For the final session of the Contemporary Aesthetics course we looked at Jenefer Robinson's article about style and the implied personality of the artist (Reading 52 of the set book) in relation to the Gauguin exhibition at Tate Modern.
Robinson focuses on individual style. This is a way of doing things, that reveals the implied personality, character, mind, sensibility of the artist. Individual style contrasts with, for example the general style of Cubism, or the period style of the Baroque. Individual style is the evolving yet reasonably consistent implied character of the artist as evident in the oeuvre, and, presumably within individual works.
Like Nelson Goodman, she rejects the simple style/content dichotomy (or how/what) - the idea that individual style is simply the formal or technical aspect, and content, what is depicted or symbolised, something completely different. More plausibly, selection of subject matter can itself be a key component of style (with photography it almost always is).
On p.619 Robinson explains that her interest is in the implied rather than actual artist: it doesn't matter whether or not the real Tolstoy was compassionate or not: the key point is that the implied author of Anna Karenina is.
Individual style allows us to make sense of the work of an artist - the implied persona of that artist shapes our appreciation of the relationship between different works and reveals to us the aspects which seem to be deliberately chosen, the themes and obsessions, as well as the technical choices.
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