rather betray his country than his friends; Orwell famously did the opposite.
Main source: Andrés Mario Zervigón, 'A "Political Struwwelpeter"? John Heartfield's Early Film Animation and the Crisis of Photographic Representation'. New German Critique, Summer 2009, Issue 107, pages 5-51.
For more on propaganda in Zurich, see Hans Richter's Dada: Art and Anti-Art.
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Zombie Steve Jobs wants your blood
Apple are well-known for their strict censorship, particularly when it comes to the iPhone, and Italian developers Molleindustria (motto: "Radical games against the dictatorship of entertainment") are the latest to face their wrath. Produced in association with the Gwangju Design Bienniale and Abandon Normal Devices, Phone Story is an "educational" and satirical game which mocks consumer obsession with mobile phones and comments on the the conditions faced by workers in the consumer electronics supply chain. In the game's various levels, players have to mine Coltan, the valuable mineral whose control has fuelled the Congolese Civil War, prevent far-eastern factory workers from jumping off high buildings, and fling out the latest gadgets to rabid consumers.
Apple banned the game on the grounds that it depicts cruelty to children and features "excessively objectionable or crude content". The game is available from the Android Market. Molleindustria promise that their revenues will be donated to charities that help protect the poor and vulnerable caught up in the mobile phone supply chain.
(Source: The Guardian)
Apple banned the game on the grounds that it depicts cruelty to children and features "excessively objectionable or crude content". The game is available from the Android Market. Molleindustria promise that their revenues will be donated to charities that help protect the poor and vulnerable caught up in the mobile phone supply chain.
(Source: The Guardian)
Friday, April 29, 2011
You think that you're the only one
Cat's Eyes, the eponymous album by The Horrors' Faris Badwan and singer Rachel Zeffira, is the latest record to dip back into the musical sounds of 60s girl-pop, following Comet Gain, Velocette, Lucky Soul, and the more mainstream acts like Duffy. The first track, Cat's Eyes, starts off with the two signifiers of early 60s pop: a single chord played on cheap piano that might have come from a whorehouse, and a few spoken words in a confident young female voice: "Let me tell you something", but then it falls away in favour of a slow build.
Early 60s girl-group pop - The Crystals, the Chiffones, the Shangri-Las was a slightly cynical, opportunistic, ironic, push-it-out-fast commercial sound. When Carole King heard her babysitter was being beaten up by her boyfriend she wrote a song about it - He Hit Me And It Felt Like A Kiss - but no hard feelings because the same babysitter went on to have a massive hit as Little Eva with The Loco-Motion. It was that kind of time, when emotions don't really come in to music making.
But the later tracks on the album owe as much to a more sophisticated late-60s adult pop sound, an era of craftsmanship of songwriters like Burt Bacharach and vocal talent and artists like Dionne Warwick and Dusty Springfield, in their mode of melancholia and soft sadness. This is music of quiet resignation, already in the 60s hearkening back to past days of pre-rock-and-roll songwriting (Julie London, and before her Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, and they heyday of the American songwriter for hire), a music of emotional expressiveness that finds fulfilment in classical form. The classic recording of that genre is Dionne Warwick's Walk On By, one of the few pop songs about a refusal to admit emotion.
Comet Gain tied this sound to a radical Marxism and it's music in the face of an all-encompassing system of spectacle - it's very small. The soft reverb, the feeling like it's being performed in a deep hole, only add to the sensation that it's the defeatism of someone who's already been buried and is just waiting for their own death. Fredric Jameson defined postmodern art as simultaneously superficial and x-ray-like, in other words, art that sees through things. The advantage of recalling a lost sound instead of creating your own is that your music becomes analysis from a position of certainty, rather than an open-ended synthesis of new forms.
The influences are various: it also relates to more modern takes on girl-pop like the electronica of Stereolab and particularly Ladytron, and the minimalism of James Blake; the brass and fierce restraint and repetition recalls the even more avant garde minimalism of These New Puritans, only without their hints of Levellers and Lollards and other puritan revolutionaries. Often with an obsessively repeated few notes, Cat's Eyes seems to say: this is all there is, I play it over again, and then I fall silent for a bit.
A few later tracks are much weirder though: Sooner or Later is Nick Cave-ish, with scraping sounds, odd percussion, drones, brass, stabbing strings, and slow male vocals. Faris Badwan has claimed the band are making pop music, but later tracks rather belie this. There's an aura of tension to tracks like Over You, a sense that it's being held back, that there's something wanting to escape, the restraining influence of the half-idea of 60s pop's smooth surface presenting an explosion.
