Art
There was an art movement called decadent art in the 1880s which had elements considered by critics as degenerate.
Max Nordau's book Entartung (1892) was rendered in English as Degeneration. Nordau blamed modern social phenomena for creating pathological conditions under which unacceptable art was produced. The artists who produced such art were diagnosed as "degenerate," which was a medical term referring to certain mental states caused by social forces.
The Nazis also used the concept of degeneration in art, banning "degenerate" (entartete) art and music: see degenerate art.
Read more about this topic: Degeneration
Famous quotes containing the word art:
“... in the fierce competition of modern society the only class left in the country possessing leisure is that of women supported in easy circumstances by husband or father, and it is to this class we must look for the maintenance of cultivated and refined tastes, for that value and pursuit of knowledge and of art for their own sakes which can alone save society from degenerating into a huge machine for making money, and gratifying the love of sensual luxury.”
—Mrs. H. O. Ward (1824–1899)
“Andy passes through things, but so do we. He sat down and had a talk with me. “You gotta decide what you want to do. Do you want to keep just playing museums from now on and the art festivals? Or do you want to start moving into other areas? Lou, don’t you think you should think about it?” So I thought about it, and I fired him.”
—Lou Reed (b. 1944)
“Among the laws controlling human societies there is one more precise and clearer, it seems to me, than all the others. If men are to remain civilized or to become civilized, the art of association must develop and improve among them at the same speed as equality of conditions spreads.”
—Alexis de Tocqueville (1805–1859)