Oh hi! I've enjoyed many Woody Allen films. Unless you've been completely in your
own bubble for the last 20 years, you probably know Woody Allen for things
outside of his filmmaking. Gross, disgusting, transgressions. So can I like
Woody Allen films even if I'm not too fond of the person? Or is that just
giving them a free pass? There's a 1967 essay which I absolutely have not read,
written by Roland Barthes. It's entitled The Death of the Author, except it's all
in French and junk. Now I may not have personally read it but it was brought up
in many an English class that I attended. And it's also referenced in many other
media studies. And I'm sounding completely pretentious, I know. So it must
mean it's a Thursday! This essay changed the prevailing wisdom that the author
was the authority of how the text should be read. What ethnicity were they? What
was their socio-economic standing? Where did they lean politically? And what does
love got to do, got to do, got to do with it? Barthes found this much too simplistic and
that it gave too much power to the author, instead of the intended audience
of the piece, who bring their own upbringing and background to critique
what they were reading. He was using this as a way to look at literature
specifically, but I like to use it as a way of engaging with all types of media:
movies, TV, comics, messages written on bathroom walls. For me the worst types of
classes were those where the teacher would stand at the front and drone on
and on and ask questions like: "what does the author mean by these color of
curtains?" Which I just think is the least interesting question to ask, especially
when it's obvious that it represents the failed policies of the proletariat.
What the author means is less important than how I experienced the story. And because
I'm a complete and utter narcissist I do truly believe that. Whether the author
was a drunk, or a Catholic bishop, or a twelve-year-old savant, it's an
interesting biographical tidbit but really doesn't impact on how I react to
the story. I've been skating around the true topic
of today's video. And yes I said skating. I've been scraping frost off my car,
so winter is actually here. Thanks a lot Jon Snow. It's your fault the Wall came down.
How does this translate to bad people? Woody Allen and Roman Polanski
are most likely child rapists, and yet I still like many of their films. Orson
Scott Card wrote probably the best sci-fi story of all time and yet he's a
big ol' homophobe. Recently Joss Whedon was revealed to be a less than reputable
person towards his wife. Louis CK apparently masturbates in front of women
who don't want him to. And I'm sure there are many more that we could point to
throughout history. Let me know your favorite ones down in the comments below.
Nice engagement Kyle! For me the work is the work, and the person's the person. No
matter how small. My friend William White is a much smarter person than I am, and
so I recently asked him: does separating the art from the artist simply trick
ourselves so that we can continue liking something?
WILLIAM: Hello my name is William White.
And I was asked to talk about the death of the author, and separating art from
the artist, and generally about how I think that's a bad thing. And I think
it's unhealthy, and I think that artists should be held entirely accountable for
the things that they do in their personal life. And the only way to do
that is to connect them to their art, because if we continue allowing them to
either have monetary success or just, like, a success or a platform for their
art. Or, I mean while they're still alive. If we're still holding their art to a
higher standard than we're actually holding them to, then that gets to be a
problem. And it kind of blurs the lines between what we're finding actually good
about the art, and what we find good about the person who's making it. Some
trickier things about this is with people who have maybe been, like,
brilliant game-changing artists like Alfred Hitchcock or John Lennon, who
created entire filmographies and discographies of work that people
generally regard as being incredible. The thing about that is they are dead. So
they will no longer get monetary success, or will no longer have a platform for
their art. John Lennon beating his wife and being kind of an asshole in general
and Alfred Hitchcock being incredibly abusive, especially to the actresses that
were in his films. It's also more difficult because both of their art
forms were made entirely collaboratively, so
there are a lot of people who work on a film set. There are actors, and there are
gaffers, and grippers, and directors – well Alfred Hitchcock was a director –
but there are camera operators, and assistants, and crew, and extras, and all of those
people work to make a film. Supporting the work that Alfred Hitchcock made is
also supporting all of the other artists who were collaborators on it. It's not
about, like, dragging someone because they can't defend themselves, or
anything like that. It's that he did these really bad things and I think that
it's dangerous to disconnect those things from the work that they did
because it will just prove to further artists in the future that they will be
able to get away with stuff and still make their art. As long as, you know, they
die before they go to prison or something and then people can just, like,
ignore that and just focus on all the good art that they made, and how much
they they like that one song. Like some really good examples are Woody
Allen or Jared Leto. Or I mean Roman Polanski. People are still defending that
guy and that's like ... he fled the country and he's been in France for decades and
hid. And he's still making movies! And the big problem there is it just like if we
don't separate ... well if we do, if we are separating the art from the artists
(which I don't think is possible) but if we say that we are and we're doing this
it continues giving a platform to people who are doing horrible things. I would
rather, in a hypothetical world, have half as good of artwork in the world if all
of the people were fucking better. So thanks Kyle for getting me involved. I
hope that you found something out of this that works. Heyvall of Kyle's
viewers! It was cool chatting with you. Catch you around on the flip side.
KYLE: thanks William! There have definitely been critics of Barthes criticism, and I'm
sure there's some that are watching this video right now. I'm not here to say
that I am right, and that everyone else is wrong even though that is true. I
think it just comes down to how you view art. Should a work be judged on its own
merits or should the creators of that art also be judged. And for me I think
it's just more interesting to look at the work that's in front of me. Just know
that I always present my prettiest side to the audience. So judge accordingly. Of
course I'm much more interested in knowing what you think about this. Do you
think that the art and the artist should be separated? Let me know down in the
comments below! Thanks so much for watching. My name is Kyle. I upload videos
every Monday and Thursday. And if you want to be part of an exclusive club you
can also go and support me over on Patreon. I should learn French so I can
go and read that essay, But "essay" is Spanish. I don't know how language works...
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