Art and the Artist- Srianee Dias

Art and the Artist

By Srianee “Bunter” Dias (nee Fernando)

- "Should we not separate the creative work from the personal lives of the creators and appreciate the works for their artistic value”- 

While reading The New Yorker magazine online recently, I came across this article entitled “The Second Death of Pablo Neruda.”  It sparked my interest because Kumar G. and others had written about him previously on our Blog. Neruda was a Chilean poet who led a colourful life, and was a supporter of the socialist President Salvador Allende, who was overthrown by Augusto Pinochet in a coup in 1973. For generations, Neruda’s prestige in literature was unquestioned, but now it appears that his life, his work, and even his death are under scrutiny. 

He first published his poetry using the pen name “Pablo Neruda” when he was just 19 years old, and kept on writing poetry throughout his career in the foreign service.  One of his appointments was in Colombo.  Later he was elected to the Senate in Chile, and officially joined the Communist Party. He won the Stalin Peace Prize in 1953 and the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1971.  He was revered and celebrated in Chile long after his death in 1973.  His homes in Santiago, Valparaiso and Isla Negra are now museums visited by thousands of visitors. 

Things began to change in 2011 with a strong feminist movement demanding accountability for Chile’s institutional violence against women.  There were street demonstrations demanding non-sexist education in schools and protests against sexual harassment of women.  Details of Neruda’s life began to be viewed in a different light; his womanising and his treatment of his daughter, who was born with hydrocephalus.  There was also his own confession of the rape of a maid in Colombo when he was in his late twenties.  Neruda wrote about this incident in his book “Memoirs.” (The original Spanish title of this book translates as “I Confess That I Have Lived.”)   There is a movement in Chile now to recognize Gabriela Mistral as Chile’s foremost poet instead of Neruda. 

These days, when Neruda’s work is taught in universities, the students frequently challenge the professors.  Isabel Allende said it best: “Like many young feminists in Chile, I am disgusted by some aspects of Neruda’s life and personality.  However, we cannot dismiss his writing.” 

After reading this article, I began to think, is it fair to denigrate, blacklist, and banish the creations of talented artists/writers/poets/actors when serious personal misdeeds are revealed?  Should we not separate the creative work from the creators' personal lives and appreciate the works for their artistic value. In the distant past we were far more forgiving.  Of course, there were no social media then to generate frenzied emotional rhetoric. 

An artist whose paintings I have long admired is Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio known simply as Caravaggio.  He was a violent man who killed a man when he was a teenager and was forced to flee his village.  Throughout his life (1571-1610) he was involved in drunken brawls and possibly even more killings.  He subsequently died in Naples after being injured in a fight which led to wound infection. His paintings are magnificent, featuring struggles, torture, death, and biblical themes.  He was known for his dramatic use of light – chiaroscuro- (the treatment of light and shade in drawing and painting)  and tenebrism (painting using especially pronounced chiaroscuro, where there are violent contrasts of light and dark).  He was also known for painting directly from life on the canvas without first drawing the subject, which required exceptional talent.  Despite his violent and murderous ways, his paintings have not been condemned to the basement of museums.

Paul Gauguin ( 1848-1903), whose vibrant paintings have delighted many of us, left his middle-class life as a stockbroker, a life including a wife and five children, and moved to French Polynesia.  There he “married” several young women who were about 14 years old. Gauguin’s paintings continue to be exhibited proudly in many museums in spite of his questionable lifestyle. 

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) was another genius who famously treated the women in his life miserably.  He created about 20,000 paintings, prints, drawings, sculptures and ceramics. His style evolved from realism to abstraction, cubism, surrealism and expressionism.  He is held in great esteem in spite of his many character flaws. 

One of the most shocking revelations in recent years was when the actor/comedian Bill Cosby was accused by several women of sexual assault.  My daughters and I had been fans of his many TV productions, which included some children’s shows where he played loveable, funny characters.  Most recently, he played the affable Dr Cliff Huxtable on The Cosby Show, a doctor and a dad handling the usual family crises with great humour.  Reruns of the show were being aired when Bill Cosby’s trial began, and many TV networks decided to stop airing the reruns.  They punished not just him but all his young co-stars as well.  Bill Cosby got his judgment in court, and I thought the actions of the networks were quite unnecessary and not justified. 

A work of art, literature, poetry, stage play, film, or television series should be appreciated and judged on its own merits.  It is distressing when we discover that the people involved in creating such works have major flaws ranging from racist views to sexual abuse and even murder.  As difficult as it may be, I try to separate the creation from the creator whenever possible and appreciate the work on its own merit.

My guess is that not everyone will agree with this viewpoint.

(graphics inserted to original post  by Mahendra)