Monday 26 January 2009

Gesamtkunstwerk

'In his book The Plurality of Reality published in 1921 Polish logician and painter Leon Chwistek suggested that there are four kinds of mutually independent (and thus presumably non-interfering) realities; of things, as they are perceived by common sense; of physical science; of impressions; and of the imagination. Artistically these are expressed respectively by primitivist, naturalist, impressionist and futurist painting.' [Lesek Kołakowski, Metaphysical Horror (1988: Penguin 2001) 111]

I don't buy the painting angle. But something about this quotation speaks to me; I think because my instinct is to put all four together, and to imagine what sort of Gesamtkunstwerk would result. The answer, it occurs to me, is: science fiction, and that alone.

2 comments:

Mahendra Singh said...

And perhaps also the cinema, at least a Platonic Ideal of the Cinema as it could have been?

Adam Roberts Project said...

You're right; I should be more specific. Science fiction cinema; as it might be, La Jétee, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Solaris, Stalker, The Matrix, the lovely Solaris remake.