Adorno quote

June 14, 2005 12:38 PM

I'm looking for a quote from T W Adorno, which I think comes from Aesthetics. It goes something along the lines of "the value of a piece of art is inversely proportional to its function."

I've Googled but can't find it. I'm looking for the full quote and citation if possible.

posted by johnny novak to Religion & Philosophy (6 answers total)

Well, I find Adorno saying of a particular piece of art, a recording of Beethoven's Missa Solemnis by Herbert von Karajan:

"Its reputation stands in inverse proportion to its comprehensibility."

...which has a very similar idea at its heart. Maybe this is what you were hoping for? This is cited here, about 1/4 of the way down, as being on page 553 of:

Adorno, T.W. (1968): Orpheus in der Unterwelt. In: Adorno, T.W. (1984): Musikalische Schriften VI (=Gesammelte Schriften, 19). Frankfurt/M.
posted by CaptApollo at 1:24 PM on June 14, 2005

"Whereas in the real world all particulars are fungible, art
protests against fungibility by holding up images of what reality itself
might look like if it were emancipated from the patterns of
identification imposed on it. By the same token, art--the image of the
unexchangable--verges on ideology because it makes us believe there are
things in the world that are not for exchange. On behalf of the
unexchangable, art must awaken a critical consciousness toward the world
of exchangable things."
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 2:10 PM on June 14, 2005

--from Aesthetic Theory, 1970.
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 2:26 PM on June 14, 2005

pp 122-123
posted by mokujin at 7:02 PM on June 14, 2005

...beside the squiggly pencil line down the margin and n.b. in loopy script...
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 6:56 PM on June 15, 2005

Response by poster: thanks all
posted by johnny novak at 1:03 AM on June 16, 2005