Aestheticism and Decadence PDF

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Liceo Scientifico Angelo Messedaglia
Docente: Giovanni Communara ...

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Aestheticism and Decadence The aesthetic movement developed in the last decades of the 19th century Born in France with Thèophile Gautier. Reflected the sense of frustration and uncertainty of the artist, his reaction against the materialism and the restrictive moral code of bourgeoisie, his need to re-defined the role of art. The result was that French artists withdrew from the typical and social scene and “escaped” into aesthetic isolation, into what Gautier defined as “Art for Art’s Sake”. The bohèmien embodied his protest against the monotony and vulgarity of bourgeoisie life, leading an unconventional existence, pursuing sensation and excess, cultivating art and beauty. Doctrine imported into England by James Mcheill Whistler, an American painter who worked in England, although the roots of the English Aesthetic Movement can be traced back to the Romantic poet John Keats, as well as D. G. Rossetti. WALTER PETER is regarded as the theorist of the Aesthetic Movement in England. He rejected religious faith and said that art was the only means to stop time, the only certainty. Life should be lived in the spirit of art, namely “as a work of art”. Filling each passing moment with intense experience, feeling all kind of sensations. The TASK OF THE ARTIST was to feel sensations, to be attentive to the “comely”, the “gracious”, the “blithe”. The artist was seen as the transcriber “not of the world, not of the mere fact, but of his sense of it”. Art had no reference to life, and therefore it had nothing to do with morality and need not to be didactic. Peter’s work had a deep influence on the poets and writers of the 1890s, especially O.Wilde and the group of artists met in the Rhymers’ Club and contributed “to the Yellow Book”, a periodical published from 1894 to 1897, which reflected the “decadent” taste in its sensational subjects. Features: -

excessive attention to the self; Hedonistic and sensuous attitude; Perversity in subject matter; Disenchantment with contemporary society; Evocative use of language;...