Most of the songs are about comparison: "You're the best person I know" (The Best Person I Know), "I know I'm not the prettiest girl" and "she's better than me" (I'm Not Stupid), "Don't ever tell me you're the only one" (Face In The Crowd). Just as the singer's persona is trapped in competition with other people not the uniqueness of love, this is a record trapped in competition with the past. It's maybe not as claustrophobic as the lovingly pastoral retro sound of Fleet Foxes, which feels like a desperate wish that the last 40 years of popular music had never taken place - but it feels like a more desperate yearning for extinction even than that. Not an album for anyone who believes in the future; its utopias are all in the past.
Early 60s girl-group pop - The Crystals, the Chiffones, the Shangri-Las was a slightly cynical, opportunistic, ironic, push-it-out-fast commercial sound. When Carole King heard her babysitter was being beaten up by her boyfriend she wrote a song about it - He Hit Me And It Felt Like A Kiss - but no hard feelings because the same babysitter went on to have a massive hit as Little Eva with The Loco-Motion. It was that kind of time, when emotions don't really come in to music making.
But the later tracks on the album owe as much to a more sophisticated late-60s adult pop sound, an era of craftsmanship of songwriters like Burt Bacharach and vocal talent and artists like Dionne Warwick and Dusty Springfield, in their mode of melancholia and soft sadness. This is music of quiet resignation, already in the 60s hearkening back to past days of pre-rock-and-roll songwriting (Julie London, and before her Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, and they heyday of the American songwriter for hire), a music of emotional expressiveness that finds fulfilment in classical form. The classic recording of that genre is Dionne Warwick's Walk On By, one of the few pop songs about a refusal to admit emotion.
Comet Gain tied this sound to a radical Marxism and it's music in the face of an all-encompassing system of spectacle - it's very small. The soft reverb, the feeling like it's being performed in a deep hole, only add to the sensation that it's the defeatism of someone who's already been buried and is just waiting for their own death. Fredric Jameson defined postmodern art as simultaneously superficial and x-ray-like, in other words, art that sees through things. The advantage of recalling a lost sound instead of creating your own is that your music becomes analysis from a position of certainty, rather than an open-ended synthesis of new forms.
The influences are various: it also relates to more modern takes on girl-pop like the electronica of Stereolab and particularly Ladytron, and the minimalism of James Blake; the brass and fierce restraint and repetition recalls the even more avant garde minimalism of These New Puritans, only without their hints of Levellers and Lollards and other puritan revolutionaries. Often with an obsessively repeated few notes, Cat's Eyes seems to say: this is all there is, I play it over again, and then I fall silent for a bit.
A few later tracks are much weirder though: Sooner or Later is Nick Cave-ish, with scraping sounds, odd percussion, drones, brass, stabbing strings, and slow male vocals. Faris Badwan has claimed the band are making pop music, but later tracks rather belie this. There's an aura of tension to tracks like Over You, a sense that it's being held back, that there's something wanting to escape, the restraining influence of the half-idea of 60s pop's smooth surface presenting an explosion.
Most of the songs are about comparison: "You're the best person I know" (The Best Person I Know), "I know I'm not the prettiest girl" and "she's better than me" (I'm Not Stupid), "Don't ever tell me you're the only one" (Face In The Crowd). Just as the singer's persona is trapped in competition with other people not the uniqueness of love, this is a record trapped in competition with the past. It's maybe not as claustrophobic as the lovingly pastoral retro sound of Fleet Foxes, which feels like a desperate wish that the last 40 years of popular music had never taken place - but it feels like a more desperate yearning for extinction even than that. Not an album for anyone who believes in the future; its utopias are all in the past.
Thursday, February 17, 2011
Psychology of buildings: the tragedy of Heinrich Wölfflin
This is a story about one of the greatest intellectual figures of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Or maybe it's a story about how people today view that time period, and how we choose our heroes. It's the story of a great academic who, caught up in a crazy bloodthirsty world, lost faith in his profession, and gave it all up. Or else it's the story of how intellectual engagement with ideas of the past has been replaced by emotional reactions and a search for people we can feel pity for.
Heinrich Wölfflin was perhaps the greatest art historian of the late 19th century. He sought to use the new science of psychology to explain how art works could encode moods and emotions, and in his dissertation Prolegomena to a Psychology of Architecture he applied this to the appearance of buildings. In Renaissance and Baroque and Classic Art he sought to explain how the culture of Europe in the Renaissance and early modern periods was manifested in its artistic styles. Wölfflin was instrumental in creating the central idea of art history: that an age has a spirit, and the art of that age manifests its spirit.
But by 1914, the spirit of the age was less comforting to Wölfflin. Germany was increasingly militaristic, Europe was moving towards war, and he was struggling to write another book: "It is hardly even possible for me to muster the minimum, the little bit of composure, scholarly composure, that one can expect. To talk about the influence of Italians on German art, when countless Italians with bayonets are advancing at the border."
