DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.68516#0021
INTRODUCTION
esting to find that Fry uses the word ‘morality’, a word which does not
often appear in his later writings on aesthetics. Throughout the whole
essay he is at pains to find some theory which can be used as a justifica-
tion for art, and yet leave art free from morality; and this preoccupation
with morality suggests to us the historical setting in which his theories
should be viewed. The later nineteenth century had seen a conflict
between two rival conceptions (they can hardly be called theories) of
beauty. One, supported by Ruskin, maintained the inviolable union
of art and morality, the other the belief that art must be freed from
moral chains. The latter had, as can be imagined, less respectable
champions, and less popular success, but through the unsystematic
melodious pages of Pater’s Renaissance, it had appealed to the intelligent
young; and it had the advantage of being obviously closer than its
rival to the facts of experience. Whistler’s Ten O'clock Lecture by attack-
ing, and Tolstoy’s What is Art by defending had shown, in very different
ways, that the moralistic theory of art could be made to look ridiculous.
In a sense, therefore, Fry was only giving systematic statement to ideas
which had long been current in the parrot cry of ‘art for art’s sake’.
But his deliberate candour and his constant appeal to experience are so
different from the paradoxical and poetical treatment of his prede-
cessors, that the general impression of his essay is one of great origin-
ality; and, gradually, as he explored his position, he found it to contain
implications which had not hitherto been developed.
The most important of these is the idea of the pure artist and the
pure aesthetic sensation, terms which at one time appeared very fre-
quently in his writings, and are still to be found in the following
lectures. They are, perhaps, his most debateable contribution to criti-
cism. Purity is a dangerous word to apply to such a complex and vital
matter as art unless it is used simply as an instrument of analysis, and
although Fry was conscious of this danger I do not think he always
avoided it. He sometimes gave the impression, to a casual reader at
least, that a work of art could be perfectly pure, by which he meant that
it could appeal solely and directly to a special kind of perception, as
FLL
< XV >
b
esting to find that Fry uses the word ‘morality’, a word which does not
often appear in his later writings on aesthetics. Throughout the whole
essay he is at pains to find some theory which can be used as a justifica-
tion for art, and yet leave art free from morality; and this preoccupation
with morality suggests to us the historical setting in which his theories
should be viewed. The later nineteenth century had seen a conflict
between two rival conceptions (they can hardly be called theories) of
beauty. One, supported by Ruskin, maintained the inviolable union
of art and morality, the other the belief that art must be freed from
moral chains. The latter had, as can be imagined, less respectable
champions, and less popular success, but through the unsystematic
melodious pages of Pater’s Renaissance, it had appealed to the intelligent
young; and it had the advantage of being obviously closer than its
rival to the facts of experience. Whistler’s Ten O'clock Lecture by attack-
ing, and Tolstoy’s What is Art by defending had shown, in very different
ways, that the moralistic theory of art could be made to look ridiculous.
In a sense, therefore, Fry was only giving systematic statement to ideas
which had long been current in the parrot cry of ‘art for art’s sake’.
But his deliberate candour and his constant appeal to experience are so
different from the paradoxical and poetical treatment of his prede-
cessors, that the general impression of his essay is one of great origin-
ality; and, gradually, as he explored his position, he found it to contain
implications which had not hitherto been developed.
The most important of these is the idea of the pure artist and the
pure aesthetic sensation, terms which at one time appeared very fre-
quently in his writings, and are still to be found in the following
lectures. They are, perhaps, his most debateable contribution to criti-
cism. Purity is a dangerous word to apply to such a complex and vital
matter as art unless it is used simply as an instrument of analysis, and
although Fry was conscious of this danger I do not think he always
avoided it. He sometimes gave the impression, to a casual reader at
least, that a work of art could be perfectly pure, by which he meant that
it could appeal solely and directly to a special kind of perception, as
FLL
< XV >
b