Response Paper - Eric Zimmermann

Eric Zimmermann
Spring 2010
Walter Benjamin Response

After reading this essay, I was confronted with a lot of things that I had not really ever thought about, or at least not in such a lucid manner. The perception of art and how it has/is changing due to film and photography and the reproducibility, I was uncertain exactly what Benjamin was making his primary topic, because in a sense he seems to be all over the place, floating between thoughts as certain things relate to others. Universal perspective, is that even a plausible idea?

It is clear that throughout the entire essay Benjamin is addressing the modernization of our world and its effects on art, and at the same time examines film and photography. Authenticity, originality and reproduction paired with these ideas of an “aura” that is created in any piece of art whether it is a painting, photograph, or movie seems to be his focus, along with how this “aura” is projected in the work(s) of art.

The “aura” is gone. Mechanically reproduced work has made sure of this in Benjamin’s opinion. He begins to speak of mass consumption and how original artwork has never been able to have a simultaneous collective experience, and painting created a demand that cannot be fulfilled fully all at once, whereas film and photography is able to. However, he does go on further to say that film has observers but unlike people who observe art, those who view these films are absent-minded observers.

When Benjamin began spinning off into the political aspect I started to get lost. The only part I understood clearly was that in his opinion and others the loss of the “aura” could potentially be a good thing, hand in hand with the reproducibility of art in the modern world. This aura seems to be this driving force or underlying theme of this entire essay.

I found the essay interesting, and I’m sure I will continually read it now that I have already read it once, and hopefully each time it will make more sense to me and I will gain new understanding of it after reading it.