Germany was gripped by a wave of patriotism, as much in the highest towers of academia as in popular sentiment. Wölfflin complained, "Why are all of the oldest artists and professors rallying to the flag? Apparently, only the very few feel comfortable with themselves. I can understand it as far as art historians go, but it's the same everywhere! And the speeches that scholars make in favor of the war! So this is the unity everyone's making such a big deal about - everyone losing his mind!" Intellectual debate was dead, and to argue against the popular view of art was tantamount to treason.
When the war started, Wölfflin devoted large sums to the Red Cross; apparently "he was prepared to forego half of his salary to that end". He summarised the declaration of war thus: "At the Marienplatz suddenly a race toward Sendlinger Street (where the newspaper Neuste Nachrichten was headquartered). One hears three short 'hurras.' The first who return cry: 'mobilization!' 'There's a mobilization!' Waited with the crowd for a while, until the printed telegrams are handed out. The people are very calm.- A father, who carries his little boy home on his arm, has tears in his eyes. Two young people: 'Business is ruined!"
In the first few months of the war Wölfflin overcame his writer's block to produce his last major work, the flawed masterpiece Principles of Art History. He now rejected all relations between culture and art; instead he imagined art as driven by its own internal logic, that turns the linearity and symmetry of Leonardo and Raphael into the restless, asymmetrical, impressionistic style of Baroque art. Rejecting the tradition of German art history, he denied that cultural change was behind change in artistic style. It was as if art had its own life, its own logic and movement, regardless of the society that was contemporaneous with it. The book is judged by almost everyone to be a failure. He could not justify the changes in art without reference to external causes. His theories lacked necessity.
When the war ended, Wölfflin found no relief. He was tired of the politics of academia, the competition to get into print, and increasingly came to feel that, as he put it, "works of art are not 'the greatest good'". Writing, "it's true that I ... don't know any more what else there is for me to do as a Professor of Art History", he tried to give public lectures on art to the workers of Munich, but found the audiences were full of middle-class ladies.
His friend Karl Vossler wrote to Benedetto Croce: "Strange case. At the height of his activities, with a full capacity to work, not yet sixty years of age, Wolfflin announces that scholarship no longer interests him and that it is time for him to leave the profession. ... All of his friends and I too have tried to change his mind and have encouraged him to stay and continue his extraordinary service as a professor and scholar, but to no avail."
Wölfflin gave up his job at the University of Munich in 1924. This was the same year and the same city where Hitler was convicted for treason after his failed 1923 putsch. Wölfflin moved back to his homeland of Switzerland; he set up home in Zurich, which until shortly before had been the home of Lenin, Tristan Tsara, and James Joyce, but now we suppose was back to the usual qualities of the Swiss. Before he left, he explained to his students: "I am thought of as a formalist, as cool. I'm not. I wrote the Principles of Art History not in order to mechanize history, but in order to render judgment exact. Arbitrariness, the sheer, uncontrollable eruption of emotion, has always disgusted me".
This story, and the interpretation I give it, comes from Martin Warnke in an article published in English in 19891. Despite admiring Wölfflin's sense of principle, Warnke chose not to defend Wölfflin's ideas.Warnke concluded: "Since Wölfflin hardly felt himself to be defensible, one hardly does him justice by defending him in the name of some 'culture of seeing' or ascribing to him some role as a forefather. One also hardly does him justice when one confirms, extends, or disproves his teachings. One does him the most justice through a rigorous relativization, perhaps in accordance with one of his favorite maxims: 'Not everything is possible at all times.' Not even Wölfflin".
Today, nobody believes Wölfflin's ideas in Principles of Art History, but they still study it. Wölfflin thought, at least in its earlier years, that when we look at a picture of a person (or even a building) our body unconsciously conforms to the position of the person in the picture, and thus we come to empathise with what the picture is expressing. Looking back in time, Warnke empathises, he feels a common pacifism, and yet he does not know what Wölfflin was thinking. This is a judgment made on sensibility not on logic. Looking at Wölfflin's later years, if not the earlier, perhaps logic is not to be hoped for.
1Martin Warnke, "On Heinrich Wölfflin", translated by David Levin, Representations, No. 27 (Summer, 1989), pp. 172-187.
Heinrich Wölfflin was perhaps the greatest art historian of the late 19th century. He sought to use the new science of psychology to explain how art works could encode moods and emotions, and in his dissertation Prolegomena to a Psychology of Architecture he applied this to the appearance of buildings. In Renaissance and Baroque and Classic Art he sought to explain how the culture of Europe in the Renaissance and early modern periods was manifested in its artistic styles. Wölfflin was instrumental in creating the central idea of art history: that an age has a spirit, and the art of that age manifests its spirit.
