 |
| "'I am not concerned with jurisdiction of the courts as Hess or others are.'(Laughs.)" Albert Speer(Hipster Archetype), Interview before Nuremberg Trials, 1946. |
Accepting the benefits of Empire while not giving a shit about it is not only a narcissistic defense, it's obscene collaboration. Here ironic detachment becomes abasement masters find most pleasing.
***Thanks to Pere Lebrun for a series of valuable posts on Hipsters.
http://perelebrun.blogspot.com/
4 comments:
Archetype or prototype? It's fun to throw in Nazis (like Eva Braun in minstrel garb), but been wondering if 'hipster' is a distinctly post-war phenomenon.
Hipsterism is the protean Jugendstil of Fascism. Imperialism is always Fascism--Fasces always comes first.
Nazis emphasized style, pageantry--i.e. stylistic cover for atrocity, aggressive war via film, parades, architecture, statuary, and "spiffy uniforms". All marking cultural supremacy. One could say the same of 18th-19th Cent. England, 19th Cent. France.
In U.S. cultural supremacy is marked by access. The Hipster Consumes alienation from imperial atrocity, inequality and inhabits a privileged, ironic, remove. They are living parodies of Epicurean(no, not hedonism--but unmoved, careless) Gods.
Stendhal, a great novelist for sure, was a hipster.
Wordsworth, Coleridge= hipsters.
Romanticism abounds with hipster heroes--Werther(blue coat!), Don Juan(Byron), and Julien Sorel(I've missed a ton).
I focused on Speer because he believed, since he was involved in "Cultural" endeavor, he was not to blame. Like US and UK cultural leaders(journalists, writers, celebs, artists) who supported aggressive warfare, atrocity, or did or said nothing feel blameless, innocent.
You may have a point on the specific phenomena---Perhaps I paint with too broad a brush.
(One more thought)
Couldn't the poets who nestled under Maecenas' patronage, and flattered Augustus in their work(saving Propertius), definitely the "smart set", be considered Hipsters?
I see Hipsterism as a recurrent movement in Culture(adopted by producers and consumers) that promotes sycophancy or inaction towards Imperial Rule.
I read somewhere that the CIA actually funded "abstract" art because it was berfet of obvious, accessible political commentary and thus neutral and useful.
re: CIA funding abstract expressionism
http://gizmodo.com/5686753/how-the-cia-spent-secret-millions-turning-modern-art-into-a-cold-war-arsenal
Post a Comment