Perhaps I am alone, but when I look at a beautiful work by Renoir, Rousseau or Friedrich, I find great difficulty in acknowledging ‘Banksy’ as an artist of equal stature.
Recently, issues of cultural identity have pervaded the news, with emphasis being placed on protecting a European way of life. Predictably, the left immediately mobilised to claim no such identity exists, or worse yet, that European cultural heritage is something to be ashamed of.
Clearly such people have not attended a decent production of Shakespeare in a while, or spent an evening at the Royal Opera House.
Watering down entertainment, education and development to meet with misguided attempts at diversity will not benefit anyone in the long term.
A contingent of lefty literati have such a perceived stranglehold on what does and does not constitute ‘good’ art, that people are afraid to offer different perspectives and, most importantly, call certain artistic contributions exactly what they are – shit.
It reminds me of an old TV show called ‘Faking It’. One particular episode saw a girl who played classical cello professionally, attempt to convince a panel of experts (in this case, uneducated former drug addicts in the guise of musicians) that she was a pro DJ, after just a month of practice. She successfully duped the experts. Now, let’s see that done the other way around…
I therefore venture that love of the high arts is not snobbery, but simply good taste. There is nothing exclusive about culture, just as listening to the Beatles is not the reserve of working class Liverpudlians, the problem is simply that instant gratification seems to be the order of the day for the great unwashed.
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