On Standards of Beauty
Every movement has an “agenda.” Foucaultian criticism, which took over the Humanities Departments in our colleges and universities, sees only power agendas behind the great works of art. Yet the Foucaultians have their own agenda which is seen in how they interpret art works usually in more or less Marxist political directions, and often only for personal, professional advancement.
The traditional standards of beauty, handed down in the West for centuries, show principles of beauty that do not merely affirm the agendas of the Christian West, but affirm the agendas of the Classical world as well as other Traditional civilizations. To eject from our culture the traditional standards of beauty with their long human history in favor of a Marxist reductionist agenda makes no sense, unless one is virtually some sort of criminal.
We almost instinctively know the standards and principles of beauty found in what is generally lovely, handsome, pretty, fair, and which is more deeply described as balance, clarity, moderation, simplicity, restraint, proportion, and ultimately in affirming the sacred and the Divine. These principles of beauty must and will be recaptured, since they reflect the cosmos itself.
(Here is a good essay on art, “Beauty as an Essential Characteristic of Civilized Culture” by Kevin Cope)
Every movement has an “agenda.” Foucaultian criticism, which took over the Humanities Departments in our colleges and universities, sees only power agendas behind the great works of art. Yet the Foucaultians have their own agenda which is seen in how they interpret art works usually in more or less Marxist political directions, and often only for personal, professional advancement.
The traditional standards of beauty, handed down in the West for centuries, show principles of beauty that do not merely affirm the agendas of the Christian West, but affirm the agendas of the Classical world as well as other Traditional civilizations. To eject from our culture the traditional standards of beauty with their long human history in favor of a Marxist reductionist agenda makes no sense, unless one is virtually some sort of criminal.
We almost instinctively know the standards and principles of beauty found in what is generally lovely, handsome, pretty, fair, and which is more deeply described as balance, clarity, moderation, simplicity, restraint, proportion, and ultimately in affirming the sacred and the Divine. These principles of beauty must and will be recaptured, since they reflect the cosmos itself.
(Here is a good essay on art, “Beauty as an Essential Characteristic of Civilized Culture” by Kevin Cope)
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