But by 1914, the spirit of the age was less comforting to Wölfflin. Germany was increasingly militaristic, Europe was moving towards war, and he was struggling to write another book: "It is hardly even possible for me to muster the minimum, the little bit of composure, scholarly composure, that one can expect. To talk about the influence of Italians on German art, when countless Italians with bayonets are advancing at the border."
Germany was gripped by a wave of patriotism, as much in the highest towers of academia as in popular sentiment. Wölfflin complained, "Why are all of the oldest artists and professors rallying to the flag? Apparently, only the very few feel comfortable with themselves. I can understand it as far as art historians go, but it's the same everywhere! And the speeches that scholars make in favor of the war! So this is the unity everyone's making such a big deal about - everyone losing his mind!" Intellectual debate was dead, and to argue against the popular view of art was tantamount to treason.
When the war started, Wölfflin devoted large sums to the Red Cross; apparently "he was prepared to forego half of his salary to that end". He summarised the declaration of war thus: "At the Marienplatz suddenly a race toward Sendlinger Street (where the newspaper Neuste Nachrichten was headquartered). One hears three short 'hurras.' The first who return cry: 'mobilization!' 'There's a mobilization!' Waited with the crowd for a while, until the printed telegrams are handed out. The people are very calm.- A father, who carries his little boy home on his arm, has tears in his eyes. Two young people: 'Business is ruined!"
In the first few months of the war Wölfflin overcame his writer's block to produce his last major work, the flawed masterpiece Principles of Art History. He now rejected all relations between culture and art; instead he imagined art as driven by its own internal logic, that turns the linearity and symmetry of Leonardo and Raphael into the restless, asymmetrical, impressionistic style of Baroque art. Rejecting the tradition of German art history, he denied that cultural change was behind change in artistic style. It was as if art had its own life, its own logic and movement, regardless of the society that was contemporaneous with it. The book is judged by almost everyone to be a failure. He could not justify the changes in art without reference to external causes. His theories lacked necessity.
When the war ended, Wölfflin found no relief. He was tired of the politics of academia, the competition to get into print, and increasingly came to feel that, as he put it, "works of art are not 'the greatest good'". Writing, "it's true that I ... don't know any more what else there is for me to do as a Professor of Art History", he tried to give public lectures on art to the workers of Munich, but found the audiences were full of middle-class ladies.
His friend Karl Vossler wrote to Benedetto Croce: "Strange case. At the height of his activities, with a full capacity to work, not yet sixty years of age, Wolfflin announces that scholarship no longer interests him and that it is time for him to leave the profession. ... All of his friends and I too have tried to change his mind and have encouraged him to stay and continue his extraordinary service as a professor and scholar, but to no avail."
Wölfflin gave up his job at the University of Munich in 1924. This was the same year and the same city where Hitler was convicted for treason after his failed 1923 putsch. Wölfflin moved back to his homeland of Switzerland; he set up home in Zurich, which until shortly before had been the home of Lenin, Tristan Tsara, and James Joyce, but now we suppose was back to the usual qualities of the Swiss. Before he left, he explained to his students: "I am thought of as a formalist, as cool. I'm not. I wrote the Principles of Art History not in order to mechanize history, but in order to render judgment exact. Arbitrariness, the sheer, uncontrollable eruption of emotion, has always disgusted me".
This story, and the interpretation I give it, comes from Martin Warnke in an article published in English in 19891. Despite admiring Wölfflin's sense of principle, Warnke chose not to defend Wölfflin's ideas.Warnke concluded: "Since Wölfflin hardly felt himself to be defensible, one hardly does him justice by defending him in the name of some 'culture of seeing' or ascribing to him some role as a forefather. One also hardly does him justice when one confirms, extends, or disproves his teachings. One does him the most justice through a rigorous relativization, perhaps in accordance with one of his favorite maxims: 'Not everything is possible at all times.' Not even Wölfflin".
Today, nobody believes Wölfflin's ideas in Principles of Art History, but they still study it. Wölfflin thought, at least in its earlier years, that when we look at a picture of a person (or even a building) our body unconsciously conforms to the position of the person in the picture, and thus we come to empathise with what the picture is expressing. Looking back in time, Warnke empathises, he feels a common pacifism, and yet he does not know what Wölfflin was thinking. This is a judgment made on sensibility not on logic. Looking at Wölfflin's later years, if not the earlier, perhaps logic is not to be hoped for.
1Martin Warnke, "On Heinrich Wölfflin", translated by David Levin, Representations, No. 27 (Summer, 1989), pp. 172-187.
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