"The
unexamined life is not worth living." -Socrates
We are
forging through events that closely resemble those that followed the printing
press, but have we placed a mirror somewhere between Gutenberg’s great
invention and advent of the internet? Are we funneling ourselves back into a
modern, self-inflicted futile system? Or is the information explosion something
that we will adapt to as we did when the printing press "made the
renaissance permanent" as Rachel argued?
Kekoa
masterfully told the story of Leonardo da Vinci's painting of the Last Supper,
and I think it lends light to the responsibility we have moving forward,
in our own modern information era.
As da
Vinci began the painting, he found a model that would represent Christ, and
placed him as the focal point of the piece. Slowly he continued, finding models
to use as the apostles, working his was outward until he finally had to paint
Judas. He searched for a model to stand in as Judas, but nowhere could find a
face racked enough by sin to represent the disciple that betrayed Christ.
Eventually he found a man facing the capitol punishment, his face disfigured by
scars and mannerisms dejected enough to stand in. As Leonardo da Vinci
approached the man he was greeted. “Do you remember me?” he asked. The startled
artist insisted they had never met before, at which point the man reminded him
that they had met about a year before, when he had been the model for Christ.
Throughout
the Renaissance, classic works and public attitudes reflected on and challenged
the worth of the individual. Pawns in the futile system were exposed to
possibilities beyond social stagnation, as they tried new spices, felt
silk, or admired decorative vases. They heeded the voice of Petrarch that told
them to use the past to help them into the future.
We began
the digital age with an existing sense of individual responsibility. We have
watched our ploughboys become priests, need not even travel if we want to
experience other parts of the world, and rarely doubt big dreams that originate
in small towns (especially when they are delivered charismatically). We can
learn from the examples of these great philosophers and painters and inventors,
and rather than let time or trial scar our faces and sensibilities, create what
has never been done before.
The idea
that every individual is dignified became the manifesto of the Renaissance, one
we shouldn’t forget.
Towards the beginning you ask whether our information explosion will push us forward or hurt us. I think that this is where the importance of the individual steps in. Each of us really determines our own destiny. I just hope we can create a culture of improvement around us (one expected of the courtiers of the Renaissace) that will spawn that kind of growth.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you, it is a lot of responsibility, but as we learned today in class the most important thing is that we make the good ideas more accessible and popular than the inevitable bad ideas!
DeleteI thought that what you shared in our group about this mirror was very thought provoking. I even wrote about it in my post for this assignment. I feel like the renaissance opened up the idea of possibility. People could do anything and could invent anything and could be anything. The idea of the Coutier started this idea of the best way to be. I think of how much spretzzatura ties in with the Coutier and how much it ties in with modern media. Instead of enjoying humanity and individuality, our media tells us that being one way is okay and everything else is weird, lame, etc. I wonder if there is a moment in time where that mirror was actually placed or what could have been the cause of this use of modern media and spretzzatura.
ReplyDeleteI think it is simply one of the natural responses to the accessibility of information. We now are exposed to everyone and everything (generally) and we (thus far) have chosen to impose the idea of an ideal. Like Professor Burton mentioned today though, much of the information disseminated by flyers that were printed was a rehash of old, horrible ideas. Maybe this is our internet period of spreading terrible ideas and we just need to make the good information more readily available/ published in the future.
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